Chemistry Pt 10

Author's note: this is the tenth and final installment in a ten-part series.

~

I make it out to the athletic fields without being apprehended. I enter the field house and hobble to my locker. The numbers of my combination lock swirl in my vision and I can't immediately recall the code required to undo the lock. There are voices from the other side of the locker room and as I fiddle with the lock, I hear locker doors slam and the voices fade away. In the quiet, the combination comes to me.

Just as I expect, there is a set of clean clothes in the locker. I pull out a fresh-smelling T-shirt and hold it to my face. I smell laundry soap and only the faintest, sterilized remnant of previous exertion. There are underwear, socks, a pair of gray shorts, and my cleats. The clean, folded clothes feel like a gift from my former self -- an organized and high-functioning version of myself that I seem to have lost, completely.

My body is filthy. I desperately want to get clean. There is nobody around. I strip off my clothes, throw them in a bloody pile in my locker and slam the door. I leave my clean clothes in a neat pile on the bench and head for the shower room, hoping that nobody will see me, see my blood-streaked body.

The shower room in the field house is huge and empty. I walk to a far corner and turn the knob for hot water. An entire bank of shower heads along the back wall comes on. It takes maybe a minute for the water to heat up. Steam starts to fill the room. I adjust the temperature to the hottest that I can possibly stand before I step into the spray.

The crust of sweat and blood covering me begins to liquefy and run off my legs, tracking in a pinkish river to the drain in the center of the room. As the water contacts my wounds, it triggers waves of pain, but then the waves pass, leaving a sense of warm relief that spreads through my body. I stand in the stream of water and let it melt away my thoughts.

***

The bouncer looks at me, then back at my ID, which in his hand. I'm drunk, and enough THC is swirling through me such that all my senses seem like a remote feed, data from an probe millions of miles away, delayed and offset from my body in space and time.

My... friend... puts his hand on my lower back. The bouncer looks back and forth between the two of us, and looks me up and down again before handing my ID back to me. He winks at the guy I'm standing with, and nods us into the club. The guy -- the blond -- grabs my hand and pulls me inside, into a hot, pulsing hallway. There are lights flashing along the ceiling, red, green, yellow... and then we pass through a narrow space that is illuminated only with a black light. I see brilliant fluorescent stains splattered across the back of his T-shirt. My friend's shirt.

I laugh to myself.

My friend?

~

It's the middle of July and it is hot. I'm a little more than half-way through my summer internship at the pharmaceutical company.The apartment I'm subletting supposedly has air conditioning, but something is wrong with it. It seems to come on randomly but mostly it stays off. There is another renter supposedly living here over the summer, a guy I met when I moved in, but I've only ever seen him a few times. When I asked him about the A/C, he told me he'd call the landlord, and then he disappeared. It's been two weeks since then and I haven't seen him since.

It's annoying, but it's livable, I guess. I'm only ever really in the apartment to sleep. Most days, including weekends, I work late into the evening at the lab, and then get dinner on the way back to the apartment. The route to and from work goes by a couple of decent and cheap restaurants. A burrito place that I like and an Italian food restaurant that also has a deli.

Tonight, Friday night, I stop at the deli and get my usual dinner -- a big provolone sub. Although I promised myself earlier that I wouldn't, I also ask for a twelve-pack of cold beer -- bottles. They don't card me here. The harried deli guy just puts the beer into a paper bag and swipes my credit card.

~

The blond leads me out of the hallway into a large, open, industrial-looking space. The place is packed with men. There is a throng of them in the center of the room, dancing in a large, circular space flooded with kaleidoscopic light from what seems like a hundred different sources in the ceiling. There is large disco ball twirling overhead.

There's something about these men. They're all... kinda big. Some of them have their shirts off and I see sweat and body hair on large bodies. I suppose they're not

all

big. Among them are some smaller and skinnier ones. Like the guy who's with me. The music is so loud that he has to lean into my ear and shout.

"I'm gonna get us a drink," he says.

His breath is hot and stale on my face. He leaves me standing by a railing and I see that I am on the higher of two tiered landings ringing the central dance floor. I lean onto the railing to steady myself. My forearms stick uncomfortably to the narrow wooden counter top that runs along it. I lift my arm up to find sticky, beer-smelling residue clinging to my arm hair.

I watch the men dance. Some of them look like my uncles -- my mom's brothers -- middle-aged dudes, fat and hairy. I imagine my uncles stripping off their shirts and dancing like teenagers to Christina Aguilera. What a spectacle.

Is this what --

My train of thought is interrupted when the blond comes back. He hands me a clear drink in a narrow glass.

"It's a double," he says, into my ear. His eyebrows jerk up and down.

~

The apartment is sweltering. I check the thermostat. It's set to 70 degrees, but it feels more like 90 degrees in here, hotter even than it is outside. I throw the beer into the fridge and unwrap my sandwich on the small counter separating the kitchen from the living room.

I strip off my shirt, which is soaked through with sweat from the walk. The only window in the apartment that opens is over the sink in the kitchen, and I crack it open the measly five inches that I can, hoping for some relief from the heat and fetid air.

Sitting on a stool at the counter, I chew my sandwich, slowly. It's nine PM. A wave of sadness and self-pity crashes over me.

What the fuck am I doing?

I am here in this strange city, a city I should be out exploring,

living

in. But instead I'm working myself ragged in a lab and rotting, alone, in this apartment.

It is an odd feeling, to see my career spreading out before me, ever more defined and tangible, ever more illustrious, potentially -- my team here at the company has been impressed with me, I can tell; they've hinted strongly that they would like to hire me back next summer for a well-paid associate position, something next to unheard of for someone at my stage -- but everything else, my personal life, whatever that means, feels rotted, wasted.

I chew my sandwich, jaw moving up and down, beads of sweat trickling down my torso.

It's time, Amir.

The thought comes into my head violently, as though pounded into me from outside my skull. Despite the heat, a cold weight descends on me. I look around.

Is someone else here?

There's nobody except me and my sandwich.

~

The blond is looking at me now with half-lidded eyes, a caricature of seduction plastered on his face. He moves in to kiss me. I feel his lips and his tongue on my mouth and I relax my jaw to let him push in. The oddness and remoteness I'm feeling about being here, in this club, is more immediate than the feeling of his sloppy wet kiss, and strangely, the fact that this is a guy, a

dude

, sticking his tongue in my mouth, doesn't seem to register with alarm at all. It's just... weird. I feel his hands on me, on my chest, and I put my hands on him, too. I can feel his ribs and shoulderblades through the material of his shirt. He feels light and angular, like a bird. A slobbery, moaning bird.

~

I lurch over to the refrigerator to get a bottle of beer. The cool, carbonated liquid helps to subdue the uneasy feeling I have after the odd, jagged thought comes crashing into my head. I down the entire bottle in a few long gulps, then open another to drink as I finish eating. I'm not really a beer person. I'm not really much of a drinker at all, honestly, at least compared with some of my buddies from school. This summer, though, I've gotten into the bad habit of drinking beer on the weekends. It's something to do in the evening, drink some beers and work on programming or watch DVDs. Beer is what I can get, from the deli, since the city's official liquor stores would surely card me. I've come to appreciate the nuanced differences between Schlitz, Coor's Light, and Rolling Rock.

You can't avoid me, Amir. It's time.

This time the thought comes with the sensation of a sharp pain in my temple, as though I've been struck by something right above my ear. I reel forward and knock the bottle of beer onto the kitchen floor.

"What the fuck?" I yell, grabbing my head.

There is a pounding in my temple as the thought echoes around in my mind. My heart begins to race. I stand up and grasp for the roll of paper towels on the counter, then kneel to wipe up the spilled beer. The bottle didn't break, thankfully, but there is beer everywhere. The movement of wiping it all up seems to help push the strange, foreign thought out of my head.

I get up and toss the sopping paper towels into the trash. I swig the remaining beer in the bottle, and then get another from the fridge. I drink it as fast as I can, then open another.

~

The blond is pulling me to the dance floor and into the crowd of big, burly guys moving their bodies in time with the thrumming bass. I feel the heat of their collective mass of bodies. As I move through them, their eyes range all over me. They are hungry, like animals. In their eyes, there is lust, but also something else. Something disturbing, some evidence of a mass coordination, as if they are all aware of me, who I am, where I come from, the fact that I don't belong here.

More than eyes. I feel hands, On my body -- not just the blond's hands, the hands of my friend, who is now swaying rhythmically in front of me, pressing himself into me -- but also others' hands. Large hands moving on back, belly, shoulders, and ass. It's not an unpleasant feeling. My body is moving, too, grinding against this small, blond man who keeps giving me that ridiculous seductive look.

I feel a hand at my crotch, squeezing me. My cock responds, thickening in response to the firm grip. I'm not sure whose hand it is. The blond leans his head onto my chest. There is light everywhere, men everywhere, a wall of men in every direction. I try to let myself go, to disappear into the music and the sensations of being among so many bodies. My body belongs here, clearly, but my mind is immiscible. I am wrong, an alien, trapped.

~

In my room, lying on my bed with the fan pointed at me, the numbness I'm seeking from the alcohol starts to manifest. I feel relief as the nothingness spreads through me, dampening thoughts and anxieties. My fear melts away, or rather, seems more and more silly as I lie here getting drunk. To be scared by a

thought

like that, what a joke. The sensation of the air blowing across my body feels wonderful.

I roll off the bed to use the bathroom, then grab another beer. What is this, four, five? I am better, now. Calmer. Drunker. Back in the bedroom, I take off my pants and sit down in the chair at the computer desk. I slide down in the chair, into a lazy slouch so that my head is resting on the back support. I pull out my cock and balls to flop over the elastic rim of my underwear. My cock starts to lift up into an erection and I swig my beer.

"Just you and me, bud," I say, watching my dick swell up.

I am going to turn on the computer and jerk off, but I feel too lazy to sit up. From this angle, I am almost level with the top drawer of the desk. I realize I haven't ever opened these drawers. This sublet was fully furnished when I moved in, and the guy who lives here left almost all of his stuff. I'm not a nosy person, usually, but my drunkenness has disengaged my inhibition and I reach out and slide the top drawer open.

~

I'm being pulled through another dark hallway, back into the bowels of this place, this club filled with men. It is hot and humid and it smells like spilled alcohol and urine, we must be by the bathrooms, the blond guy is leading me by the arm. I have to pee, but he pulls me past the bathrooms, past more big, beefy male bodies, more eyes on my body, until we are outside, in a narrow alley.

It's raining lightly, and the rain feels cool and fresh on my face and skin. I turn my head up to the sky and let the mist-like droplets of rain fall down on me. Then the blond is on me again, kissing me urgently, insistently, and his hands are all over me.

My body reciprocates in spite of the fact that my mind wishes he would stop. I feel my hands move over his slender frame, and down into his pants, to squeeze his ass.

"Yeah, fucker," he says and he pulls me further down the alley.

We walk around a corner, into another, darker alley, where there is a huge expanse of brick wall and only a solitary, dim light bulb hanging over a doorway far away. I feel his hands on my pants, pulling down the elastic of my basketball shorts and my underwear in one motion, and then he's kneeling between my legs. I brace my arm against the cool brick and feel his mouth envelop my cock.

~

There's a bunch of random shit in the drawer. Pens and pencils, rubber bands, paper clips, some loose change. I root around further back and pull out a large box of strike-anywhere matches. It's partway open, so I slide the inner container further out from the cover. Inside, I find a pipe and little baggie of what looks like marijuana. I pull the baggie out, fumble with the zip-lock seam until it pops open, and raise it to my nose. Yep, definitely weed.

I know immediately that I am going to smoke it. I can see the near-future version of myself, standing by the cracked kitchen window with the oven hood fan on, reaching back through time to grab my hand. It is so out of character for me to snoop and then smoke someone else's drugs that I almost gleefully get up to go do it. I drain the rest of my beer and pull my underwear up over my semi-hard cock.

I root around in the closet for my workout clothes -- basketball shorts and a tank top. I figure I should at least be partially clothed if my roommate unexpectedly comes home to find me smoking weed in the kitchen. I catch a glimpse of myself in the full length mirror on the closet door. My eyes look drunk. But my body looks...

hot?

I've been working out a lot this summer. I flex my arms and I'm surprised to see some nice definition amid my general hairy bulk.

"Beast," I whisper, winking at myself. Then I grab the weed and pipe from the desktop and head into the kitchen.

~

The blond is really going to town. He's slobbering and making all sorts of noise. I should be embarrassed, anxious that someone will walk by and catch us. But I'm so fundamentally detached from this moment, not to mention so drunk and high, that the anxiety has nowhere to sit. I'm just starting to feel turned on when he stops, suddenly. He stands up and tries to kiss me. At first, I move my mouth away from him, but he grabs my neck and I relent, feel his tongue in my mouth again. He's floundering with his own pants now, I hear the jangle of a belt buckle and a zipper being unzipped. He turns away from me, to face the brick wall, and pushes his ass out, backing it up against me.

"Fuck me," he says, in a harsh whisper, his head cocked over his shoulder to look me in the eye.

I look down and see his gleaming white ass sticking out at me, and my cock standing out from my body, shockingly erect, hovering over him. I put my hands on him, along the sides of his narrow butt cheeks, and he moans.

"Yeah, man. Do it. Fuck me!" he says, louder.

I try to line up my dick with where I think his asshole might be, but I can't tell. I can't see in enough detail in this light and my vision is distorted, hazy.

I pull him toward me and kick his legs further apart. I need him to bend over more so I can get a better bearing on his hole. I sway and stumble, almost lose my balance, falling forward onto him slightly. I feel my cock contact his crack, feel his smooth skin against mine.

"Come

on

dude, hurry up!" he says. There is irritation in his voice.

I grab my cock and steady myself with my other hand resting on his hip. I lean in and jam my cock into his ass crack. It slides off to the side, so I adjust my stance and aim again.

In a rush, the shame and horror of what I am doing comes crashing through whatever barrier has been in place and sucks me into the immediate moment. I occupy my body again. I feel the light patter of the rain on my neck and shoulders, and I can feel how absolutely wasted I am.

I step back from the guy and pack my cock back into my shorts.

"Hey, what the fuck?" he says, looking back at me.

No. No, this is not what I want.

~

I am not sure how much weed I smoke. All I know is that I am smoking, coughing in the kitchen, drinking more beer, and laughing at how ridiculous this whole situation is. This whole summer, my first year at college, Zahra, high school, my whole pathetic life. And then all of a sudden I am outside, walking in the night.

There are lots and lots of people out, lots of guys -- men -- walking around in this neighborhood. I hear music thumping out from bars and clubs as I walk along the brightly lighted streets. There is a general din of whoops and shouts, drunk people running around, groups of people standing in clusters outside of bars, smoking and laughing.

I don't have a destination in mind, I am just walking, I guess. The streets are numbered sequentially there's no way I can get lost. I will be able to find my way back to my apartment as long as I remember how to count. This strikes me as hilarious and I am chuckling to myself when I hear someone catcall me.

It's a group of maybe six or seven young-ish guys, early twenties maybe, walking along the opposite sidewalk. I hear a whistle and then someone shouts.

"Hey you, tank top!"

I look up. A thin, bearded guy is yelling at me.

"You can top my tank any day!"

He waggles his butt at me and his friends dissolve into raucous laughter before walking off. Amused, I keep walking. I am aware, now, of guys' eyes on me, looking at my body, checking me out. A non-inebriated Amir would never, ever,

ever

, leave the house wearing a tank top. He is too ashamed of how hairy he is, how hairy his back and shoulders are. But tonight, the attention I am drawing has an almost narcotic effect on me. It feels... dangerous. Titillating.

When the guy comes up to me, it is almost like I am expecting him. I

am

expecting him. Expecting

something

. This is why I got wasted, right? Why I smoked the stolen pot? Why I am out walking around in this neighborhood at night? My thoughts coalesce around a central question.

This is what you want, right? Amir? This is what you want?

"Hey man, are you, um... looking to have some fun tonight?" he asks.

He's older, maybe late 20s or early 30s. He's slender, blond, and a lot shorter than me. He smiles, and there's something immediately off-putting about him, a slickness that reminds me of a salesperson at a department store.

"What do you have in mind?" I hear myself reply.

He brightens -- he senses he is about to make a sale.

***

I'm sitting on the bench in front of my locker when Jamie arrives for soccer. I wasn't sure that he would come, and when he turns the corner, I feel my whole body tense up.