I knew when I bought the house in West Virginia that I was throwing in the towel. I was thoroughly tired of the cosmopolitan millennium with it's Sex and the City flaxen haired expensively attired social climbers and the accompanying pretty boy voids that invaded every aspect of life in DC. I was bored with the swank upscale clubs and their tired jazz combos and bored with the dive bars and their androgynous bike messenger slackers all trying to out-tattoo and out pierce each other. I was sick of slick men in tailored suits and casual Friday play clothes wining and dining me and them attempting book-acquired moves on my clit that never failed to irritate rather then stimulate me. I hadn't orgasmed without the help of myself, my books and my fantasies in so long I was beginning to think there was no hope for a true smooth effortless orgasm ever again.
So I bought this house, on a whim, in a small mountain town, in search of the simple life. My town is tiny; one bar, one restaurant that closes at nine on the nights it bothers to open at all, the post office, town liquor store and police station all reside in the same tiny brick building as the town hall. We don't even have street addresses, that's how small it is.
Obviously, when I moved in, the prissy city chick with my Saab, my dog with papers, my snakeskin knee high boots and my low riding hip huggers, the town tuned in. There hadn't been fresh blood in these parts in some time and mine was running hot and thick. Cars slowed down as the moving men carted my belongings into my new home, neighbors gathered on their porches giving tentative waves and trying not to stare at my furniture. I had to wait all of three hours, when as I sat on the porch with an iced tea, my first visitor dropped by.
He drove up in his pumped up Chevy truck, Harley stickers and confederate flags adorning the spaces not occupied by Nascar decals on the windows. His mangy mutt of a dog rode in the back, no doubt cultivating his flea and tick collection. Bucky Waters threw open the door of his truck and slung his shit-kicker boot into the mud of my driveway, spitting a wad of thick tobacco juice from the left side of his mouth with the movement. His mullet was something to behold, second only to his dirt caked fatigue jacket with pockets that held his stash of tobacco, extra bullets, Bubbalicious gum and plastic comb. I could smell him before he reached me, a stench of sweat, dust, tobacco, old beer and dog. I tentatively shook his thick, rough right hand, wondering when he had last washed it.
I am no stranger to men. I've sampled from the buffet of those that life has to offer; golden surfer boys, dumb jocks, mysterious foreign men, bad boy bikers, stoic Waspy men, stammering preps. But Bucky Waters stopped me in my tracks. I didn't understand him. I didn't know how to play him. It became painfully obvious in the first few seconds of interaction that I wasn't going to win him over with my intelligence, my wit, my worldliness or my independence. Communicating with Bucky was a one-way street of Bucky-isms all done at fourth grade reading level. He looked at me like I was a bug. When he asked me if I wanted to go to the Mudfort Bar, he was in his truck before I answered, starting the engine. On the way there I noticed his rotten stubs of teeth and caught a good whiff of his fetid breath.
The Mudfort was a dive in the finest sense, mismatched chairs, broken pool cues, flat beer, dirty glasses. I had more teeth then anyone in the place, including Bucky. All the men there looked like derivations of Bucky; gap toothed, flannel clad, tobacco spitting, sun burnt hillbillies. The women came in two varieties, bone thin or fat. The thin ones weren't Kate Moss thin, rather the crystal meth thin that goes with too many cigarettes, too much bleach and not enough sun block. The fat ones were poured into their cheap poly/cotton bippy shirts and flaunting their beer bellies like they were the latest fashion trend. I wondered how long I would last until someone beat the shit out of me.
