The Provocative Games

Note: Chapter One does not have any sexual situations. It's there for plot building. Yes, there's a story in this one.

*

I had awoken in some strange predicaments before — the Vegas incident being the first to come to mind. Hotel security had found me reeking of booze, asleep in a wheel chair wearing only a stripper's bra atop my head and a diaper to hide my shame. Vegas wasn't one of my finer moments.

But this...this was definitely my Sistine Chapel of fucked up awakenings.

When I opened my eyes this morning, I noticed two things very wrong.

First, I was naked.

Second, I had a raging hard on, which is fairly typical of any other morning, but to have one while lying on my back on asphalt and inside the centre of a satanic ritual circle; that was just bizarre.

How did I get here? And how long had I been lying ass-naked on the ground with my dick pointed to the sky like a homing beacon?

I stood up and dusted the stones and grit off my bare skin, staring at the archaic circle drawn around me in thick, red blood that still looked fresh. The numbers and symbols outlying the circumference were crude looking and their meanings were anyone's guess.

"Holy shit," I thought aloud (a bad habit of mine), "I'm being sacrificed."

I scanned the area, seeing if there were signs of any other breathing soul. I was at the centre of a town square in what to be a quant looking main street, surrounded by white picket fences, efflorescent gardens, and quaint little red-bricked shops.

Overhead, I heard birds chirping and with the sun's rays beating down and the gentle gust of spring air breathing against my bare skin, it could have been picturesque. But it wasn't.

The entire thing was some spooky shit, reminiscent of the Stepford Wives of the Children of the Corn.

My first gut instinct was to call out for help, but I had seen enough horror movies to realize the potential gruesome outcomes if I did: zombies bursting through the windows and overwhelming me, ending in my face getting chewed off; or a masked serial killer stabbing me in the kidneys and then carving out my heart to cook in a stew; or a family of cannibal rednecks hunting me down in their big red jalopy, riddling my body with shot gun shells and roasting me over a spit afterwards for their moonshine parties. Call me neurotic, but there was no way in hell I was going to end up as someone's dinner.

Not today. Not any day.

So instead of calling out for some assistance, I covered my genitals with my hands and ran towards the closest building, which to my luck ended up being a thrift store. I peeked through the windows to see if there was anyone else inside.

Empty.

The entire place was a ghost town, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing for a paranoid and confused naked man running through the streets. At least my erection was gone.

I grabbed a nearby rock and hurled it at the window, smashing through the glass and creating an opening wide enough for me to fit through. I was careful navigating through the broken glass, doing my best to avoid broken pieces on the ground that threatened to carve open my bare feet.

The mens' section of the store had a limited selection, but luckily I found a couple of items that fit and didn't smell of body odour or old men: boxers, a pair of faded jeans, and a plaid short-sleeved collared shirt. I also discovered a set of old golf clubs that I thought was perfect for smashing in some cannibal cultist's teeth. Those sick satanic fuckers weren't going to get the best of me.

After scouring through every inch of the store and deciding that there was nothing else of use, I exited through the main door of the thrift shop and was surprised to see a gun pointed straight at my head, by a girl that I was convinced was an angel.

She was a tall and alluring blonde (I always had a thing for blondes) sporting a sizzling red dress that clung tightly to her sumptuous body. Her long golden hair drifted past her shoulders and down to her full breasts, her cleavage full on display. She had a serious face that made her look all the more sexy. However I didn't doubt for one second that she would pull the trigger if I gave her a reason too.

I was mesmerized by her soft red lips and sparkling green eyes that crackled with intensity.

"Going golfing?" she asked.

I dropped the golf bag down to the ground, my hands instinctively reaching for the smooth metallic surface of the club's head.

"Planned on using these for self-defence," I sighed. "You know, in case anyone crazy wanted to attack me."

"Oh yeah? How's that working for you so far?" she asked.

"Like shit."

"Looks that way," she said. "So you know what comes next, don't you?"

"A dinner and a movie?"

"Nice try tiger. Take your hands off the iron and put them over your head."

"You wouldn't shoot me would you?" I asked.

"You on any medication?" she asked.

"No."

"Well I am," she replied. "And I haven't taken it over the past twenty-four hours. In another twenty-four, I'll probably be bat-shit crazy, doing the Macarena while painting the walls with my urine. What happens between now and then is anyone's guess."

I let go of the clubs and sighed. Just my luck. The only other breathing soul in this god-forsaken place was a ravishing blonde beauty, and already she had the urge to shoot me in the face. I seem to have that kind of effect on women.

#

The only time I felt confident in talking to women was when I was talking to them online, behind the safety of a computer screen.

I'm not going to lie, I've been described before as a loser, nerd, useless, weak, feeble, dorky, and the list goes on and on and on. Hurts the most when half those adjectives are coming from my dad, whom I haven't spoke to in the past ten years. We have a mutual hatred for each other, probably because he can't forgive me for killing my mother while entering into this world, and I can't forgive him for being such a dick.

Before I was born, my father had it all. He was a rich and powerful venture capitalist with the looks and charms of a fairy tale prince and by his side was his beautiful and loving wife who was the apple to his eye. When I burst through my mom's core like an ugly worm and killed her, my dad had cast me aside, concluding that his only family had died with my mom. I ended up being raised by nursemaids and nannies, and when he wasn't hurling insults at me, my father spent as much time as he could far away from me.

From all the pictures I saw, my mother was a beautiful woman. I had her hazel brown eyes and soft, midnight black hair. Often, I apologize to her in secret prayers when I can, but I figured that wherever she was, she wasn't listening seeing as how she probably disliked me, like most other women.

Anyway, after many failed attempts at meeting women face-to-face at work, bars, clubs, parties, social gatherings, supermarkets, libraries, bus stops, doctor's offices; I finally decided to take my pathetic attempts at a love life to the internet, and much to my surprise, discovered that I was quite the online Romeo.

It seemed like my nerdy wit and amazing photoshop skills were the essential tools I needed to draw women to me like chimps to a banana. My profile pictures looked like artistic masterpieces with me displaying my best smile and my airbrushed face plastered against the backdrop of the sun. Not to brag, but I looked good. Cute even.

I also found a rhythm when it came to emails, texts, and instant messenger. My handle was "NerdyBoy4<3" as I entered into the harsh arena of online dating and crushed it like a steroid injected barbarian warlord.

My dating profile looked something like this:

***

About: 27 year old caucasian with hipster hair and normal body type. City: Vancouver, Canada Education: University degree in Engineering Profession: Electrical Engineer Intent: Looking for a life long partner Personality: Fun loving, carefree nerd.

Interests: Everything that you like. Bonus points if that includes musical instruments, literature (Hemmingway is still the greatest author who ever lived), revolutionary artistic movements, making people smile, and philosophical discussions on zombies and their cultural effects on society.

About me: I'm currently in the process of completing my time travel machine so that I can turn back time, punch Hitler in the testicles, and take over the world, thus creating a perfect utopia where nerds can rule the world free from judgement and that god awful group Nickleside. However there is one key component missing for the completion of my time travel device, and that is love. Will you be the queen at my side when this is all said and done? I'd really like you to =)

First date: I can't think of a better thing to do for a first date than play a board game, so that's what we'll do. We'll do it over a bottle of wine and laugh at how terrible I am at strategy games, while listening to trippy atmospheric electro pop music and when the nights over, I'll shake your hand and maybe give you a polite hug and text you exactly one hour and twenty-minutes later asking if you got home safe and telling you what a lovely time I had.

***

Women loved my profile and enjoyed talking to me through pixelated words on a screen. However it all fell apart when I met them in person.

My online profile pictures were almost too-good and I could see the letdown on their faces when my face failed to meet their unrealistic expectations of me. I hid all my flaws in my photos, not to say that I that they were detrimental to my appearance. But my face wasn't perfect either, which was what they had come to expect.

Another strike against me was that I had this uncontrollable habit of thinking aloud, which was extremely difficult for me in face-to-face conversations. At least when I was talking to someone over internet, text, or messenger, there was a "delete" button; a second chance to delete all the words and sentences that came out strange and awkward.

I recalled one time while playing Monopoly with a gorgeous brunette, she had landed on my Park Place and went bankrupt. I had thought to myself, It's a shame she's only losing Monopoly money and not the clothes off her back. Problem was, I didn't just think it. I said it as well.

That date, along with many others, ended abruptly, leaving me alone in my two-bedroom condo with a half drunk bottle of wine and Monopoly pieces scattered all over my coffee table. The least they could do was help me clean up.

A summary of my twenty-seven years of life thus far: my dad saw me as a curse upon the world, making me feel like shit for the first sixteen years of my existence (thank God for my nerd friends and my teachers that kept me away from the dark side), I moved out the first chance I got, ended up going to university on scholarships, ended up with a high paying job, I own a luxurious condo, but despite being successful and average looking, I'm completely hopeless with women, unless they turn out to be cyborgs. Oh, and I seem to piss them off with my thoughts.

So to have a gorgeous blonde threaten me with a gun's rather unnerving. I can't help but worry that at some point, I'm going to say something incredibly dumb which will result in this ravishing beauty shooting me in my imperfect face.