“Yeah. So she was like: oh yeah, I love when a guy’s got big balls…”
----------
Where does he find them? That’s the only thing I ever really want to know.
He’ll go on about his dick. His dick in this pig’s hole. His dick going in and out of whatshisname’s girl’s mouth, etc.
I don’t care about any of this shit. I just want to know where he finds them. That’s all. These broads. But I never ask. I never ask or say anything while he’s soliloquizing about his abhorred infidelities. And it bothers me that I don’t. I just hit him with the placating “really?’s” and the “oh shit!’s”. That’s all he needs while he drives like Mr. Magoo and tells me beer pig stories.
The ten-years-ago me, woulda smacked him in the back of the head during one of these tales. I woulda told him that his dick stinks and it’s gonna kill his wife. But I don’t.
It’s probably because my face is fucked up. I can’t talk for any prolonged period of time because it’ll get noticed. My words’ll come out all half-assed and garbled ‘cause I want the staring to cease. I got Thomas’ English Muffin cheeks. Nook and cranny scars from zits. All over my face. I’ve seen people who got it worse than me; but it’s rare.
I used to get nasty zits back in high school playing games that required helmets. The ten-years-ago me. Every tackle would rupture a new zit or zit cluster. My face and chest would be caked with dried blood after a game when I had a good amount of contact behind the plate. This is what led to the moon pocks that I lament today. I would’ve quit the team and taken zany yearbook pictures of all the “most likely to’s”; if I had a crystal ball illuminated with images of my marred, future face.
I notice that when people talk to me, they rub their faces. They probe their always-perfect epidermis with curious fingers to feel if they have what I have. It’s almost as if they’re in a horrible dream where every mirror they look into reflects Edward James Almos. They need their flesh-enrobed phalanges to reassure them that their face remains a still saucer of butter cream. I could complain a hungry dog off a chuck wagon if I wanted to about my facial plight. Truth be told, I could have something worse. Cleft palate would be bad. But still, the dermatological problem sponges up that last little puddle of self-esteem on my confidence kitchen countertop.
----------
“When I saw you up McDonald’s, all sweaty and dirty, that made me so…”
I tuned him out like I literally used to do Jack Tripper right before he made a misunderstanding ass out of himself at the Regal Beagle.
“…She wanted the wang, dude.”
…“Oh shit, really?”
While he unabashedly crafted the golden god-chicks dig me-I fuck it all- self-portrait, I drifted.
With the window down, I could breathe in the spring. Feel the air that reminded me of cutting school with a new pair of sneakers on. Air that was full with the promise of finding someone with the same pet peeves as me: someone who reviles nose-breathers and is also just as concerned about newlyweds who choose Disney World as their honeymoon spot as I am.
His mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear anything he was saying. The whites of his eyes were creeping me out. I homed in on them. I studied the capillaries. The moisture content. The eyelashes index-finger-summoning me. Pointing. Telling me, this is where the truth is. This is where you’ll find the poisonous dog. The whites told me that he does bumps off of toilet-tank tops in the bathroom at DP’s with that guy who looks like Koy Detmer. The whites told me that he’s still banging Chris’ wife. Fat Eric’s fat wife probably got done right here in this very seat I’m sitting in. They said he kicks dogs because his convict father does too. They said he’s the worst kind. There’s no salvation for him. End this ridiculous friendship. He’ll never be the funny kid you grew up with ever again. Your embracing of the Jimminy Cricket role in this cock-sucker’s life is commendable, but ineffectual.
----------
I thought about the new ballpark. We were almost there. At least he loves the Fightin’s. I was impatient. I couldn’t wait for the underwhelmingly less famous pinstripes to take the field. We’d park and get out. His beer pig stories, my hammered complexion and his whites would stay right here in this fucking car. Where they belong.
