June 12, 2015

Mitch:

"Why don't you want to? Hmmm? Are you scared I'll bite it off?" she laughs as her fingers play with the drawstring on my swim trunks, clumsily trying to undo the knot without looking or thinking. She stinks like hard liquor and chlorine from our little pool party and her bikini top has given up trying to hold anything back. She obviously isn't worried about Jerome or the neighbors seeing anything in the late afternoon sun, or maybe that is what she wants. I know that of all times, now is not the best time for me to try to come out to her, and if she gets in my pants there is no way for me to pass it off. I pull her tipsy hands away from my crotch and lace our fingers together in the air, earning an annoyed huff from her. She never gives up that easily.

"I just don't want to do that right now. I would rather have you sing me a song." She giggles as I reach around her waist and pull her closer, carefully pulling her now see-through top down with my teeth. She isn't deterred, and she goes back to trying to grab me through my shorts.

"Well, I do want to do that right now. Why are you so touchy about it? Think you're not big enough for me?"

"Something like that." She smiles deviously and goes back to trying to undo the knot, finally managing to pull the correct string and slide the waistband loose. This isn't going to end well. "Mel, not right now. Can't we just go back to what we were doing?"

"That's boring, babe. I think it's about time we..." She latches her mouth back onto mine and sprawls out on top of me, pretending to be holding me down like she thought I wouldn't put up a fight. This isn't how I planned for this to go. This is going to end very, very badly. I try to gently move her off of me but she acts like this is a game. She perches on my stomach and reaches around behind her to slip her hand down my pants, and every move I make just makes her do it faster. I watch her face as her hand passes underneath my packer and she realizes that something isn't right: my dick shouldn't be above her hand. She frowns and goes lower, and her eyes fly open when her fingers gloss over my actual dick. I might have been able to lie and say I had a micropenis if she didn't start fishing around inside of me, trying to prove her suspicions. Her fake nails are fucking sharp. She pulls her hand away and immediately climbs off of me, backing away toward the pool like I might infect her. "Oh my god. Oh my god. You're a girl. Oh my god."

"Mel, I'm not a girl. I was going to tell you-"

"You're a girl. Oh my god. I kissed you! And you- Oh my god. I'm not a lesbian. I'm not a lesbian. You... No. No." She looks down at herself before she walks over to the pool to wash her hands off. We stand there, frozen in the thick, awkward silence for what feels like twenty minutes, neither of us quite sure what to say. She seems a lot more sober now than she did when we were fooling around on the lounger. I reach down to retie my shorts and she lets out an angry, breathy laugh. "I'm not a lesbian."

"I'm not, either."

"Yes you are! A girl who likes girls is called a lesbian! That makes you a lesbian!"

"Melanie, I'm not a girl."

"You have a pussy! You're a girl! Oh my god. I can't believe I let you touch me." She walks as far around me as she can and she goes inside the house, slamming the door behind her. If this is going to happen this way, I would rather have her scream at me inside the house than outside in the yard where the entire neighborhood can hear it. I grab my shirt from earlier off of the chair by the patio door and slip it over my head, feeling like I am completely naked even with it on. I give her a few seconds' head start before I follow her, hoping that this will be over quickly, regardless of what the outcome is. I find her upstairs in my room, packing everything into her bags with a pair of tight jeans and one of my hoodies pulled over her wet bathing suit. She turns and looks at me like I am something that just crawled out of the sewer system. "Stay away from me, you sick fucker."

"Can you just stop for a second so we can talk about this? I gave you a chance to explain yourself with the text messages." She grabs her makeup bag from the bathroom and slams it down on top of her suitcase, her perfectly dyed blonde hair messy and fly-away from her dip in the pool. She crosses her arms and glares daggers at me, waiting for me to say my piece so she can finish packing. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you earlier, but I was afraid of how you would react. I wanted to get to know you better before I-"

"Before you told me you were a he-she? Yeah, I kinda figured that out on my own. Are you done now?"

"Is that all I was to you? Did you just want me for my dick and my credit card?"

"Well, now that I look at you, I probably could have got more. It must've cost quite a bit, getting all that plastic surgery. You almost can't tell." That really stings, and she knows it. She gives me a haughty smile and goes back to rolling her clothes up in her suitcase. I walk closer to her and she recoils and throws the shirt down. "Don't touch me. If you touch me, I'll call the cops and have your sick ass arrested."

"For what, Melanie? For what?"

"I'll find something. I bet they really like things like you in prison. Some people like finding extra holes." If she wants to be an asshole and start a fight, I can give her a fight she will never forget. I wait until she goes back into the bathroom to find something else, then I grab her phone off of the bed and I type in the password that she thinks that I somehow don't know after all of the times I have seen her type it. I open up her Photos app and scroll through it, finding the pictures of her two other beaus that she has been trying so hard to hide from me this week. I came clean to her about my little slip-up in Ireland, but I didn't tell her the details. I got my ass chewed out about it, and now she turns around and does this to me a second time after the last huge fight about it. I knew something was up when she said she didn't want to put couple selfies on her Facebook, and now I see why. So much for her parents being really conservative, huh? I post a photo of her with each of us to her account before I open up the bedroom window and pop the screen out of the corner. We'll see what her parents have to think about that now. I can play the asshole card, too.

"You know, being in a long distance relationship doesn't mean having a different dick to sit on every hundred miles." She reappears with her straightening iron and blow dryer in her hands, and her eyes widen when she sees the picture on the screen of her kissing some guy named Trey on a dune buggy. "I guess we don't have to worry about that anymore, do we? It looks like you might be stuck here for a little while." Her mouth opens in horror as the phone slips out of my hand and speeds down toward the cement patio below. I shrug and pop the window screen back into place while her hands go up to cover her mouth. I walk over and start unpacking her bags for her, throwing everything into two piles while she looks on in disbelief. "You might want to go downstairs and find your SIM card. You might need it if you ever decide to buy your own phone."

---

June 12, 2015

Jerome:

"You know, being in a long distance relationship doesn't mean having a different dick to sit on every hundred miles," Mitch yells down the hall and I have to cover my mouth and pinch my nose shut to keep from laughing out loud where they might hear me. I'm turned towards my computer screens with my noise-cancelling headphones on, hoping he'll think I'm editing and not listening in if he decides to drop by. I hear him mumble something else and a small crash before he says, "You might need it if you ever decide to buy your own phone."

Holy shit. He broke the eight-hundred-dollar phone he bought her?! This's the best fucking show I've ever seen and I can't even see it. This's better than primetime TV. This's better than the 'Will It Blend?' videos on YouTube. Yeah, it does blend but it smells like shit. I'd pay a thousand bucks for an invisibility potion right now so I could go stand out in the hall and watch it all go down. I wish I had popcorn so I could pull a fucking Keemstar. I'd probably just choke to death on it, though. I don't have those kinda skills. I slip the other side of my headphones off for good measure. It still looks like I'm wearing 'em but I can't miss any of this. Best. Day. Ever.

"You little tranny bitch!" Oh, shit. I can't even imagine the look on his face right now. And I thought the Level Five Bitch Faces were bad. She just found the cheat code for the bonus levels. There's another crash and I just hope he doesn't do something stupid and end up in jail over it. He's not the kinda guy who'd hit her but if something bounces off the wall and hits her, she's not above trying to get him arrested over it. I told him she was bad news. "Leave my shit alone! What are you doing?!"

"Your shit? If I bought it, it belongs to me. I bought this, and this, and this, and this, and these. These are all mine."

"You gave them to me!"

"Oh, like you gave yourself to half of the guys on the East Coast? Suddenly, it doesn't mean very much, does it?" There's a long silence and a loud zipping sound and I hear him walk past my door. Where the fuck's he going? He went past the stairs. Then I hear the upstairs patio door open and I hear a splash. He just threw one of her bags of crap down in the pool. Guess she won't hafta worry about paying for another carry-on bag now. Remind me to never piss Mitch off this much. I can hear her sniffling over at the other end of the hall as he locks the door and gets his ass away from the twelve-foot drop. I wonder if she woulda tried to push him if she'd had the chance. Crazy bitch. "You had better get back to packing so you can find another dick to ride back to Penn State."

"You wish you could've had me! You wish you had a dick!"

"I thought you would have liked that. I bet it made your job a whole lot easier, didn't it? You got paid pretty well for the little bit that you did, huh?"

"Shut up!"

"How much were the other two paying you? It feels like I got ripped off."

"SHUT UP!" Damn, she sounds like a fucking macaw. Talk about an ugly crier. I'd almost feel sorry for her if I didn't know who she was or why she was here. I tried to tell him but no one ever listens to the dumbass Bac. I learned my lesson after what happened with Preston and his little babydoll.

"I guess I didn't qualify for the bulk discount, huh?"

"Get the fuck away from me." They're talking at normal volume now but it's loud enough to echo in the carpetless hallway, and I'm too absorbed to miss a word.

"I just want to make something very clear to you, sweetheart. If you try to pull any shit about this online or anywhere else and it gets back to me, I will take every last god damned thing you and your sugar daddy own. I'm good friends with one of the best civil attorneys in the state of Florida and I will sue the implants right off of your fucking chest if you tell anyone about me. You will be out working the corner until your legs pop off if this gets out, do you understand? Try to keep at least one pair of your lips sealed." I hear him walk away again and I guess he went back to his room to get the rest of her glittery shit. A couple minutes of clunking and fake sobbing later, there's another loud zip and I can hear the suitcase wheels thumping down the stairs. I can't imagine how it woulda gone if I was the one he was throwing out. Computer monitors and piles of clothes and pieces of furniture would all be dive-bombing down into the pool. It'd be like the grown-up version of 'Will It Sink or Will it Float'. I hear her flip-flop-flippity-flop down the stairs after him and I can almost feel the splashes of make-up running off her face and down on the poor floor. I hope to god he never takes her ass back. I hope he learned his fucking lesson about trying to date Barbie dolls. "That's mine, too."

"Now you're going to take the fucking shirt off my back?!"

"It's mine. You have plenty of clothes right here." There's a bang as the suitcase falls over, and I hear someone walking through the downstairs to the kitchen and back to the front door. "I almost forgot about my purse! I don't think you actually have anything in here, Mel." There's a pause and I hear change jingling around as he dumps everything in her Coach bag out on the floor and starts going through it. "It's a good thing you didn't pay for dinner, or you wouldn't have any money for an Uber. Here's this, and this... and all of this is mine. You might want whatever is left of this, too." There's a long pause and I can imagine her trying to put on a pity ploy so he'll feel sorry for her. I know Mitch more than Mitch thinks I know Mitch, and I know that as soon as you get on his bad side you never come back. I watched what happened with Ash and Seto and Adam and what almost happened when Nooch stepped too close to the edge. Once you've pressed the big red button, there's no going back.

"What am I supposed to do now?" I have to strain my ears to hear her because she's still using that fake crying voice. She's not that good an actor. She knew this was coming since the beginning. Well, she obviously didn't know about him being trans, but she knew he'd find out about her using him as a pickaxe to mine for gold and she knew he'd lose his shit. If he bitches and moans and groans for half an hour about losing a round of the Hunger Games, what'd she think would happen when he found out she was milking him dry? Beyond our little matchmaker deal, I'm just glad to be rid of her. And I know he is, too.

"Oh, I almost forgot something: your flight just got rescheduled to the twelfth of never. I'll notify the airline as soon as you leave. You might want to go dance on the light pole on the corner so someone will let you call your dad. I'm sure he can figure something out for you. If that doesn't work out, they have a gas station about half a mile down the road from the gates. If you hurry, you might be able to use their phone before they close." The sarcasm is so thick in his voice that I know something's up. He never sounds like that. That doesn't sound like Mitch. "I hope the roaches in your bag fuck you right in the ass." And with that, the front door slams shut so hard the windows upstairs rattle. Then there's a horrible silence. This's what death sounds like.

Even though it goes against my better judgment, I take my headphones off and set 'em aside on my desk. I know I've been listening in on the whole thing, and I know he knows it, too. Me staying up here and hiding out from him isn't gonna make things any better. Something really fucked up must've gone down for them to get into it balls deep like this. At first I'd just thought he found something on her phone again but I guess he came out and she freaked the fuck out about it. And I don't think his self-esteem could take a massive blow like that. Cockiness stems from insecurity and he was already cockier than a barn full of roosters. I turn the ceiling fan light off and put my monitors on standby before I silently open the door and creep downstairs as stealthily as I can. He's faceplanted down on the couch away from the door with his head on his arms. This doesn't look good. I sit down on the end by his head and he jumps and cringes away. Maybe I'm not losing my Endy touch after all.

"You okay, Mitch?"

"Fuck no." He breathes out deeply so he can try to keep it together but I know him too well. This was too much.

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Can you watch her shit for me, please?"

" 'Course, bud. Hacksource's at your service. We'll nuke her ass from here to Uranus and back if she tries to post anything, like anyone'd believe her anyway." He nods a thanks and we just sit there for a while, him trying to put the pieces back together and me trying to figure out how he's doing it. And what the hell what's-her-name's doing right now. I half expect the cops to come banging on our door any minute now. I wouldn't put it past her. I watch his back rise and fall too slowly and deeply through his t-shirt and I wish he'd just let go for once and let it out. For every fucking meltdown Rob's had, Mitch has spent a year bottling it all up inside. I'm waiting for it to start leaking out of his ears and nose someday. It's been a while since he's had to deal with someone being a complete bigoted asshole to him like this and I don't think he's used to it anymore. Not just that, but she hit him pretty hard below the belt, from what I heard. He isn't gonna get over this by himself. He's just gonna freeze dry it and save it for the day he loses it in the not-so-distant future. "She isn't worth it, dude. She doesn't get it and she still wouldn't be worth your time if she did. She woulda been a Hannah 2.0 if you hadn't got rid of her ass when you did."

"It's less about her and more about what she said. I spend... all this time building this fantasy world up around me and she just..."

"This isn't a fantasy world. She's just a whiny, childish bitch and she's gonna get hers now. She hit you where it hurts and now you're lettin' it get to you. Don't let her win this, Mitch. Don't let her get in your head and don't let her suck you off like a leech." He nods and I pause before I continue. "Ya know, we should really go cancel her phone insurance plan tomorrow. She's gonna try to gouge you if she took the busted phone with her."

"Yeah." I ruffle the semi-curly hair on the back of his head before I get up off the couch and head towards the kitchen. "What are you doing?"

"I'mma go fish her glittery fuck-all outta the pool before we hafta pay to have the drains cleared again. You want anything outta there before I toss it?"

"It's all yours. I don't want it. I just didn't want her to have it."

"I don't blame ya." I turn the porch light on and head out to the side yard to grab the poor, tortured leaf catcher that never gets used to clean up leaves. The last few rays of the sun are disappearing below the horizon and the sunset's almost as beautiful as the fallout from the last six months of bullshit. Tomorrow we'll hafta get up early so we can get to the Apple Store as soon as they open to shut off her phone insurance, and I'll hafta talk to Ryan about how much his mom would charge to represent Mitch in a big ass slander-slash-libel lawsuit in case something slips by us online. Probably be a good idea to get ahold of Trinh right about now to put Glitter Ass on our monitoring list. And people say the sidekick doesn't do anything!

I hook the half-floating, half-sinking suitcase out of the pool and watch in satisfaction as two or three gallons drain out of it before I put it on the sidewalk. I'll let it sit there and unsoak a bit before I stick it in a trash sack and put it in the garage to mold over and rot and shit before I set it out for the trash. She ain't gettin' pitily shit from me. I sidestep around the broken phone glass by the stairs and I grab the push broom to sweep it up. At least this didn't end up in our cesspool of a pool. It was a good call about the phone, though – the other million broken parts are nowhere to be found. I throw the bag of chlorinated crap to the side in the garage and head upstairs to send an e-mail to our lord, our savior, our watcher on the virtual wall, Miss Trinh. What I didn't expect to find was a showered, fully dressed Mitch sitting in my computer chair with his grody feet up on my desk. You'd think everything was back to normal except his eyes are still pink.

"You're not goin' after her, are you?"

"Are you fucking joking? No, I just thought I owed you something for always being there to clean up my darude shitstorms."

"You don't hafta do that, Mitch. I'm your main Bac. It's in the job description."

"Are you turning down chicken nuggets?" He raises his eyebrow and swings slowly back and forth in my computer chair before I beckon for him to move his ass. He milks that nugget fetish for all it's worth.

"Gimme two secs and I'll find a hat." I type out a quick request form for T-Bae and put a link to Barbie's Facebook while Mitch walks over to my closet and starts digging around for something. "Just make triple sure you set the alarm before we leave. Last thing we need is to come back and see she found some asshole to come in and steal shit and spray paint the walls."

"Yeah, yeah. Here," he says as he slides something down over my eyes and laughs at the ugly ass frown on my face. I pull the penguin hat up just enough to see him put a snapback on top of its head, followed by one of my Posh Life hats and a pair of sunglasses.

"Now that's what I'm talkin' about. What're we gonna eat?"