My Little Slut

Since my mid to late-teens, I've come to terms with the fact that as far as looks go, I am something of an acquired taste. There are no hordes of women knocking down my door because I am ridiculously handsome, but there have been a few women over the years that have hit on me while "out in the wild," something that I fear I may never get used to.

Aside #1: Secretly, I actually hope I never get used to this.

One time for instance, I was riding my bicycle somewhere to get lunch, when I heard someone wolf-whistle in my general direction. Assuming the catcall wasn't meant for me, I ignored it, and locked my bike up before going into a restaurant and eating. When I had come back out, there was a note left on my bike that read:

You're really cute...text me...for a good time.
Signed, girl who whistled at you earlier
(phone number)

Now, normally I wouldn't have paid any mind to something like this, because to me, this note sounded incredibly promiscuous, verging on skanky. But I'd actually noticed the girl who had whistled, before she had done so. She was definitely attractive, and I was definitely single at the time.

Aside #2: Plus, she'd actually used the correct form of "you're," and that alone is something to marry someone over nowadays.

I had nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Smoothly, I waited about an hour before I sent her a text message introducing myself and asking her what her name was. "Valerie," she said in her response, before telling me that she'd like to get to know me better. A little too smugly, I sent her a text that read "That can be arranged."

Aside #3: If you haven't noticed by now, my most commonly used method of flirting with members of the opposite sex involves being really awkward and direct, verging on serial killer-esque, intermingled with infrequent moments of smoothness and charm. That really works for some women, I guess.

So two days later, after talking/texting nonstop about whatever it is you talk about with someone you've never officially met, we weirdly met up for lunch at a Taco Bell near my apartment. She was red-headed and quite a bit skinnier than I'd originally thought she was, verging on almost being too skinny, but still managed to have a sort of larger, more intimidating attitude about everything, something that I naturally find irresistible. Her voice was also slightly raspy, but in the pleasant way that isn't quite like like the way a throat cancer patient's is.

Reciprocating my unspoken attraction, she invited me over to her house after we'd finished eating, telling me she wanted to "watch a funny movie" with me. Coyly thinking I was reading between the lines, I accepted her offer, and we departed.

Not long later, we arrived at the house Valerie shared with her father, a small two-bedroom with the darkness of a bachelor pad but the stereotypical tidiness of somewhere a woman lives. Her father was out of town for the week, she explained as we looked over her movie collection, stillness of the house only interrupted by our movements.

Looking over the movies she and her father had collected over the years, I was slightly disappointed. There were half-decent action movies mixed in with the usual comedy fodder; movies like Bad Boys and Die Hard were alongside such "comedy classics" as Black Sheep and Anchorman. Given that she wanted to watch something "funny," it was slim pickings for someone like me, who had seen every chuckle-worthy film they owned too many times to count (on cable, no less).

Aside #4: Because of this story, I am now guilty of writing and consciously publishing a really whiny first-world problem. I don't feel great about myself.

After a rough inner-struggle followed by seconds of tedious decision-making, I decided on Adam Sandler's classic fish-out-of-water story, Billy Madison. If we were to ever be married, we would tell tales at our wedding of the first time we ever laid eyes on a television screen simultaneously, watching the original manchild himself work his way through academia. We'd be that couple.

Nothing unexpected happened over the course of the next two hours. We watched the movie, smoked a little bit of weed, and made out during the parts we'd both seen a million times (read: during most of the movie). There was something very high school about it all, and that was comforting to me.

At least, comforting until things became slightly more adult when Valerie took her shirt off mid-kiss. Not really knowing how to react, I just continued kissing her, until she finally gave up on waiting for me to be progressive and straddled me before she began taking my shirt off.

Aside #5: I am made of 100% pure certified playa. Don't even try to deny it.

Uncomfortable because being shirtless in the middle of her living room made me feel exposed, I asked Valerie if she wanted to go to her bedroom. Nodding, she hopped off of my lap, gathered up her shirt and mine, and lead the way.

The "hooking up," for lack of a better term, continued as soon as we crossed the threshold into her bedroom. We shockingly wound up on her massive, ridiculously fluffy and comfortable bed, with huge sheets that felt like they were stuffed with the finest softboiled cloud fetuses. It was ridiculous.

Apparently, it was a little too ridiculous, as mid-makeout the both of us began to feel incredibly sleepy despite the fact that it was only around four in the afternoon. Realizing that we'd potentially have the rest of the week to do whatever we wanted to each other, we hopped off the Love Train at Sleepytime Station, and decided to take a quick nap before continuing our journey.

Aside #6: That last one is definitely a contender for my favorite sentence I've ever written.

Our "quick nap" however, turned into the both of us sleeping until nearly 9 'o clock that night, the both of us only being awoken when her phone vibrated with a call from her father. Picking it up, she motioned for me to be quiet while she spoke with him. After she'd hung up, she straddled me once more (still shirtless), implying that she wanted to pick up where we'd left off. And needless to say, that's exactly what happened.

Now, I've never been one to go into explicit detail when it comes to the intricacies of my own sex life, but something curious happened during Valerie and I's...passionate lovemaking. At one point, when I was lying on my back with her on top of me, she leaned down and whispered something into my ear. At first, I wasn't sure I'd heard her correctly, and asked her to repeat herself. Speaking louder, she confirmed that I had, in fact, heard her correctly.

"Tell me I'm your little slut," she pleaded, hips grinding into mine. "Please, tell me I'm your little slut."

Aside #7: That first sentence right there is probably a contender for my favorite as well, though for an entirely different reason.

I had no idea how to react to this, as I'd never been asked to say something like this during sex before. My sexual history's Weirdest Member's Club only consisted of one girl who liked it really, really rough and that girl that insisted we watch Saw IV during the act, never someone that got off on dirty talk like this. So I did what any self-respecting male would do in the situation. I totally went with it.

"You're my little slut," I said softly, the end of the sentence trailing off like a question. To my surprise, this seemed to work some kind of magic on Valerie, as she went at it more vigorously than before. Slightly more confident, I repeated myself. "You're my little slut!" I half-yelled, producing another burst of energy from her.

"Yeah, I'm your little slut!" she yelled in my face, pulling my hair a little too hard and breathing heavily.

I'd call her my little slut two more times before we finished, and each time I said it, it was as if I had said some sort of sexual hypnotism trigger phrase that was she was conditioned to be turned on by. It was one of the most bizarre things I'd ever experienced, and my internal wonder at this phenomena and the odd urge to test it against other derogatory phrases made it really difficult for me to concentrate when it came to my role in the wrapping-up of our sexy time.

Aside #8: What I really mean to say is, the fact that this effected her so much almost killed my boner.

But as I said, we finished, and then engaged in the usual post-coital cuddling that is required of every guy when they want to impress a female. Something was wrong though, and I could tell Valerie could feel it too.

I don't know what happened between the two of us after we had sex, but I have a theory. We didn't talk directly about her preference in pet names, but I think the both of us felt awkward about it (and she insulted or embarrassed) because of my initial hesitation. For the rest of the evening, our conversation felt stilted and forced, and when I slept over we didn't sleep near one another like we had earlier when we'd taken that nap.

The next morning we woke up relatively early, and she drove me home in near-silence. Naturally, we said we'd see each other again soon, but neither of us really meant it. We kept in touch a little bit afterwards, and less than two months later she was engaged. He seemed like a pretty good guy, from what little she told me about him.

I just can't help but wonder if she's his little slut, too.

My Near-Miss

I've mentioned this before in a few posts in the past, but let's go through it again:
The summer in-between my freshman and sophomore years in high school, my parents uprooted me from my birth state, Texas, and moved me to the suburbs of Phoenix, Arizona.

Shortly after moving all of our possessions and selves to the Grand Canyon State, we were told that we would have to endure the plight of having to live in an apartment for a month while our house was being completed.

Since we'd moved during summer vacation, this left me with no convenient outlet for trying to find friends, leaving me to desperately prowl around the complex looking for people my age.

To make a long story short, the only person I ended up meeting during this adventure was a twentysomething pot dealer named Garth, who had an affinity for The Doors and a bong made out of a real human skull. Essentially, Garth was not exactly the type of friend I was looking to make at this point in time.

Aside #1: Though he does sound a lot like a few people I know. My, how times change.

Not long after this failed friend-finding mission, I began hanging out across the street from a high school a block away from the apartment we were staying in (not my future high school, by the way) in hopes to maybe hang out with a small group of teenagers that I'd noticed leaving the school one day in the early afternoon; looking like they were part of some sort of school club.

And part of some club they were. As I would later find out, this half-dozen strong collection of my peers turned out to be the school's Yu-Gi-Oh trading card game club, meeting up before the school year had began to plan out meetings and the like while sharing an enjoyable game of Yu-Gi-Oh between friends.

Aside #2: This blog post is brought to you by Yu-Gi-Oh: "The Funnest Trading Card Game Out There!"

But like I said, I was completely unaware of this fact as they walked up to me and started questioning me relentlessly. During this questioning, I couldn't help but stare at the sole female member of this microposse, named Jessi, who returned my advances by staring and smiling at me flirtatiously. So in order to get closer to her through her friends, I walked around the area with them over the next hour, pretending to get to know all of them, but only truly being interested in her the entire time.

Luckily, my "hard work" paid off, and everyone else with a penis left Jessi and I alone, talking to one another like it wasn't a huge deal (which it totally was, for me). Eventually our conversation winded down, and we exchanged numbers and made plans to do something the following day.

Thrilled, I returned home to tell my mother, who didn't share my excitement. Crushing my hopes of having Jessi over to our apartment the next day, she told me that she and my stepdad would be visiting our new house all day the next day, and that I was not to have any visitors while they were gone.

Naturally, I completely ignored this, and invited her over anyways, reasoning to myself that they'd be gone all day, and that if I had her over right after they left and had her leave a short time later, all would be well.

Surprisingly, all was well. They awoke the next morning, got dressed, and left without suspecting a thing. As planned, Jessi came over shortly after they'd left, and we walked around the complex for a few minutes, talking, before heading to the apartment to "hang out."

Aside #3: I used quotes to point out the euphemism I'm trying to convey here. I hope I've now drawn enough attention to it.

Before I continue, I'd like to take a second to break down Jessi's appearance during this meeting, from head-to-toe. I've intentionally not said anything about it until now. You'll see why.

Head:
-Short brown hair with multicolored streaks in it.
-Big eyes, with tons of eyeliner. Wore a small jewel on her upper cheek.
-Small, diamond lip stud.

Torso:
-Huge breasts barely contained by a band shirt she'd taken scissors to.
-Tons and tons of bracelets. So. Many. Bracelets.

Legs:
-Short jean miniskirt.
-Leopard-print tights.

Feet:
-Semi-tall socks. Yes, over her tights. Yes, in the summer.
-Converse she'd drawn all over, rebelliously.

What I'm getting at, is that besides for her ridiculously proportioned boobs (which totally wasn't why I liked her), she was just like 80% of the girls that were at that age when I was. Except sluttier (which was totally why I liked her).

Basically, she was not the type of girl you want your mom catching you with. But lo and behold, fifteen minutes after I'd taken her back to "my place," laid her out on my parents' bed (after closing and locking the door, of course), and taken her shirt off, my mother opened the front door and stepped into our living room.

Hearing this and panicking, I handed Jessi her shirt and ushered her into the adjoining bathroom, telling her to step into the shower/bath and close the curtain, just in case. Closing the door to the bathroom and opening the one that lead from the bedroom to the living room, I stepped across the threshold and faced my mother.

"Hey, what are you doing?" she asked suspiciously.

"Nothing. I was just going to the bathroom in there," I said, completely innocently.

"Oh really?" she asked, stepping past me and into the bedroom.

Aside #4: Growing up, my parents always assumed I was up to no good, or lying to them. This lead to me usually being up to no good and lying to them about it.

Scoping out the room, she lingered at the threshold for ten seconds before deciding not to go further; her mannerisms not unlike a velociraptor from Jurassic Park.

Aside #5: I'd almost have rather her been one, come to think of it. In fact, I can safely say that I'd rather be put in a cage match with one of these prehistoric killing machines than my own mother. Freud would love me.

"Well, we just went out to eat down the street before going to the house. I forgot my sunglasses, so we had to come back," she explained, after turning around and walking towards the front door.

"...oh, alright," I offered, following her to the door while consciously trying to make my rapid heartbeat stop showing through the front of my shirt.

With that, she left. After watching my parent's car pull out from the parking lot and waiting a few seconds to make sure she didn't come back for some illegitimate reason, I walked through the living room and bedroom, opening the door to the bathroom, finally pulling back the shower curtain to find Jessi standing there, still shirtless and shaking slightly.

"Why didn't you put your shirt back on?" I asked.

"I didn't want to make noise!" she exclaimed. "I didn't know if she would walk in or not!"

Completely ignoring her ridiculous reasoning and grinning, I said, "I thought for sure she was going to find you."

"Me too," she said, stepping out from the tub. "What happened?"

As she put her shirt back on, I explained the events of the past few minutes.

"Wow, I can't believe we came that close to getting caught. I should probably leave in case she comes back," she said, once I'd finished speaking.

"But...no! She won't be back for a few hours," I pleaded. "Please don't leave."

Aside #6: The first, but not the last time I'd say those last two sentences together.

"I don't feel comfortable here anymore. I'm gonna go," she said, sadly.

Less than five minutes after my mother had, Jessi departed from the apartment, promising to call me sometime in the next few days so we could meet up again. She never did.

But looking back, I'm very glad she didn't. Any girl that thinks, even for a split-second while under loads of stress, that putting on a t-shirt is loud enough to be heard by someone in a different room, through a closed door, is no girl for me. I don't care how slutty she is, or how big her boobs are.

My Other Life

Since I'm lazy and have only written half of this week's post, I'm going to republish something I wrote almost two years ago. I promise it's just as funny as the day I released it. Enjoy. New material will be posted this sometime later this week.

I lived a completely false online life for three days using Omegle.

Omegle is a chatroom that connects you with a random person around the world. These strangers can range from horny Turkish men to Chinese people using a IP address-masking site to chat with people. It's interesting, fun, and scary.

So I decided to do something interesting. I decided to create a person, and live that life via Omegle. Here is a little bit about "me":

Name: Nicole Myers

Date of birth: January 19, 1983 (age 26)

Hair: Brown

Eyes: Green

Height: 5'5

Weight: 115-125 (depending on "the time of the month").

Location: San Fransisco, California, USA by way of Tyler, Texas, USA.

Occupation: Receptionist at a law firm.

Other parts of my persona:

-I own a male cat named Pablo.

-I went to law school for six years, and graduated seven months ago.

-My father has connections in the business, and got me a job in SF. He is rich, and paid for my college education. He is expecting me to work my way up the ladder.

-I live in a two-bedroom house on a hill on a street with trolleys that pass by.

-I am a workout fiend. I own a treadmill and enjoy swimming.

-I like my men built, but not bulky.

-I can't seem to find a good man in SF that isn't either gay or an asshole. Or both.

Under this persona, I managed to get a few bites. One was a single, 40 year old man living in Texas. One was a 28 year old Norweigian milk factory worker. But the most interesting by far was a 20 year old SoCal-based video editor named Troy.

He and I had a two-hour conversation that was mostly about "me," and how cute he thought I sounded. Green eyes drive him crazy, he likes to surf, and is absolutely a cocky, shameless douchebag with an IQ in the double-digits.
Anyways, Troy and I chatted it up outside of Omegle. I created an email address (nicolemyers83@gmail.com) and talked back and forth with him for about two days.

This is a social experiment conducted on a complete stranger; unbiased and absolutely aloof. Ladies and gentlemen, I present:

The Troy and Nicole Emails

My Bad Timing

If I were a believer in luck, I'd consider myself an unlucky individual. My timing, it seems, is never exactly right. One of the better examples I can think of to illustrate this took place during my sophomore year in high school.

When I was that age, I was amongst the thousands of other post-pubescent teens that wanted to be a photographer for a living. Not because I particularly enjoyed taking pictures, or even had any skill with it, but because it's one of the things my grandfather had done for a living, and I thought it would be cool to follow in his footsteps.

Aside #1: His biggest claim to fame is taking this picture.

I'd enrolled in a Journalism course to hone my nonexistent abilities, while also hoping to blow through the class without actually doing anything. That, unfortunately, was not the case, as my teacher absolutely hated me and everything I stood for, and would often send me out of class for reasons unknown.

Aside #2: It's ironic that this class is what made me realize I appreciate writing more than anything else, isn't it?

There was a silver lining, however. On the first day of class, I'd noticed a girl sitting two rows behind me that I'd never seen at school before. Her name, I would later find out, was Stephanie, and I liked her the moment I saw her. Much to my disdain, she seemed to be completely out of my league, possibly even playing a different game altogether. I knew I wasn't going to get her attention by just sitting in front of her and doing nothing, so I flirted the only way I knew how to at the time: via a passed-back note.

To my surprise, it worked. Within two weeks we were regularly passing each other longer and longer letters, meeting up after class, walking home together, liking each other more and more as time went by. She would draw me pictures, and I would bring her hand-picked tiny flowers from ouside the school to leave on her desk before she came in every morning. It was sort of disgusting, actually.

Then, out of nowhere, just as I was about to make my move and ask her to take a chance on me, she began dating someone else. His name was Brad, he had an eyebrow stud, and I hated him more than anything on the planet for unknowingly taking her from me. I thought my world had ended because of it.

Deeply apologetic, Stephanie tried talking to me the day after I'd found out. But being as stubborn as I possibly could be, I refused to talk to her, initially.

But that didn't last long. Soon we were talking just like we had been when she was sans boyfriend, hiding our "friendship" from Brad.

Romanticizing the situation, I told her one day soon after we'd started talking again that I'd be patient, and that I would wait around for their relationship to fail, after which I'd sweep her off her feet and treat her as she'd never been treated before. She didn't seem to mind hearing these sentiments, though she didn't exactly agree to the terms after I'd said them.

Aside #3: I assume this was because doing so would throw her into what some people would consider a "morally grey" area. I wouldn't know, my morals are so out of whack that this sort of thing doesn't even faze me anymore.

Despite the lack of a verbal contract, I decided to soldier on and wait for her to be freed from Brad's grip. Soon, a month had passed, and Stephanie's attitude towards me and her attitude towards she and Brad's relationship remained exactly the same. She was, as they say, caught between a rock and a hard place.

It was only a matter of time before I exacerbated the situation further by doing something stupid and rash. Naturally, I did just that. One day after a particularly flirtacious walk home from school, I surprised her completely by kissing her, out of nowhere.

Aside #4: My advice to anyone, ever: kiss everyone that gives you an opening. The worst that could happen is they turn you down, right? ...right?

Shockingly, rather than act offended and push me away, she kissed me right back. Even more shockingly, she continued to kiss me for the next 45 seconds.

Then the moment I'd been waiting for since I'd first met her ended, and we pulled apart and looked at one another. With an immeasurable amount of calm, Stephanie turned on her heel and walked up the concrete path to her front porch, not saying a single word. When she got to the door, she opened it, stepped in, then turned around to look at me. Smiling, she shut the door and I walked away, grinning like an idiot.

Unfortunately, this encounter changed nothing. The next few weeks went by in the same fashion as the previous few had, with her leading me on while dating Brad. Becoming frustrated at not having a chance with her, I began to slowly cut her out of my life as I started to date a different girl.

A month after we'd kissed, I had stopped talking to Stephanie completely, and was completely satisfied with the status of my relationship with my girlfriend. Things were pretty good.

But just as I'm sure you can infer by my use of the term "things were pretty good," naturally everything soon took a turn for the worse.

To make a long story short(er), Stephanie and Brad broke up, she began talking to me, convinced me to like her again, and I broke up with my girlfriend so that she and I could be together.

Aside #5: Don't tell me I'm terrible, I was young and dumb and will probably do this exact same thing another half-dozen times in the future. Regardless of whether or not I'm referring to women, I will never, ever turn down a free upgrade.

Over the next few days, we began hanging out often, holding hands and kissing in public like any normal couple would, and I assumed this meant we were together. I couldn't have been happier. All of the time and effort I'd put into our future relationship was finally paying off, and I felt that I was being rewarded for what I considered to be unwavering patience when it came to the situation.

Aside #6: Nothing says "jaded" like thinking you're unflappable after you've given up on something twice.

Soon, evidence that showed that Stephanie didn't feel the same way about our "relationship" began to surface. Mostly in the form of her cutting me off as I'd done her (with less justification in her case), and dating Brad again, leaving me heartbroken and regretting the day I'd began talking to her.

That was nearly four years ago, and despite breaking up and getting back together a few times between then and now (like the overdramatic couple they clearly are), Stephanie is still with Brad. They'll probably end up married someday, have children, and end up divorced because that's the way life is. At least my foot isn't caught in that bear trap.

The Airsoft Gun Story

When I was a teenager, I was convinced that someday I would become a professional artist, despite the fact that I only exhibited what could be called "talent" in one out of every ten pieces I worked on. I was convinced that this was a mere bump in the road to stardom. After all, I reasoned, Van Gogh's artwork was considered trash when he was alive, and it was only in death that he actually became famous. Maybe my artwork was the same.

Aside #1: And people say I had an ego. Pshaw.

Regardless, when I moved to a new school at the beginning of my Sophomore year, I enrolled in a mid-level drawing class to hone my "abilities" even further. Taught by a gruff, mustachioed ex-coach that had no artistic ability or training whatsoever, I could tell from the first day that the rest of the year that I spent in that class would be completely wasted, and that it wasn't going to help me in what I then saw as my future career.

So I spent most of my time slacking off rather than working on whatever assignment we'd been given, talking to the other five guys that were sitting at the same large, square table as me.

Amongst these fellows was a goateed teen named James. With his long, black, greasy hair and affinity for wearing suggestive t-shirts with massively baggy pants, he was usually the singular scapegoat our teacher chose to scold if we were in trouble as a table (which we often were). He must have been used to this sort of misdirected anger, as it usually rolled off his back without affecting him at all.

Aside #2: This is where I would normally imply that he was verbally abused at home on a regular basis, but to save time, I'm just going to say it: He was verbally abused at home on a regular basis.

The rest of us at the table appreciated this, and would often pontificate about the injustices served to him and how much we appreciated him taking the fall, in order to make his plight seem worthwhile. This semi-symbiotic relationship between James and the rest of us worked, much to our collective surprise.

Then, one day about midway through the school year, James was telling anyone that would listen that he was planning on going over to a friend's house after school to have an "airsoft gun war" (as he called it), and that he'd brought his (unloaded) pistol to school so he didn't have to stop at home to pick it up on the way to said "war." Since our school didn't have lockers, and required students to carry around their backpacks all day, this was a particularly risky decision. But he'd made it to our shared fifth period without any harm befalling him, meaning he only two more to go.

After James' admittance that he was packing pellet-firing heat on school grounds, the six of us discussed the finer points of guns, shooting things, and shooting things with guns. During this conversation, James had a weird gleam in his eye.

"Do you know what would be cool?" he asked, not pausing for responses. "If someone took a picture of me holding this with the classroom behind me."

Aside #3: This is not EXACTLY what he said, but rather the general idea behind what he said.

Realizing that no one had a camera, and never wanting to miss an opporotunity to impress my peers, I stupidly offered to take a picture with my then-slightly-uncommon camera phone, to be emailed to him afterwards.

So we set up the photo, and I took it just as the teacher had his back turned. As promised, I sent it to him, and after that class ended, forgot about the situation entirely.

That is, until the next week, when I was called into my school's principal's office. Upon entering the room, I was informed that I was to be suspended if he found out that I was lying about anything said in the following conversation. Sweating profusely, I agreed to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Aside #4: I wasn't afraid of being suspended, exactly, I was afraid of what my parents would do to me if I was suspended.

Opening a folder, he showed me a full-page printout of the picture I'd taken of James holding his airsoft gun in our art class.

"Did you take this picture?" he asked, handing it to me.

Not needing to look down, I shamefully replied. "Yes. About a week ago."

"James said you did. He also said that the gun was Photoshopped into his hands, and that he really didn't bring anything like this to school. Now, I've looked closely at the pixels, and I can tell this isn't Photoshopped. Did he really bring a gun to school?" he asked, crossing his arms.

Aside #5: I'm not even exaggerating with the whole "I looked at the pixels" thing. I swear.

In my mind, protecting James wasn't worth getting suspended over, so I told him the truth like I'd promised.

"Yes, he did. But it was an airsoft gun, and it wasn't loaded!" I added.

"That doesn't matter," he said. "He still brought a weapon to school, and will be expelled because of it. Thank you for your honesty. You may go back to class now."

Feeling like shit for sending James up the river, I went back to class and waited to be shunned by my art-room classmates later that day for what I had done.

But I wasn't. Apparently James had named all of the people at that table as accomplices to his "crime," and all five of us had been grilled by the principal. Not a single one denied that James had indeed brought the gun, meaning I wasn't the only one who valued my own educational safety over that of another student's. This made me feel better, because in my head, it was better to have split the blame rather than take it all.

---

Two years passed, and James was finally allowed to come back to school. Forgiving me for what I had done, we became friends again and began to hang out regularly. We had a good relationship.

Or so I thought. I would learn a year later, after we'd drifted apart again outside of high school, that during this time, he'd kissed the girl I'd been dating. On two seperate occasions. Once while I was in the same goddamn room.

So if you learn one thing from this story, dear reader, let it be this: If you rat someone out, even as part of a group, and they claim that they've forgiven you, I promise they haven't. People hold grudges, and will take every chance they get to make a move on your girlfriend when your back is literally turned.

My First O.N.S.

When I was in high school, I wasn't really the type of person that partied all the time. Sure, I had some experimental phases with booze and drugs, but for the most part, I was a fairly straight-laced teenager. This is because I realized something about myself during said experimental phases: weird shit happens to me when I'm any form of inebriated, as I've illustrated before (see "The Blackout Story" and "The Shower Door Story" for proof).

One of the earliest examples I can think of this took place early in the summer between my sophomore and junior years. I'd recently become friends with a guy that lived down the street from me named Joseph, and was invited to a "small get-together" he was holding at his house while his parents were away for the weekend.

Aside #1: Cliches exist for a reason, as it turns out.

Naturally, I accepted his invitation and walked over to his house just as the sun was setting the night of the party. Upon arriving, I realized just how small this get-together was. The so-called party consisted of me, him, his girlfriend, his sister, his sister's boyfriend, and his girlfriend's best friend, Melissa. To his surprise, I told him that I was completely okay with hanging out with this small group as opposed to a larger one. I've never done well in crowds, and this wasn't even close to the capacity of some of the smaller parties I'd previously attended.

Shortly after I arrived, we all began drinking mixed drinks at a relaxed pace while sitting around, listening to music and talking about nothing in particular. About an hour into this, Joseph's sister and her boyfriend became bored and disappeared into her room, presumably to have ridiculous amounts of sex. Seeing this as a chance to kick the festivities into high-gear without wasting too much of the alchohol we had on, we began taking shots of the high-end vodka Joseph had somehow had managed to get his hands on.

Aside #2: Nothing says "inexperienced" like getting plastered at 8 PM.

After we'd all had our share for the time being, we began to talk about past relationships we'd been in, and why they failed. When you're generally a depressed drunk like myself, this is one of the worst topics of conversation you can possibly be involved in. For me, it's mostly because I end up (sometimes rightfully) blaming myself for the generally premature demise of every good thing that has come my way.

If the specificity of the above paragraph wasn't a strong enough indicator, that night was a shining example of just how self-deprecating I can be. If that weren't shameful enough, a certain song came on the "party shuffle" Joseph's computer had put together, smack in the middle of my tirade about how badly I'd treated the few girlfriends I'd had in the past.

That song, dear reader, was a sorrowful track titled "Tiny Vessels" by former indie-cred band Death Cab For Cutie.

Aside #3: If you've never heard the song here it is:

Listen to at least 30 seconds of it so you know what I'm talking about for the next few paragraphs. Even better, listen to it as you read the next few paragraphs.

The instant this song came on, my eyes inadvertently began to water and I couldn't figure out why. I didn't have an attachment to this song, nor did I find it to be particularly depressing. Yet there I sat, pontificating about my faults and blinking profusely to prevent tears from running down my cheeks as I did so.

Noticing this before the two females in the room did, Joseph reached over to change it, using the excuse that it "didn't belong on party shuffle," trying to help me save face before I was in danger of being considered the third female in the room.

But being a glutton for punishment, I stopped him from doing so. By this time, everyone in the room was fully aware that I was crying, and soon Melissa was by my side, holding my hand and telling me that everything would be okay.

Less than five minutes later, she kissed me. Ten minutes after that, we found ourselves in Joseph's parents' bed (at his reccommendation), removing our clothes frantically.

Now, I'd known Melissa for around a year at this point, and had always harbored a sort of I'll-never-get-her-but-I-can-still-admire-her-from-afar-type crush on her. After all, she was blonde, had gorgeous blue eyes, and (at the risk of sounding like a complete douche) had fantastic boobs that any self-respecting guy at my school would have gladly paid any amount of money to see. I never would have guessed that a few uninhibited, drunken tears shed during a self-thrown pity party would have been the correct route to land her in the sack, but I guess it was. For some reason, I didn't find this odd at all.

Despite the fact that she was out of my league, and despite the fact that this should have been one of the most memorable nights of my four years in high school, this is precisely where things start to get fuzzy as I think back. I can blame it on the fact that we did it in the dark, or I can blame it on the vodka, but when I think back to the actual sex itself, I don't remember much besides the fact that it took a little while to get started, was good while it lasted, and that we both enjoyed ourselves and passed out immediately afterwards.

Aside #4: Oh, and I also remember Joseph coming in pre-penis-insertion and handing me a condom as we both laid in his parents' bed, naked. That was pretty cool of him.

The next morning, we both woke up at the same time. Despite the fact that my breath smelled awful, my head was pounding, and I felt like I could throw up at any given moment, I did what every guy does after a one night stand and decided to try to attain the "morning after lay." But I didn't get a single taste of the coveted pre-breakfast poon.

Aside #5: If I ever become ridiculously famous, and future historians speak of my contributions to literature and additions to the general lexicon, I hope one of them mentions that I coined the phrase "pre-breakfast poon," assuming I just did so.

Graciously and politely turning me down before getting out of bed and redressing herself, she left me laid out naked on a bed owned and slept in by people I'd never met, feeling cheated out of a prize I didn't know I had to win. After all, I had assumed that our experiences the previous night would inevitably lead to a relationship, or at least consideration of one, but her disinterest in me that morning lead me to believe otherwise. I felt like she had used me for something, and I didn't know why.

Lo and behold, I was right. A week later, I was talking to Joseph about what had happened, when he told me something that would forever change my opinion of women.

He explained that Melissa had been waiting for the right moment and guy to lose her virginity to for weeks, and I just so happened to fit the bill in both cases. He then told me that it was because she'd had her eye on a "sexually experienced" guy, and didn't want him knowing that she'd had no previous experience herself.

Aside #6: I've never, ever met a guy that would turn down a virgin who is all-too willing to have sex. This guy had some whack priorities.

I didn't know exactly how to feel. One side of me considered the fact that she'd seen me as the "right" guy to lose her virginity to as vaguely flattering, but the other side of me was disappointed that she'd known all along that our relationship would never extend past that night.

After plenty of time spent wondering how I should handle the situation, I realized that I was approaching it like a scorned woman would. I was hurt because someone had used me for sex, for their own selfish reasons. It then dawned on me that most men would kill to be in my position, scoring a no-strings attached one night stand with an attractive female virgin. I felt like an idiot for behaving the way I did.

So it was on that day, during the summer directly in the middle of my high school years, that I decreed that I would never again be the bitch in any situation I found myself in. And I haven't looked back since.

My Stalker

Through the final two years of my three years in middle school, not a lot of things remained constant in my life. I was going through the hell known as puberty, I'd switched schools in between the 6th and 7th grade, and was still "discovering" myself.

Aside #1: Consider that a polite euphemism for "started to masturbate regularly."

One of the things that did remain constant towards the end, however, was the undying affection of a girl named Erica. I was thrown off by her advances when they began via a note slipped into the grates of my locker one afternoon. Written in green ink on notebook paper, it went something like this:

Dear Ty,

I saw you walking. We have a class together. Your cute [sic].

Call me.

(phone number)

Love,

Erica

Reading the name at the bottom of the note, I was confused and also flattered. I'd never heard of this person before or noticed anyone named Erica in any of my classes.

Then it hit me. A year younger than me, with braces and thick glasses, Erica was the mentally disabled girl that was in my Computer Literacy class. I wasn't sure what to do, and I definitely didn't want to hurt her feelings, so I ignored it.

Aside #2: My motto: "Don't want to hurt someone's feelings? Ignore them!"

But she was persistent. Over the next few weeks, she would drop more notes into my locker, despite the fact that I never replied to a single one or gave her any indication that her feelings were reciporicated in the slightest.

It started to get worse, too. Every time she walked by me in the hall, she would giggle, look down, and rush out of my field of vision. I was beginning to get worried. My sensitivity towards the handicapped like Erica made it difficult for me to say no without devastating her.

Aside #3: At this point in time, my mother was a Special Education teacher, so I was well aware of how emotionally unstable she may be. I don't mean to generalize this group of people, but it was a distinct possiblility.

Soon after her barrage of notes had started, spring break began. I was given a week off from my moral torture, and to be frank, forgot about it completely.

But the following Monday, I opened my locker to find a bright red envelope with my name on it. Opening it, I found a card with yet another plea to call her, and to my horror, a wallet-sized copy of her school photo with her name on the back next to a bright-red heart. She just wouldn't quit.

I knew I had to take some sort of action against her, for her sake and for my own. So one day, after school had ended, I walked to the special education room where Erica spent most of her time, and asked to talk to the teacher that had been assigned to her.

I was then introduced to a polite, soft-spoken teacher named Mrs. Morris, who, after I'd explained the situation, told me that one of the side-effects of Erica's particular disability was that she became obsessed with people that she found attractive, as a coping mechanism.

Aside #4: I say "coping mechanism" because she was apparently incapable of admitting these attractions like a normal person, instead choosing to become obsessive.

Apparently she'd cycled through celebrities, teachers and other students before, and had lost interest after a few weeks. Mrs. Morris assured me that Erica would become "bored" with me if I continued to ignore her, and the notes would stop. Thanking her for her candor and help, I left.

---

Three weeks later, the notes still hadn't stopped, and were becoming more and more unsettling. I began seeing her several times a day, as opposed to the two or three times I'd normally run into her. I can't say that I was scared, but I was definitely uncomfortable.

So I went to talk to Mrs. Morris again after school, to tell her that Erica's obsession with me hadn't waned. Immediately after I'd entered her room, she rushed over to me.

"Oh my gosh, I am so sorry she hasn't stopped bothering you," she said. "I haven't been able to contact you because I forgot to write down your name, and Erica refuses to tell it to me because she knows exactly why I want it. I was this close," she held her fingers apart a small amount, "to following her throughout the day and hoping she'd run into you."

After explaining what had been happening over the last few weeks, she sighed and took a folder out from her desk.

"These are what Erica has been drawing during her special ed. period," she said, opening the folder.

Handing me a stack of paper, I leafed through them. Every single one was a childlike drawing of either me alone, or she and I together, holding hands and partaking in various activities she must have assumed couples did regularly.

Aside #5: The few I can remember are she and I walking through a park, playing with a dog and eating dinner together.

"She's on a level of obsession with you that I've never witnessed before," continued Mrs. Morris. "I'm not sure what to do about it."

"Well, what if I told her that I'm not interested?" I asked. "Would she freak out?"

"I'm not sure," she said. "We've never had her take it this far before. The last time she drew pictures of someone like this, it was of Orlando Bloom, and we had to convince her that there was no hope. She didn't take it well."

Aside #6: And that was the only time in my life that I've ever been inadvertently compared to Orlando Bloom. Get on my level.

"If I were to do it," I continued, "I would be very gentle in letting her down. I could even lie and tell her that my fake-girlfriend doesn't like that she's sending me these love notes."

"You know...that actually might work," she admitted. "Well, I guess we'll try it and see how it goes."

We then made plans to call me out of class at a certain point the next day. She told me that Erica would likely "spaz out" when I entered the room, but to not show her that it made me uncomfortable. After planning out what I should say to her, I left.

The next day, I was called to the special ed. room just as planned. Walking down the hall, I rehearsed what Mrs. Morris and I had decided that I would say. Soon, I was at the door to the room. Taking a deep breath, I opened it.

The instant it swung open, Erica turned towards the door and saw me standing there. Just as Mrs. Morris had predicted, she started freaking out, not quite knowing how to contain herself. I walked over and sat in the chair across from her, as Mrs. Morris sat in the one beside her.

"Hi Erica," I said.

"Hi..." she said, in between making excited noises with her mouth.

"Erica, Ty has something that he needs to tell you," chimed in Mrs. Morris, looking at me and nodding.

"That's right. I came here to tell you that I think it would be best if you stopped writing notes to me. My girlfriend doesn't like it, and is getting jealous," I lied.

"Girl...girlfriend?" she stammered. "You...don't have a girlfriend..."

We hadn't planned for this. Thinking on my toes, I said, "Actually, I do. She goes to a different school. That's why you've never seen me with her."

"Oh...well...okay..." she said, sadness in her voice.

"But Erica, if you want to be my friend, I would be more than happy to come down to this room once a week to talk to you. But you've got to promise me you'll stop writing notes to me."

She looked at me for five seconds before looking away again and smiling.

"Okay..." she agreed, still grinning.

After spending a few more minutes talking to her, I left. I worked out a deal with Mrs. Morris before I did though, agreeing to be called out of one of my elective classes on every Thursday until her obsession with me had faded.

Two visits later, she was finished with me, and had moved on to a new crush. I saw her in the halls from time-to-time after that, but she never acted the way she had when she was obsessed with me.

I ran into Mrs. Morris some time later, close to the end of the school year. She told me that she had been working on this facet of her behavior with Erica, and that what I had done helped this cause immensely. She said that she expected this habit to be knocked within the next few months, if all went as planned. And I hope, for Erica's sake, it worked.

The Blackout Story

I've never been one to admit that I use the internet as a crutch for meeting women. But seeing as most of my major relationships have begun in some capacity before I've even met the girl, I think it's time I finally stop denying my reliability on the written word to woo females. It's just how I function, I suppose.

One of the girls I've done this with was named Bethany, back during the week of my 18th birthday, the summer before my senior year in high school. I was "introduced" to her via a friend from school, and told that she and I would really hit it off if we began talking.

So naturally, I took his advice and began playing the game I've come to partake in all-too often. She was pretty, smart, and had a great sense of humor, and I sincerely did enjoy talking to her. She seemed to enjoy my company well, and soon we developed small crushes on one another.

There was an issue with seeing her, however. Between work and babysitting her younger sibling, she didn't have a lot of free time. On top of that, she lived more than 45 minutes away, so a trip would take a while if we'd planned to see one another.

Then one night, she called me around 10:30, asking if I could meet up with her somewhere and go to a party in her part of town that she was invited to. My parents weren't exactly the "let your kid go to a party with a girl he's never met at 10:30 at night"-type parents, so I told them that I would be spending the night at my friend's house instead.

An hour and a half later, she showed up at a park that we'd decided to meet at, 50 minutes later than she said she would. Despite this fact, I was willing to forgive her and move on.

But there was a problem. Bethany was not all like she'd advertised herself to be online, and I'm not only talking about her physical appearance, but her attitude as well. 80 pounds heavier than me, with a callous, bitter personality, she was practically the exact opposite of what she'd told me and shown me she was before.

But I was stuck. It was midnight and I was supposed to be at my friend's house, and didn't have any other choice but to go with her to this party. So we left, and arrived there nearly an hour later, both exhausted and in bad moods (me because of her deception, her because of my attitude towards her).

Aside #1: Before you think I'm an asshole for judging her like this, then treating her badly afterwards, understand my level of disappointment by putting yourself in my shoes. She literally wasn't anything like the girl I'd began to like online, and I wasn't too happy about it.

I was introduced to a large group of people upon my arrival, including the redheaded girl who was hosting the party named Allison that I immediately hit it off with, much to Bethany's chagrin. Everyone there seemed glad that I had come, and they all welcomed me into their fold with open arms, telling me to drink as much booze and smoke as much hookah as I'd liked.

Happily, I obliged, taking a 2/3-full fifth of high-end vodka and making it my own. One of the patrons of the party saw this, and dared me to chug the whole thing in one go, without stopping. Not wanting to disappoint my newfound friends, and never willing to back down from a dare, I happily obliged.

The last thing I remember hearing, as the vodka was being emptied into my mouth, was the long-haired guy that had dared me saying the following:

"See you later, duuude."

I don't remember much after that. I vaguely recall getting into a pool in nothing but my boxers, and Allison jumping in after me. I remember swimming over to her and trying to kiss her, but I can't remember if I was successful. I also distinctly remember Bethany leaving shortly after my attempt at showing affection to a girl that wasn't her, telling me that I could find my own way home.

Aside #2: I realize that I could have very easily had sex with her that night, but I'm near-positive I didn't. As I've said before, alcohol usually makes my man-parts go all limp and unusable.

Six hours later I woke up at the end of her driveway next to a pile of my own vomit. A guy with dreds that was at the party was lightly prodding me with the toe of his shoe, telling me I needed to get up and that Allison's parents would be home soon. Still really, really drunk, I slowly stood up and asked him where I should go. He pointed down the street, and I slowly started shuffling in that direction.

What didn't really cross my mind was that I was easily a 45-minute drive away from home, didn't know where my cell phone was, and was deathly afraid of what my parents would do to me if they'd found out that I lied.

So I continued stumbling down the street, until a kind-looking woman pulled over and asked me if I was okay.

"No, I'm really drunk," I replied, slurring my words.

"Well get in, I'll help you," she said, unlocking the car door.

Not caring that I'd never seen this woman before, or that she may have a secondary adgenda when it came to helping me, I climbed into her car.

"You have writing all over your face," she informed me, as we headed in the direction I'd been walking in.

"What does it say?" I asked.

"The only word I can really make out is 'dick' on your cheek. I think there's an arrow pointing to your mouth, too," she admitted, clearly trying not to laugh.

Around then, we pulled up to a Starbucks. Tripping over myself to get inside, I sat down at one of the small tables while the woman walked up to the counter and placed an order. Putting my head down, I passed out until a few minutes later when my order was delivered to my table. The woman was nowhere to be seen, and the barista that gave me my black coffee and cinnamon cake told me that she'd told her to tell me that she was sorry that she had to leave, and that she'd had an appointment somewhere.

After trying to take a sip of my coffee, burning my mouth, and spilling it down my front, I resumed my head-down position on the table and passed out again.

Not long later, I awoke to four police officers and two firefighters standing around me, one putting a blood pressure monitor on my finger and another rummaging through my bag I'd brought with me. A third began talking to me.

"What is your name?" he asked, chuckling.

"Ty...Tyler..." I said.

"Well, Tyler, you're lucky to be alive, from the looks of it. How much did you drink?"

I raised both hands and put out my index fingers, holding them six inches apart.

"Th...this much vodka..."

He whistled. The other men started chattering.

"I couldn't drink that much," one said.

"Your liscense says you weigh around 115 pounds, is that correct?" asked the first officer, my wallet in-hand.

"Yes...I can't gain weight!" I gargled, laughing.

Aside #3: Three years later, and I don't weigh more than ten pounds more than this.

"Well, we're checking your blood pressure right now to make sure you don't have alchohol poisoning. I assume you drank all of this last night?"

"Yes...last night..."

"Well, your readings are okay, it looks like a lot of it is out of your system. You're just dealing with the residual stuff right now. We're not going to punish you, because it looks like this has done more than enough to teach you a lesson."

"I don't have a ride home..." I remembered, getting scared.

He then asked me where I lived, and after I told him, and he began to look worried. He then told me that they'd found my cell phone in my bag, and were going to call my parents to have them come pick me up. After a few half-assed attempts to prevent him from doing so, the officer was soon on the phone with my stepdad. He explained the situation, gave him the address of the Starbucks, and told him to come as soon as possible.

During their exchange, for a third time that morning, I put my head down on the table and passed out.

Some time later, I awakened while being dragged out of the shop by my shirt.

Aside #4: I'm not exaggerating, I literally woke up as I was being dragged out. My heels hit the door frame and it jarred me awake.

After being unceremoniously thrown into the passenger seat of my mother's Honda, my stepdad quickly walked around the car and sat down harshly, slamming his door. If I had any question as to if he was angry with me, it was answered by his actions.

The drive home was filled with no talking and lots of falling in and out of consciousness. When we finally arrived home, a lot of yelling was done, by both him and my mother, followed by me sitting and staring at them in a drunken stupor, not sure how to respond. They both said things to me that made me feel like the absolute worst person on the face of the planet for what I had done, as if this instance wasn't one amongst millions like it in the whole of teenager-dom.

Once they were finished with me, I walked into the bathroom and tried to kill myself by slicing my left wrist open with an X-Acto knife. But, as I've mentioned a dozen times previously, I was still incredibly drunk, and...well...missed every single vein I could have possibly hit. By a wide margin.

Aside #5: Fun fact: The reason that I started wearing watches regularly was to cover up some of the bigger scars from this day. I'm now a bona-fide watch fanatic.

After fifteen minutes of barely bleeding from the few cuts I'd managed to actually make, my mother knocked on the bathroom door.

"What are you doing in there?" she asked.

"Well...I was trying to kill myself, but I don't think it's working," I replied.

Quickly, she opened the door and found me standing there on the verge of tears.

Aside #6: The fact that I didn't lock the door should tell you how serious I was about killing myself.

The next few minutes were a blur. Nothing really important happened, aside from both of my parents being angry with me for trying to kill myself (which is EXACTLY how you should treat a "suicidal" person, by the way). After an hour of sitting on our couch and calming down, I took a shower and went to bed.

Aside #7: As I took a shower, I found that there wasn't just writing on my face. It was also on my stomach, my thighs, and shoulders. None of the things were pleasant.

Eleven hours later, around 9 'o clock that night, I woke up, still unable to walk in a straight line, but sobered up enough to face my parents. Except, something had happened to them in those few hours. I'll never know what, exactly, but a shift occurred in the both of them.

My stepdad hugged me after I walked into our living room, in a rare display of parental affection that I wasn't used to. He'd also gone to the store during my mini-coma, and had bought mango popsicles for me, to help with the dehydration that the booze had done to my system.

My mother, for the first time since I was a child, asked me to come into her room to watch a movie with her. Together we sat side-by-side on her bed at watched some lame romantic comedy as we talked about what had happened the night before. She assured me that I would be punished for it, but that I shouldn't worry about it for the next few hours, and should just relax.

This was the only time that I can remember my parents being this pleasant to me since I'd started high school, and the only time they were both nice to me at the same time since. If I would have known that all it took for them to be this way was a shitload of high-proof vodka and a botched suicide attempt, I would have done it a helluva lot sooner.

This post is dedicated to my friend and longtime supporter Jacob Seemann, to remind him that bad days happen to us all, and to keep soldiering on, no matter what.

My Supportive Friend

In the summer of my fifteenth year, my mother and stepdad were in the midst of uprooting me from our house in Texas, to live in a new one in Arizona. I'd lived in Texas my entire life, and wasn't too happy about the situation.

Aside #1: The day that we actually set out to drive from state-to-state was my birthday, something that I've never forgotten or forgiven my parents for.

I looked for solace in many places, finally settling on the support of others through the internet. I began making friends through websites and chat rooms I frequented, generally speaking to those that were in or had been in the same situation as me. But there was one person, a female named Jenne, that stood out from the rest of people I was speaking to. She'd been uprooted before, and hated the ramifications of it at first, but had slowly grown to like her new life.

Aside #2: I should mention that I did not use my real name in these situations. I usually went by my middle name, Drew.

My friendship with Jenne began a month or two before we were set to leave. I can't remember exactly where we met on the web, or what made us start talking, but after a few weeks, I couldn't stop. I'd only had one true 3-month long relationship under my belt, and was new to the idea of females paying attention to me. She didn't seem to mind my attachment to her, and soon we were scheduling times and dates for when we would talk to one another via instant messanger. We'd start early in the night, and end up talking well into the early hours of the morning, never seeming to run out of subject matter.

I talked about school, my friends, my parents, and anything else that came up. She talked about her job, husband, pets, and what she hoped to make of her life in the future.

Did I mention Jenne was 27 years old? I know should have turned and ran after the first few weeks when she'd first mentioned this to me, but my fascination with how completely different her life was from mine kept our strange friendship going.

And stranger did it become. Soon Jenne was making references to her mental health state, claiming that her husband didn't love her anymore because she was crazy. She claimed to have schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and a slew of other issues that I can't recall.

Again, I should have cut off contact with her after this revalation. But it only made her more interesting to me. As our friendship grew stronger, so did my schoolboy-type crush on her. I didn't make my feelings hidden, and she didn't act like it was wrong.

It was only a matter of time before she began taking advantage of the attention I was giving her. She began teasing me, telling me about her sexual habits and slight fetishes, while also calling me "handsome" and "cute." Sexually inexperienced at the time, I hardly knew anything of the terminology she was throwing at me. She would imply, but never state directly, that my feelings for her were returned.

Aside #3: After everything, I think she didn't admit it because it was because she was truly in love with her husband, though she was convinced he wasn't with her.

Then the pictures started coming. Vanilla at first, they slowly became more and more promiscuous as time went on. She never sent me straight-up nude photos, but some were a moved blanket or a shifted arm away from being so. All were self-shot and in black-and-white, the latter for reasons I didn't and still don't know.

Jenne would always follow up these conversations and sent pictures with claims that she'd "forgotten" how old I was, and that I kept "tricking" her by acting older. All were meant to be in good humor, and seemed tongue-in cheek, but showed me that she knew what she was doing was morally questionable. I wasn't complaining, because I found her ridiculously attractive, physically and mentally.

Aside #4: It's no surprise that I'm attracted to damaged women.

Near the three-month mark of our so-called relationship, I suddenly stopped hearing from Jenne. She was never online anymore, and had never given me a phone number to call, and I was convinced something serious had happened to her. I didn't know what to do.

Then, a month later, I recieved an email from her. She had been taken to a sanitarium for a short-term stay after having a mental breakdown one day at work. She was now medicated for all of her illnesses, and things were looking up between she and her husband. She explained to me that her attraction to me was part of her psychosis, and that she no longer felt that way because of the medication she was on.

Luckily, I hadn't fooled myself into thinking I'd actually had a chance with her, so my heartbreak was only minor. I tried to continue our friendship after this, but was met with half-assed responses to my emails and attempts to talk to her. I think she was ashamed of the way she'd acted towards me, and didn't want to be reminded of it.

Either way, I'm now thankful nothing happened past what did. I'm glad she never sent me nude photos, and that she never admitted that she had feelings for me, because my head probably would have exploded if she did.

The Shower Door Story

In the summer of 2007, I was many things. I was a year away from finishing high school, I was freshly single, and was going through much-too-long a period in my life where hormones were the decider of my every move.

One of these decisions that my hormones decided to make was to attend a 4th of July party that the girlfriend of one of my close friends Tom was throwing. His girlfriend, Lauren, and her sister Leah had decided to commandeer their parents' house while they were away for the holiday, inviting me and a few other people over.

The get-together started out just like any small party, with people slowly getting drunker as it progressed. Amongst the soon-to-be-shitfaced was me, taking shots left and right and using a mixed drink as a chaser. I wasn't a huge drinker back then (I never really have been), but for some reason I felt that I needed to get absolutely wasted.

Nothing too substantial happened until Tom, myself, and another one of our friends. were all sitting on the back porch, smoking cigarettes. Leah, with an estimated blood alcohol level higher than the three of ours combined, stumbled outside through the sliding glass door. Seeing that I was occupying the only chair, she decided to forgo asking me to relinquish my seat (which I would have gladly done) and opted to plop herself down right on my lap.

Now, before I continue, I have to mention a bit about Leah. I'd known her for around a year at this point, and she was part of my small group of "lunchtime friends;" people I'd gladly eat with but rarely saw outside of that. She was a sweet girl with a lot of personality, whom, to be frank, a lot of guys at my school would have liked to fuck. I'm not going to say she was a slut, but she definitely didn't mind this sort of attention.

Anyways, Leah was sitting on my lap, and like I said, we were both very drunk. Unsurprisingly, she leaned in and started to kiss me. Suddenly, we were in her bedroom, and getting undressed very quickly.

Aside #1: We didn't teleport, but I definitely don't recall how we made it from the porch to her room.

Soon, we were both naked and standing in the middle of her room. Dropping to her knees, she began to giggle in that sort of "I'm going to regret this tomorrow" way that women always do when they know they're going to wish they hadn't done whatever it is they are currently doing the following day.

So she began to do said thing. While still giggling. It was terrible. After about five minutes of this, I realized the alchohol in my system was making it hard to concentrate on the task at hand, and I was actually beginning to get bored. Being a bored male during sexual activity does not bode well for the future of the sexual activity, so I asked her if we could move it to her bed and make the pleasure-giving mutual.

She laid on her back on her bed, and I got on top of her. At the risk of being blunt, sex started happening. The instant it did, my penis felt like it was being mashed into a brick wall. It was as if I was trying to put it into a hole that was far too small for it to fit in (which in retrospect, was probably exactly what was happening). To make matters worse, her body's "natural lubrication system" seemed to be broken or in disrepair, meaning said brick wall felt as if someone had coated it in sandpaper.

Aside #2: I've had sex nightmares about this exact metaphor.

There I was trying to fuck the sandpaper-covered brick wall that was Leah's vagina, the door to her room opened. Almost instantly, Leah let out the loudest, most dick-shriveling scream of anger that I've ever heard. Turns out two of the people outside the door had decided that it would be absolutely hilarious if they interrupted our so-called "lovemaking" session by opening the door for a split-second.

Her scream, combined with the pain in my groin, made the most important part of my body at that moment go completely limp. I wasn't sure what to do. I hadn't technically had sex with her yet, and wanted to get laid, so I suggested that we go into her bathroom and try to do it in the shower. My drunken mind thought that the running water would make things simpler and less painful on my end, while also cleaning off the thin layer of filth I'd felt my body had accumulated that night.

Aside #3: From the drinking, not the sex.

So we made the nude mad-dash to the bathroom down the hall without being seen by anyone, and turned the shower on. A few seconds later, after it had warmed up, we both got in. The shower that we'd decided to fornicate in was one with dual-sliding glass doors set over a bathtub, with steel bars across both panels on the outside that acted as handles.

After situating ourselves inside the shower in the ideal positions, and after I'd...missed a few times, some part of Leah's brain had decided that it would be a great idea to use the shower's glass door as support.

Bad idea. Within seconds, the glass door shattered into millions of light-green pieces, raining all over the both of us. Immediately, Leah began screaming the same scream she had screamed earlier, only now the tiled bathroom that we were in made it reverberate all around us, increasing the sound tenfold.

Pissed off and visibly bleeding from my feet, I told her to shut the fuck up. As we both stood there ankle-deep in shards of glass, I called out for Tom at the top of my lungs and struggled to cover up my manhood as to avoid any further embarassment.

Aside #4: No, I don't have a tiny dick. I just don't like showing it off to my friends.

Almost immediately, like the great friend he was, Tom came rushing into the bathroom. Taking one look at the situation Leah and I were in, he began to laugh. Once he was finished, I asked him to get the both of us towels and to brush some of the glass that had spilled out onto the floor away so we could get out of the shower without injuring ourselves.

Aside #5: Something told me to take a picture of what had happened, and here it is:

Note the blood stains.

Of course, he obliged. Soaking wet and naked, Leah and I stepped out of the shower onto the glass-free floor and began to dry off. I went into her room and gathered my clothing, and redressed. She would drunkenly talk to people for the next hour before passing out in her bed. I wouldn't sleep a wink that night, and would go home half-drunk and full of regret, with feet shredded to hell and filled with microscopic shards of glass.

The Checkered Blanket Story

Throughout my life, I've been what I would consider to be seriously depressed quite a bit. Whether it be from financial woes, romance woes, or any other sort of woe, I can't help but spiral into a sort of self-deprecating nosedive any time something in my life goes terribly wrong. It usually lasts a few days after whatever it is that has happened, generally being fixed by sex, drugs, or any other vice meant to make the user feel better.

Such was the case towards the end of winter during my nineteenth year. My girlfriend at the time (whom I was living with) had left me, leaving me feeling like a worthless piece of shit. Naturally, I began looking for girls to replace her with, going on random dates with four different females over the course of the next three months.

Amongst these girls was an absolutely gorgeous part-time model named Shannon, with legs like toothpicks and a mind just as sharp. She'd invited me to a party one night when she came into my work, offering to pick me up after my shift had ended. Flattered, thinking that this absolutely gorgeous girl was way to far out of my league to be interested in me, I accepted.

Two hours later, she pulled up outside of my workplace with a (female) friend in the passenger seat. Hopping into the back, the three of us began talking like we had known each other for ages, me trying to charm the hell out of the both of them.

It must have worked on Shannon, because after we pulled up to the house where the party was being held, she locked her arm with mine on our short trek to the front porch. Seeing that I was nervous about entering a house full of people I'd never met on the arm of someone I'd just met, she told me to be calm and assured me that everyone inside would love me.

She was right. Her words affected me, instilling a sort of confidence in myself that I very rarely show in large groups. Throughout the night, she stayed by my side as if we were a couple, and I definitely didn't object to her behavior. Soon, we were holding hands and talking to each other like there wasn't a bustling party going on around us. It was the first time I'd connected with someone so deeply since my girlfriend had left me, and it made me feel absolutely fantastic.

We started talking about our lives and our interests, and it was revealed to me that she was older than she looked. Five years older than me, in fact. Fearing that she would lose interest if my own age was revealed, I dodged the question in a cutesy way when she asked. But after a few minutes of flirtatious prodding, I finally told her. Luckily, she was not deterred by this in the slightest, and told me that she thought I was older than I actually was, a comment I took as a compliment.

Aside #1: I'm convinced I am cursed to go through life looking like I'm sixteen, so to hear that I looked older than nineteen is a huge deal. Hell, to even hear that I look my age is a huge deal.

As night turned into morning, people started leaving the party. Not wanting to end what I now considered a date, I asked Shannon if there was anywhere she'd like to go before I was to go home. Just as I'd hoped, she offered to take me back to her apartment to "hang out for a little while."

We had just gotten into her car when I first kissed her. Through forces unknown, we looked at each other and the moment sort of clicked. After the fact, she began blushing and trying to explain herself, telling me that she wasn't the "type of girl that kissed random guys," and that this was "really weird" for her. Lying to make her feel better, I said that it was strange behavior for me as well, something that seemed to make her feel more at-ease.

Aside #2: Before you think I'm a terrible person for lying about that, consider how it would have seemed if I said that I'd been in this exact position a few times before.

After this shared intimate moment, we began driving towards her apartment. Not five minutes passed before her right hand left the steering wheel to join my left. It was at that moment that I knew I could really grow to like this girl a great deal more than I already did, if given the chance.

My tune changed quickly after we had finished our trek and arrived at her apartment. Walking in, everything seemed completely normal. She had an incredibly sweet dog, an apparently nice roommate (who wasn't there), and didn't have any dead bodies of other men that she'd lured into her abode hanging from the ceiling. Nothing was out of place or raised questions.

That is, until we entered her bedroom. The first things I noticed were the half-dozen tall glass candles strewn about the room, each with the Virgin Mary on them. Alarmed, I continued to look around the room while we sat on her bed and talked about nothing in particular. I noticed an old Bible on her bedside table, along with a dog-eared copy of Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. Having read the book before, I brought it up in our casual conversation, hoping to then segue into her apparent religious beliefs.

It worked. Shortly after our conversation on the finer points of Tolstoy's work ended, I brought up the Bible. Just as I'd feared, Shannon launched into a sort of robotic response that confirmed that she was a ridiculously devout Christian.

Aside #3: I'm an atheist that is over having issues with religious people, aside from the crazy ones (such as the type Shannon was turning out to be). It's them that usually have the problem with me.

Then she bluntly told me that she wasn't going to have sex with me, as if I'd asked her directly. She explained that she was one of the believers in the "virgin until marriage" rule, something that her parents had both practiced when they were younger. She even threw in an anecdote about how when she was conceived the first time her parents ever had sex. How she knew this, I hate to imagine.

Then she said something that, to this day, still sends shivers down my spine. Something that made me leap off of her bed in disgust. Something that I still can't believe passed through her lips. Motioning to the blanket we were currently sitting on, she said:

"Actually, this checkered blanket was the one I was made on."

I didn't speak to her much after that.

The "Saw IV" Story

In my final year of high school, I was forced to take a third-tier drawing class along with a group of students that were one year younger than me. It took place after my designated lunch period, but during another, meaning that it was the most prone to be skipped on a day-to-day basis. The teacher, a 30-something, once-great artist that decided that family was more important than becoming famous, saw my not-giving-a-shit attitude and simply let me slide for most of the year.

Until finals came around. The year I was to graduate, my school had begun enforcing a strict policy stating that all classes must have a written portion of the exam to go along with whatever else the teachers felt like they needed to throw at us. Meaning that, rather than give us all fudged grades on shitty "art" that barely stayed within the final exam project guidelines, art teachers were now forced to actually grade papers based on facts, not "interpretation."

Which, of course, put an end to my away-from-class excursions, and forced me to interact with the motley crew of people that were out to discover and hone their artistic abilities.

Aside #1: I'm not going to sit here and make comparisons to The Breakfast Club in my attempts at describing how diverse the individuals were in this class. Not because that's a cliche, but because you couldn't understand just how different everyone really was. Classes this diverse would have made John Hughes rethink the classroom dynamic in a film setting, trust me.

At this point in time, I was fresh from being rallied back and forth between two girls for several months, and frankly, was not looking for any sort of relationship with anyone. And as any person that has ever been in this situation could have told you, that was exactly when two girls, two best friends that were in this very art class decided they wanted to jump my bones.

On side #1, I had Amanda. She was:

-An interesting person with stories I could relate to.

-Taller than me.

-Beautiful and curvy.

-A good artist, actually. Or rather, a decent artist.

On side #2, I had Tiffany. She was:

-Shorter than me, with a great figure.

-Loud. So loud.

Day after day, these two would compete for my attention, and I would gladly give it to them. At this point, I was so caught up in feeling sorry for myself over my recent heartbreak(s) that I would have gladly accepted anything of the sort without much fuss, never mind the fact that I considered them both attractive. They both appeared to be enjoying the game, neither ever seeming uncomfortable with the situation they had put themselves in.

Naturally, after a few weeks of this, they both gave me their phone numbers within the same three-day period. Tiffany had broken up with her boyfriend of nine months a few days previous (the fact that she had a boyfriend being news to me), and wanted to see me sometime soon outside of class.

Definitely leaning towards pursuing Amanda at this point, I made plans to see Tiffany on a boring Saturday afternoon, at her house, where her parents would likely be keeping a watchful eye over the two of us teens.

So around 1 'o clock on said Saturday, I showed up at her house. She opened the door, pulled me inside, and started furiously kissing me.

Surprised, but definitely not thinking ahead, I started kissing her back. We migrated into a room containing a TV set and a couch, the latter of which Tiffany had thought to cover awkwardly with several blankets. After sitting me down on the couch, she walked over to the TV and turned it on, for what I assumed would be background noise.

"Do you mind if I put this in, while we...?" her voice trailed off, as she held up the case for the movie Saw IV.

"Um, sure?" I answered, not sure of what to make of the scene.

She put in the movie, started it, dimmed the lights and walked back over to me on the couch. Sitting on my lap, she started kissing me again as the opening of the movie began.

Aside #2: For those of you that have never seen a Saw film before, every film begins with one of the series' infamous "traps" being sprung on a person or a few people.

Clothes started coming off, and things started getting...more passionate (for lack of a better word). Soon enough, we were both completely naked and kissing on her couch. What happened next should have been easy, except for one problem: having a gory film play in the background is not my idea of "setting the mood." Simply put, the film's content was distracting me to the point of flaccidity, despite the fact that I had a perfectly attractive, naked young woman sitting on the same piece of furniture as me, practically begging me to have sex with her.

So I did what any man would do when put into this position: I made the best of an awful fucking situation. First, I positioned Tiffany between the TV screen and myself, ensuring that it was out of view. Second, I forced blood to rush to my penis with pure willpower alone, in a feeble attempt to retain some piece of my manhood throughout this event.

Not long later, after what felt like an erectile marathon, I finally felt like I could say I had finished without rousing suspicion.

Aside #3: We fake orgasms too, ladies. But only when we have to.

"I'm going to go take a shower. You're welcome to join me," she told me, after we'd caught our breath.

"Um, I need to go home pretty soon, so I think I'll just go," I replied, still trying to act normally.

So I got up, got dressed, and left.

But the story doesn't end there. After Amanda had found out about Tiffany and I's tryst, she was, of course, upset. But not with me. Apparently, Tiffany had lied to the both of us about the status of her relationship, meaning that I was nothing but a trophy, and Amanda was nothing more than squashed competition.

Of course, Amanda wasn't too happy about this, and told Tiffany's boyfriend about what had happened (kindly omitting my name), and they broke up. Less than two weeks later, I received a call from Tiffany, crying, claiming that I had impregnated her. I only said four words before hanging up and never speaking to her again:

"I didn't come, bitch."

The Metallica Story

Throughout middle school, I was obsessed with Metallica. I'm not embarassed about this fact at all. I am, however, VERY embarassed about the type of Metallica fan I was. You see, Metallica is one of those bands whose entire discography is filled eqally with albums that are hits and misses. I was unfortunately one of those rabid hyper-fans that was drooling over everything they'd ever done, including the absolutely abysmal "Garage, Inc." It was that bad.

Around the peak of my obsession, Metallica released their album "St. Anger." For those of you that don't know what this means in relation to the Metallica canon (if you will), I'd like you to think of your favorite band or musician that has more than five albums out. Now think of that artist's most generic, shitty, uninspired album (as a whole). That's what this album is for Metallica. Except this album was made during a period in their career where every member of the band wanted to kill one another in the most violent way imaginable (as shown by the sub-par-but-still-worth-a-watch documentary "Some Kind of Monster"). Even more, the entire band was fresh from famously suing Napster, after which bassist Jason Newstead left (for an unrelated reason). Their minds were probably on other things while recording this.

Regardless, I worshipped anything these four horsemen decided to hammer out, and listened to the album incessantly with my terrible blue Walkman CD player and ill-fitting headphones that made the loud parts (i.e., the whole album) sound like it was playing through a tin can. But I didn't care, terrible-sounding Metallica was better than no Metallica at all. After playing the album dozens of times, a certain song on the album stuck out to me more than most. Entitled "Sweet Amber," the song seemed to be about a girl that was pretending to be a kind person, or something. Anyways, I thought the song was badass.

Aside #1: I was so obsessed with this album that I still remember that "Sweet Amber" was track number eight on "St. Anger." Despite the fact that you may not believe me, as I'm writing this, I am nowhere near an internet connection, nor do I have this album on my laptop or anywhere nearby.

The summer after the album was released, I was spending a weekend at my dad's house when he and the neighbors threw a sort of impromptu block party. Friends invited friends, and soon people that we had never met were showing up.

Aside #2: I know that saying that strangers were at this party makes it seem like things got out of control, but I assure you, they didn't. This was a party of adults, not college students.

I was hanging out with the group of kids that were around my age, sitting on our next-door neighbor's front porch. J.T., the large, greasy, bespectacled mouth-breather that was the son of the house's owner (and my best friend at the time), was petting one of his many dogs, talking to a boy named Richard that lived a few houses farther down the street. Sitting next to Richard was a skinny, brown eyed, brown-haired girl that I would later find out was his cousin. I was sitting in a wooden rocking chair adjacent to her side of the couch that she and her kin were on, trying not to stare at her. I was still, of course, at the age where I was completely unaware of how to flirt with girls, avoiding her glances and subsequent smiles by feigning a weirdly creepy fascination with another one of the house's smaller dogs that was sitting on my lap. The two sons of the neighbors on the other side of my dad's house, Cody and Austin, were sitting on a pair of fold-out lawn chairs, eating chips.

After a few minutes, the four other males on the porch decided to go into the house to get drinks, leaving Richard's cousin and I alone and sitting less than three feet away from one another. Anyone that has ever been remotely social at any point in their life knows that forced, awkward social interaction was inevitable at this point. So it happened. And it wasn't that bad. She was easy to talk to, and laughed at my jokes interjected into our polite preteen small-talk.

Aside #3: Looking back, I'm not sure if she was laughing at my shitty jokes or the fact that my voice was shaking as I was telling them. Either way, she found it charming, and I was obviously far too inexperienced to tell the difference.

I looked inside during a lull in our banter, and saw that the four boys had decided to sit in the living room and play Gamecube. Opting to not join them, the girl and I decided to walk over to my dad's house to get some food. On the short walk over, we continued to talk to one another, talking about unimportant and benign things. Though I was not good at reading most signals, I was picking up strong flirtatious vibes from her. She'd gone from laughing at my aforementioned "shitty jokes" to adorably giggling at even the most muted of my responses. I had an admirer, it seemed. This realization only propelled my interest for her, and she jumped from "cute girl" to "the girl I'll tell my friends about after the summer's over."

We entered my dad's backyard to find a large group of people milling around a grill, my dad's friend Bob making cheeseburgers for the crowd. We each requested one, and put our condiments on our respective patties while standing side-by-side in the warm garage. This was the most romantic thing that had ever happened to me at this point in time, and I didn't know how to react. After anxiously eating while standing in the humid space, she grabbed me by the hand and lead me to her father's truck, parked outside my dad's house. She opened the back hatch, and we climbed in. Sitting indian-style next to each other, we both looked up at the still-darkening sky in silence.

"You're not like anyone I've met before," she said, still looking up.

I wish I could say that I swept her off of her feet and suavely shot back a witty retort that made her fall madly in love with me, but I did nothing of the sort. As far as I can recall, we sat there in silence after this admittance, too afraid to talk any more. Before I knew it, she was bustled into Richard's parent's van, leaving me with nothing but a bruised heart and her first name: Amber.

I never saw her again, or really ever talked to Richard as far as I remember. But to this day I can't even listen to Metallica without thinking of that sweet girl Amber that I met when I was a kid.