This post will be short, since I have Theraputics homework to get done (a future post about that is brewing, promise). In the meantime, the Reader had a call for submissions regarding bad dates in under 500 words. Uh, if I had a drink for every one of those I've had, I'd be toe UP. Possibly dead.
Naturally, I submitted and got creative with some non-fiction. Literary liberties were taken, you can decide where. With that, I humbly present a bad date:
I was 19. My boyfriend had just cheated on me and the guy at the gas station on the corner had been asking me out for months. He was Middle Eastern and very good-looking, if a little Euro-trashy. He had developed a friendliness with my dad, who stopped in every morning to buy two Mountain Dews and a pack of Salem Lights. When I’d fill up my Ford Focus, the guy--Sean--would ask why I wouldn’t talk to him, and I’d laugh and he’d ask me out, and I’d laugh again. But he was tall, dark and handsome, and my boyfriend had just banged some other chick. This time, when Sean asked, I agreed, already knowing I’d put out.
Sean picked me up in a black Cadillac with a leather interior that smelled like grandpas and freshly-smoked weed. The backseat was cavernous and as he drove, a smattering of CD cases slid back and forth. The smalltalk was strained; he was 22 and had been working on his associate’s degree since graduating high school. We got to the movie and he ushered me though an Exit door as people were leaving. I guess I wouldn’t have wanted to pay for the holiday slasher Black Christmas, either.
We stopped for milkshakes, then parked down a quiet side street. As we made out, my hands wandered under his t-shirt and I came across the sharpest stubble I would ever encounter in my life. Doing my best to ignore it, I unbuckled his pants.
He was large and well-formed--pretty, even--in the orangy glow of the street light. By the time he pulled me into the backseat, his shirt was gone and mine was undone, and the CD cases slid to the floor. He was on top of me, his razor-stubble torso grating my chest. Our pants came off, a condom came on and the magic began to happen. Except delicate flesh and dry latex don’t make magic.
“Stop,” I finally said, my hands pressed against his prickly chest. “This just hurts. A lot.”
“What? What’s wrong?”
Then he prodded me the way a hungry schoolboy would poke a Pop Tart in the toaster oven. His face fell. Not ready yet.
“I have some lube,” he said, reaching into the glove compartment. Of course he did. He slathered some on himself and then me. It was better, until a fiery burning began to emanate from my most tender bits. I pushed him off.
“What the hell was that?” I said, panicking.
“It’s warming.” Warming lube on my raw, hurty cupcake. His eyes were huge. He had no idea what he had done. I sighed, my head falling into my hands. “
Can you take me home?”
As I tenderly undressed to shower, I saw an angry red stubble-burn had spread across my chest and belly. With both hands, I gingerly cupped my poor ka-choo. “I’m sorry,” I whispered to her. “I’m so sorry.” The worst part was knowing he would see my dad in the morning.
In other news, doesn't Ladytron kinda sound like Dolores O'Riordan?
