She, 4

            She popped the MDMA just as a popsicle cart rode by. She laughed.

            “Want a lolly with your molly?” She laughed again at her hilarity. She peeled herself off the grass and waved to the popsicle vendor to stop.

            “And what would this beautiful lady like today?” he asked warmly as she walked up to him.

            She looked at the sickly colourful poster on the side of the cart showing the goods available.

            “Fruity and red,” she said. “Please,” she added.

            “You want a Strawberry Fruitsicle,” he said as he took out the popsicle from inside the cart with a flourish.

            She almost rolled her eyes but realised it might make the situation slightly awkward and refrained. Instead she smiled, gave him the money and waved goodbye.

            As she took her place back on the grass, she thought about the sweet nature of the popsicle vendor. Were there really people like that who existed? People who had enough happiness inside them that they could share it with others?

            And had she ever been one of those people?

            No, she decided. It was a ruse, if not intentional.

            She remembered his exaggerated action when taking out her Strawberry Fruitsicle (which was delicious and definitely cancerous) and she shook her head.

            “Silly,” she muttered bitterly. “And stupid.”

            Her phone rang out and she searched through her bag to find it.

            “Hi,” she said.

            “Hey, it’s after ten and you’re not in the office.”

            “Didn’t I ring?” she exonerated in a reverential tone.

            “Where are you?”

            “Sick. I ate steak last night.”

            “What? Steak? What the hell does that have to do with –”

            “I haven’t eaten meat in sixteen years. Do you really want me to come into work today? I will. I’ll just use my paper bin as a vomit bucket. How does that sound?”

            “Well, fine. But you should’ve called. And do not take that tone with me, you work for me and I will not have insub-“

            She hung up and immediately called back. “So sorry, the call dropped or something. Fucky networks. You were saying?”

            “Ah. Well, it doesn’t matter. Is this just a one-day recovery thing? Or are you handing in sick leave?”

            “If I’m not better tomorrow I will call in an airlift to bring me up to your office window so I can personally hand you my sick leave slip.”

            “Do not take that tone with me! I simply meant do you think you will need more time to recover or what?”

            “It’s pretty up in the air right now,” she responded, languishing delicately in the grass. She swallowed a large piece of popsicle and the cold went to her head. She squinted against the pain and then smiled as the jaunty feeling tingled in her body. Hello, molly. “But if you’d like, you can call me every ten minutes from now until tomorrow morning to see my progress.”

            “Look, wise-ass, I could have you fired for this bull-“

            She hung up and waited five seconds, then called back. “So sorry. Fucky networks.”

            “You did that on purpose!” he spat from the other end.

            “So I’ll call you in the morning if I’m not coming in. I won’t call you if I am because that would be idiotic since you’ll see me anyway. Or would you definitely need more confirmation than my physical presence to know I’m coming in?”

            There was a pause where she could imagine his face, red as fuck, his eyes bulging out of sheer rage, wanting to scream into the phone at her for being a sarcastic fucking cunty bitchass bitch with the cockiest dildo up her hairy saggy fat ugly ass.

            “Fine,” he said calmly and hung up.

            She laughed and lay down in the grass, the high washing through her. She laughed again and sprung to her feet. As she walked through the park, her steps felt light. It didn’t feel like she was moving on her own accord but more like floating through the scene. The crisp morning air felt tingly and her hands were clammy. She put them on her cheeks and shuddered. The feeling was electric.

            She approached a wooded area and started to climb the surrounding rocks, heading into the trees. The autumn leaves scattered the floor, making hues of brown, yellow and orange swirl into a bright cacophony for the eyes. She treaded carefully, trying to make as little sound as possible. She searched through the tree trunks, looking for any human movement through the stillness.

            Then, she saw it through the foliage: a man wearing a navy blue windbreaker. She watched as he stood in a small clearing and rubbed his cock through his jeans. She moved closer until she was behind a tree not more than twenty feet away from him. Now she could see another man approaching the clearing. The first man continued to touch himself as the second slowly approached, eyes alert and cautious to the surroundings. He walked up to the first man and, without introduction, fell on his knees and started sniffing the other’s crotch. He moved his hands under the windbreaker and fondled the first’s nipples.

            The navy blue windbreaker rustled almost soundlessly as the man on his knees undid the jeans to expose the other’s hard, purple-pink cock. As the first man put his hand on the second’s head, pushing his face into his ruddy cock, she saw the white gold wedding band on his finger.

            For some reason, this heightened her senses and she put her clammy palm into her undergarments, rubbing her crotch as she watched the blowjob unfold.

            The married man shuddered for a moment as the second fellow’s mouth wound its way up and down, leaving a coat of glistening spit behind. He pushed the second man’s face deeper and let out a moan, broken by soft staccato as he trembled while the second man licked the head of his penis viciously.

            “You like that?” asked the one giving the blowjob, only momentarily, between mouthfuls of dick.

            “Deeper,” said the windbreaker, as he rammed his pelvis hard, over and over. “Fuuuuuck,” he said in a low grunt through supposed teeming pleasure.

            The second stood up and put his moist lips on the first’s. They kissed passionately, tongues wrangling each other as they groped the other’s body haphazardly, almost as if the human form were a mystery. They did this for several minutes in sexual abandon. The windbreaker pulled the other’s hair as he stuck his tongue deep into his mouth, pulling him close and thrusting his hips. His dick remained rock hard, bending and wrinkling against the trousers, staining it with precum.

            She pushed against her clitoris and a solid breath escaped her mouth. She saw the condensation rise in the air around her head as the second man pulled down the other’s jeans fully, turned him around in one quick movement, dropped to his knees and started rimming him. His tongue searched deep into his ass and the windbreaker gasped, the sound echoing around the clearing as he placed his wedding-ringed hand on a nearby tree trunk for support.

            He pushed his ass back to meet his tongue, slowly winding his hips as he gripped one of his ass cheeks and pulled it, opening up wider.

She continued to toy with herself. Her wetness surrounded her fingers and she pushed inside while her thumb flicked at her engorged clit.

            She shifted and stopped suddenly. Both men were looking in her direction and the windbreaker was already pulling up his jeans. She stepped behind the tree in front of her quickly, cursing herself. They had definitely seen her. The adrenaline pitched through her blood at lightening speed, her heart hammering hard as a giggle escaped her lips.

            Without thinking, she ran in the direction she had come, going full throttle through the woods, screaming with laughter. The leaves became a yellow blur she continuously blinked against, her eyes watering from the chilly air.

            She catapulted out of the wooded area and collapsed on a patch of grass nearby, panting hard through huge belly laughs. After some minutes she sat up, feeling the ebbs of molly starting to leave her.

            She walked uptown and stopped in at a diner.

            “Booth. Window,” said the guy in front.

            She complied and sat quietly, looking out the window at passersby. She started counting how many people were smiling. She got up to ten before getting bored and turning her gaze to the white tabletop. It was scratched and stained with years of dirt that had no hope of being wiped away at this point.

            Stains. They stayed no matter how raw you rubbed. Somehow, something sticks and stays, forever.

            Her mind strayed to what she had just done in the park: the molly, hunting through the woods to see and engage in sexual depravity. She rubbed her eyes and sighed as a waitress approached her.

            “Hey,” she said. She had long curly red hair in high pigtails on her head.

            “Hi,” she replied, rubbing her face again. “Coffee, please.”

            “That it?” asked pigtails.

            She nodded in acknowledgment and went back into her thoughts.

            She could so easily detach. She knew how to completely disregard her feelings as a part of herself. They became dust at her will, letting her physical being take over. It was easier than feeling everything else.

            She thought about him and jerked unexpectedly. She breathed in deep, trying to catch herself, the anxiety inside bubbling up. Would he be at home? Would he be packed and ready to leave?

            She breathed in heavily again, holding back the water behind her eyes. Stop, she implored herself, trying to let her eyes and mind wander back to the people on the street. But the restriction inside her did not abate and unexpectedly she let out a sob. She covered her mouth and looked around quickly to see if anyone had noticed.

            The waitress was returning with a tray.

            “Coffee, milk, sugar (white and brown), mug, and some pie,” said the waitress, resting each item on the table in front of her as she listed it off.

            “I didn’t order pie.”

            “You look like you could use some. It’s on us,” said the waitress as she turned to leave.

            “Hey, wait. I really don’t want the pie.”

            The waitress turned to look at her with a pitiful expression.

            “Honey, it’s cut, it’s on a plate, there’s a fork: do the math. What’s biting your ass anyway?”

            She guffawed in sheer shock at the waitress’ question and shook her head. “You can’t speak to me like that.”

            “Why? Because I work here? Think again, sister – you refused the pie. You better trust that my supervisor will be on my side.”

            She surveyed the waitress for a few seconds and then laughed. The waitress cracked a smile and re-approached the table. “You’ll have the pie then?”

            She nodded and picked up the fork.

            “Big city troubles?”

            She stopped chewing and looked at the waitress in her eyes somberly.

            “Yes,” she nodded, her pigtails jumping around with her head, “big city troubles.”

            “I really don’t want to talk or think about it,” she said, eating another piece of pie.

            “Okay. Enjoy the pie.”

            She ate the pie, drank her coffee and left the money on the tabletop. Before she could exit, the waitress came up to her.

            “If you don’t want to think about it, or him, you should come to my friend’s party tonight. She owns a bar.” She slipped a business card into her hand.

            She stared at the waitress in near horror. Think about him? How did she know there was a him?

            “I don’t think…”

            “Trust me, it’s fun,” said the waitress. “Anyway, just a suggestion. I’ll be there around midnight tonight, maybe see you there.”

            She shrugged, deciding she didn’t have the strength, and said, “Maybe,” turned and left the diner. She hailed a cab, put the card into her jacket pocket without looking at it, and hopped in.

the long road.

i'd been waiting to meet him for months. i'd added him while trolling random guys on facebook. creepy, yes, but he had one if those super-watt smiles that makes you want to feel that happiness.

we exchanged a couple of messages but he was never very forthcoming to conversation and i figured he wasn't interested in me. why would he be? he was perfect and i was a stalker who messaged him on facebook about some arbitrary topic to make the awkward opening only slightly less awkward. he had tons of friends, he was active and glowing and i was stuck somewhere between heartbroken and heartstrong. a real catch.

eventually i gave up and stopped messaging him, i deleted him from facebook after adding him aggressively because i had already embarrassed myself enough. my jaded energy rubbed off on everything i was part of. i was low and scared and unsure and markedly unhappy about every romantic piece of shattered glass in my life.

this year we started speaking again. i messaged, of course, but i couldn't help it. i was scrolling through my whatsapp contacts and there he was. smile and all. we would exchange occasional "heys", sometimes i would message and receive no reply which i began to understand was not an attack on me but simply his busy life. cool.

we stopped talking for a bit again. occasionally i would say hi and he would tell me he was horny or masturbating. i didn't really know how to take those messages. as poignant as my sexual past is (that may be an odd adjective but it has been... poignant), sexually aggressive and straightforward messages aren't my forte. i wield my sexual energy through physical interaction - it's stronger and more authentic that way. sending a dick pic really doesn't get my juices bubbling. whenever he would message in this manner, i would laugh it off and nothing more. the conversation would die until the next awkward hello.

once i asked if he would ever be interested in meeting. we both go to the same university so meeting would not be a problem. he informed me that he was busy with school and that if we ever met it would have to be on his terms and i couldn't rush it. those were his words: his terms. i assumed he meant he wanted absolute control of the situation and didn't want to be pressured. every subsequent message about meeting would either go unanswered or ignored completely - why can't i read "the signs"? because my quest for this love-construct i have created in my head outweighs the signs.

this week i messaged him early in the morning. "jocking" was his response when i asked what he was up to. "jocking" is colloquial for masturbating. i replied, "show me." on came a sleuth of photographs of his erection from various angles. suffice to say, i was instantly drawn in. the conversation meandered along, until he asked my sexual position - a question i abhor over a textual conversation. i answered "vers" but with a disclaimer: that sexual chemistry wasn't something to be decided over a whatsapp conversation.

"i'm top," he appropriated. so there it was - no questions, this was who he was. this was a sexual conversation. this was not about how cute my profile picture looked or how well-spoken i was. it wasn't about my intellectual ability or stimulating conversation. it was about my anus.

"would you let me fuck you?"

"yes," i said - unsure of myself. did i enjoy bottoming? certainly not in a random hookup instance. impersonal, in agony and detached is how i feel if ever getting fucked by a complete stranger. it isn't my sexual caviar. but his smile, the 3083498 penis shots he had sent and the fact that i had been trying to meet this boy in the flesh for a long time overrode the facts that i knew within myself. i put aside who i am and what i know of me for him.

he was a horny fucker that morning and thus he said we could meet later that evening. i was excited. very excited. but i was excited because i wanted to meet a beautiful guy who i could connect with; a guy who would want to hold my hand while i put my head in the nook of his neck while we spoke about last night's episode. the purpose of this meeting was thoroughly sex, though, as put forward by him. he even asked that i bring condoms. but this is where my mind plays the trick: i cannot disengage between what i want and the actual reality of what someone is requesting of me. in actuality, i probably fall too easily, love too much and have a massive amount of hope that is truly saddening, threatening and scary.

throughout the day i messaged him and asked if we would still meet. "yeah, most likely." most likely. the two words that kept me going through that tuesday - even in that instance "most likely" was a shining beacon to me, when in reality it was the invalidation of my emotions. it was not a definite answer, it was not a "yes, i want to meet you and can't wait." it was a consolation, it was a maybe i can, maybe i can't - you're just going to have to wait see if i'm still horny enough to be tantalised by the thought of meeting you to stick my penis inside you. i was the crack addict and the prospect of meeting a guy that seemed sexually appealing and also vaguely sweet was rock. and i was ready to inhale.

we met in the darkness an hour after we had planned. he saw me coming and walked over. "james?" he asked although it was obvious i was james. i was nervous and desperate: i oozed it; i smiled at him, i engaged him, i simultaneously wanted to die and rise. we walked for a bit until deciding to sit in a dark park area on campus. we spoke for some time, nice conversation really about many things. were we forging a connection or was this polite preamble? eventually we went off in search of some adventurous space to fuck.

polite preamble, it was.

we found a spot and started to kiss. it was nice. he is slightly taller than me, the perfect height for intimate kissing, where you can lean your bodies together and feel your heartbeats as if they are colliding in the same space. things got heated and then i lied: i said i didn't have a condom. he wanted to fuck anyway.

"that's irresponsible," was my stance. the real irresponsibility was lying about not having a condom, not being honest about why i didn't want to have sex, giving in completely to my physical ethos and sucking his cock the first ever time meeting him. so, there i was: a hypocrite, a liar and completely emotionally dressed up, pretending to be someone i wasn't and acting like i wanted things without being specific about the context in which i needed them.

"you know, when someone sticks their cock in my ass i usually prefer that i be in love with them." why couldn't i say that? why couldn't i be honest? was i that hyper-aware of his feelings? too accommodating to the stranger i met who would fuck me without a condom because he was so involved in his own visceral experience to care about every other conjecture?

yes, it was the first time we had met but did that mean that my wants and needs were any less than it would be if it was the fifteenth time we had met? no.

honesty is like the trap door you so desperately want to peer through but are too nervous or incomplete to be able to fully accept what it could reveal when opened. it's there - present, abrupt, nagging - but it's shunned. don't be too honest upfront, don't lay all your cards on the table, play the game, don't say i love you first, don't let yourself feel more than the other person, don't tell him that or he will freak out.

where did all this advice come from? and who thinks being this repressed about your emotional necessities is healthy to anyone? holding back isn't going to hurt the guy who "most likely" would see me at 7pm which turned into 8. it isn't going to exonerate him, or fulfill him, or make him feel satisfied that he was at least the person he knew he was. it hurts me - the one who knows that the experience i want is not the one being experienced.

i am so far away from the person i think i am. my mind and actions don't work in tandem and i am probably self-destructive to a tee. and so the long road awaits, the one where i walk and "find myself", and get to some place "within me" - some dodgy, corny hogwash. at the core, the reality is i need to start caring as much about myself as i care about the projection of myself.

and i need to be enough.

sneaky, bitchy, gravy.

if integrity was a bank, you wouldn't be broke
you'd be cracked, demolished, fucking up in smoke
you'd be sippin' on leaves with a little pinky out
pretending to be classy with so much jizz in your mouth
shizz in your mouth, inked lies in your mouth
"why you lookin so trash?" everybody shout
bleeding your stank-ass shit all about
words from the birds, skyfall with gravity
how could a broke bitch like you tackle me?
nothing you say ever computes
do me a favour: get the remote, press mute
you probably believe every single word you say
you got a fugly-ass soul, personally honed everyday
your hair is so big, it's full of secrets
sad-ass fuck - wish you could beat this
eat this, elite this, street this, be this
i totally love your skirt, tell me where you got it
on second thought - fucking choke on a cockpit
i mean, olive pit... i mean, stop it... i mean, cock, bitch
i got that steady flow, you a wide-set vagina
or better yet, let's keep it gender-neutral because you so blah
got something to say then just spit it in my face
but don't spray it because i'm the real mace
pepper me up, salt-shake me all around
i'll show you the most seasoned thing to go down
be real, get real for once in your fucking life
don't just say some programmed shit you think is right

you might be the sneak but i'm already at the peak
add six more shots cuz your shit is weak
tip-toe everywhere like a muh fucking ballerina
cinch that tutu in cuz i can still see ya

http://instagram.com/p/kkmTxdnRvU/

Brown Eyes

They smolder at me

Blazing

Beautiful

Brown

With arches of hair above

Perfectly curled like sand dunes on a beach

Curving down to meet the frothy sea

And lashes so long, they curl upward as if searching for sunlight

Each lip perfect in and of itself,

One arcing upward, with a small dent in the middle, as the line in the small of your back

And the other sitting silently: thick, dewy and soft

I love when you kiss me and keep those brown beacons open

Looking into me, searching, prowling, grabbing, owning

They become smaller as our lips conform

Smaller but still larger

And every emotion seems to pass

Small hands, like mine

Soft, like mine

I want nothing more than to be touched by them

Please:

Run your fingertips along my inner thigh

Press down on my back

Grab my hair and pull

Squeeze my neck in passion as we kiss

Gnarl your palms around my ass and put your fingers in

Hold me from inside in your small hands

And hair on your chin that pricks, the way a pear’s grains gently graze the tongue

It covers some of your neck, growing over the rocky Adam’s apple like blades of grass growing on a lonely moor

I love kissing the apple; pointy, hard, large

It jumps when you swallow

Moving upward and sinking in simultaneously

Then reappearing as if nothing happened

The browns roll away into the back of your head

Leaving behind white – only white

Seen through a small slit between eye and eyelid;

They flutter as you let out a heavy breath

And your body shudders for a moment beneath mine

I kiss the blades on your neck

More shuddering

Then they reappear;

Staring into me from below

Beckoning me in, lulling, cooing, seducing

And I follow without hesitation

There is no need to defy those brown eyes

Costco.

A friend I had dated briefly lent me his Costco card. There’s a branch in East Harlem and I planned an entire day of renting a Zipcar and driving there, using my friend’s card and buying a bunch of shit in bulk which I could now store in the downstairs basement storage unit that came with my apartment (or in all the extra storage space I had installed in the apartment itself).

I felt like a pornstar seeing themselves onscreen for the first time: vibrant, energetic and full of self-esteem that wasn’t necessarily merited. I had found a beautiful apartment in a neighbourhood that was sure to be the next big shit as soon as The New Yorker got a whiff of it and I was about to go grocery shopping for wholesale items like toilet paper and dishwashing liquid.

I had officially succeeded in creating a life of my own.

The day would be long: I had to rent the car, I had to drive to Costco, I had to shop, I had to drive back to West Harlem, find a parking spot, unload all my groceries, hop back into the Zip and return it to a designated spot.

As excited as I was at the thought of saving .89c on each roll of toilet paper, let’s just say, the thought alone of hauling my booty (the groceries, not my ass) up four floors at the end of it all didn’t make my nipples hard.

As I entered the Costco parking lot, I witnessed a woman pushing two shopping carts expertly to her car. A kid was in each shopping cart seat. She motioned to me and I stopped alongside her. “Come take my parking spot,” she said. I nodded and followed her in the car. There was a parking spot right next to her car so I pulled into it and got out.

“Hey,” I said with a big smile when I had walked up to her. She was unloading the contents of her shopping carts into the trunk of her car. Her two kids were looking at me with wide eyes from their posts, strapped into the shopping carts. One was biting on its balled fist and the other had just dribbled the nastiest looking bit of spit from its mouth onto the handle bar of the shopping cart. I prayed to never have the misfortune of using that shopping cart in my life.

“Yo baby,” she said to me smoothly. She had smooth, dark skin and her wavy hair was light brown and reached her waist. She was also tall – taller than me – with a large, round backside and round, jaunty breasts in an all-black get-up. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your stance), while I’m not straight, it doesn’t stop me from noticing these things about women. Not in a perverted way, necessarily, but in admiration.

“I say, you wasn’t gonna get no parking up there. Full of cars – Christmastime in Harlem, y’know.”

I smiled at her and she returned it. She had small teeth set into dark gums; a beautiful smile that also flowed through her eyes. “Can I help you with your groceries?” I offered.

“That’s aite,” she said coolly, “but you can help me put one of these babies into the car.”

I didn’t think much of this, considering I’m from the Caribbean and babies are like oral sex; you love it even if you can’t admit it to yourself at this point in your life. However, when I relayed this story to one of my American friends they thought it was highly “weird” that a woman from East Harlem felt comfortable letting a male put one of her kids into their car seats.

I immediately claimed the kid who hadn’t dribbled. “That’s Allistair,” she said to me. “This,” she raised the dribble-kid out of the shopping cart, “is Frederico.”

I nodded in amusement and put Allistair in his car seat which he didn’t seem to like because he kicked me, punched me and screwed up his face like mushed up dog shit while he cried.

She hurried over to soothe him and buckle him in.

“Have a good day,” I said to her as I started to walk away.

“Have a great day!” she smiled to me and we waved to each other.

I smiled while recounting the incident on my way to the entrance. I had to say, nothing phased me much anymore here. I hadn’t been in New York for a full year of my life yet but already this was my life. The randomness of life seemed so much less random here, and occurrences that might seem oddly placed and even spiritual to others, to me seemed justified in this beautiful City with endless possibilities, realities and reactions.

As I approached the entrance I quickly fumbled in my wallet for my friend’s Costco card. I imagined that if I simply flashed the card nonchalantly, the guard at the door wouldn’t even notice that my picture on my Costco card was of a blonde white dude with blue-grey eyes.

Luckily, at the door the guard was standing a ways off speaking to a suited gentleman. Shoppers were filing in without showing a thing and I just followed the throng while pushing my shopping cart jauntily. I was in; I felt like I was in The Incredibles.

Incredible, James Incredible.

I got my list out and started perusing the aisles. It was like Candyland. Or what I assume Candyland must be like, whatever Candyland is. Seeing all the possible shit I could consume had an overwhelmingly joyous reaction on me. I could buy a bag of fifty Twix bars if I wanted, or get a 20lb can of cranberry jelly if the mood suited me.

All in all, I stuck to my list and added a few indulgences to my cart (like a pack of twelve jars of Alfredo sauce and almost-expired Snickers ice cream bars that were 75% off).

About two hours later I joined a cue to cash out. My cashier was a buxom Latina girl with winged eye make-up and sleek hair pulled into a high ponytail. She was laughing with the last customer and I smiled at her. One thing I’ve learned is that Caribbean charm works wonders in the service industry. Once, a Rite-Aid attendant gave me a $50 refund on a non-refundable phone card after seeing my Trini ID card, which in Rite-Aid code is the equivalent of God donating you his lung.

She smiled at me and put out her hand for my Costco card. I gave it to her and she took a swift look at it and then back at me. “Where’s the cardholder?” she asked.

“Oh, he’s just still looking around inside. But you can just cash me out,” I said coolly. I had practiced this line a million times while I was waiting to be cashed out.

She looked at me pointedly and said, “We’ll have to wait for him.”

I sighed heavily as she motioned to the guy behind me to bring his stuff up.

“Ok,” I said slowly and softly, leaning closer to her over the conveyor belt with my 40%-extra container of cream cheese melting between us, “I didn’t really come with him. I’m new to the city and my friend lent me his card.” I gauged the situation. She was looking at me and listening so I continued, “Can we please let it slide this time? I won’t do it again. I’ll even just go buy the membership right now. Please?” I smiled sweetly at her, my heart hammering away.

“Alright,” she said slowly, swiping the card quickly and cashing me out. “We’re not supposed to do this but at the end of the day, you’re buying the stuff. There’s still the economic exchange.”

I breathed a sigh of relief and looked around with a relaxed grin. My eyes caught the guy’s who was behind me in the line and I doubled back. He grinned at me and I turned back to the cashier immediately.

“I’m James,” I told her and she introduced herself.

“You from Trinidad?” she asked me and I nodded my yes.

“You know some Trinis?”

“Lots of my friends from school.” We spoke a bit more, I paid my bill, thanked her for being so nice and pushed my goods away, glancing back at the guy.

I pulled over at the cafeteria area and hid behind a wall, sneaking another look back at the guy. His back was to me as he cashed out and his butt looked fantastic.

I knew him. We had bumped into each other one night at Industry in the dark entrance hallway more than a month prior. I was going outside for a cigarette and he was leaving. I saw him and said hi and he smiled before one of his friends yelled for him to come with them, they were fucking leaving like, NOW! As in: “Adam! Come on, we’re fucking leaving like, NOW!”

He passed by with his shopping cart heading for the exit and I emerged from my stealthy spot among the Costco eaters and followed him. As he rolled his shopping cart outside I summoned my courage and said, “Hey! Adam!”

Instantly, I regretted it and my lips clenched shut as he turned around. “Hey,” he said with a look of recognition. “Way to work the cashier inside,” he added as he walked over to where I stood.

I smiled and said, “Never underestimate the power of being nice.” He grinned and nodded and looked at me expectantly. “We met at Industry a while ago. Your friend yelled your name, that’s how I know it,” I explained.

He nodded, “Oh, right.”

I realised he didn’t recognise me in the least but I ignored it. “Well, it was nice to see you…” he began.

“That’s it?” I asked recklessly. Something comes over me during these encounters. Firstly, there’s abandon where I engage the situation without giving a fuck. Secondly, there’s panic because I have no idea what I’ve just engaged in. Then, from nowhere, comes absolute arrogance because I’m thinking if I’m going down, I’m going down like a Charlie Sheen hoe – nothin’ less than hundreds.

He stopped and looked at me. “I really have to meet a friend. I just ran here to buy the cake and I’m really, really late.”

I nodded in recognition and started to pull my shopping cart away. “Okay. Have a great day!” I called to him. I figured I had tried, and fuck him if he didn’t think I was cute. Or maybe he had a boyfriend? Or maybe he didn’t like younger guys? Or skinny guys? Or guys who weren’t white and blonde? Or short guys?

“James,” he called after me. I turned around immediately because I didn’t think he knew my name. “Can I get your number?”

I looked into his eyes for a moment, feeling like I was stuck on the pendulum of the cuckoo clock of doom, swinging back and forth between “will he/won’t he?” I then looked at his lips. There was brown stubble around them and I noticed that his bottom lip looked a little like an incredibly skinny baby carrot. It was sexy, his eyes were stunning, his hair defied fucking gravity for cum’s sake…

“Don’t ask for it if you don’t plan to use it,” I retorted.

“I’ll use it,” he assured me. I gave it to him skeptically. “I’m going to use it,” he promised, smiling widely at me.

I shrugged and walked away, wondering how much kismet I could take for one day.

crash

helmet x shades

Born

Born of hate
Bred in rage
Never believing in a state of grace
Fed with guts
Used for glory
Just useless words to a heartbreaking story
Honed with lies
Sharpened by cruelty
Always made to feel stupid and guilty

But you are a man
A man with a beating heart
And you have hands
Hands in which, I beg you, please accept my heart
And an open will with a life less than pure
But together, facing rapture, we have found something worth living for

Guilty, oh!
For everyone's responsibilities
Guilty, oh!
Of your own fluidity
Guilty, oh!
For being hot as City summer heat
Guilty, oh!
Shall I read you Socrates?

We're in bed. We're naked. You're wearing glasses and all I want to do is fuck you.

Guilty, you are not
Born of hate, bred in rage
How could you ever attain a state of grace?
Fed with guts, being used for glory
Feed your heart to me, for I adore thee
Honed with lies, fucked by cruelty
But you were never proven guilty

No, you were never proven guilty
No, you are still worthy
No, you are a master
A fucking disaster
An asshole drinker
A mister maybe never
A fucker emotionless
I'm not fucking impressed
But you were never guilty and that is why I adore thee.

What happens when drugs meet me.

it's always hard to look at someone in the eye and hear that we're not they want - even when we feel that they were put into our lives for the divine purpose of love. knowing that no matter what we do or say, nothing can change who they are and what they want - it makes us powerless and insignificant. it's hard to think of them living their lives free of us; joyous, purposeful and beautiful while we're left holding on to the hurt that comes with the letting go of something that feels like an organ made for our sole intention. we are in agony and feel complete rejection... but perhaps this is the true understanding: our ingrained feelings are not the only emotions in play; the person we love isn't rejecting us - they are simply accepting themselves.

Do the Beyonce. Arnaldo James Photography, 2011

"somalia, bosnia, cuba, colombia, ecuador, mexico, butanne, morocco, botswana, ghana, india, serbia, syria, lebanon, zambia, namibia, bali, mali, chile, malawi, bequia, st. vincent, trinidad and norway, china, canada, USA and UK, nepal, nigeria, ethiopia, north k, myanmar, panama, philippines, nicaragua, palestine and greece, peru and france; it's so simple, do the dance."

a very random thought i had: i will actually never have the feeling of having sex with the woman who is pregnant with my child. if you think really deeply about this, it's a little sad.

i'm not particularly attracted to pregnant women in any way - sexual or general interest-wise - but imagine being in love with a person, deciding you want to have a baby together and then make love to that person knowing that inside, they are carrying the fruits of your immeasurable love. that's some hot emotional sex.

and hot emotional sex is the best sex. you know it.

Give me back to me

Floating through the world -
Child, ward, now adult and scarred.
Your world has never been enchanted with mine
Your thoughts, beyond speculation or speckled sight

We exist independently and freely
Autonomous deities with four hands each:
one to scratch, one to slap, one to maim and one to cover our eyes;
Because looking at the truth is harder than anyone can sing, write or postulate

But we still share the world because we share each other's worlds
Blood, shed and borne in a sphere of loathing, love and constant responsibility
I don't own you but there's still a part of you inside
And beyond leaving you behind, I have engulfed yourself in mine

Why? You are a cretin, a coward
The mercy you have shown my love is pathetic
Grown, manful, sacred fear boils in your blood, to the weakness of your bones
You cannot help me any more than you ever have because you lack the gall

You fear the road not traversed, you fear fighting for righteousness and beauty
For love, for a bountiful break of bread, for the sake of my love, my bread and my beauty
You fear yourself within me, you fear me within yourself but cannot find the words or actions
To show and express the prickly emotions that make the back of your neck tingle or your eyes well with liquid

And thus, you have failed - because where you have gone wrong, you have left dark pieces for me to pull together
(A magician's son would be no better equipped against your twisted forage)
Dark pieces that have become me, that I will not escape forever all because you, in your fumbling existence, cannot understand what it is to fully love

So you will steal more of me, you will plunder my vibrations and you will exhaust my trust
You will exclude my light from your life, you will interrupt every particle I send your way
You will entrench me before I can even attempt to regenerate, you will scrape at my insides like a tiger who takes its claws to the bark of a tree
You will devour my heart, you will corrupt my mind, you will lie and cheat me because you think you can, you will eat my feast before my very eyes, you will ask of me and I will give but you will never return any of it

You are a taker, and you have taken all of me.

Tell me

Tell me how I walk
And tell me how I talk
And tell me how I kiss
Tell every detailed thing

Tell me why I smile
Tell me what a little child
I become around you
Tell me, is it also true for you?

Tell me whispers in bed at night
About life and love and fright
Tell me secrets of yourself
While I pull you to myself
Tell me how the light hits my eyes
When the sun peeks through the blinds
And our feet are tangled into one
Both our hearts, undone

Celibacy

I have taken an oath. It's somewhat like a nun's, except my oath has nothing to do with an extra-spiritual belief. More the belief that I should save myself for love.

Over the past few years, I've come to regard sex as probably one of the most rote things. I've had sex in dark bushes, sex in cars, sex at the seaside, sex in bathrooms, sex in dirty one-room apartments, sex in luxurious hotel rooms, sex on rooftops, sex outside churches, sex next to ogling complete strangers, sex with ogling complete strangers... my point is, as biological and wonderful the act is, I'm all sexed out.

In the quest for love and partnership, the absolute rule for me holds true: honesty. Emotional honesty is probably highest on the list, as well as honesty with oneself. And if I'm completely honest with myself, love and sex are things that I want entangled beyond untangling - like headphones that have been scrunched in your pocket for over four hours while on an over-packed car ride.

Luckily, I've had sex with someone I loved (I think...) within the past year. And the feelings of want, care, absolution, desire and possession were overwhelming. If you can have sex like that, why would you ever want it any other way?

Sure, my dick still gets hard looking at beautiful pictures of men on tumblr and I lust dutifully over guys with hard pecs and biceps with the most resplendent of curves but physicality is so far-removed from emotion that it doesn't matter anymore.

I'd actually taken this vow once before, about a year ago and I stuck to it until I got to New York and men were falling from skyscrapers and I just thought it was silly to deny myself of pleasure. But now more than ever, the drive behind everything in my life is love. And not just love from another but love from myself. It's probably self-preservation or self-indulgence; whatever it is, I think I deserve sex with love. And so I've decided that the simple act of sex is not enough anymore and probably never will be again.

I will forage and plunder (and blunder) until I find someone I care, respect and love enough to know that when we fuck, we will also be making love. Because there are better things than cumming on a guy's stomach while he looks up into your eyes and smiles. Like laying next to him after, maybe not even touching, and knowing that what lies between you is more than words or thoughts could ever express and that right there, in that moment and in that space, you are safe.

"Us"

And he, one day, said, "I am inexplicably tied."

"Tied to what?" I countered, unsure about the direction of the conversation. I looked at him with a confused expression and he smiled, extended his arm and touched his index finger lightly to my knee.

"To this. Us."

I continued to stare into his eyes, waiting for him to look away uncomfortably, or fidget oddly, or cough unexpectedly, or sneeze gratuitously. But nothing - he held my gaze the entire time until I ran my hand through my hair dazedly and shifted markedly and cleared my throat delicately.

"Us?" I asked quietly as I dared to look at him once more. My heart hammered and there was a numb grind in my ears; as if everything was pressing into me, sucking me into a vacuum of nothingness.

"Yes. There is an us - and it's beautiful."

December

I can't forget but won't remember by December.
I tell myself this to feel better, I won't be bitter.
I read, I see, I feel, I sing and try to let it all in.
Just in the hope to let it all go, I let my emotions flow.
I pretend it was a dream sometimes and wish it were real oftentimes.
I write constantly about this, and slowly everything becomes amiss.
Did it really happen, I wonder while I try to not be fonder
Of it, of this, of the not knowing which limits the growing -
The growth of me, the growth of beauty.
The expectation of things to come; Russian Roulette's gun.
If I pull the trigger will I drift assunder?
Or will I return resplendent? Back to independence?
I can't forget but won't remember by December.
Though it will be alright if I do - because it's you.

Cabbage baptism

Yesterday, I went to help my father pick cabbage that he planted himself. Firstly, my affinity for manual labour is nonexistent. In fact, I consider my only useful limbs to be my fingers since they type (and they do that so well).

We got to the field where the cabbage is planted around 4PM - the sun was orange and hot in the sky and the field looked beautiful with huge cabbage leaves sticking out of the soil in endless rows that went on and on. I have no idea how you actually determine whether a cabbage is ready to be picked but my father went around looking at the heads, cutting at them with his machete when he deemed them ripe (do cabbages get ripe?) and then throwing them at me to stack into boxes.

The beauty of this was that I didn't feel too incompetent because cabbages are big enough that you can't easily drop them when they're thrown at you and, even better, their large leaves act as dams for rain water. As the cabbages made contact with my hands, the water inside the leaves would splash onto me. Probably not the cleanliest water, but as the liquid doused my forearms and neck I felt oddly reshaped. Maybe it's because I was catching cabbages, something I never thought I would be doing or maybe it was because mentally I've been trying this new thing where I see the glass half overflowing or whatever but it was a peaceful experience. The sun was warm, the cabbage leaves were billowing and green, speckled with white and I was soaked by the end of the expedition in cabbage water.

Halfway through, my dad and I went to a mango tree across the way and picked a few. We sat down and sucked on mangoes and he genuinely laughed when I described my views on the cabbage-water baptism and it felt like we shared a nice moment. In all, we picked a whopping seven hundred and ninety pounds of cabbage.

Can we please stop and reflect on this for a moment? SEVEN HUNDRED AND NINETY POUNDS. I tried to keep count but got lost along the way but we picked roughly 600 cabbages. It was long, tiring and I can't believe I felt so cleansed by cabbage-picking. I even had enough energy to go run for an hour and a half after which seemed miraculous.

So if anyone out there has the chance to get a cabbage baptism, I definitely recommend it. It was enlightening... or just fun.

Letting go

The past few days have been hectic, with a lot of new shit popping up in my life. It feels like I've reached a bit of a juncture - you know what I mean. There's one of those metaphorical forks in the road - pesky fucking forks - and I have to choose a path.

And in doing some reflecting (as well as reading other online blogs about general life trends/rules/love) I have come to the conclusion that I must fully let go of the past few months of my life. This is clearly a vague statement and probably seems like I'm trying to be mysterious and sexy in a desperate bid to seem interesting. I totally am.

In reality, I've just had the most tumultuous time within myself for the past month with many questions arising, emotions that have been betraying me and leading me to believe a myriad of things that were either completely created by myself or the byproduct of analysis that was completely self-indulgent and one-sided (points for using two hyphenated adjectives. I rock). And so, today I am completely letting go of the past. Not in the truly dramatic "write letters to the people you have unfinished business with and burn them in a symbolic gesture" way (although that would probably be fun and is definitely something I should consider, come to think of it...) but more in the manner of "it's in the past, it was the best of times and it is over." I've been holding on to an idealised and fantastical motion picture screenplay in my mind, trying to make sense of shit that basically isn't real and probably never will be.

And so, on this here blog, I profess that I rid myself of the past and will only hold fond memories of times gone by, but will not have expectations, place ultimatums, imagine ensuing scenarios or wreak my inner-self with havoc and sorrow over things that aren't.

Life is now and I gotta keep the fuck up.

But my heart, it won't.

Now I feel it, now you don't.
Like a grave of forgetfulness,
Leave it behind, I won't:

Can I be transparent,
Or is it all through haze?
My love is apparent,
My heart beats your phrase.

Electric transfer, darkest nights,
Awake, in sleep; I am always haunted,
Farthest reaches of my weak plight,
Wash away your stain, may this be granted.

A burnt root, blackest ash and coal,
With uprooted insides, scattered afar;
Thus, my heavy, sacrilege soul
Is interred in the numbest war.

This isn't pain, that wouldn't be justice,
It wrings and pulls and kicks and wounds.
Your face and body and voice insists
On seeing me through 'til all hope is pruned.

Bare, leafless, adjacent to fact,
At war with what?
It is you I lack.

Now I need you, now you don't.
My mind will forget you
But my heart, it won't.

Saying "I love you."

My question today: why do the words "I love you" freak everyone out? For some reason, we have conceptions that saying these words too early can scare a person away, give them a sense that the individual who has said it is claiming some sort of possession over them and in general means they are clingy.

But does it? We can all agree that relationships should be built on some form of trust and honesty but why do we feel that being honest about our truest and most uncontrollable emotion - that of complete want, care and support - must be hidden until the "time is right". Is there ever really a right time to say these words? Better yet, is there ever a right time to feel them?

And what about these rules that we can never be in love too early? Who writes this shit? We have been completely blinded by Hollywood and literature, where first kisses must happen with intense eye contact and a slow movement of faces toward each other, as if the subjects are unsure about the upcoming action or the sheer energy of the kiss is too much to bear. And when someone says, "I love you," there must be a huge musical crescendo and a dramatic flair because these three little words mean so much.

While I'm not discounting the magic of first kisses and I love you's, the amount of emotional baggage we attach to some of these things (including, but not limited to, first sexual experiences, hand-holding, introduction to friends and parents, being completely vulnerable and honest about every emotion we feel) put them upon this pedestal that is scary and attainable only through some form of divine sign or experience.

And that just isn't the case. First of all, feeling like you love someone is a testament to how open to love you are and how loveable the person you feel the emotion for is. It should not be scary, it should not make you question numerous circumstances and your feelings, it shouldn't make you wonder whether your feelings are being skewed by situations that you are reading incorrectly or over-thinking. You should be ecstatic and truly indulge in the feeling. Not only that, but you should be able to tell the person you love exactly how you feel without them thinking they owe you something, or that everything has changed because you feel strongly for them. And you, yourself, should not feel like it means anything more than it does.

Maybe this is the problem: we hinge more on being in love than there is. Feeling like we are in love is a self-indulgent and personal experience. A true testament to us and our emotions - not the other person's. Yes, we would love for our love to be reciprocated and it is what we all deserve. But our love is not another person's and we should be comfortable with that (as should the other person in question). It is what runs through our own selves and it is completely, absolutely okay.

Who doesn't want to be loved? Who doesn't want to love? One of the goals of human nature is to find a thread of commonality that can make sense of the senseless and put purpose into breathing. Being in love is one of these things - it makes you feel attached and like you belong, like you are living for someone else who you give a damn about and want only the best for. This in no way should be made to seem like a weakness or a curse.

So I've decided the next time I feel it, I am going to say it. I'm not going to keep it to myself because what the fuck is the use? Even if it's only been a month, even if the self-help websites say you don't want to scare him off, even if I am scared of what it can mean and change - it is something that should be shared and felt in its entirety. Denying it only makes it seem dirty and unworthy of being felt which love is not.

It is beautiful - and we are beautiful for feeling it and even more beautiful for being able to say and express it.

tumblr

A Gay's "Guide" to Online Dating

Over the past few days, the Technological Universe has found a way to show me just how slutty I am: I have received roughly 30 or so odd emails from all the dating sites I have profiles on. With subjects like, "James, your next love is literally RIGHT HERE ON OUR SITE!" or "James, open this email - it's free and you're easy", it's hard to ignore the fact that

a) I am dreadfully single
b) I'm not important enough to get regular and personalised emails from friends, and
c) the cosmos are trying to tell me that the next love of my life has a perfectly instagrammed and airbrushed profile photo and is waiting for me somewhere out there.

In our technologically booming society, online dating isn't just a trend, it's basically the way we are resigned to find love. Statistics don't lie, and as a man who appreciates proper numbers I can't help but feel slightly bruised by statements like "People with online dating profiles are three times more likely to find a relationship." The fact is, most of my dates within the past three years have been procured from online sites. And I am no more closer to finding a relationship than I am to stumbling across a cave opening in the Sahara in the shape of a tiger's open mouth with a magic lamp hiding somewhere inside promising three wishes (a nicer ass, an unlimited supply of Neutrogena Combination Skin facial moisturiser and the elusive perfectly-fitting pair of jeans).

With the massive glut of online dating profiles - especially gay online dating profiles - has technology actually done us in? There are literally thousands of these profiles and everyone somehow finds a way to make their lives sound ten times more fabulous, make their skin look eleven times smoother and their personalities shine like gold.

In a completely self-indulgent and retrospective mood, I mapped out the online dates I have been on in the past few months. Some of them procured ongoing "things" (the word things is used very loosely here to mean multiple hook-ups, free dinners or - deep breath - actually dating) while most of them led to absolutely nothing but futile attempts at second dates and bouts of hair-pulling rages where I realised a man who described himself as "good-natured" probably meant "fucked up, three years older than I claim on my profile and a whore."

The really sad fact is that most of these profiles offer completely false hope and most of the men actually never respond, or even better, respond succinctly with "Ok", "Good" or "Fine lol". There have been multiple times I've become completely blown away and excited by reading a man's profile, viewing him scantily clad in his photos and reading the probably-fucked statistics saying we are a 98% match. I should know better, after all. If I wanted a 98% match then I would sit down with an extra-50%-free bottle of Vaseline moisturiser and masturbate for sixteen hours a day.

And once you get to the first date, it's a complete 50/50. The person can either turn out to be a distant relative of Sasquatch or Ryan Gosling's long-lost second cousin. And that's just physically. First date conversations are classed in two groups: good or fucking deranged and terrible. And if the conversation itself isn't deranged and terrible, the acts following said conversation can be disastrous.

For example, I once messaged a guy on OkCupid late on a Sunday afternoon and we met an hour later in Chelsea (I should have known it was going to be bad from the moment he suggested a bar close to W 19th and 9 Avenue aka the whores' playground).

After spending literally two hours sharing margaritas and great first date rapport (wherein I made it clear I wasn't really into the sex-on-the-first-date thing because, foolishly, I was on the quest for love or something), he invited me back to his apartment two streets away. We went, he pulled out his incredibly large cock and got all kinds of bent out of shape when I refused to sit on it. He asked me to leave, said he hated guys with no follow through and then sent me an angry text after saying that he felt jilted because he footed the margarita bill and I couldn't even show my appreciation by giving up my anus. I explained that my anus costs more than five margaritas, thank you very much, and that I had made it abundantly clear - in English, which I was pretty sure was his mother tongue - that sex was not on the table.

Of course, I had no one to blame but myself because I had gone back to his apartment to "watch TV", I looked incredibly good that night in particular and - in his words - I kissed the way vanilla smells.

The worst part about it was his dating profile said (I'm actually copy/pasting here for full effect): "I am respectful and enjoy great company and conversation. Hook ups aren't my thing, I'm looking for something more substantial" yada yada bull fuckery.

A few weeks later, I met an Australian who was roughly the height and size of Atilla the Hun (which was very sexy, aesthetically). We had spoken numerous times on the phone after our online exchanges, his accent was a Madonna-esque hybrid of Australian/American, he had a gorgeous, gravelly laugh and  his profile said something to the effect of "looking for the one" - in not so much a gag-worthy tone.

We met in the West Village for tea late one night and immediately I sensed the chemistry wasn't right. He barely shook my hand, called me "Jack" which is as insulting as smearing dog shit on my cheek and refused to let me pay for his $3.75 cup of tea, which especially annoyed me since I had to break $20 on my own $3.75 cup and wouldn't it have been easier for me to just pay $7.50? We sat and spoke for some time, although I was a little miffed by our initial face to face interaction. By 10PM, he was ready to hit the road and I was ready for a large glass of a mixed vodka drink. As we stepped outside, he informed me that he had just procured a large art installation piece (which I really didn't give a fuck about because in my mind, large art installations and large men who call me "Jack" really don't interest me individually or in conjunction with one another) and would I like to come see it, his apartment is literally one building away.

Against my better judgment I said fine, why not? It was in the direction of the nearest bar anyway and I couldn't get the thought of a vodka/club soda/lemon out of my mind. As we entered his apartment (which was the most impressive thing about the night up until that point, it was huge), he lunged at me and started kissing me like I was a concubine from the Old Testament. He pushed me against his exposed brick wall (was that maybe the large art installation he was speaking about?) and grabbed at my hips with his huge hands. Immediately, I was turned on and extremely confused. After about ten minutes of clothes-dropping against his wall, he stopped and asked me if I wanted a bump. Looking at the large, luminescent creature in front of me (he was very sun-deprived), I asked if he meant what I thought he meant.

Yes, he meant coke.

Ok, I'll take a bump.

Just one?

Yes, just one.

It's pointless if you take just one.

How many would you suggest for it not to be pointless?

At least five or six.

I'm not taking five bumps.

Never mind, then.

Ok.

That was it. I dressed myself, I left, got my vodka drink and purposefully lost his number and never responded to his text to meet for another cup of tea (really, a man who thinks five bumps is the least amount of coke one should do in one go-around can't even go out for a proper drink?) and haha, wasn't it funny that I never did get around to seeing his art installation?

On the other hand, men I've met in the more "traditional" sense have turned out to be less neurotic and more charming. One day I was biking in Prospect Park when I had to hit the brakes really hard to avoid killing a mother and her child crossing the bike path. The bike skidded and I fell on my side in front of every morning cyclist and jogger Brooklyn has ever seen, scraped my elbow pretty badly and wished I could evaporate into thin air. A guy who was riding behind me stopped and asked, "Did you just have a bi-hicular accident?"

It was cute, I laughed and he offered me a hand up. After my fall, we pushed our bikes around the park and had lovely first date conversation - which was simply chalked up to "conversation" considering it wasn't even a date. He lived around the area, he was very handsome and had the kind of eye/smile combination that makes panties vanish in a puff of sexual energy. He even made a makeshift bandage for my elbow scrape with some tissue and saran wrap we got from a nearby hotdog vendor. I didn't even mind walking around the crowded park on a sunny morning with an elbow wrapped up like a piece of pork - he was that disarming. When I was ready to leave, he asked for my number and sent me a text later that day to ask if we could meet for a drink in the neighbourhood.

I loved this particular interaction because it was very romantic, the way we met was worthy of some Bridget Jones hi-jinks and it was easy. There was no "will he/won't he?" online exchange, no fighting to try to meet - we didn't even have a conversation about being gay. The chemistry was instant and our subsequent dates were fun. I met some of his friends, he liked to hold my hand in the street and he knew the oddest tidbits of information about old New York which I love hearing about.

The only reason it fizzled was because I was dating another man and Bike Guy, while charming, intelligent and beautiful, didn't hold my attention in the same way.

The other guy, Ren (who I've written about before) was actually a hybrid: I had met him outside a club once before with very minimal dialogue, then messaged him online only for us to realise we had interacted months before in person. This was also by far the most fun, interesting, personal and deep connection I had felt with any man in New York. So maybe this is the trick? Maybe a mixture of the real world, coupled with cyberspace is what makes a proper click? Maybe reality coupled with the online fantasy is what can really push a relationship into hyper-drive.

Indeed, an online profile is stilted, intangible and can be misinterpreted in so many ways, we should have a tarot card reader next to us while we're on the hunt. And as true a representation we may all want to give, how honest are we really on these profiles? Even if the information is honest, is our relaying of it the same? Information has a funny way of being mistranslated, pictures can be completely skewed (and, in some cases, over ten years old when the subject was fitter, younger and had actual hair colour) and even the online statistics can be fucked depending on the subjects' honesty when answering the questionnaires that are responsible for these percentages.

And even knowing this, I still log on to get my flog on. It's simple, there's a ton of choice and hey, it's easier than approaching some hottie in a bar with Adam Levine's beard and arms. But I have resigned myself to expect the worst. At least then when I meet someone who is everything I want and more, I can pretend that I never really hinged that much on it because I'm too cool and it was all by chance... even if the website said we were a 98% match and his self-summary said, "I am searching for true, irrefutable love oh, and by the way my diet consists of eating anything yet my body still manages to resemble every hot Italian sculpture you've ever seen."

Now, that's honesty.