Sin and Zen, #1

by S. W. Stribling

  I had another beer while waiting for her to come home. I ran the conversation through my head multiple times and no matter how convinced I was that I was right; I knew it would end badly for me. I wasn’t sure if she would pick a fight, but if she did, I wasn’t sure if I could keep my mouth shut. I went upstairs to hang out with my neighbor. She would work up quite a tropical storm of frustration, anger, and fight on the walk up to our apartment. I figured giving her a few minutes to cool off alone would be best.

  There were four apartments above me. Right above me was a Romanian named Petru, sometimes Pierre. He was a kind heart in a heavy man’s body. Above him was Kay, a French guy that grew up in England. He spoke like an Englishman and told everybody he was English. He was the guy who left me to take my India trip on my own rather than coming with me. Above him was a French and Moroccan couple. The French guy was an alright guy, but we never went past pleasantries. His Moroccan wife was a high maiden of Venus. I wasn’t sure how he landed her, but she was a real sweetheart. One of those rare women who didn’t realize how beautiful they really were. Above them was a two-story apartment with roof access where a Dutch guy who I was friends with in the Legion lived. I helped him get the place. It was a nice place, and we would often drink wine on the rooftop.

  I went to see the Englishman.

  Kay was up there drinking alone as he sometimes did. Drinking wasn’t really a vice for him as much as the white powder was. Drinking was usually just something he did as he was high. I was the opposite. I drank, and then drugs came later. I didn’t particularly care for coke. But it felt good, and it sobered you up damn well when you started to feel the Earth sliding out from under your feet. One led to the other.

  He wasn’t high that night that I could tell; he was just watching TV. He either watched Sky News or some music channel, usually in the background as he was cleaning. He was always cleaning it seemed. We hung out. Talked about women. Women was always something we talked about. It was rarely about one in particular, just a general discussion about the experiences we had survived with them and trying to figure them out. He wasn’t a fan of Claudia. He never would suggest to end things though. He would just joke about how much longer we would have.

  Claudia came home about ten minutes after I went up. You could hear the building door open and any apartment door shut no matter which apartment you were in. I finished my beer and used my second as an hourglass before heading back down.

  It was probably about twenty minutes from the time she came home before I headed down. I figured she’d be in pajamas at that point. Maybe in bed, maybe on the couch, but definitely on her computer. On her Facebook. She always played the indifferent mature woman, but she was still a victim for attention like every other human.

  I opened the door and found the lights out and nobody there. I walked over to the edge of the living room to look down into the bedroom. She wasn’t there either.

  I guess she went back out. Maybe that guy called her back.

  I sat there and drink alone as I listened to Bob Dylan. I asked Maverick, my dog, where she went, but he didn’t give her up. Damn dog. I didn’t even finish one beer before I got a call from a friend asking me to join him at a concert. Sure, why not I thought? I knew why not, but I ignored it.

  We met up at my place. We had a beer and caught up for a minute, and he gave me some MDMA. I had become quite the fan of the stuff and usually kept that or ecstasy around, but even when I didn’t, my friends knew the only way they could drag me to one of those techno, rave music scenes was to get me to see pretty lights with a bunch of soft women roaming around.

  It was about a twenty-minute walk to the concert area, and I could already feel the chill that passed, followed by the immediate surge of joy. That initial cool feeling freaked me out a little the first few times I partook in the happy chemicals. I always knew it was coming, so I’d go somewhere that was out in the cool open area and not around too many people. The people would freak me out, and about the same time the cool feeling started, I’d also start sweating like a virgin in heat sitting next to a sensual woman. It would take me about the time of a cigarette to watch that part fade away and then embrace the overwhelming ecstasy that consumed me just after. Ecstasy itself was just as well, but I preferred Molly.

  We were in the line to enter the concert and I had another little bag of MDMA in my pocket when I looked up ahead and saw the bouncers feeling everybody up and emptying pockets. I reached in and put the little bag in that small key pocket above the normal pocket. They had never caught me putting it there.

  I was right again. And we got in.

  The long wait in line probably wasn’t that long of a wait for normal people, but being high made it seem like forever, and I worked up a huge shit. One thing I hated about cocaine, Molly, and any upper, were the shits. It’d hit you and wouldn’t go away. Just build up and become more and more digested until it became diarrhea and your guts exploded.

  I ran to the bathroom, held my beer, and tried to look cool while I waited for a stall.

  I spilled my guts. It just wouldn’t stop coming out. They should sell this for diets. Hell, they should just put MDMA in the drinking water, what a world it would be then. I could see myself running for President and cutting all programs and using a 10th of the money to put the stuff in the water system. What a happy world it would be. Imagine.

  They didn’t have any toilet paper, and I had quite the collateral damage around my asshole and surrounding area. I undressed my bottoms completely and wiped my ass with my boxers and threw them in the trash beside the toilet. Fucking A, what a shit.

  We had a good night.

  It was a damn good night.

  I drank too much beer and too little water. I was still in the learning phase of knowing when to cut off the beer and switch to water with this stuff. You had to drink something. You never felt drunk when high, but when you come down, you only want a buzz to help with the landing. Drink too little and it’ll be depression. Drink too much and it was a blackout. I was near blackout drunk, and if I hadn’t had my babysitter with me, I would have went home in the wrong direction or not at all.

  I got home though.

  I crawled in bed. I thought I was quiet. I probably wasn’t.

  Claudia was there.

  38

  Claudia was pissed the next day, but not too hostile about it. She didn’t tell me where she went or with whom though.

  ‘Just out. With friends.’

  She had a way with words. She stopped speaking to me in English too. It had only been French the past couple of weeks as if she didn’t care anymore if I understood her or not. I did most of the time though.

  I told her about my night, but she didn’t seem interested.

  ‘That’s stupid.’ she said.

  It was, but I’m stupid, and she should know that by now. How could she still be disappointed?

  We didn’t talk for a few days after that and I was feeling wrong and down about it all. The MDMA probably didn’t help. Coming back up and into a normal state of emotional stability, I decided to right my wrongs or at least give her a reason to like me again.

  I planned a romantic evening with candles, wine, massage oil, and sweet music. I didn’t know many Romanian love songs, and didn’t like the ones I found, but it wasn’t about me. So, I downloaded what I could along with some other love songs in both French and English. I also grabbed a video of a fireplace I put on the USB and had that going on the TV in the living room. I was going to grab her at the door and make love to her on the couch. We hadn’t had sex since we brought in the New Year, and that seemed wrong. I also had a couch that was only a week old and we always made love on the couch. This couch was waiting to be broken in.

  With music going and electric flames burning, my queen came home to her man standing in nothing but a bathrobe. I thought bathrobes were sleazy, but they were comfortable and I loved having the hidden exposure.

  She stopped and looked around as she walked in. I s
miled, and she didn’t. I grabbed her by the hand and started my apology.

  ‘Claudia,’ I said. ‘You know I love you, right?’

  She said nothing. She still wasn’t smiling.

  ‘I’m sorry I’m such a dick sometimes. I never was good at being good.’ I stopped. I sounded like a bad song or some douchebag you made fun of on the internet.

  She squeezed my hand but then let it go.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ she said.

  My heart dropped. I stopped smiling, and it was my turn to be silent.

  ‘I’m moving out.’ she said.

  ‘What? Why?’ I understood what she said and the reason for it, but I didn’t want to.

  ‘I’ve been planning to for some time now. I just wanted to wait until I found a place before I tell you.’

  ‘Is this because of last week?’

  ‘No.’ she said. ‘I decided this before.’

  I still felt like shit, but at least it somewhat explained her behavior on New Year’s and made me feel a little less guilty about my behavior. Didn’t change the fact and pain of still knowing it was me she was leaving. It was me that wasn’t good enough to be with.

  I sat there in my bathrobe on the unfucked couch as I watched her walk downstairs.

  Shock.

  Denial.

  Confusion.

  I sat there until I finally fell asleep. She never came back up, and I never went down.

  SHE STAYED IN THE APARTMENT for a month before she moved out.

  It was civil. We went about our days normally and lived harmoniously. There was some awkwardness but no fights or crying. And mostly, I felt okay about it. It had been a long time coming. I figured two weeks out with the guys getting drunk once she finally left and I’d be over it.

  I slept on the couch most of the time. A few nights I went out drinking, but I always came home. In my drunkenness, she meant too much to me. I needed to be around her as much as possible before she would be gone forever. When I would come home on those nights, I would go downstairs to her bed, our bed, in reality, my bed, and just lay on her with my head on her stomach. She would wrap her arms around my head and caress me.

  ‘I’m sorry we didn’t work out.’ I would say.

  ‘I know.’ She would reply.

  ‘I still love you. And I don’t say that to hear you say it back.’

  ‘I know.’

  I would then kiss her little breasts. Run my hands from the side of her face, across her neck, down her side, to her waistline and then pull myself up to her to kiss her. We would kiss and touch. It was nice. Not sexy. Maybe sexy. Just full. Full of everything I needed. We would whisper meaningless expressions of a love fading away, and we would make love. Not our usual acrobatics, but a very slow, meaningful, and savory motion. A dance that was painted in pastel, making love as if it may be the last time. Saying goodbye. In sadness that it was over, in joy that it had happened.

  We would hold each other all night. It felt right. Right because we knew this was right. The moment was right. The past was right. The future would be right.

  39

  It was the end of January and my surgery to have the metal removed from my leg was finally about to take place. I was nervous, all the doctors recommended against it. However, they also said that this was the last chance to do it before it would be too late, too consolidated with the bone to be removed later. I had never been too good at a permanent consolidation. So despite their wishes, I went through with the procedure.

  I was back to being lame again as I had to wait for my leg to heal. At least a week of nothing but bedtime. And then three months of hobbling around on crutches again. I was used to being broken, so the idea didn’t bother me too much.

  Claudia found a place during that time. She took her time, but I really didn’t mind. It was heartbreaking to live with a woman who was leaving you, but she finally found a place for the start of February.

  I was in my week of laying on the couch, unable to move my leg as I watched her walk out the door. My friend, Petru, helped her carry everything. He couldn’t say no to any woman that talked to him.

  It was a lonesome feeling watching it all happen. I wanted it to be over so quickly, and then I wanted it to last forever.

  She finally closed the door for the last time and then it all hit me.

  What a sight I was for such a long time. I didn’t let go with grace; I wanted to know all the ugly details about how she really felt, a timeline of the ending from her perspective, always sending one more email with regret about it the next day.

  She played me along for my feelings or hers for a few months. The first few were back and forth of deciding to speak to her or not. I always eventually did, but I’d go a week or two or maybe three in between and then go right back to my emotionally tormented state as soon as our friendly affair was over, be it coffee, text, or sex. Sometimes ice cream.

  The first few months, I couldn’t imagine being with anybody else, and even though I didn’t want to hook up with anybody else, I did. I found out she had hooked up with a guy while I was in India, named George. This George was also the same fella we were supposed to be meeting New Year’s Eve night. Now she had a plant in her new apartment from him she named after him. I wanted to piss on it when I saw it, or throw it out the window, or both.

  Most of the time, I didn’t care, I kind of laughed, I mean, she was starting something new with him and still calling me over to rub ice cream on her. I knew she didn’t leave me for the sex. I was just shit at everything else.

  It was a confusing and blurry spring.

  40

  The spring seemed to end with a letter.

  I was still in my back and forth pains of the soul over Claudia. Still occasionally sleeping with her for what she would always say was the last time.

  ‘So are you seeing him tonight?’ I said.

  ‘Why would you ask that?’ Claudia said.

  ‘Cause I love the pain, baby.’

  ‘No, I usually only seem him on Wednesdays.’

  ‘Ha, you have him down to a schedule?’

  ‘Yeah, I don’t want to get him too attached so quickly. It was only with you I broke that rule.’

  ‘So he comes over Wednesday night, a bit of hanky panky, and then he’s back out the door?’

  ‘Pretty much. He tried to stay the first few times, but now he knows.’

  ‘I bet he’s already told you he loves you.’

  ‘He has.’

  ‘So why are you sleeping with me?’

  She moved a little. But it felt like a lot since we were basically on top of each other on the un-pulled-out futon.

  ‘I know,’ I said, ‘last time, right?’

  ‘Yes, that was the last time.’ She said, ‘Did you ever read that letter?’

  ‘Letter? You wrote an actual letter? Or do you mean the email? I read the one from last month or whenever.’

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘I wrote you a letter. I put it in your book.’

  ‘Which book? When?’

  ‘A long time ago, just before your trip to India,’ she paused. ‘I think it’s in that big black book you got from your South African friend.’

  ‘Easterhouse?’

  ‘No...’ She still hated him.

  ‘Ah,’ I said, ‘The other Slater.’

  ‘You should read it.’ She said.

  We weren’t as sweaty anymore, and the breathing had slowed down. My penis was getting hard again from being pressed up against the side of her leg and ass. I grabbed her. I loved to manhandle her since she was so thin, and I’m not so big I can do that with any woman.

  I threw her on her side, biting and sucking her neck just below her right ear, firmly pressing my hand down her chest, up to her hip, and then down to her clit. I rubbed it as I positioned myself in a way that my now hard penis found its way between her legs, right in the crosshairs of bottom ass and upper thighs. I reached my hand down further to grab the tip and push it up inside of her. Her back arched and her h
ead pushed just below mine, with our cheeks touching and the corners of our lips making desperate attempts to taste each other.

  She turned, and we kissed. Kissed hard and with meaning. The meaning of passion and no other. She was extremely wet and I could feel it running down the side of my penis and then down my waistline.

  I rolled her to her stomach and sat up. Penetration was the key now. I slid my thumb off the bottom of her vagina and rubbed her asshole with her own juices. I did it again until it was ready and then slipped my whole thumb in. Sometimes rotating it, sometimes in and out, but mostly just rubbing that thin piece of skin, that fleshy wall between her ass and her vagina, my thumb and my penis, feeling it all.

  We were animals now, and I felt like the lion king. I picked her up from her waist into a doggie position and stuck my nose and tongue into the center of the world. She danced around moving herself so she could grasp the back part of the futon with her hands and push herself onto my face.

  Once I decided I should come up for air, I grabbed her by the waist and put myself back inside her. One hand reaching around to the front; to grab, to caress, to press, to possess.

  I pushed harder and had her pushed full body against the back of the futon with her knees in the bend and her feet hanging off the front side.