The Illusion of Life

Life is Beautiful

Days later he stands in a motel shower, watching pink tinged water spiral down the drain. They pay by the hour but it takes less than twenty minutes for most of them to come so he has time. He wonders how long it would take Scotty to come. An eternity maybe. Or maybe only twenty minutes too.

The money comes in quick when he doesn't care who fucks him or how they do it. Enough booze numbs the blood and bruises. Enough booze keeps his mind too foggy to question why he's doing this. He drinks so he can let them fuck him, he lets them fuck him so he can drink.

He might be getting a reputation. All you need is bottle-brunette hair and hint of a six-pack and he's yours for the low, low price of the cheapest bottle of vodka you can find, half what any decent whore would charge, and whatever a human soul goes for these days.

He begs men who almost look like Scotty to fuck him till he bleeds. He drinks enough that when he looks at them he almost can't tell the difference. He says things sometimes that he can't remember later, drunk, murmured words that might be something like forgive me and I love you. They fuck him harder and they walk away and sometimes he cries.

He turns the shower off and dresses in his work clothes. Work clothes used to be a tank top, grease stained slacks and sometimes a pair of worn out welding goggles; now they're tight pleather pants and a shirt that wouldn't fit a kid half his size. He doesn't look at himself anymore; it was hard enough before he became this desperate, pathetic whore.

He stands on his corner with a half bottle of cheap whiskey at his feet and sips it when the johns aren't looking.

It's been slow all day; the hint of snow about to come down keeps all but the most desperate of the johns away. His wallet's running empty, his bottle running dry.

Even with the whiskey, it's too cold to be out, and his work clothes are barely adequate to stave off frostbite. He drinks until his vision goes hazy and he can hardly stand straight. The desperate ones don't care how drunk he is.

Then comes the first man to cross his corner all evening, wrapped up in a downy coat, face half covered by a scarf and hat. He walks carefully, deliberately, eyes locked in front of him like he knows this neighbourhood and thinks catching someone's eye is enough to catch something else.

Broad shoulders, his footsteps light and fluid, hint of brunette hair beneath the hat. He'd be perfect on the best day. Toddy is desperate enough to risk it.

"Hey, mister," he calls, "looking for a good time?"

The stranger freezes, completely unmoving. Maybe he misjudged. At least if he spends the night in a jail cell it'll be warm.

Slowly, the stranger turns to him. Toddy doesn't meet his eye, he never does. They don't notice that he doesn't look at their faces. It breaks the illusion too quickly.

He tilts his head back, bears his neck like an animal in submission and shuffles his hips to draw eyes to his ass. It's a practiced routine. The shy ones like it--makes them feel like he wants them, he supposes. In a way, he does.

Of all of them, this man resembles Scotty the most. It's fucked up how much Toddy wants him. He's fucked up. He wants this more than he's wanted anything in a long time. He grabs the bottle by his feet, chugs and tries not to think about it. The man who could be Scotty watches silently and he might be shaking beneath that feather down parka. Toddy can't tell if it's rage or anticipation.

"Don't you want to feel good?" Toddy asks, running his hand along the neck of the bottle. "I can do whatever you like."

"Toddy?" the man says. It's a strange, choked noise, with just the right long-familiar drawl. Toddy closes his eyes and remembers the game. If he wasn't so disgusting and desperate, if he wasn't the kind of man Scotty would look at with disgust, if he wasn't standing on a pick-up spot waiting to get fucked by a stranger. Toddy has a good imagination. He's going to get fucked by Scotty tonight. He swigs the whiskey.

"Yeah," Toddy says, "that's me." He wishes he had never told anyone his name. But the name doesn't belong to him anymore. The man who was Toddy Smith is long dead, replaced by this moving automaton made of booze and come and blood. His name belongs to strangers now.

The man who will be Scotty tonight hisses like all the air has been punched out of him. He stares at Toddy's feet and the streetlight catches on his shoulders. He moves minutely, like there are insects buzzing under his skin.

Maybe it's his first time.

Toddy swigs the whiskey.

"What are you doing?" Scotty asks.

It's a strange way to ask, but he's not the first guy to be coy about it. They're usually the vicious ones. Repressed. Frustrated. Needing something almost human to channel that aggression into. They like it when he cries.

"Whatever you want," Toddy says because he has no pride and he has no shame and there is nothing that he wouldn't do for a man who looks like Scotty.

"What?"

"Blowjobs, handjobs, whatever. You can fuck me as hard as you like. Kinky shit too, if that's your thing."

"Oh." He pauses like he's only just figured it out. As if anyone could look at him and mistake him for something better. "Is that... is it the money?"

Toddy rolls his eyes. "Well, I don't do it for free."

"Are... are you okay?"

He wonders what that's supposed to mean. Clean? Sober? Up for rough stuff? He doesn't have the patience for this kind of bullshit anymore. The john still won't look at Toddy, like a shy college kid asking out his crush. It's almost as pathetic as Toddy is.

"Are you fucking interested or not?" Toddy asks.

"Can't I just take you for dinner or something?"

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

"No, I just want to –"

"I'm not some high-class, fucking escort. You pay, you fuck me and you leave."

"But –"

"Look, if you're not into it, fine. March on your merry way and never think of me again."

"Is... is that how this has to go?"

"Fuck me or don't. Just stop wasting my time."

The man makes a desperate sound, half choked, like he's forgotten how to breathe. Toddy thinks it's strange that he keeps doing that. He'd choked on his name like it was somehow shocking, and now he's holding his breath like he doesn't know how to say yes. "Okay," he says. Toddy thinks it sounds more like he's agreeing to kill someone than to fuck them.

Toddy looks at the bottle in his hand and then he looks at the stranger. This man whose face blurs into a thousand men and a thousand fantasies. This man whose eyes he can't meet and who he can't look away from. He is nothing like Scotty and everything like Scotty.

He wonder how tonight will end. With the life draining out of him, with the illusion of Scotty's voice in his ear, with Scotty's cock down his throat or Toddy's blood on the sheets. What would it take to make this man kill him, to turn this Scotty into a murderer? What kind of man does it make Toddy for considering it? He thinks maybe Scotty would be more disgusted by that than anything else.

He closes his eyes, but only for a second. He has always been a fantasist. Once upon a time it made him who he was: world class inventors need to imagine like world class chefs need to taste.

He opens his eyes and sees Scotty. Only Scotty.

"I can stay with you?" Scotty asks.

"Sure," Toddy says. "If you're paying."

There is something wretched and painful that contorts Scotty's face, a tension in his jawline that is too much like the real thing. Of all the men who've fucked him this month, none of them have hit so hard.

Toddy looks at his feet and tries to remember what confidence felt like. "What do you say, soldier? Want to fuck me?"

Scotty says, "Okay," and sounds like he's going to cry.