The Song of the End of the World, Part I

Summer, 1999

After scoring and winning the second game 11-5, and thus winning the first match 2-0, and watching Ian get mad, and then offering him a lemon Powerade in consolation and grabbing a grape one for himself, Joseph asks Ian a question.

"So what's it like? This reaction of yours where you see hot chick legs in public?"

Ian's sweaty face lights up yet gets all of a sudden very serious. "Ok: So I stop dead in my tracks," he starts. He stares into the distance, eyes widened. His talk, faster than usual. His tone and manner has adopted an urgent-yet-authorative, quasi-military quality. He continues: "Eyes darting wildly up and down them desperately striving, rushing, to take in every visible square inch since this moment won't last forever. Eyes dart up to the face too and if it’s a sexy angel or a sexy devil this whole thing skyrockets. I'm in a daze of disbelief, awe, bewilderment. A terrible pang of... anticipated loss, self-loathing, self-pity, resignation! At what will most probably end up being yet another unfulfilled reward hits me, right in here, smack in the middle of the solar plexus, see??"  Ian smacks just under his sternum with the palm ofhis right hand.  "Salivary glands start aching, scalp starts aching, balls start aching.  Hands start trembling. Sweat runs down scalp. Sweat runs down crack. Sensory perception, triples. Heart rate, cuadruples. This fucker? Quintuples. Those two things, man. Those. Two. Fucking. Things. I don't know. That pair. That dumb, fucking pair. That functional pair. An evolutionary marvel, but corrupted by culture, fashion, lust, vanity, thrown foot-first, pun intended into the face of the instinct-laden male. Functional marvels but now thrown into the field of aesthetics, and yes, eyes darting wildly. Right foot, right thigh, left calf, right shin, left foot, right thigh again!  Face.  Left knee, left upper thigh, right ankle, left knee. Face. Right lower thigh, left calf, right calf, left calf, right calf, left foot, left upper thigh, right knee, repeat. The rest of the world around a muted blur."

Joseph finishes his Powerade. Ian goes on.

"Chest hurts. Balls hurt again. Motherfucker utters, 'Je-sus-fuc-king-mo-ther-hell-damn, godfucking damn damn damn damn damn... Damn! FUCK! DAMN! Jesus H, fucking CHRIST! Fuuuuccck... My god, Jesus, look at that, Jesus, look at that...'

People, staring."

"Damn", Joseph mutters.

"Overwhelming. Overwhelming. You know though, right, that this has nothing to do with... normal sex, right?  And it's not about coming up to someone at a bar, or the library, wherever, not about coming up to someone you see somewhere like that.  This is an object in tje round in the public realm that you see for the first time. Has to be a stranger. Total stranger. Someone new. Someone first-time-seen. Nameless, mindless, soulless, just a physical object, just an entity, just bone, flesh and skin, just another animal, another hairless hapless animal under the sun. Speaking of, the more daylight the better. The more exposed legs the better. If she's walking, better. If glistening due to perspiration or sebum, better. If among the midtown dwellers of the bell curve regarding skin pigmentation, better. Outliers only welcome in selected cases. If the flesh very subtly quivers upon impact at every step, better. If muscles discernible at work underneath that precious skin and fat at every step, better. If no eye contact, better. Cellulite, less welcome. Tiny little hairs more welcome. Wrinked sags, far less welcome. Contact redness from just having had them crossed during a two hour lecture, more welcome. The occasional scar if not too feisty or extroverted, welcome. Tatoos, less welcome. Aaggh!! Hopefully she's not some ultra-fast-walking, toilet-seeking, can't-hold-it-in-much-longer-Speedy Gonzalez-type bitch, too. Now! Legs have to have shape to them, you know? Shape? S-H-A-P-E, shape. 'Three-dimensionality'. Thick without being fat. Cause fat kills shape, normally. Mesomorphs usually the winners. Some endomorphs. Not obese bitches of course. Rarely skinny bitches though. Proportions! Slightly longer lower leg than thigh. Slightly longer thigh than lower leg. Both work. So many fucking variations. So many shapes. Or skinny chicks with smooth, low-muscle-toned, thin thighs, but then juxtaposed with angular, thick, emmusculated lower legs, fuckers thicker than those thighs. Low calf and Soleus insertions evening out the leg. Oh yeah. Fetishes. Let's talk fetishes. You throw in some tall shoes, wedges, pumps, call 'em the fuck you want. What they do, they bring the leg closer to you, see? Closer to eye-level. Put them up on freaking fucking pedestals. Like all of a sudden, now they're objects. Like fucking art? Art! On display. Shit. It has all been visual and from proper, well-mannered, respectful distance up til now. Gotta admit I have no idea what will happen the day I actually act out what I usually just dream about, kneeling on the floor just in front of a pair these idols, just as when I was toddling about at fucking three, planting my big, trembly, sweaty, richly innervated say right palm, on the back of her knee; my other big, trembly, sweaty, richly innervated left palm, a foot or so above the other, planted right where thigh becomes cheek, then run the popliteal palm down, curving convexly down along thick, round calves, down slowly to meet her grab-worthy, sufficiently-thicker-than-will-allow-the-tip-of-my-thumb-and-middle-finger-to-touch-going-around-it-part-of-the-lower-leg-just-below-the-calf-and-just-above-the-ankle, you know, then down the ankle to the base of the foot, my femoral palm then going for the whole ride, sliding down along the back-of-thigh to feast in dermis thanks to ample, indifferent, sweet-smelling, friction-easing clear sebum from the cat while at the same time taking in the tenderness of that primeval layer of subcutaneous fat, the primeval cushion that deliciously rounds the sharp edges off of all subjacent muscularity, you know? Starting with both heads of her glorious Gastrocnemius, her single double-peeking Soleus, all the way down to, ah, connect, with the ... Calcaneal."

"The tendon."

"Right. Then my tarsal hand, back upstairs, this time planting it just above the patella -- on the front this time of the leg – to take in some fine, scrumptious Vastus Medialis. Then hear the sound of healthy flesh. Giving that fleshy lower thigh right, you know, above the knee, you know? A single loud solid slap. 'Splat!' Then do it again. Three times is enough. Cause this all needs to be processed and appreciated internally also, you know?"

"So, you're looking forward to this... casual ... encounter. Happening. Someday." Joseph lays down the empty Powerade plastic bottle and stands, picking up the basketball and resting it against his side under his arm.

"You know, planting eyes on... the one. You know? That one female walking by with her naked legs on full display and I just won't fucking resist and will actually carry that shit out. And that she'd be cool with it? Fuuuuckk. That would bring the odds of that actually happening down to like literally zero."

"But you're looking forward to that, though. Right?"

"Don't know. Actually. You know?"

"Why not?"

"Well..."

"What?"

"Shit man."

"What?"

"Well, if it were to actually happen... if it were, could be I like... fucking die that day. You know?" Ian is looking at Joseph straight in the eye. He tosses his empty Powerade bottle behind his back, it hits the chain link fence that separates the court from the park, then noisily hits the concrete of the court and bounces a few times and rolls back before coming back to rest right against Ian's ass. A few seconds later, Ian's stern expression relaxes. His eyes narrow slightly as his upper lip pulls back to reveal his gumline and then a wide smile. He starts laughing.

Joseph smiles, then laughs too. "I bet, bro." He drops the ball from his side and catches it by his thigh before it hits the ground. "I bet."