Jay Fox - THE WALLS

“Implied by what? He just went off the fucking handle, man, about fucking God knows what. And what's this shit about the physionomical ? Are you just making this up as you go along?”

“Hey, I'm just a little wound up right now,” with a finger on the nose.

“That's no excuse to just fucking rage out like that. Did I ask for a fucking polemic against someone as…as…fucking marginal as Andrea Dworkin?”

“Polemic,” he giggles.

“…”

“All right. Fine. My bad, man,” Tomas begins as he looks around. “I didn't mean to explode on you there.” He stretches his arms out. “Hugs.” He receives a wry glance. “Hugs, man. Fucking hugs.”

People from as far as ten feet away are staring at us. To assume this to be due to the earlier commotion would be correct, but it misses the more important element here: there's no one within ten feet of us even though the place is fairly crowded. It's a very uncomfortable situation to be in — not that this is odd; it's been something of a reoccurring theme over the course of the past twenty-four hours. I think about this, the past twenty-four hours. Exactly one day ago I was being roused from sleep by a passing train, Vinati in my arms, the scent of her hair manipulating my dreams. And now I'm hugging Tomas in some shitty hipster club in Williamsburg. People are taking pictures. If I am to be defined by my presence on the Internet, the girl a few yards away potentially holds a large degree of my personal essence on her digital camera.

“You want that drink?” Tomas asks once I pull away from him.

“Sure.”

Equanimity has never been his strong suit. Furthermore, he's drunk; and when he's drunk, you never really know the contours his harangue will assume. This is the first time it's been directed at me…well, the late Andrea Dworkin and me. Typically it's just the dead, the powerful, or both: Goldwater, Buckley, Reagan. At times it's the typical whining that one encounters when discussing politics with those on the left — about their rationality and open-mindedness vs. the evil chaos propagated by the right under the auspices of freedom and democracy. Then again, this is better than discussing politics with those who are so far on the right that they honestly believe that their opinions have been marginalized even if said opinions are little more than snippets of populism taken from headlines and the soiled oratory that goes by the name of punditry. I guess it's common for people on both sides to claim their opponents' positions to be ubiquitous in the media, Hollywood or otherwise. What they both fail to recognize, however, is that the media, by its very nature, is a business, and that, as a business, its only goal is to have as many consumers as possible. Consequently, the news is neither liberal nor conservative (or, if it is, it is only so accidentally) — it is sensationalist, knowing only that bloody waters equal profits (unless that blood is seeping from a portion of the conglomerate of which they are a part). This is the sad fact of news: sensation and alarmism both sell a hell of a lot better than conscientious reporting, which has a nasty habit of painting everything in oatmeal gray.

“Again, I'm sorry about that, man,” he says as we stand waiting behind a dense wall of people at the bar. I turn around to see Lindsay by Aberdeen's side. He raises his can of beer and shakes it. I guess this means he needs a refill. “I just have this thing about Dworkin.”

“And you decided to take it out on me.”

“Look man, I'm not blind, okay. I know that you think that James and me use our…I guess fame to, you know, get laid. And you're right, man. You're totally right. But wouldn't you do the same fucking thing, man? I feel like any guy's going to do the same fucking thing.”

“Well…”

“Okay, fine, if you weren't afraid of fucking girls, you'd totally—”

“I'm not fucking afraid of women.”

“Women!” he laughs. “Of course not. But riddle me this: How come you never stick your fucking neck out there, man?” he says as he smacks me on the arm.

“What do you think I've been doing for the past two and a half weeks? So, what, talking with complete strangers every fucking night isn't sticking my neck out there?”

“You have no problem talking with men. And it's not that I think you're into dudes; I just think that you have this idea that…women…need to be respected — which is good, it's beyond fucking necessary — but that, you know, you don't just respect them. It's like you think that respecting them means avoiding them.” I scoff. “Look, I'm just saying this because that's how I fucking used to be, dig? I used to think that women couldn't be approached because it…what's the fucking thing in football? You know, where the defense jumps offsides, but it's different than offsides for some reason.”

“Encroachment.”

“Yeah! Encroachment. You're like a portable dictionary, you know that?” I nod slowly. “Yeah, but you think any advance, you know, encroaches upon them. Upon their independence. I thought that way, too, but I've found that women respect a man capable of approaching them without being creepy about the whole thing, dig?” He notices a derisive look. “Hey, if you think I'm just blowing smoke up your ass, then tell me to shut up. Shit, man, just say that I'm wrong, and I'll just drop it.”

“You're babbling like a fucking fifty year-old lush, and, more importantly, you're wrong.”

“Okay. Then fucking riddle me this: When was the last time you got laid?”

“Twenty-four hours ago.”

“…”

“You were saying something, Tomas?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait? Hold on. You gotta go back. What the fuck happened?”

“I don't know. It just kind of happened.”

“I always love that. It? 'It' just happens when you blow a transmission or break a glass. Getting pussy requires skill, tenacity, fucking genius, man.”

“I didn't do anything special. One thing just led to another.”

“Fine, fine, I believe you.” He slaps me on the back. “So who was the lucky lady? Did you finally bone the notorious…uh, what's her name? The Indian broad?”

“I've never told you about her.”

He shakes his head. “You fucking drunk bastard,” he laughs.

“What?”

“You don't remember telling me all about her. The Indian chick. What's her fucking name, man?”

“Vinati.”

“Vinati. Exotic shit, man.”

“Yeah.”

“So you nailed her. That's fucking great man. Fucking solid.”

“Wait…how the fuck do you even know about her?”

“Remember the other night, like, last week sometime. We were in that shithole in Windsor Terrace — the one with all the TVs and the really fucking fat guy in the Snee jersey. Remember? Snee! Who the fuck has a Snee jersey?”

“…”

“Anyway, you wouldn't fucking shut up about her; you just kept going on and on about how much you dig her: how beautiful she is, how smart she is, how you thought you had your shot some night a few weeks ago. Yeah, you said that you totally could've fucked her had it not been for this shit that the bartender made you. It was called,” as he rubs his temples. “It had something to do with sodomy.”

The girl standing next to Tomas turns. She has a look of dumb perplexity on her face.

“A butt-fucking cowboy,” I say.

“Butt-fucking cowboy,” he repeats with a laugh. The girl shakes her head and turns away. “And then you passed out on the can.” The girl goes to turn around again, but decides against it.

“I didn't pass out on the can, man; she—”

“No, dude, I'm talking about the night in Windsor Terrace. You passed out on the can, the bartender threatened to call the cops, and I had to drag your drunk ass into a cab. Snee helped out.” I'm staring to him blankly. “We were with fucking Randy, man. We slept at his place. Remember? On Seventeenth Street, by that one house with the cross in front of it.” Pause. “You know the house, man,” with what would be italics.