Jack Moody

A Series of Poor Decisions, Part 1

You are drinking at the Guilty Sparrow. It does not matter what day or what time of day it is, as this is the sole activity you now participate in if you’re not jerking off, vomiting or fucking—if not all three at once. You are with your old coworker Joseph, as you often tend to be these days. He is a heavyset, perpetually depressed Hispanic hopeless romantic—always stooping low over the bar counter like a dying tree to illustrate this—with a serious drinking problem to match yours. In the last few weeks you and Joseph have taken to each other’s company quite well. You’ve always stayed friends since the day you were fired, but he finds company in misery, and he has been unable to find anyone more miserable than you. His girlfriend of five years left him when he asked her to move in. This was a year ago now but he still talks about it. He can drink more than you and you don’t like that, but you love him.

He’s talking to your friend Miles. Miles is a gaunt and unpredictable drug addict with an underlying issue of undetermined mental illness. His constant erratic movements and incoherent rambling always unsettles you until you’ve drunk enough to ignore and then enjoy his unique brand of company. You’ve known him since the two of you were four years old and he had frosted tips like a member of the Backstreet Boys. He used to mix cocaine and heroin in a needle and shoot that. He wore sleeves to hide the track marks and became very paranoid when people asked about why he wore his sleeves in ninety-degree heat. After the two of you talked he got on methadone and kicked the junk. He still does every other drug but at least he doesn’t do heroin, and you love him.

Miles and Joseph are talking about the baggie full of pills that Miles has pulled out onto the bar top.

“This is Ecstasy,” he says. “My guy told me it’s the best shit he’s gotten.” He opens up the baggie and pops two into his mouth. “You want some?”

“Fuck yeah I do,” says Joseph. He reaches out and pops one in his mouth as well. He begins chewing.

You look over at them from the side of your vision. Before you can ask him why he’s chewing an Ecstasy pill, Joseph swallows and says, “This is a Flintstones vitamin.”

“No, it’s not,” says Miles. “It’s Ecstasy. My guy told me it was the best shit he’s ever gotten.”

“Yeah, the best Flintstones vitamins he’s ever gotten. You bought a bag of vitamins from your drug dealer. Mine was cherry flavored.”

Miles leans in and peers through the plastic like a scientist studying a petri dish through a microscope. “You’re fibbing.”

“I’m not. How much did you pay for that?”

“A hundred fifty,” Miles tells him.

“You just bought twenty dollars worth of Flintstone vitamins. How many have you taken so far?”

“Four, I think.”

“And how’re you feeling?”

“Nothing so far, but it just takes a second.” Miles pauses and ponders this, staring through the shelves of liquor in front of us like he’s experiencing a war flashback.

Joseph picks up the bag and pulls out a little green one, shoves it front of his face. “Dude, it’s shaped like a fucking dinosaur.”

Miles looks at this and you can see the exact moment his heart breaks.

“What you’ve taken has made you healthier. You have literally achieved the opposite effect of Ecstasy.” He eats the little green chewable in his hand. “Apple.”

Miles is distraught. He gets up and leaves to call or stab his drug dealer. This is when the person who’s been sitting on the other side of him is revealed to you.

Her hair is shoulder-length and curled and strawberry blonde. Her eyes are large. Her legs are long and bloom out from a pink pencil skirt. She sits erect, almost regal, despite her apparent intoxication, suggesting it had been hammered in at an early age to remain ladylike, regardless of how her own personality would eventually steer her towards anything or everything otherwise. She is sitting alone. You lean across the bar without hesitation. There is no time for hesitation any longer. There are too many holes bleeding from every part of you, and the irony is that the more you fill them with what they require, the faster you are going to die anyway. There is no time for hesitation.

“You are fucking gorgeous,” you tell her.

“Ah hehehehe.”

She laughs like that, high-pitched and overacted. You do your best to ignore this.

“Well, thanks,” she slurs. “You are too.”

Joseph butts in, taking it upon himself to be your wingman. “Y’know, my boy’s an author. You ever fucked an author? Do you read?”

“Ohhhh is he?” This doesn’t appear to impress her but nonetheless she moves to the seat closer to you. “And who are you?”

“I don’t think she reads,” he whispers to you. “I’m Joseph,” he redirects to her. “Isn’t my boy good looking? Who wouldn’t love that face?”

You’re not sure if he’s just trying to get you laid and live vicariously through you or he’s gotten so drunk and lonely that some feelings are coming out.

“He’s gorgeous,” she says and grabs your leg.

“I’m Henry,” you tell her. You feel the need to reciprocate, honor the friendship and maybe get Joseph’s dick sucked instead. “What about my friend though? You think he’s cute?”

She appraises his appearance through one eye. “You’re both cute. I’d fuck both of you.”

Anna the bartender comes by and rolls her eyes. She’s become accustomed to a very different Henry than the one she’s been used to in these last few weeks. “Another round boys…and…lady?”

“Shots!” Joseph shouts. “Three tequilas, no training wheels.”

“Wooo! Shots!” the girl screams, throwing her hands up. “You guys are so much fun. Like ah hehehehe…so much fun. Her bedroom eyes drift between the two of you.

You realize as the shots are put out in front of you that you never got her name. This doesn’t bother you.

Joseph holds up his shot. “So, what’re we cheersing to?”

“I wanna fuck both of you at the same time,” she says.

Anna makes a face like she bit into human shit and walks away.

“To fucking both of us!” he screams. He looks at you and shrugs as the shot goes down, like, So…down?

If you were sober this would be one of the worst ideas you could possibly think of. Right now you can’t imagine why this ideas has never been expressed until this moment.

“I want one of you to fuck me in the ass while the other fucks my mouth,” she says.

You almost choke on your tequila. “Yeah, yep. We can do that.”

You and Joseph exchange glances. “We’ve gone this far,” he mumbles. “It would be uncouth to leave her hanging at this point.”

“It would be ungentlemanly,” you agree.

She eyes both of you. “Okay, okay, lemme just check with my boyfriend.”

Her boyfriend.

Joseph launches into a fit of laughter.

“Is this like, an open relationship situation?” you ask.

“I’m not sure. I can’t remember,” she says. “Lemme call him and ask.”

Joseph looks at you, his entire face lit up. You’ve never seen him enjoying himself this much before.

Call him and ask? you mouth to him. She’s fucking crazy.

He shrugs and talks with his hands: Is that bad?

I didn’t say that.

She steps away to make the call and see if her boyfriend will give her the okay to get double penetrated.

Joseph watches her walk out the door with the phone on her ear. “What would you rather take?” he asks.

“I’d rather the mouth but I’ll take one for the team if you need me to.”

“Not a fan of anal?”

“Not for me, no.”

“That’s fair. Alright, it’s settled then,” Joseph decides. “Makes you wonder why her pussy wasn’t an option, though, doesn’t it?”

“I was just thinking that,” you say. And you were. You really were.

Before you can dwell on that for too long she returns, sits down next to you and straightens out her skirt. “He didn’t answer. Poor baby must be asleep. Wanna take me home?”

“Is this the home where your boyfriend lives?” you ask.

“Ah don’t worry about that,” Joseph interjects. “We’ll figure that out when we get there, right…uh—what was your name?”

She throws her head back and kicks up a leg. Her stilettos look like weapons. “Ah hehehehe. You’re so funny. You guys kill me. Seriously.”

Joseph leads you down the street in a direction you can’t stabilize yourself enough to be aware of. It’s nighttime. You wish you were a sailor so you could navigate by the stars, but realize you’re so drunk there are multiple copies of each star in the sky and so even if you could, fuck all it would do for you. You think about how often pirates must have gotten lost at sea in the 1700’s.

The girl piles into the back while you collapse into the passenger seat like someone had thrown you.

“So where to?” Joseph asks the girl. He is shit drunk, but you have done enough tonight to make the bleeding stop for now, and so you could hardly care what happens at this point. You don’t hurt anymore and that is all that matters. She gives him vague directions and Joseph tears down the street like he’ll win a prize for getting there within a certain time limit.

Joseph insists on talking while driving, twisting around with one hand on the wheel to make eye contact with her. “So we should just come in, is what you’re saying. I’m sure he won’t mind. He can watch! Maybe he’d be into that.”

“That is true,” you add. “Cucking is becoming a more and more universally accepted sexual kink these days. Have you ever typed ‘cuck and bull’ into Pornhub? It’s a thriving community. We don’t judge!”

“No not all,” says Joseph. “It might wake up something in him. Maybe he just needs a little push to learn that we accept him.”

“I agree. Let us give him the courage to step out of his shell and accept his desires. We’d be doing him a service, I think.”

“In fact, it might even be detrimental for him not to watch us fucking his girlfriend,” says Joseph. “I don’t think it’s fair of any of us to deprive him of the sexual awakening that this could provide. I’ll go as far as to say we’d be doing him a disservice if we don’t.”

“Just something to think about,” you tell her.

“Ah hehehehe. You boys are too funny. And so fucking sexy. I want you both fucking all of my holes.” She starts pulling down her blouse. “You wanna see my boobies?”

Her specific choice of vernacular is off-putting, but Joseph is unperturbed, and shouts, “Yes!”

You turn around and there they are. Her tits are out in the backseat. She starts playing with them and making fake orgasm faces like a poorly trained porn star, her mouth open and her tongue sliding across her lips, her eyes rolling to the back of her head. If you hadn’t before now, you decide that she is insane.

“Oh shit!” Joseph takes his eyes entirely off the road to enjoy the show taking place behind him.

“No, no, no.” You wave your hands in front of his face. “You drive, I’ll watch for the both of us and relay it back to you through descriptive words.”

As you say this, the girl throws her body into the back of your seats and points to a turn that you are at this point about to pass. “Oh shoot, there! Turn there!”

Joseph spares no time, whipping his Ford Explorer at a hairpin turn, slamming into the curb and launching you three feet into the air. The car lands on its right two wheels, and the left two follow after a moment of angled suspension like a spiraling rollercoaster, slamming down onto the cement with the force of an anvil dropping from a two-story building.

Nobody moves. The car stays idling in silence. You stare forward, your eyes wide with the feeling you imagine someone must experience after recognizing they almost just died. Joseph says nothing, his hands gripping the steering wheel.

The girl points her finger towards the house you’ve nearly crashed in front of. “There I am! Thanks, boys!” She takes your phone out of your trembling hands, puts in her number, calls herself, and kisses you both on the cheek before jumping out and skipping towards her door. “I’ll let you know if boyfriend will let you fuck me! Have a good night!”

And she disappears inside her house.

You and Joseph continue staring forward.

“We never even got her name,” he says.

A grin stretches across your face. “No,” you laugh. “No, we didn’t.”

The next night you and Joseph are back drinking at the bar when you receive this text:

Hello. Thank you so much again for the ride home. But boyfriend and I decided that we aren’t going to go for the threesome. I’m sorry I showed you my boobies, that wasn’t cool. That’s not something my dog and I agreed on. Hope you’re having a good night! Bye bye.

You show this to Joseph.

“Her dog?” he says. “Well that explains a lot.”