First and foremost, here is a link you should check out: http://hardlyworkingcomic.com/. This lovely webcomic highlights the antics of a few co-workers at a school photography company, and hilarity often ensues. Plus it has a talking ostrich, so you should give it a gander. The author and illustrator happens to be my roommate, so if you like what you read, feel free to donate money.
Preferably before our rent is due.
So my friends and I, when properly bored, are known to take a drive in some random direction for some random length of time and enjoy the conversation and scenery such an adventure provides. It was during one such outing, about a year ago, that this particular story takes place, but before we can commence, I feel I should introduce the cast of characters.
In the interest of preserving the integrity (and limiting the death threats I receive) of those actually present for this trip, I will be using alternate names. That being said, there was myself, whom I will refer to in the first-person as the story unfolds. Sitting in the front passenger seat was my best friend of fifteen years, Ronaldo, and behind him was another good friend of mine, Dr. Dill (I find it prudent to remind you that Dr. Dill is just a pseudonym, and not indicative of my friend’s graduate status from any licensed medical or scientific institution, via a doctorate or otherwise. He is not authorized to perform medical diagnosis, nor an expert on any science affiliated with the realm of secondary education, nor its many affiliates. That being said, the man DOES know his way around a pickle. For example, if you gave him a stick, and you offered to put anything on that stick that he could possibly dream of, without fail, he would ask you to put a pickle on that stick. It was a borderline obsession, really. One time, when I arrived early to his place to pick him up for a movie, I let myself in (as I was wont to do at the time) and caught him dressing a particularly large pickle in doll’s clothing. He was placing a pair of apparently handcrafted wire-rim glasses on the pickle when he noticed I was watching him, at which point he held my gaze for but a moment before turning back to his efforts with the pickle. It was kind of weird, but then again, pickles ARE delicious). Behind me in the driver side backseat was my perpetual travelling companion, Sarge. Sarge is a three foot tall stuffed penguin, so I figure he will not mind my using his real name in this manner. Now that you know the cast, let us progress on to the story.
We four journeyed out, eager and anxious to see where the open road would take us. After a heated debate as to which direction we would travel, we settled the matter in the only way we knew how, which was a best of 3 rounds of paper-rock-scissors. Displaying an almost supernatural prowess, Ronaldo one in straight rounds, so we headed south. It was late evening when we started, and the moon was undressed with that kind of “come hither” smile that no mortal can dare resist, so we drove a good strong thirty miles south before we bothered to check our surroundings.
Along the way, conversation was filled with the kind of musings you might expect from three young men and a stuffed penguin. We played a game which Dr. Dill called “what would you do for $10,000?” The rules were simple: phrase your question in the form of “for $10,000, would you…?” and fill the rest in with whatever came to mind. You can learn a lot about someone from what they will do with a moderate sum of money. $10,000 is not enough to do much with, but certainly a game-changer for most lower middle-class Americans, and for $10,000, I discovered that Ronaldo would urinate on his grand-mother’s grave. You can buy the assassination skills of Dr. Dill for $10,000, (but only if he were guaranteed he would not be caught), convince Sarge to eat a bucket of human eyeballs, and for $10,000, I would perform fellatio on another man. Truly, these were the revelations destined to define our sagely times, and it only seemed appropriate that ours were the minds to usher in such edifying conversation.
Such is the games people play, and we played it all the way to a city whose name does not matter. With all the talking and joking, my throat had grown dry and I was thirsty enough to sidetrack our little joyride to get something to drink. Pulling in to the nearest gas station, we all piled out of the car to stretch our legs and look around. Sarge elected to stay in the car, considerate stuffed penguin that he is, so as to make sure no ruffians made to vandalize the car. Meanwhile, we three (Ronaldo, Dr. Dill and I) entered the gas station, and now that I was standing and fully conscious of my body, I realized I needed to use the restroom. Excusing myself from my compatriots, I made my way to the rear of the establishment, where a dirty and unkempt sign for the unisex bathroom was less than proudly displayed. Breathing in deep, steeling myself for what horrors might greet me beyond that door, I ventured forth.
The door opened outward, away from the bathroom. It did not take long before I realized it was a pretty typical gas station bathroom in that there was no row of stalls, but a single stool and sink. The scene was pretty standard, down to the overflowing trash can and the rusting air dryer, along with the little check-off sheet that assured me this bathroom was cleaned twice a day, most recently by “Ima Doosh.” There was, however, one curious thing that stood out and struck me as strange.
Standing as still as a statue, there was a middle-aged man standing against the wall adjacent to the stool, facing the door (and, by extension, me), with his pants unzipped and his manhood exposed, grasped firmly in his hand. The look he gave me was not the look that says, “Oh, no, I forgot to lock the door!” so much as “Oh, noooooooo, did I forget to lock the door?” I paused for a brief moment, recollected my wits, and stammered out, “Oh, sorry, it wasn’t locked, so I figured it was unoccupied,” and began to close the door as I backed out. To my surprise, the man said matter-of-factly, “You can join me if you like.”
Interestingly, despite the uncomfortable nature of it all, I was still in possession of my sensibilities enough to respond, politely, “Oh, no thank you.” My mother was from Kentucky, after all, and she made sure to raise me with all the southern sense of decorum and courtesy.
I closed the door, and did not have to walk far before I bumped into my fellow friends.
“That was fast,” Dr. Dill said. I smirked.
“There was something in there,” I replied. Ronaldo looked confused as he asked, “What could have been in there to make you hop right back out?”
“Gay sex, mostly,” I said, and went over to grab myself something to drink.
Whether they were too unsettled to check for themselves or content to take my word for it, Ronaldo and Dr. Dill opted not to use the restroom, and so we were back on our way.
Nothing terribly exciting happened for the rest of the trip until we were winding down and nearly back home. We were no more than three blocks from Ronaldo’s house when something darted out into the middle of the street. I tried to swerve around it, but I chose the same direction the creature instinctively made for, and I unfortunately felt the sickening thump as my tires ran over what appeared to be a cat. I pulled the car over immediately, and went to investigate. I was regretful to find the busted remains of a collar in the middle of the street, which affirmed my concern that this was a housecat, and not a stray. The collar was too mangled for me to read properly, so I had no way of identifying who the cat had belonged to.
Curiously, however, there was no blood on my car, under the wheel, or anywhere near the site of the collar. Nor, for that matter, could we find any evidence of the cat, save the collar. The three of us (again, Sarge keeping a sharp lookout, in case the cat returned) fanned out and searched the area as best we could (which is to say not very well, as our attention quickly thinned as the cool late night air began to settle in), but to no avail. For all our searching, for all the sensible reason behind it, we could not find any trace of the cat or the signs we would expect to see from a creature recently struck by a car. I even swallowed my fear and checked under the wheel wells and under the car to make sure it had not gotten stuck on impact.
With little option left, we lamented the accident and went about our way. I dropped off Ronaldo, then Dr. Dill, all the while joking about a phantom cat that would no doubt haunt me over the course of the next several weeks.
While true that I was never visited by any feline specters, I did awake very late that night in a cold sweat, unable to fight back a nagging thought. Without thinking, I called Ronaldo, the desperation in my voice cutting through his midnight fatigue like only true panic can.
“Ronaldo,” I practically shouted into the phone, “I just had the most horrible thought about what happened, tonight!”
Ronaldo, bless his heart, was patient and supportive as he kindly replied with, “Yeah? What kind of thought?”
“What if that guy in the gas station bathroom had $10,000!?” I urgently exclaimed.
Ronaldo was silent for so long I thought he hung up. When I was about to do the same, he said, “There is something wrong with you.”
“Wrong with me?” I asked, my incredulity thick, “I’m not the one propositioning random strangers for gay sex in a public restroom!”
Another silence.
“I’m going back to bed,” Ronaldo muttered, and the phone went silent.
I wrestled with my thoughts for another hour before exhaustion finally claimed me, and with it, sleep came. I dreamt that night. I dreamt of a cat that was not really a cat, but a cat-shaped ten thousand dollar bill. I was watching as it was crossing the street when, out of nowhere, a man I recognized as the man from the gas station bathroom was riding a giant pair of scissors like a motorcycle. I knew what was going to happen, but I was powerless to stop it. They crashed as one in a horrible collision, the cat-shaped ten thousand dollar bill ripping to shreds as the man riding the scissors cackled like a madman. I knew what he was trying to tell me. I knew what the dream meant.
In the end, the cat got its revenge. Well, it was not really “revenge,” per say. But at least there is a moral to be learned in all this. Well, not really a “moral,” per say, but at least a kind of running theme. Well, not really a “theme,” per say, but I can tell you that this is all true. Well, except for the part where Sarge said he would eat a whole bucket of human eyeballs for $10,000. Stuffed penguins cannot talk, after all.
Still, as far as propositions for gay sex go, I can honestly say this one was my weirdest. That has to count for something, right?
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