virgins no longer wear white

I like to see life as a house of cards every person symbolizing a card, how long they’ve been standing for you, holding you and which one will make it all collapse. Sometimes that task even falls on yourself and that’s when there’s no one else to blame. I had always put the top card, the last one, myself with trembling hands, as a child, causing everything to collapse, but I would stop at nothing to make the perfect house of cards, no matter how many times I would make it fall down.

Once I got a photo and that’s when my mother took a photo of me, grinning and watching it before it would inevitably fall.

I had only fear in my mind.

To never be loved.

Maybe that’s why I had been chasing it through my fingers all my life and I couldn’t help but feel old.

Love is a two ended scale, like a see-saw, only someone always ends up loving the other a lot more, never really gaining balance or maybe there’s always the two kids jumping up and down, making sure that one person loves the other more or detaches even more. I felt as if I was hallucinating this morning, my head in my hands, no longer understanding what the point in anything was.

There was too much misery to be counted when the reflection felt broken and I knew that I was being watched. I didn’t even bother to turn around. I didn’t bother to move out. I could feel the ghost’s presence everytime I would walk in, sometimes I would greet the ghost, sometimes I wouldn’t, knowing that only on the day when I would draw my last breath, would be the day when the ghost’s business was done.

Sometimes love suffocates.

I had held her down with a pillow, while she was asleep, holding her further and further, arriving to the city a day earlier from a trip, only to drive back at night and cry my heart out. I had killed my wife. I couldn’t take it any longer, I couldn’t divorce a person who I loved and no longer did. So there she would be, in my field of vision, watching over me and I would wonder why she was still here and why wouldn’t she ever talk.

Sometimes I would feel her elevate my head and put her ghost hands around me, trying to choke me but it would always go through and she would stop, knowing that she couldn’t take my life in the way that she could.

But I could feel her anger at some days and her desperate scribbling at night with the remains of the blood in her body. It took a while for the forensics to take me off of her, when I had discovered her corpse the damn next day.

I had brought boys back to my home, after they would insist and I would tell them that my house was actually haunted, but it was no surprise, any old country was filled with them, filled with bitter souls and regrets. So what if someone would watch us fuck? If I were to lay on a sofa and tell, I started sleeping with boys the age I had fallen in love with her. Which was rather young, but of age. That was all that mattered. Sometimes the thought of killing would cross my mind again, while choking the said boys, I wondered how would a face look, how would the life leaving the soul looked like, since I had only seen it through a pillow, her spirit going through me with a wild, exasperate scream, which was only meant for me.

We married early. It was back when I thought I had no choice, when the parents were still alive and convincing. Once I had killed, I stopped visiting their graves, I had changed and my head had gone grey in my twenties. I felt like an old man, whose life was stripped due to my own decisions. I couldn’t do anything, I just wanted to be loved, but instead all I did was sleep around with boys the age I thought my life had ended back then.

The age I had first kissed my wife.

It hadn’t been so long ago, yet it was driving me crazy. Pill after pill, people saying that it were simply because I was windowed, that was the root of my depression and I could never confess that I had merely killed to my heart’s content.

She wanted children, I never wanted her to get pregnant, I was cautious. But I had caught her once, tearing the condoms, desperate to be a mother, while crying that all her friends had their own children, their bundles of joy, that maternity was an important part of womanhood. We had fought. I had left for said trip and came back, only to kill. We had stripped each other from love, life and all places of Heaven. Maybe she would’ve been pregnant.

I don’t know.

She haunted me, as I sat on the bed, putting her arms around my neck once more, the covers dirty from the night before and when I had told the boy to leave, telling him that my wife would be back and that seemed enough of an excuse, because she would be.

“So kill me.” I said and I felt her tighten her grip as usual, but what joy would it be just to make a suicidal man leave for good? So she didn’t, she let go and faded.

–

If you enjoy my stories and want to make my day, you can get me a coffee https://ko-fi.com/graspthesanity

Ko-Fi

https://ko-fi.com/graspthesanity

I’ve been a writing rollercoaster for many, many years now, changed blogs several times, but I’ve been loyal to the words and sentences I’ve created. I’d like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading and supporting me.

If you want to make my day, send a coffee my way!

it never ends

I always wondered what it was like to be scattered like ashes in the ocean, that was how I had wanted to go. The kiss was no longer fresh on my lips, as I had woken up-

Woken up.

I wasn’t in the sea anymore, where I had wanted to return if my body were to be cremated, but I knew that what would’ve happened was that my family would bury me with the wrong name, in the wrong funeral spot and with a photo I wouldn’t have recognized as myself. I wasn’t as cold, instead there were covers around me and I seemed to be pretty much-

I wanted to move my limbs, but instead they felt restrained so I opened my dry mouth.

A screech.

That was all I could manage.

Another screech from me.

I saw my own father just sit there, eyes cold, as if he had accepted my death already, but then he had surely read my will, which consisted of photographs and writing to be burnt and never to be sold. I don’t even know why I had written that. I was a fucking stupid ass teenager.

“Is this what you wanted?” He stood up and headed towards me. “She’s dead.”

The pact was broken-

Well, fuck.

I could still feel her hair among our kisses, even if they seemed like… they were a lifetime ago.

“Josse. We’re done for today.”

“I broke everything in my parent’s apartment that day.” I suddenly said and my psychologist sat down, but I knew by her eyes that I had said it before, but I couldn’t recall everything properly. I was drifting all these years through a blur, barely finishing school and crawling my way into university, just because I had to, just because my parents had wanted it. They wanted me in a normal life. I scratched my stubble, I still didn’t know how they had accepted it, maybe suicide attempts do change people. But then we were never the same. They wanted me alive, just because a dead daughter was worse than a living son, as I had been told, sitting in a chair, in the middle of the room, as they were circling me, both their eyes fixed on me and all I could do was cry and scream-

That she was gone.

That she was gone.

I had outlived her.

Her own parents buried her away from me and no matter how many times I dialled I never knew where they buried her. I even held a stupid name, just because she liked it, because she was Joyce and Josse was the male form of it. It felt like losing a twin at birth now, I could barely recall the years we spent together, but there was something about her, that I still loved.

My tooth started aching, reminding me of the next dentist appointment right after the psychologist. I needed to excuse myself.

I was called a dyke by them, even if now I didn’t even know how could one even see me as such.

I had changed, my body had changed. My voice had changed.

If I saw them on the street, I would’ve screamed, but they moved, I would’ve been held down, but they moved.

They moved with her washed off the shore corpse, as if she were some tragic, never loved Laura Palmer. I could dream of her.

She was standing in front of me, about to fall, never looking back, telling me that no one would understand the love between a woman and a transgender man in this day and age. As time went by, the angrier I got and the more I’d have to hold from destroying all the pictures of me before I had started testosterone from my parents, but I remained quiet and no matter how much I had flung them around, they would print new ones, while I lived with them.

Now

I was alone.

Mom died from cancer and all the stress I had caused her, she had hissed. Dad remarried and had no intention of anything, besides sending a check to his damaged child. I had no one else to brag of, so I just had an empty apartment and a small job, which if you’d wake me up in the middle of the night I wouldn’t recall. It was filing, a plain, office job, I was a clerk, I dealt with files, people and I would speak to my colleagues who now knew what a trans man was. I had moved and that was it-

I had moved.

People grew accepting, but when we were fourteen things were different.

My memory was deteriorating, and I was angry, I would scream and no pills could stop that, saying that suicide was something I would have to get over. I was no longer classified as suicidal. I had no intention to try and fail again. I wanted to die in the sea, that’s why I no longer went to swim, instead I would go to the beach, eat some ice cream or write some poetry, just to throw it later in the trash.

Some people would flirt with me, but I would ignore them.

I had lost my virginity all over again. This time with a couple, a man and a woman, who seemed to sympathize with me, but I couldn’t cum. I faked an orgasm and they knew, so I just excused myself and left.

I kept walking, the scent of sea in the streets and I couldn’t help but crave a cigarette, I hadn’t smoked in years. I’m sure I still smelt post-coital and of sweat, fluids which weren’t my own. I asked a taller man for a cigarette and he looked at me sympathetically and I just blew out the smoke, as if none of the years had passed.

I wanted to ask him if he could fuck me right now, in the alleyway, which was nearby, I wanted him out of all people to just use and abuse me, thrust deep inside me and keep doing so until his balls were dry.

But instead we smoked in silence, standing next to a wall, as if we were cruising or maybe we were rent boys for older men. I waved him off and wanted to go back home, but instead he wrote his phone number on the cigarette box, which was half full, saying that it’d be a stormy night and I thanked him, looking gingerly at the number.

I did call him.

I didn’t know what to say, so I held the receiver as I heard him battle with stir fry, while eating an apple.

“When I die… I want to be in the sea, I want it to consume me and when they find me… I wanted to be cremated, just to be brought back to you, because we’d both be dead.”

I got an apple myself and bit into it a bit too hard, looking out of the window, to see the said storm. We should’ve died in the storm. I had nothing else to break.

So I finally screamed.

it’s not the first time

I hastily put on the cowboy boots, as the cigarette boxes get passed around along with a blunt, who I’m not sure who it belongs to. But then in such surreal places after coming from a posh background, nothing seems eternal or impossible. Old money is the one that stays constant until it runs out, but the swollen pride is eternal with the last pieces of jewellery. I put inside my boot the photo of Alison, I’ve always put in, way before I even started doing drag.

I put on the red lipstick and then I start overtracing my lips, as I get elbowed to pass on the baking powder along with the contour stick. We’re all short on time, even if we go one by one. It feels like a very brief eternity, while we all stand with cigarette smoke around us. Some have already done coke after their performance, using the flyers to some cruising bar.

I tended to stay away from all drugs, but alcohol was a weakness of mine, too many memories of wine bottles enough for me to get into a dance with vodka by the end of the night, when I’d be done and then I’d find some guy to sleep with.

There were too many things to make it handy. It all started by trying to find some family which would accept a trans guy and finding it among drag queens who believed very often that cocks meant male was bizarre, but they still saw me as a man in drag by the end of the night with laughter and smeared lipstick.

It’s strange how much can a few photos can get you through to many names, connections and all. Maybe some begging and stalking, I looked at Mint, the drag queen, who was the star of us all and was the closing act, because without her, no one would’ve even looked at us twice. I still wondered why she preferred these shabby places.

“Dearie.” She addressed me once. My drag mother. “Drag should stay underground, it should stay surreal, like a John Waters movie, we should all be surrounded by filth and the glamour of Showgirls, but with a lot less budget. There’s no Dale from Twin Peaks either.”

She made an effort to show up to charity, that’s how I had met her. She went to a LGBT group once, seeing me back when I was a teenager and seeing a rather chubby guy, who looked like he would look terrible in drag, listened to me, nearly crying that I couldn’t transition under a certain roof which no longer belonged to me and I packed my bags the day I struck 19 and left. I weighted everything and then I went under Mint’s wing. She taught me drag, that was her only condition, even if I insisted that no one would want to see a trans man in drag, I knew how nasty the community was to anyone who freaking didn’t have a dick. But she’d actually fist fight anyone, right after tearing off the wig, if it were possible, saying that women wouldn’t fist fight. Mint was who she escaped to be.

Mint wasn’t too confident in my outfit for today, but she just raised her brows, feathers falling out of her boa and watching me, smoking a cigarette. Or was it her turn to smoke the shared blunt?

I was next and my legs started shaking.

Walking on stage meant that the room would quiet down for me and I would see who would enter, I would see who would leave. I remember getting told that once you leave the stage, you realize that it had all been a dream, a fantastic hallucination, which happened to be true somehow. But I was still midway through my act, which filled with fear, obscure references coming from my background, which still made people laugh, as I would make sure to convey them and after every gig I would shuffle a deck of cards, just to cure my anxiety, recalling my young days when fortune telling was the sort of thing you’d grow up on. I would always wonder if I had managed to rush through my performance, but no matter how much time passed, Mint would watch it or listen carefully through the haze and cigarettes to make sure I sounded okay, because I always asked how was I.

She’d kiss me on the forehead.

Sometimes I wondered if in some distant world we had slept together, but she seemed too much of a mother figure even if it were only a few years which had separated us. Mint seemed to have her own different taste in men, but I never felt excluded, just that I wasn’t her age and she tended to go for men her own age. But I would be lying if I said that growing up with her, I didn’t look at her in awe, at all of her transformations and how she held my chin high with lipstick for the first time in a while on my lips.

“Drag is art. Nothing feminine at times. It’s a caricature of life. It’s a middle finger to all of us, we dictate our rules and ridicule them at the same time. You’re a man. Underneath it all, it’s your bones and your soul. You were born a man and will forever be it and no flesh can change that.” She had told me and that was when I realized that I had a tremendous crush on Mint and at the same time, that she was like a mother, a father, a parent to me, someone who held me close and listened to all the boys and girls who had broken my heart.

She loathed the state of drag now, so we were outcasts in something which was supposed to be outcast enough already. The show venues were filled to the brim, just to see her sing, play and insult the entire room, yet build the confidence we all lacked, even Mint herself did.

I remember one night I had caught her crying, photos spread all around her, nearly in a circle. She was out of drag there, a man next to her of her age and I could see that as the photos progressed so did their ages.

“He was my one true love.” Mint had confessed, later next morning, as we sat in her kitchen and she had poured me some milk to later get some cereal for. Her apartment was small and cramped, yet she enjoyed it and I slept in a spare room, which was probably supposed to be for children with dinosaur walls. I barely minded, it seemed to give me a childhood I never had. “I’m sorry dear, that you had to see me like that.”

Before I could even shake my head or react, she raised her hand.

Mint, was out of drag and that’s when she spoke with her point brief.

“Never settle for anyone who won’t love how you view life.” She paused, looked down. “Your parents didn’t love you for being transgender. He didn’t love me for my love of performance, for my desire to ridicule life. You can say… what is there in common? Because every problem, every speck is worth something significant and where that significance is… Is where the point of life is hidden, under a big, flat rock for some Japanese guy to flip over, when it’s time for us to go see death and leave.”

I later learned that she referenced to Kafka on the Shore. I didn’t know whether she meant to remain with death or come back just like Kafka did, but I never asked. Instead I saw a scar once on her arm and never questioned it, knowing, soon enough she got it covered by a tattoo. Maybe because I had seen it and she didn’t want me to see her as an imperfect mother.

I shuffled the cards, once, twice and I left the club during the performance by Michelle, right before Mint’s and smoked outside just to see the person who had left midway my performance. I felt like a puffed up pigeon. But they seemed to ignore me. It was hard to determine someone’s gender at times and I was in cowboy boots after all with a full face of make up and years after starting testosterone. Both me and Mint loathed the queens who lasered their body hair, wearing it as an act of pride. Out of drag, Mint was a proper bear and would go to such bars and once drag became mainstream she seemed to be more accepted by them, so she didn’t bother anymore.

But I knew that she had still loved him.

Every one night stand, she would shoo off the poor guys out.

She would smoke with me and describe me in detail what they had done to each other, just to detach herself from the act and make it pure sex. Eventually I picked up on her smoking habit.

The person just stood there, not moving, checking their phone and with violet eyeshadow and gloss, hair in a messy ponytail, barely touching their cigarette. I approached them and yet, they made no movement. I kept observing. I looked at them from head to toe. A rather bright highlighter was on their dark cheeks and it hadn’t dimmed down by the night, I even noticed it when they were leaving. Small venues made everything person. They raised their light eyes on me, contacts, I assumed and nodded, as if asking how could they help.

“I just got curious… You left midway-”

“I’m not here for Mint, if that’s what you’re asking.”

That was new.

“Wanted to see what Mint’s drag daughter was all about.”

“Yet, you left.” I remarked and they just shrugged, smoking their cigarette now and putting the phone in the back pocket of their jeans. “So, I failed the mark.”

“No, no. I just needed…” They pulled the phone out again and messages kept popping up, as they unlocked the phone. “Some time. I will come next time, you know. You’re a regular. What’s stopping me from seeing you next Saturday?”

I didn’t know what to answer. They smirked and pulled on their hair, giving out a small smile, now looking at me. I wondered why, I had been Mint’s drag daughter and performing for a while now. I smoked my own cigarette in silence, as they watched me back.

Mint was heartbroken so she would tell me to never take love for granted and would kick every single man outside after fucking, and it’s not like I hadn’t fucked someone after a drag show. Usually I would ask for some time to remove it all, I never liked people fucking the fantasy of me, because it somehow reminded me of how I had lost my virginity, and that was a performance too. I wanted them to see my body with all its glory and self-hate, the dysphoria I would feel at times even if my chest was dealt with and I’ve decided to avoid bottom surgery for now. I wanted to feel the kisses down my chest and I preferred to be fucked in my front hole, anyway. I felt weird, because trans guys were very often cookie cutter. But so were drag queens these days.

I couldn’t take anyone for granted.

But I wanted to.

This person with the violet eyeshadow just decided to see me. Somehow, in the middle of spring.

“It’s my birthday soon.” And started replying to texts. They scratched the tip of their nose, nervous. “I’ve seen some videos of you on YouTube.”

For a second, I was scared someone had filmed me for PornHub or something without me knowing.

“You seemed cool.”

We stood there still.

“Wanna celebrate a birthday with someone who doesn’t have anyone to celebrate with?”

“You walked out of my show.”

“Just because at midnight, I wanted to be alone and face my age. That was the only time I wanted to be alone in a while.” They shrugged, I just nodded, wondering how the fuck would I be celebrating my own soon approaching anniversary. Probably with Mint, like any other time, both of us whining. I had tried girls, I had tried boys, I had tried many people of all genders and no one stuck. I was queer and I was drawn to people all together. It was something only Mint knew.

“Well then…” I paused. “Is it your birthday, yet?”

“Yeah-”

“When were you born?”

“Five a.m., why?”

“That’s when we’ll really celebrate. I’m Russian. That’s when it all starts.” I gave out a grin to the birthday person. They shrugged, a small smile playing on their lips, as if they had gotten a glimpse of the birthday cake before the candles had even been put in. I had never been asked by someone like that to celebrate my birthday with them.

“It is your anniversary?” They ask cautiously and curiously.

“Yeah.” I nodded.

“I’ll be hitting a milestone myself in a month or so.” I was frankly baffled, by the small sign of affection. “Do you want me to be in drag or-?”

“I can pay-” I laughed them off, not even allowing them to continue.

“I’m no hooker. I just want to know what the birthday… birthdee? Wants.” I smiled. They seemed pleased that I didn’t gender them and I was happy myself. “What’s your name?”

They stayed silent, probably thinking of something to say.

“V?” They looked at me confused. I shrugged. “You have violet eyeshadow, so I figured… why not keep it simple and decide on something like that. You’ll never know the name my parents gave me either. It’s a fair trade.”

“Is it that noticeable that I have no name as of now?” V smirks. I laugh just slightly, more like one single breath and nod.

“I’ve been there. Mint helped me with everything.” I paused. “So… nothing personal?”

“On the opposite… I want you to know everything by the end of the night. I want it to be personal, for once and then just… go.” I nodded.

“Whatever the birthday person wants, V.” I say and I start taking off my wig, slowly, revealing the cap, which is hiding my chin length black hair. They look surprised. “What? Never seen a drag queen without a wig? Mint would kill me if I took you backstage, her Achille’s heel. An annoyance to her powerful being.”

We both laugh and I can still feel how nervous and awkward V feels. I put my hand on their shoulder and we both silent for a while, as I wonder if I should let my hand travel to their cheek, just for the sake of tonight, but instead I pat it a bit too strong, to which V takes my hand and holds it for a while.

“Geez, got a groupie on my hands.”

“Well, when’s the last time you’ve gotten asked like that?”

“Never.” I confess. I’m intrigued as hell. “Not for a birthday at least. I’ve been asked to perform at ones, but never to actually go out and celebrate with the person-”

Because they’re as lonely as I am, but that was something to say under alcohol, because the second hand weed smoke hadn’t gotten to me yet. V remains curious to what else I have to say, but instead I keep the flirtations for the end of the night, I wonder if they would end up taking me back to their place. I want to keep it post-coital, even though I fully understand what is going to happen.

I excuse myself and head back in to change. V nods, standing outside and smoking, starts replying to all of the text messages they’ve started receiving from people I see they would rather get a text, avoiding all calls and refusing them. I wonder what their excuse is. Maybe everyone thinks that they’re off with person A, while person A think they’re with B and C. I honestly don’t know. I’ve always celebrated my birthday with Mint and she did the same.

I gave her a quick wave, as she flashed me her middle finger, causing us to quarrel a bit for the show, as I went onstage, bowed down and put my wig on top of hers.

“The unprofessionalism is far too much, sometimes, that you even have to quote some mainstream stuff for the twinks to get the references.” Mint kept a straight face from laughing at her own joke and threw the wig back at me, as I went backstage and I caught it with one hand, already not turning towards Mint. Now, the queens were doing coke, some smoking weed, some just drinking cheap vodka shots, which I would’ve shrivelled at the sight of, but I’ve drank them too. It was all a part of the experience of the peeling walls and the cheap pink posters. I kept on my cowboy boots on with the photo of Alison, I had no idea how I could pull off a lip-sync of hers and it didn’t matter. It was back before she had lost herself and back from I believed in everything else.

It was an ode to something old. I used to wear an orthodox cross when I just moved in with Mint, but soon enough I realized that God abandoned us all and if even suicide wouldn’t get buried, what would that mean about transgender drag queens? I lit a cigarette, as I just stripped from the sequin dress, which clashed with the cowboy boots, the studded vest and changed into jeans, a plain shirt and the cowboy boots were the only thing which was from a female section, but that’s because I loved them and after all, I was a professional drag queen by now, well, as Mint talked about me.

What was professional anyway?

I paid my bills.

Was that enough?

For my family not really. I remember how she would listen to my stories, how I was abused, as I would trace my fingers against the dinosaurs as Mint listened to everything I had been through by that time. I was sure that by this point I was even in Mint’s will. I didn’t even know where they properly were. In the beginning I wondered if I could open a newspaper and see one of their deaths, even if they didn’t matter, but I could picture myself, shirtless, done in drag and listening to some of Mint’s morning singing and not mourning. Happy, that the world was with one less abuser.

“Why does love ache so much?” V asked me right off the bat sitting down the ground, staring at a text and holding a hand to their face.

“Because it shouldn’t.” I reply, not really knowing what I was really saying. I didn’t know their situation and all of tonight’s lights could be reflected on our skin, different shades, blue and soon to be gold in the sun, once the night is over. V didn’t buy any of it and started rubbing their eyes with their hand, as I just sat besides them, people starting to roll out of the small drinking venue, which happened to host us weekly. They did know we had another gig at a separate bar in a neighbouring town on Friday, the world’s smallest field trip for all the drag queens out here.

“Sometimes we are our own fault. Sometimes we get scared when faced with love, actually.” V said, taking their hand away and I looked at their light eyes. “I’m not saying this is the case at hand.”

They bit their lip. They wanted to go. They wanted to talk. But we just sat there, until V could get the night going.

“I fell in love with a married man. That’s why I’m running away tonight. It’s been going on for six years. He wanted to make it special and shit, but I couldn’t. He’s married, married very young, about several years older than me. Nothing was ever out of the law.” V’s hands were shaking. “I wanna break it off, but….

Where would my love go?”

And they looked at me. A small smirk played on their lips.

“Is this where I come in?” I ask carefully.

V grins.

“It’s not that I want to be loved by the night, I’d have a hooker for that.” They pause and I see them flipping their phone a few times from top to bottom, with the text received exactly at midnight. That man should probably love V very much, I couldn’t help but think. “I just want someone to know. I want someone to care, not judge. No.”

They pause.

“I’ll never fall in love by the end of the night with anyone. My heart is taken. I should’ve known better.” They start speaking to a void, maybe to the married man in their head. I’m not entirely sure. V does look up to the moon and I watch them for a while. Good, they don’t see me blush, my foundation is off, my stubble is seen and it’s hard when someone as V is stunning. Eventually V locks their phone and puts it in the back pocket. They thought of these words coming in, I could tell that. “I just want to spend the night with no strings attached. No hooker, no commitment, maybe no sex, no psychologist late night call, no suicidal tendencies, I’d lie if I said no feeling sorry for myself.”

They laugh sadly. I just watch them, sitting a bit closer and they don’t mind and that’s when I notice their silver Chelsea boots, which reflect like their highlight and are now stretched out for the street to trip onto. Then they look at me. They look at me for a very good while, a grin appearing and then fading. I could hear my heart in my ears. Too many bad memories cross my mind and I think of drag, I think of Mint putting on a wig on me for the first time, I think of having sex with people freely now-

I am me

V kisses me. Electricity runs through my body.

“Cut the tension at the start.” They quietly say against my lips. I feel hungry for their touch and lips, but it’s their night, not my own. V’s the owner of the night now, an endless beautiful half-moon night which will vanish once dawn hits and they will be gone. A lover never written. ” And let it unravel.”

I feel their tongue, I moan against it, before feeling our tongues properly rub, it feels as if I’ve never kissed a person. I pull V closer. Surely they counted the human factor and they don’t mind. We sit there making out for a good while, some people whistling from recognizing me, some just whistling from seeing two queers from a gay bar. I run my hand against their cheek, they’ve just clean shaved for the night, so some stubble seeps through to the touch after all these hours.

I pour my soul into the kiss with V. I don’t know them or do I know them better than most people? V seems privative from what I see. I wish I could numb their love, at least for tonight. We break-

No, we stop, before V gives me a final small kiss and looks ahead.

“I haven’t kissed anyone else in six years. Technically… am I cheating if I am helping someone cheat?” V asks, hands on their lips, a smile playing and they can still feel the effects of our kisses, I assume.

I shrug. All of a sudden I feel young. I’ll hand that to V. I haven’t felt young in years. I felt like I was going down down on an aging slide, now I feel like I’m on Mint’s doorstep but now out of curiosity on who I really am, rather than running away.

I could fall in love with V. I smirk and V smiles at the change of subject, nodding to ask what’s up.

“I could fall in love with you for the night.” I say as V leans back, their hands behind them, holding them up, I’m sure if we could see the stars from the city they’d be laying down.

“Then do.” V closes their eyes. “Nothing wrong with a bit of love for my birthday.”

We laugh.

“It’s in a few hours.” I remark.

“Whatever.” V continues laughing. Then V’s phone vibrates with a call, I see heart emojis, so I’m guessing it’s the married man and they drop the call. V goes silent for a while, even after putting the phone back. They put their head in their hands and close their eyes before speaking. “I used to be so scared that they would stop loving me, it was driving me crazy, but they never did.”

I don’t want to cut off their limbs with a bread knife.

“They never left their spouse.” V smirks sadly at my reply.

“Exactly, but…” They turn to me. “You know when you feel love.”

They’re flirting as well, it’s two sides of the same coin that is V’s night, their rules.

“You still want love for a night.” V nods, eyes closed and I get a good look at the violet eyeshadow. It’s pretty. I don’t wear make up outside the stage anymore, so whenever I see anyone with it, I get happy somehow, that someone else can do it. “I’ll love you for tonight.”

“It won’t be genuine.” V smirks and opens their light eyes. I shake my head and take their hand, intertwining fingers after pressing them together. I kiss V again briefly and then they don’t want to let go.

“Then pretend we were lovers in a different life. Does that sound genuine enough?” It’s my turn to grin and I catch them smile. “You can’t refuse my theory.”

They give me a sad smile.

“I always take something good from bad lovers in the past, like liking black coffee even if it were just a date gone sour, I don’t know why I want to remember so many people, so many ones which slip by even if they were utter empty on the inside or caused me harm.” I wait to see where V is going with this. “If we were to be lovers in the past, I would’ve taken a bad trait from you.”

I think for a while.

“Surely the highlighter.” And we both laugh.

“I’m no good in relationships or after them, I miss the person too much.” I can see V quickly nod at my choice of person, as if I’ve given a small nod to their identity, I wasn’t daft and I could see V through when it came to that. “It breaks a void inside me, it gives me a tremendous sense of longing…” V cuts me off halfway.

“You fall in love, easily…” They pause, wondering which name of mine to use. I don’t interrupt, curious myself, but other than the flashy cowboy boots and even then, I’m not really in drag. V pauses and closes one eye, smirking. “Let me be the same, T. Let’s keep it to initials.”

“I’m actually going to change my last name, once I figure out what to or get married.” I stare at the sky, now, not really sure I want this night to be the one, where I come out about such personal things, but I don’t feel hurt and V makes sure to check up on me.

“I can…”

“T’s fine. I hit you on the last name too, didn’t I?” I smirk. “It was coincidental on my part.”

“To be honest… I just thought of it as a joke… like spilling tea. You’ll be picking apart my heart, like a doctor and then like a surgeon you’ll surely see-” They smiled sadly. “That the patient won’t follow said instructions and… might come back to the old habits.”

We both lit different cigarettes. I had mine now.

“Maybe you should keep loving. We all have our love story and our love to give. It’s not always tragic, we just make it so.” I stop at that, making sure it gets engraved in V’s head.

“That’s why I want things to change at the same time. I want to grow a spine, even for one night. I want… To choose. What I want. It’s like with every sentence, the haze gets stronger.” They tilt their head to one side. “Or maybe it doesn’t, because I can still see my hands in front of me, maybe it’s the city which has always been wrapped in a fog and nobody else really matters. Because no one really thinks of others.”

The wind starts to pick up and our hair gets in our way, but we keep sitting there. It gets colder, as the silence draws on and I’m not even sure what to reply, because I know that this is V’s night. We’ve stopped smoking a while ago and the clubs should start closing soon and that’s when V stands up and stretches their hand towards me, yanking me up.

We quietly keep walking, V not really saying much, but making sure that I’m behind them. I wonder if they would’ve preferred if I had kept my make up on, after all they did ask for a drag queen for the night. I may not the man of the night, but we both agreed to sex.

It was different once we went in, V hesitated for a bit and so did I-

I approached them and then I stood a bit taller, stretching my neck and looked into their light eyes, wondering what the true colour behind them was, but that wasn’t for me to find out. It was just a hook up-

I kissed V and then they wrapped their arms around me and I couldn’t help but wonder if they were thinking of the married man. That’s how it rolls with us, our generation, we fall in love with the wrong people, but then, maybe it’s not just our generation with the high demands and the wrong ideals, all the right mistakes, because Mint does the same mistakes I do.

“Pretend you love me.”

V’s word struck some deep loneliness inside me and I channelled all the love I ever had to all the men, to all the women, to all the people I’ve ever confessed, who have taken it and rejected it. The lights were on and dim, some lightbulbs were out, I guess V was having a rough time, but the apartment was awfully clean. Then I noticed that it was just one of those switches which regulate light.

“You don’t have to ask for that.”

I say and we both start stripping, V jumping out of their skinny jeans as I go on my knees and they take out their huge cock. Instead of letting me blow them, they help me strip entirely and that’s when we head to the bedroom, all white and clean, bedsheets just changed and I wonder if they had thought of inviting the married man over, as always. That’s when the price of everything kind of strikes me down, since I shared my apartment with Mint, even if we were considered well off drag queens. But I just sigh, such riches always crawled upon my spine, as V traced their fingers on my shoulder blades, as if they were trying to find my wings, it reminded me of the past which I had let go. But I still headed in.

We fall on the bed and we make love.

I’ve never had sex like that. I’d usually be able to describe every goddamn detail to Mint later, but instead our mouths were on each other the whole damn time or on each other’s body, V’s fingers making sure to prepare me with what was going to happen, I was as wet as I could get, getting desperate as they would lick my neck and then fuck me into the matrass, pulling my hips as close to them as they could and we both screamed out. V ejaculating, me cumming hard, digging my nails into them.

I could retell us back and forth as if we were two photos, which I could put side by side and keep telling who is who, what is what and what’s been going on between the two of us.

We talked sweet nothings and that’s when I noticed the time on their watch by the bedside table, a few more incoming texts from the living room, where the phone was discarded. We both sat up and that’s when we both looked at each other, like Cinderella’s carriage coming to pick her up and I scanned their eyes.

“V.” They kept quiet. “Happy Birthday.”

I said that so quietly, that I wasn’t sure that V heard that their 25^th approached officially in my eyes. They just nodded and looked at the white ceiling.

“Or maybe I am my own fog which plagues the city.” They stretched out their hand, as if to make sure that they could see it, smiled and looked back at me. Then they went back to their pillow, closing their eyes. V fell asleep and I stayed there for a while longer, wondering what to even do.

I fell asleep myself.

Just to wake up to knocking, an empty bed, wrapping up the covers tighter around me.

It’s strange how even saying one phase to someone can mean breaking the world down and showing its shiny core. How the bane of our existence can be broken down to one phrase or even word.

Unloved?

Beloved?

Lonely?

I’m sure V went to smoke outside, I could see them walking around the streets aimlessly, avoiding the phone calls still and then coming back to the married man, apologizing for avoiding him for a day or so.

Or maybe they’d never get back to him, I wasn’t sure.

It wasn’t my choice.

I stayed in bed for a while longer, the watch still on the bedside table showing noon now.

Just because we want to be loved, doesn’t mean that we’re ready for it. I left the apartment, pondering on my phone number and I did leave it. After an hour, I wanted to come back to retrieve my phone number, but a man opened the door, looking all confused and I apologized deeply, leaving.

V saw every single following show, but we never talked again, watching through hooded eyes. Instead we would watch each other smoke at the end, from street to street, from city to city and eventually until one of us couldn’t see the hand through the fog.

I did learn of V’s dark eyes though once-

Beloved.

In all the ways.

Ruin love for me

We lit two cigarettes with one lighter, the flame licking both, leaning simultaneously in our seats to watch the street run by.

It’s been years and I couldn’t help but smile, too many things happening in my mind, too many faces flashes, too many memories and thankfully both me and Ian had a tendency to cling onto the happiest past, watching trains pass, when it came to the bad things. He wouldn’t recall. It was strange that we had gotten together back when people just held hands, but we could speak about love in the most childish of ways. It was a secret, of course but as we grew people picked up on it.

That was a train to pass, for now.

I looked at Ian, his polo unbuttoned due to the hurry for both of us to have an early breakfast, there was something between us, that he knew when I would wake up early and he would slowly lift himself from the bed, running a hand through his hair and kiss me as soon as I would have the thought of it, once I had taken my meds and woken up myself.

–

It wasn’t like it was drag, it felt like an identity of its own when I would look at him sometimes, putting on lipstick on the both of us, his mouth open when gently applying mine with a brush and tongue outside, bitten on the side.

It had been the weirdest request that I had gotten on Grindr. His name was Wes and Ian was out of town, I couldn’t reach him and we ended up throwing the suitcase down the stairs because I knew that an old crush of his would be at said trip. Working in the same company meant such things, I didn’t even want the witch in the same room. She didn’t believe in any part of homosexuality, so I didn’t know why he still kept in touch.

I downloaded it when he would go elsewhere, my mind drifting to a void, a hole which I couldn’t fill by wanking and it was the secret that I had kept. I just would shrug, as if scared to admit how I needed to hold another man in my arms every night and have sex as well.

Wes noticed my frustration and kept painting my face, after all, it was Halloween so why not do some soft drag? But it was only our faces which were painted and we were the only ones at our party, holding plastic cups, him admitting to saying they’d be a party just to have me over once more. Our first time was a quick fuck, he had pushed me against the floor, chocking me, pulling me back and thrusting deep inside me. He had invited me twice in two days.

Now he moved back onto the eyes and my eyes didn’t water from the mascara, but I kept blinking which caused Wes to smile at me.

He looked stunning, but I laughed at both of us with our plastic cups filled with vodka nearly to the brim, so that we would all drink up and smoke some cigarettes. He would blow smoke in my face, grinning, flirting, interlacing my fingers with his own until he leaned to my ear.

“I have a crush on you.”

I don’t think he’d remember it later. The blush highlighted my state. We started kissing, purple and red mixing. Lipstick traces running down my neck until he took off my short and paid extra attention to every area of exposed skin, as if he wanted to paint me with us. Tracing his fingers among my body hair later to ejaculate on and then the colours stuck and washed out like an old tattoo, when I came home to wash it all off.

Was I in love?

Two days.

How much was that? It was how heavy had my heart gotten. I wiped off everything with a shower, once Ian came back.

–

Wes.

He stayed with me.

Ian grew distant.

We would go to his apartment, which seemed to be an explosion of his entire life, while things were expensive mixed with thrifts, some ability I had never picked up. He would put his legs to his chest and listen to me, as I spoke of Ian now. At this point I had even asked me why didn’t he have glow in the dark stars on the ceiling and he just shrugged, stabbing the cigarette on the ashtray swiftly.

“I was never really into space.” He smiled sheepishly.

–

Was Ian a past life? I had accidentally stumbled on a few texts, which could’ve been taken any way and I got jealous-

“We’re not in love, but I make love to you.” Wes sang, looking at me, but as soon as I made eye contact he looked away, thought for a moment and sat up, since I was sitting in an armchair and kissed me, about to recite more Frank Ocean, but stopped in time, when the words wanted to come out of his mouth.

Why was there a lost love and one which was building and none of these things were spoken out loud?

I couldn’t decide on a favourite song yet for Wes, I wanted something which would convey my feelings, but I had left it on such, uncertainly, which we both dwelled on, which I just ignited really-

Ian.

Ian.

Ian.

I came back that night and we both smelled like other people, when we kissed for a while, before sliding into the bed for more sex, as if we could both still get it up and as if we both had still wanted it. But there was something animalistic within us, that still wanted the other and we made love.

–

Ian was always electric, that was what I liked about him. There was an aura, even though he kept it hidden from most people and was reserved, it wasn’t just when he drank, but it was when he was with me. It was always as if I was on a first date and he really wanted to make sure that we would’ve left for sex and pillow talk. Ian, was the one who had glow in the dark stars on his ceiling, growing up and his dreams about it.

“So.” He grinned, as if opening a box on Christmas once. “I would always fucking dream that I was an astronaut or a cosmonaut, since you know the Soviets were first and not sure I would’ve meshed well with-”

“Ian, you’re fucking a guy. I don’t think you would’ve meshed with anyone when you had homosexuality on the side.”

“True.” He said, a bit taken back, but joyful. “But I always dreamt that I was the one stepping outside, that I was the one to first fly around and I would look around, seeing how far earth was and my dreams would escalate. I would be the first one to step barefoot on the moon.”

I grinned at him and suppressed a laugh, which he gestured to just let out.

Sometimes speaking of Ian felt like the last beep on the phone after a dropped call, because it was done for. Because we were holding hands with someone else, but there was something making us both insanely in love with each other still.

–

It’s not like I even dreamt anymore, my heart was in my hands and it was heavy. It was filled with blood, to the brim and full of life. It was chocking me at times, but isn’t that what kept people going?

I wanted to rip my chest out further. It still felt heavy from all the love lost and gained.

–

I felt like my life started revolving around Wes’ sleeping cycle. I knew when he’d wake, when he’d sleep and most importantly when he became available. I had awoken some terrifying beast of love within me, which wanted me to just continue talking to him all the time, day and night, even shake him awake if needed, if I could.

I was losing my mind and that’s when I told Ian. With Wes, crying in my lap and me stroking his hair until he stopped, just as the call has gone smooth.

I felt like we were in some lovers painting, letting the audience decide what was really going on between us and what the fuck would happen later. I don’t know why I was stuck between two men, it felt inevitable like life and death. Day and night. I wasn’t sure where was life heading and how come I had fallen in love so easily. I had been looking for nothing and I had found everything. I ended the call with Ian, looking down at Wes’ still fresh tears.

I came back to Ian that night, we both smoked inside, our apartment wasn’t as fancy as Wes’ if to compare location-wise, after all where Wes lived, it was all about inheritance and when it came to both me and Ian, we had to struggle with everything. I wasn’t saying that Wes had nothing to fight for, but it was different.

“How many?” Ian had asked, pulling a strand of his longish wavy hair and looking at me.

“Just Wes.” I could see him flinch, that I had dropped the name so easily now. Ian looked down at his socks and inhaled the cigarette. “Who meant something.”

I made sure to wait Ian would look up.

“What about you?” My husband just shrugged. “No one, slept with a few, but… yeah, sure, the sex was great, I got to sleep with someone else. I’ve never really acted on my sexuality, just on the love I’ve held for you, but that ain’t working anymore, is it?”

“You’re putting words in my mouth.” I said suddenly and my husband was taken back, inhaling the cigarette faster just to breathe out the smoke. “I still love you.”

The small coffee table was between us, as if we were in a cafe, I wondered if that was Ian’s intention all along, like Chekhov’s gun, sometime to fire, but then at the same time what if it would’ve never fired at all? Who the fuck knows now? We were now caught red handed, each with a gun in hand and many problems to solve.

“Well, I want everything to go back.” Ian interrupted my gazing at the glass coffee table which only geometrically correct held the ashtray between us. He leaned back into his chair, rubbing his eyes.

“But that-”

“Isn’t going to happen.” I finished his sentence. I gulped and I could feel my whole body go stale, the saliva going down painfully. “I’ve fallen in love with Wes.”

“Does he know?”

“He knows.”

“And?”

I shrugged, putting my hands into my jacket, I hadn’t even bothered to take it off since I had arrived, the apartment was either too cold today or I was just really off even when it came to regulating body temperature. Ian didn’t take this too well, for my own sake, now though. He seemed to be focused on the fact, as if I were a friend, who just admitted unrequited love and he was thinking what the fuck to do now. My husband’s brows were together and he lit a new cigarette, passing it onto me and I wondered how many have I actually smoked in the span of these days.

I could read Ian’s expression.

I knew that what he’d say would be something like choose between me and him. Wes, he was younger and he was a new experience, but there was something about us which I couldn’t understand. I couldn’t just break him yet, but he was opening up, showing me polaroids of his life, since he had collected them even when they weren’t in production, so we sat down, when we just had sex and were in the messiest make up disaster ever known to man kind.

I had kissed him them, him dropping the polaroids gently onto the couch and we had made out for a good while with him on top of me, our erections flirting with each other, while rubbing even though we had just had sex.

I had tried to stir the topic to Ian.

“Ian… what about you?” He stared blankly at the ashtray, I could see that he had slept with plenty of women which seemed to last him a lifetime, but he shook his head.

“No one touched my heart in the way that Wes did for you.” He breathed out the smoke and finally looked at me, it was strange to see that they both had dark coloured eyes, but Wes’ were much deeper, while Ian’s were just hazel. Ian also had longer hair, which he would let loose, no one ever pestering him about it and he rarely did anything about it other than let it hang loose. “I was literally just having sex, Ewan, not making love to another man.”

–

I knew that Ian needed time, so I went to Wes’ ringing the door bell long enough just to open the door eventually, as if I was Alice, falling into a rabbit hole of love and misery. He peaked out of his bedroom, with a bottle in hand, cigarette in the other. I took a good gulp of Jack Daniels which he had offered me. I made a face, causing Wes to laugh and give me the cigarette, as if he had known that I would need it. The smoke numbed my tongue and I just looked at him.

I wanted to say things, but Wes shook his head, gesturing that it’s enough.

“I know, Ewan.” He turned to me and went to the kitchen, getting glasses for the whiskey and ice. “You love me.”

I sat still, as if I were in an interview.

“I don’t do boyfriends, I haven’t done that in a while.” He peaked out and gave me my glass and poured very generously, then proceeded to drink a bit from the bottle before pouring for himself. “Last boy broke my heart in second grade.”

“Wasn’t that a while back, Wes?”

“Fuck you.” He smirked, insulted, both of us clinging glasses together. “I told myself that I would love when the time comes.”

His dark eyes looked at me and I noticed that his hair wasn’t gelled.

“The time hasn’t come yet.”

“It hasn’t.” He stretched out his neck, scratching the area right under his beard. “But there are things which speak for themselves.”

Wes looked at me.

“But no.” I wasn’t sure what he meant by that.

–

I wondered what really was the heartbreak. What had shattered Wes’ heart. I wanted to know. Maybe that’s what made my blood spill from my heart. I didn’t know where to stick all my feelings and all my love for him. I was positive Ian wasn’t the guy to hear about it and neither was Wes himself.

–

I liked watching Wes. No matter what he was doing and how tired I was from sex, I would still watch him stand up and make us some food or just turn on the telly, browse the phone, dress up, clean up and wipe the saliva from his lips with the back of his hand.

I liked listening to Wes talk.

When he didn’t, I missed him, when we wouldn’t talk or when there was even a delay in pauses, I could fear tremble like a leaf inside me and then he’d kiss me and soothe me, knowing me from front to back, when I was reserved and he didn’t blossom fully.

–

Ian and Wes. Were they the two petals on the loves me, loves me not flower?

I pulled each petal with my teeth.

He loves me.

He loves me.

All a white lie to sleep at night.

–

I felt like my whole life was like a diary, that I was trying to find answers from a friend or a lover who I didn’t have. Things were rough with Ian and incomplete with Wes.

–

I didn’t understand how Ian had brought me breakfast in bed the next morning, as if all our cheating mattered nothing and under the daze of the dim morning light, I could barely remember why we had gotten so apart in the first place.

He felt like a lover from a distant time, someone I had stolen away, because he had been interested in some other girl, whose name I barely recalled now but he would mention her every once in a while, saying how funny how the world had turned to him, he would say with a smile and filled with love. I’m sure he would’ve mentioned her today, but today was off due to all the wrong reasons.

Maybe because I had been read by Wes at night, I wasn’t sure but I could see him drooling off the bed, laying diagnoally since he had admitted to stop sleeping for others for a while, which was strange because he was rather open and didn’t want any commitment or boyfriend for that matter. I wondered if he was looking for his Tengo or Aomame, just like in the Murakami book I was reading. I wasn’t sure. Maybe I would never be his-

“Ewan?” I shivered at the call of my name by Ian and looked up, as he just filled my cup with even more tea, him nagging under his breath that I should be drinking far more water than tea.

I wondered of Wes, of different men I had a crush on but never acted. Like this friend of mine, whom I’d go to gay bars with and I would point out to him who to cruise with and I would just sip on cocktails, texting Ian, bored, while he’d get sucked off or anything like that. He didn’t die of anything, somehow he stayed clean even if I knew he carried no condoms or maybe he was too ashamed to state something like hey, I got a STI like you had warned me. I wasn’t sure. I started thinking far too much about how his face would look like in pure ecstasy as he would pull the cock out of the other guy’s mouth, spilling cum on the other guy’s face. I knew he liked facials, we were rather into each other’s sex life and once I remember I had dragged him home with me to Ian, suggesting, laughing loudly and gesturing at the three of us, that we should try a threesome.

I had kissed him then and made out, until Ian broke us up-

That was it

Wasn’t it?

And now it was Wes.

Maybe I was the cheating type after all, but then I had fallen in love with Wes. He just hadn’t. But I didn’t want to lose Ian. I wanted them selfishly both.

–

Sometimes I wanted to storm into Wes’ place, where he would be laying down, lazily watching the telly and declare my love for him again and again and again until he would get it.

–

I keep watching Wes and I can’t help but fall in love deeper, as we had bought cake for two, which was really an entire cake and I would watch him, Frank playing in the back. Something Wes knew I associated with him and highly enjoyed. The cake was sub par, but we were taking our time with it, as if it would magically get better somehow.

Godspeed came on.

I looked at Wes, who nodded at me, with a what’s up and then I looked at the posters in his bedroom which were barely seen from here. For the envious, it was a small apartment sort of.

I didn’t know what to say and my hands shook more than usual. I couldn’t tell him that I loved him again. He wasn’t ready. He didn’t want it now.

Wes, I love you deeply. Was the mantra that was going on in my head. He’d always prepare for my visits and it was bewildering to even think that before I’d just come to get fucked hard and deep, now our sex had become far more sensual at times, at least in the very beginning of it, we would explore each other’s bodies more.

“I will always love you.” Rang in my ears still.

–

I knew that the void would never reply.

–

I would say it to Ian daily. Had we moved on? Had we accepted our fate? Had we just moved separate ways and would go out when the other would? Were we still in love?

–

The void wasn’t Wes. That’s why it wouldn’t reply honestly.

–

“I feel like you’ve become my painful muse.” I told Wes.

“Why painful?”

I didn’t reply.

–

I somehow managed to fall in love with another man, which was painful enough, while Ian slept with many women.

So who was the one to blame?

I couldn’t help but feel worse and worse about holding my feelings back for Wes. I could feel myself cracking at every step, every time I would raise my head to see him head to the kitchen to check on the food we were both attempting to cook.

I couldn’t fathom anything.

I could look at his through my fingers, hands on my face and there would be nothing I would be able to say. It would get more painful, I couldn’t fucking do anything. I was in love, deep.

–

Ian kept quiet and so did I, we would smoke sometimes in silence, as if we were unaware of what the other was doing. I didn’t really understand how the fuck were our dynamics even healthy, but we were still married. We still showed up in Christmas photos and cooperatives. We’re still together, just apart.

I wondered what would it take for us both to fall in love again? Can you even fall in love with someone twice? I looked at Ian, as I couldn’t see his eyes, covered by long wavy hair, smoke rising to the ceiling and he turned to look at me, wondering what was it that I was gonna say. There was no telly on or music, to fill in the noise.

I felt like I was changing, but then so was he. Ian, seemed to have found himself while I seemed to discover myself, but then maybe it had always been me all along? Ian had his hair short when we met, just like Wes, not gelled and we progressed he would change it from short to long, back and forth until he settled for a longer cut and he would look around. Sometimes I wondered if I was looking for another Ian, when things weren’t going well and I frankly was, but now Wes was different as fuck, which was unusual, even if my brain would try to find a pattern and try to find some similarities and a type of man for me, but it didn’t feel like they had anything in common.

Maybe because they both wanted me gone. I wasn’t sure, but at night when I would wish that I could smoke in bed (I really wasn’t because I had kept the pack next to the balcony or any of the windows and unless I wanted to piss, there was no way in hell I would stand up and neither did I drink water at night).

–

How many times?

–

Maybe I was the one ruining love for myself.

–

I wondered if other people would recognize me, when Blonde was running through my veins. I remembered and toyed with the idea of dying my hair back blonde and it kept recurring, I had never told many people about cheating on Ian, so if I were to say that my music taste had changed, it felt like letting in on a secret that I had fallen in love with someone else. Because someone had changed me for the good, someone had just switched off the lights in my old room and the glow in the dark stars suddenly became stars and Wes would just stare at them, taking my hand, to tell me the world-

He knew.

So what was wrong with me?

–

Wes played with my hair, which was even shorter than his, he had barely anything to play with, frankly. I wondered when had my sexuality stabilized so much. I had wondered when did that happen. It hit me suddenly, because both me and Ian never really discussed it much, Ian knew that he preferred girls, but there I was cruising with guys and falling in love with Wes, so I sat up and looked at him in the eyes. Sometimes, I would get scared before entering his apartment, never knowing what to expect, but once I’d see his dark eyes it was always different.

I saw those stars in his eyes, even if he didn’t enjoy space, he’d make sure to always have Frank on when I’d be around, he’d put Nikes on nearly after I would walk in or tell me a few seconds to wait, once after I had decided on a rather bizarre gesture. I bought him a bouquet, something which felt like he would like. He had flowers every once in a while, I was dressed accordingly, I was pretty flamboyant, yet the lady said that I had making this for a very lucky girl. I chose the flowers accordingly to what I recalled from my mother, when she still had expectations for me and then I made it.

Flowers were something I wanted to step over.

Maybe that’s why I wanted them for Wes. I wasn’t sure enough-

But he had opened the door, Self Control playing today and he froze in his steps, slippers on and I’m guessing he had fallen asleep, I could only dream that it was of me and he looked up.

“Thank you. You… remembered I liked these.” He didn’t bother me with names, because I had no idea what I had chosen and he took the bouquet carefully, running a hand through his hair, not sure what to even say as he headed into the kitchen to get a vase.

I tried not to say anything else, but we just sat there for a while, looking at the flowers before he plunged himself to kiss me deeply on the couch, the bouquet right in front of us-

Maybe he thought a lot of me too.

I should’ve bought more flowers.

–

I don’t think it matters what shape does love take. Or who the person really is, I laid on Wes’ chest as we smoked, sharing a cigarette as always and I couldn’t help but stop, now, I felt like I would cry if I could, but I wasn’t a crying guy. Maybe it’s because I used all my tears growing up, I wasn’t sure. I didn’t care who we were, I didn’t care where we would be.

I blew the smoke away from me, feeling Wes’ breathing. There was no timer. He could fall in love with me anytime or never at all.

–

I could feel his finger stroke me all over, I could feel his attraction and the flowers still stayed fresh and I wondered if he just kept now buying the same bouquet, since it wasn’t maybe that hard to decide which flower store was it, after all, he knew all the flowers, I could see him reading a book on flowers, but I knew that he most likely fell in love with each one of them telling a story of a lover.

I wondered if I was doing a cheap bribe, by getting many at once. I could see him tearing the bouquet apart and telling me which lover meant what and maybe settling on one flower for me or maybe I could somehow fall into the metaphor of life, because after all what was life in the end of the day?

Wes kissed me. I deepened the kiss, we had started hanging out far more than just having sex, it was as if we started craving each other in all other words. With Ian it was different. I closed my eyes, I wanted to think of my husband separately-

But then, I had no idea. I needed to give it time.

–

We had all met. I was already searching my jacket pockets for a packet of cigarettes, going outside and all of a sudden, Wes was heading inside. We stood still, for a moment, people passing and the doors closed enough for there to be glass between us.

“What is it?” Ian asked me, tracing my gaze until it fell upon Wes. I expected him to puff up like a cold pigeon, but instead I could hear a soft sigh, until he made the move either the two of us were scared to do, I followed my husband outside and instantly lit my cigarette, my hands shivering even though it was rather warm outside for this time of the year. I was just in a jacket after all.

“Wes?” Ian asked and gave out a small, polite smile.

“Yeah. I’m Wes, Ian.” And he instantly stretched out his hand. For some reason I stared at his fingers, recalling all the touch both decent and indecent. “Sorry.”

He shook his head, as if trying to wake up from a long sleep.

“Sorry-”

“Lovely to meet you, Ian.”

“Likewise.” And then I gave a good look at my husband. He knew, as they shook hands. Ian stuck his hand in my jacket and took out the car keys, I wouldn’t be driving anyway, I barely could. I still had no idea how I had gotten a driver’s license and I just never enjoyed it like Ian. There was no trace of sarcasm. “C’mon, chill, it’s just your boyfriend.”

And with that Ian, playing with the keys in his hand left me and Wes.

“We’re not boyfriends-” But Ian just motioned with his hand, that such a detail was irrelevant coming from a mouth like mine. I turned to look at Wes, who had taken my cigarette and took a good drag from it.

“We’ll get there.” He said.

–

My heart wouldn’t stop breaking, shattering, aching. I needed more of Wes and I desperately needed Ian. I’d wake up at night recalling Wes’ insomnia but I always seemed to miss that and he’d be asleep by the time I would wake. I wanted to talk to him, I wanted to know so much more. My body just ached and craved for his touch and his mouth.

–

“This unrequited love
To me it’s nothing but a one-man cult
And cyanide in my Styrofoam cup
I can never make him love me
Never make him love me”

I didn’t even notice Ian as I was reciting it from memory and looking at the ceiling, my legs up on the bed, lying on the floor and he just stopped dead in his tracks.

“You really do love him, then?” I didn’t answer. “Dinner’s ready.”

–

I put the fork down and I could feel Ian stop the small talk, where I had just been nodding. He tilted his head to one side, but I wanted to speak, so he gave me time. I was too scared to say it out.

“I’ve never really even given myself the time to think if I want two people. I just fell in love.” Ian drank some water and tapped fingers against the table.

“I just wanna sleep around… sometimes.” I raised my eyes at him, not realizing that I had been avoiding his hazel gaze all this time.

“So… we cool?” I asked, my hands shaking as I picked up the fork.

“I never said I’d leave you.” Ian chewed slowly, thinking about the right words. “I vowed, not because I don’t believe in divorce, but I meant it. I would love you regardless and I hope the same for you.”

–

We were both drunk. Again. Maybe that’s why because it was easier to just dissolve and laugh between kisses, I wasn’t even sure. I had started making a habit of buying bouquets, making sure that I was the one providing fresh flowers for his apartment. I didn’t know why I fixate on it. I tried to read on flowers online, but soon enough I got bored, but the right names would come to my mind as I would pick for the next bouquet.

Maybe that’s when it clicked for the lady, but then I remember I was at work, even if I had a ring on my finger, people assumed I was straight with a bright red jacket and changing my shoes more often than the guys would change their shirts. I didn’t know how it had happened, how I got in the middle of an argument, but I couldn’t help but wonder how could people just make assumptions on LGBT people not even knowing what one was.

“Fuck them.” Wes said, tripping and grabbing the next bottle of vodka, cigarette in mouth. I wanted to say something stupid, but instead I kept it in my mouth, about to spill out, he had said that as I described how they complained how promiscuous we were. How we were anomalies.

Anomalies.

That word stung.

I just finished the coffee as much as I could and spilled the rest into the sink, causing the two guys to stop in their tracks and I had left to Wes’. Ian was still at work. I couldn’t care.

Our legs were intertwined on his couch, telly on and all and we were laughing. I think by now he had a bouquet on every window sill, I would love seeing his surprise, as if I had never given him one, as I would pass it to him carefully now, as often as we would meet.

We stopped, as if we hadn’t known the beat.

“My guy pretty like a girl, but he got fight stories to tell.” Wes choked on his bottle of vodka, he didn’t refuse. We were beyond drinking from the discarded shot glasses. I wasn’t even sure where they were.

“I would’ve fought, for the record.” He laughed, taking my hand and intertwining our fingers and we stared at each other for a pretty good damn while, as if it was some sort of first kiss and eventually we both closed our eyes and I went on top of him. Wes wrapped his arms around my back, opening his mouth and I followed.

“I need that bitch to grind on my belt.” I pulled him by the collar of his shirt and then slid my hand lower, lifting up his shirt slightly to stroke the exposed skin.

“You’re really gonna seduce me with-” I bit his neck. He moaned. I went back to his lips, hungrier than ever, both of us terribly turned on and breathing heavily in unison, grinding. Wes shifted his arms around my neck and biting his lip, as we broke the kiss to look at each other. I slid my hands under his shirt and traced his skin with my fingers, before going lower and lower.

“Fucking tease.”

“You’ve never really seen yourself in the mirror, have you?” I couldn’t even smirk from my own remark, just a brief grin before undoing his belt. Wes shifted up, as I unzipped his jeans. I could feel myself get heavily turned on, as if I wasn’t already.

“I feel like a fucking virgin every time with you.” Wes laughed. I tried to choose my words carefully, but instead I kissed him, he returned the kiss and we held gazes for a bit.

He knew.

I went down.

I took as much as I could.

Wes kept pushing further into my mouth and throat, causing me to gag. I took out my own cock and started stroking myself. He pulled me off his dripping in saliva cock by my hair.

“Why do you feel like a virgin?” I coughed from all the cock in my mouth, edging motherfucker.

“Because I feel like I’m always making love for the first time to you.” Wes stopped in his tracks. He eased his grip and stroked my hair.

“Fucking inexperienced.” I continued. “Not knowing where to stick my feelings and just going further down the rabbit hole-

To find bouquets, to find Frank Ocean as a constant soundtrack-

And desperate.”

–

“You’re not sleeping with anyone else other than Wes and I, are you?”

I shook my head.

“Just you and Wes.” I repeated, as if for myself.

–

I wake up when they turn off the streetlights, when its no longer necessary to know whether it’s night or day.

I wake up next to Ian mostly, but instead I go down the stairs, once I had insomnia strike me down, writing a quick note for Ian, knowing that he won’t recall the fact that I needed to head out at 7 am, this cold winter morning.

12^th January.

But I wake up so often to Wes, just to see him water the flowers I’ll never recall beyond red and white, thorns or not-

“Do you want the thorns off?” Cigarette already in my mouth, about to pay, as my hands tremble.

“Never.”

–

Roses. I had added roses this time, flowers I had to give so often to family and beards for family, some of them who I’ve cared about

But these were different

Sometimes, I wanted to tell him

Wes, I can’t go on

I love you

I love you and you’ll never love me back.

The roses were scattered on the bouquet.

“You’re pretty serious today or something?” I just brushed the question aside.

–

“Tell him you love him.” Ian had told me once, we were sober. That’s what marriage does to you. I ignored him and then he took me by my hands, so that I would look into his hazel eyes.

We stayed quiet. We squeezed each other’s hands.

“Please tell me you ain’t sleeping with the witch.” Ian burst out laughing and shook his head, tears coming from his eyes.

“No, no.”

I didn’t reply.

“Is that it?” He smiled at me. “Just… the witch.”

I nodded.

“I don’t want someone homophobic or transphobic sitting on our table if-”

Ian laughed even deeper.

“I love you. You’re the one whose in love with someone else, Ewan, as well.” He tilted his head on me, as if I were a child. “I know.”

We held hands for a long while, before we kissed again, it was different. It was as if someone had unveiled the final scene in a theatre play. I was

I was

In a comedy?

Sure, I’d die one day. But today wasn’t it.

“Fucking invite him for dinner tonight. I’ll cook, I don’t want food poisoning.” But I was shaking as he said it and stood up to get some water. Fucking hydration.

–

I carried the bouquet

It felt heavy for once, I avoided roses at all costs prior.

Frank in my ears, headphones quickly taken from the living room, where I had been sleeping prior, listening to music to avoid Ian, but now…

Checkhov’s gun had fired.

I was in love.

I was a man on a mission.

I couldn’t joke, I kept ringing and ringing-

“You’re-” Wes wasn’t even looking at the bouquet. “Early.”

“But we didn’t mark anything for today.”

“I hadn’t opened Grindr in who knows how long, Ewan.” Wes smirked and I couldn’t help but stare at the younger lover, I stepped over the door threshold and held the bouquet tight, my hands shaking and I handed it over, feeling bare, stripped-

In love.

“You’re no longer a sketched up meeting.” Wes said quietly, his expression soft and unreadable today. He didn’t put the flowers in the water at first, we just stood there in his corridor.

“Roses.”

“Yeah, they’re the only ones I know the meaning of.” Wes looked up at me and his gaze softened even further. “Or I might just be guessing

But I-”

Wes stopped in his tracks, looking down before back up at me. He didn’t take a second breath.

“I love you, Ewan.”

“I love you, too.”

I started crying. Wes just stared at me for a second, before throwing his arms around me and I kept crying. I clutched his stripy shirt. He was already dressed. Fucking fortune teller. I started bawling, Wes held me and that’s when I started laughing and Wes caught up with me. I raised my head from his shoulder.

He did a full grin and stroked my tear filled face, they wouldn’t stop.

“Words escape me-

I love you. I love you. I love you.” I sill clutched his shirt. He didn’t need a cigarette.

“I’ve been making love to you for so long.” Wes nearly whispered.

–

“I don’t think words will ever express fear, death, love or sex.

It’s not even that you need to know what it is to describe it, it’s probably the fact that it should be two-sided.” Now we were smoking, the heavy rose bouquet in front of us on the table.

Wes listened, I couldn’t keep my mouth off his.

“And even then… we’re no Gods to describe what’s divine.”

I grinned when the album reached the right song and closed my eyes, Wes kissed me again.

The right lines were sung by Frank Ocean.

–

“One thing we can describe is doubt, because it’s within us. It’s not something we share. It’s the reflection we see, until we call the person over, to ask them if they’ve seen our outfit, maybe ask for a photo before buying an item of clothing… But I’m digressing

I’m not one to describe love

Because I am in love and no words will ever

ever

convey what I feel for you every fucking day.”

“Not even Frank?” Wes mocked me, right after I had told him that I had listened to everything back and forth since we had met, every day.

“Not even Frank.” I paused. I looked at Wes, I thought of Ian, who knew me, I paid attention to the song now. I closed my eyes as Wes ran his hands through my hair, giving me the cigarette and I inhaled, grinning, opening my mouth and looking at him and

“It’s not even that I’m free from all the weight of every single flower I’ve given you.

I’m yours.”

Just like a text message, we think too much, even when the other knows, so we keep erasing, rewriting, assuming and playing God.

–

I laughed at myself and cried a lot, Wes held me the whole day, he’d come to dinner.

–

We were about to leave for dinner, when Wes stopped me.

Godspeed was on. Wes spoke-

“I’ll always love you

Until the time we die.”

I nodded-

There is no ending. I can write as much as I want, but-

Wes knows it all.

Everything-

We laughed when Godspeed was on a loop.