These are not stories.

It’s been a hot fucking day. The thermostat reads 80 degrees in your room. It’s 2:30 in the morning. Fan is blowing. A/C is blowing. You want to go to sleep but your brain won’t let you. Your girlfriend is sleeping next to you. You just spent the night drinking and fucking, having a good old time, pretending you were still the 25-year-olds you wish you were. She dreams of the English countryside. You will not be there the next time she visits. You will not taint her dreams. It’s okay because you have your own dreams of walking across far off lands where you can discover unimaginable things about yourself.

It’s been a hot fucking day. You lie naked in bed next to your girlfriend, trying not to fall asleep, to hang onto this last memory of being the child you wish you could be. There was talk of Girl Scouts and Cub Scouts and how you both wanted to take part because of the uniforms. The Nazis loved their uniforms. Way to go, ya little sympathizers. Neither of us joined our little clubs because we both had parents who didn’t have the money or didn’t want to spend the time. It’s probably for the best. We probably would have been diddled. That’s what they do in those clubs, right? Then what would we talk about, how we bond about being diddled as kids? That would probably make the rape fantasies awkward. Fuck, it’s been a hot day.

“Let’s go for quesadillas,” I said.

“Mmm, that sounds delicious,” she said.

“There’s a good place up the road. But there’s also a place right next door that also might be good.”

“Let’s check out the place next door.”

“Okay.”

So I settled up and we head outside. When you’ve been drinking all day in air-conditioned bars and then you step out into a raging inferno, it always smacks you in the face like you never saw it coming even though you knew it was coming. It felt like being back in the womb, so warm and so moist. So I lay down on the ground and closed my eyes and smiled and thought about the fireflies waiting to light our way back home. She, unfortunately, was having none of this, and she shoved her foot into my arm to nudge me before I was completely out.

“This is cute and all, but I wanna go home,” she said.

“Fine,” I mumbled and slowly got up.

We held hands as we walked. She pulled away soon because our hands got clammy and she didn’t like the sound it made. Her hearing is that senstive. She hears ants on the ground, marching in lines, speculating about the queen this and that with their buddy Fred and there’s gonna be big changes cos she thought he was one thing and turned out to be another, and let’s just keep our heads down and do our jobs and not get cocky like Fred. It’s less the feel and more the disgusting sound for her. Nails on the chalkboard.

Fuck, it was a hot fucking day. You and she make it home. And you got naked and stand in front of the A/C, drying the sweat. And you look into each other’s eyes, seriously at first, and then you both start laughing. Her skin is soft and you love the way it feels. She says the same about yours, but you don’t believe her, or you’re self-concious, so you make a stupid joke about how the ants and mosquitos should get together and eat feces together. And the joke flops, and she was anticipating it. She puts her finger on your lips. “Shut the fuck up and kiss me already.” You’re both sweating again because it’s been a hot fucking day and it’s fucking hot inside your stupid hot fucking apartment. You kiss and fall on the bed and fuck for hours. There’s nothing better than this. Maybe tomorrow will be a little cooler.

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