The Way of the Brokenhearted

Woman Reclining by A Lake by Edward Cucuel

We gather in crowded rooms where we can surround ourselves with our collective misery, except that, while the shindig is at its peak like an orgasm that no one wants preempted, nobody wants to flatly admit that our lives are as artificial as a silicone implant hanging too low it’s about to kiss the navel. Throughout the charade, we prefer the gaze of the faint ceiling lamps to assure us that most of us are left in the dark, groping whatever is there to grope for as long as it is not as emaciated as Samantha’s left cheek, or pride. No one even remembers her. I do, of course, but that’s beside the point. So we shake our heads and curl our toes and rub the few things in between our heads and toes, because we are sure, and this we swear to all the gods there has ever been, that that is all that is left of us — the few things in between, and for so few the heart is not even one of them. Imagine that. But whoever took it can keep it. Long ago we have convinced ourselves that love is neither as soft as an easy chair nor as fresh as the morning air. In other words, Barbara Streisand is wrong, which does not necessarily mean that Salbakuta is right, either. Christ on a hot burrito I do not even listen to both, but then we break into singing, like a fledgling choral group belting high notes — “Yes, high notes, there is no other way to put it” my new friend said, who confessed that he was gay even if everyone already knew, gesturing how high a high note is from one fingertip to another — because this is the way of the brokenhearted.

“So here’s a condescending question: where’s your girlfriend?”

“Girlfriends.” Someone else chimed in. I wasn’t able to figure out who it was.

“C-cut it out,” I said, “you and you and you and you and” I kept pointing until everything became blurred. “Someday I’ll f-find someday I’ll find her.”

“Pity you.”

“Oh y-yeah? Fuck you t-too, Danica. Yeah fuck you,” I said.

I didn’t see it coming. What swiftly hit my right cheek was as hard as an iron beam, though I admit it was a quick follow through when Danica’s lips suddenly touched mine, which was perhaps my compensation for the punishment she just meted out. Then her tongue dug into my mouth. I liked the whiff of beer in her breath and the faint smell of cigarette smoke on her hair that still had the scent of shampoo and ohmygod her smooth hand is now inside my pants goodlordhavemercy I’m getting so stiff down there.

“Penis,” Danica whispered in my ear.

“That is correct,” I whispered back. It felt like human anatomy class all over again.

“Danica dear not here,” Benny said. Or was it Benny? He tapped her on the shoulder. “Get a room.” He winked at me, then he gently stroke Danica’s hair. And Danica nonono please no don’t stroke it up down up down up ohgodalmighty that feels so good I think I love you.

Danica laughed. Guffawed. “Oh no you don’t love me,” she said, pulling out the hand and wagging a finger in front of my eyes. She sucked the finger. She sucked it like a jealous but calculating little girl, ending her performance by running the tip of her tongue on the fingernail, circling it with as much accuracy as she can manage under the faint light.

“Not bad. Not bad at all,” Jasper said, clapping his hands like a seal. He somehow looked like one, too. I told him about it thirty minutes and I think six bottles ago. He wasn’t amused, but he was quick to pardon my sin. Better than most priests, I must say, to which he replied, smiling, “I’d rather be a nun.”

Someone returned from the comfort room and sulked on the lounge sofa beside Danica. “Hey J-Jennifer,” I said, though I can’t recall if that was her name, “wh-what was it about the - ”

“Jennifer?” she said. “Silly you, drunk as an Irish on a Friday night payday.”

I don’t quite understand why I had to remember their names. After all, that night was the first and last time that we’ll ever see each other. That’s how we roll, people who believe desperate times call for desperate measures. That’s how we roll, and roll we did, Danica and I, rolling it and smoking it until things felt hazier than I can recall that night, and when I told her I like you she said hahaha but then she embraced me and I felt her breasts pressed against my chest and ohmygod they’re so soft can I touch them and she said no not here and she led me out the door then downstairs and I remember hailing a taxi before my eyes closed and when I woke-up again we stopped somewhere and got out of the car and went upstairs and god it’s so cold inside this room where are we and she said my place and I knew and she knew and before long we were naked in bed because she took off my shirt and pants and underwear and I did to her what she did to me and ohmygod nice curves and she said shut it and enjoy the show and she mounted me and shook her hips slowly very slowly and daaaamn was all I could say.

I lost consciousness somewhere in the middle.

Another morning, and just another day for the brokenhearted. Blood on the sheets. Blood on the floor. Crimson everywhere, and a heart in my bag. Goodbye, Danica. I hope you enjoy the bathtub.