Author: Innocent Loverboy (Page 15 of 30)

TEAM AQUA GRUNT sent out POOCHYENA!
POOCHYENA used BITE!
What will WINGULL do?

I sat on the steps, shielded from the sun’s rays, a couple of metres from the left lion. Nottingham had been good to me for the past few days and, although I had nothing to do and nowhere to go, I could sit partially separated from the hustle and bustle of the Old Market Square and play Pokémon Sapphire.

I could get used to this, I reasoned.

Thinking back on it, I needed something to get used to. I knew Nottingham well, and was used to its intricacies, but I was not used to the activities I’d been partaking in all week. It had been too much effort for too little reward – and, since I’d been staying in hotels and eating in restaurants, too much money as well. I had also recently been called “wanker!” by somebody old and wise enough to know better.

Wiping away a tear, I carefully set aside my GBA and considered heading back to the hotel to see if they had another room. It wouldn’t have been affordable, perhaps, but maybe the pretty girl was still there. Old Market Square was lovely, but (unlike the action-packed morning I’d had the day beforehand, when an old man collapsed and I waited for the ambulance for half an hour…).

Maybe I could go to another restaurant.

My body screamed as I wrenched myself off the marble and started ambling towards The Cornerhouse. I passed a record shop in which a band had once played an intimate gig. A band which a girl I had a crush on liked. I didn’t know the band at all, but I knew she liked them.

And my thoughts ran away with that tiny memory.

What was she doing now? Where was she? Would I see her again? Was she having sex? Had she ever had sex? Would she ever have sex with me? How many people here, on this little street in Nottingham City Centre, have had sex? And how many of them have done so in the last 24 hours?

The last 12?
The last 6?
The last 3?

How many people on this street are on their way home from, or on their way to, the home (or hotel room) of someone with whom they were having sex? Maybe that confident-looking man on the other side of the street was having sex less than ten minutes ago and is still coming down from the feeling.

Last five minutes.
Three.

I wish I’d been having sex two minutes ago and was still coming down from the feeling, although unlike the confident-looking man, I probably wouldn’t be walking down the street. I might be cuddling her instead.

In all honesty, I would really like a cuddle.

By the time I got to The Cornerhouse, I was absolutely convinced that everyone I’d passed had been having beautiful sex for the entire year and, furthermore, I was the only one who had missed out on this. I felt like such an interloper, me being this physically repulsive, scruffy wanker who spent his time playing Pokémon and thinking about pretty girls, all at sea in this shining beacon of sexual energy called Nottingham, where I certainly didn’t belong even though I was living there at the time, because I sure as Hell wasn’t good enough.

Burning with shame, I found a Bella Italia which did sherbet lemons instead of after dinner mints. I took a couple and, to assuage any guilt, took a table and ordered myself some food.

The waitress who served me had definitely had sex in the last twenty-four hours.

I felt better after dinner, and walked out into the dusky city, now looking for somewhere else to spend the night.

Earlier this week I had two dental appointments, on two different days, with two different dentists at two different practices. I even had to rush out of work in order to make them – either by cajoling my dad into giving me a lift or making creative use of the North London bus network – but make them I did.

As a result, I now have a repaired filling on the top row of teeth, and a still-open wound on the bottom row, which feels okay most of the time but occasionally starts bleeding.

Kiss me if you want; my mouth is fascinating.

The week before last, in preparation for the same, I went to the dentist for a five-minute “sure, come back in a week” conversation that could have really happened via text…

…and bumped into “Chanel”, someone who, I suddenly remembered with a start, everyone had wanted to fuck.

I didn’t really know her at school – apart from her name and what she looked like. Our predefined social circles never crossed over, and the only time I heard her mentioned it was by one of her friends (in a complimentary way) or one of the rowdy boys I never liked (in a horny way). Despite not knowing her, I remember feeling sorry for her; in every conversation, she had been added to the end, as if she were an afterthought.

It was noticeable. There was an illicit party going on around my birthday one year (it wasn’t anything to do with me, but I heard the whispers). Everyone who was anyone who was going, from what I could tell, but Chanel was also mentioned last. Every time one of the popular clique would list her friends, in whatever order, Chanel always came at the end.

And, as I said before, a lot of the boys found Chanel desirable. Not that I ever asked how she felt about this, but after reeling off a list of girls he wanted to have sex with (he used a slightly more taboo word, but I’ll abstain from repeating that here), one boy paused a second before adding, “…oh… and Chanel.”

She was also the last on the register, although she shouldn’t have been.

Which is to say, I noticed that. I don’t know if anyone else did. Mostly what I remember was her being popular, slightly aloof, quiet and reserved, and somebody who a lot of the rowdy boys wanted to fuck.

I didn’t know anything about her otherwise. But I knew the name. And what do you say, exactly, to somebody of whom your overall memory is someone at the end of every list who some rowdy boys were entirely unsavoury about?

She remembered me. But then everyone does.

And, as it turns out, we work for exactly the same company.

And have been doing so for years.

Small world, really.

I didn’t know, and don’t know still, if I got any sleep at all last night.

I woke up early on Sunday morning – early enough that, had I gotten myself out of bed and towards the vicinity of a cup of coffee or something, I could have gone to church. Instead of doing so, of course, I rolled over and went straight back to sleep.

Had a sex dream; 9am alarm woke me up just as sex was actually about to happen. Thoroughly annoyed by that, although it’s not the first time that’s happened. I hardly ever get to have sex in my dreams, so I wasn’t expecting it right then and there, but still…

Last night was different.

I don’t remember sleeping – although who does? A more accurate statement would be that I don’t remember dreaming! – and I still don’t know if I got any sleep whatsoever. I also don’t remember being particularly awake; I certainly had periods where I felt so. But then I don’t recall feeling any of my trademark boredom, panic, or dark thoughts that usually accompany my insomnia. The night may as well have never happened.

What I do remember, in vivid flashes, is occasional pangs of discomfort. My entire body teetering on the edge of the bed (in order to give them space), ready to fall off. My semi-hard mattress (a very bad choice on my part; I was too chicken to ask for something softer) being a problem for my back. The neck pain I’ve had since our honeymoon occasionally resurfacing with every repositioning.

And, perhaps the most vividly, me clutching onto the bunched duvet like a koala – the sheets wrapped in me, rather than the other way around.

This morning, when asked, I said I was tired. I’m still not entirely sure if I genuinely was. My colleagues and clients all were – making for a slow, calm day at work – and so I decided that I was. I wasn’t sure exactly how to describe how I was feeling, because I didn’t know myself.

But I had a very odd night, and since I have no idea how to describe that, I’m attempting to do so here.

Please forgive me.