Over the past few years or so I have shared many fascinating stories via blogging...stories of how I once made out with a woman almost old enough to be my grandmother and stories of how I once urinated dark-red blood and thought I was going to die...and stories of how I once barged in on a grown man dropping heat in a Starbucks bathroom (he failed to say 'I'm in here!' when I knocked)...and stories of how I was once convinced I had gonorrhea for a hellish period of three months but never did. Wait a minute...I never wrote about that latter story. Forget I ever said anything about that. It never happened. Well, yes it did, but I never got an STD test in the ER that involved getting a long Q-tip-type device jammed down my snake eye. All right, that happened as well, but I never got a thorough butt exam immediately after getting the STD exam for a reason I'm still trying to figure out, as it had nothing to do with the symptoms I was experiencing. I'm also trying to figure out why the "doctor" who did it wasn't dressed like a doctor. Come to think of it, he was dressed more like a custodian, and his name tag said "Chester"....
By the way, I'm clean.
Anyway, after the events of this past weekend, I have another story to add to the list: how I got drunk at a dive bar and ended up at the forty-dollar-per-night motel next door with a forty-year-old crippled woman desperate for sex. Yes, this is a good one, so pull up a seat and enjoy.
It was Saturday night and I started the evening off with a forty-ounce bottle of Mickey's, which is a Malt Liquor that has the tendency to mess me up something nasty. I met up with some friends in the "man-den", which is a term for my friend Russ' bachelor-pad basement that has everything from a beer fridge to four different video game consuls (PS2, Xbox, Nintendo 64 and Nintendo Game Cube). We drank, we laughed, I played a little PS2, and - after an hour or so - we headed out to the local dive bar: a place called Clyde's.
Clyde's is a claustrophobic little joint that usually gets uncomfortably crowded, but is a good place to go if you're looking for a mean between the "clubby scene" (i.e. hambone tool-bags and dance floors with dry humping), and the young professional scene (i.e. "classy" girls who you never have a chance with because they're looking for Johnny Professional who makes a secure living in the financial district, those friggin' skanks). Yes, at Clyde's you can get a beer, smoke a cigarette, not be judged, listen to some non-clubby tunes and maybe talk to a cute girl or two who isn't looking for the next Johnny Wall Street, those friggin' skanks.
Anyway, I arrived at Clyde's with two of my friends (Russ and Andy), already with a good, solid buzz in my system due to the Mickey's. I then proceeded to buy a beer. And another beer. And then another beer. Pretty soon, I was feeling mighty fine. And it was at around this point that a lady hobbled into the bar with a cane and - for some reason - immediately gravitated towards me.
"You look like you know how to party."
"You know it," I said, kidding around, and also incredibly stewed.
The lady wore a Patriots shirt and had whitish hair, palish skin, very red lipstick and smelled like a cheap deodorizer - kind of like what you would find in Kitty Litter - and it made my nose itch a bit. To be truthful, there could have been a urine-type scent mixed in there as well (maybe cat pee), but I don't want to elaborate on that too much, because I'm trying to be nice to this poor crippled woman.
"I have three hundred dollars and I'm looking to party," she said.
"What do you mean? You want drugs?"
"Well...drugs...and something else...."
I immediately told her that I couldn't help her out with the drugs, because I thought she may have been a cop or working for the cops or something along those lines (not to mention the fact that I don't do drugs and don't know where to get anything drug-related). She then proceeded to tell me how she used to be a mason and fell three stories off a building and has had several surgeries and is in an incredible amount of pain and needs something strong to take the edge off. I suggested she try extra-strength Tylenol or something like Advil with an anti-inflammatory, but she said she tried all that shit and it doesn't help her in the least.
My memory of our conversation from this point forward is a little hazy, what with the alcohol and everything. I know that more words were exchanged and more beers were sipped and she may have rubbed up against me a few times and then, at some point, she started telling me how her husband had died four years ago and that I reminded her of him and that "it's been so long" [since she's gotten laid].
"I'm staying at the motel next door. I have two condoms," she whispered to me.
Now, of course, if I was sober, my brain would have immediately registered the fact that this was an incredibly bad idea (well, I'm pretty sure it would have). But I wasn't sober. I was rather trashed and pretty much part-retarded. Drinking not only gives me the most amazing pair of beer goggles in the history of beer goggles, but it also makes me incredibly horny. Like, REALLY horny. Unnaturally horny. Probably no less horny than a man on Meth (from what I understand, Meth makes you want to hump anything in your path and take no prisoners).
So, instead of saying "I'm not interested" to this lonely woman whose husband allegedly died four years ago, I said...
"Um...I don't know...."
"Come on, it's been so long," she pleaded with me.
To be truthful, I'm not really sure what kind of thoughts were going through my mind. On one hand, I felt bad for this woman and wanted to do a Good-Samaritan-type-thing, go back to her motel, give her some company and try to make her less lonely. But, to be truthful, I think I was seriously contemplating having sex with her. Again, I was drunk, and when I'm drunk, my brain is located between my legs.
"I'm with my friends," I said.
"Well, bring them over. I have a box of wine and we can all party."
'OK, no harm in that', I figured to myself. 'Sure, we'll go over and party and hopefully give this poor woman a good time. And as far as anything sex-related goes, maybe it will happen, maybe it won't. I'm not gonna say it will. I'm not gonna say it won't.'
So, to make a long story short...I ended up going back to the motel with her, even though my friends advised strongly against me doing so. In fact, they had absolutely no desire to go over there for a drink. They wanted no part of this charade. So I told them to chill at the bar and I'd be back in a couple minutes. And, again, I'm not really sure what was going through my head. Maybe I DID want to have sex with her. Or maybe I simply just felt bad for her and wanted to give her some company...for a short while. Maybe a combination of the two.
Whatever it was, I know I definitely ended up in the "Boston View Motel" a few minutes later, which charges forty dollars a night for a room that smells like about thirty years worth of stale cigarette smoke and rotten sex. The motel derived its name from the fact that - on a clear day - you can see the tips of the Hancock and Prudential building in the far distance, as it is located on somewhat of a high hill. Not really much of a "Boston View", but technically, the name doesn't lie.
The crippled woman's room was accessible from the back of the motel, which was probably a good thing, just in case anybody I knew saw me walk into a place notorious for cheap prostitution and shady drug deals. With my kind of luck, one of my neighbors or aunts or uncles or grandmothers would randomly decide to go for a midnight stroll in their car, pass the Boston View, and catch a glimpse of me escorting a crippled woman into her motel room. That wouldn't have looked good at all. No way.
Before we entered her room, I helped the cripple hold her cane while she put her cigarette out on the pavement, intending to save the rest for later. She then took her keys out of her pocket and unlocked the door, which - she informed me - was directly across the hall from a family (with kids) who were paying $250 a week to live at the motel indefinitely. Maybe their house had been foreclosed and they were homeless. Such a thought depressed me. Crazy economy we're living in. Insane times.
The cripple creaked the door to her room open and the first thing I noticed as I walked into the place was that the television was already on and that there were a shitload of pain-killers everywhere I looked, especially on the night stand beside the bed. There were also cardboard boxes filled with clothes, a Pringles potato chip canister or two, and what looked like a brace for her leg. This poor woman had certainly seen better days.
"Make yourself at home," said the cripple. "I need to go to the bathroom."
"Uh...ok."
I sat at the foot of the bed while the cripple went to the bathroom and I pretended to watch the TV, but I don't remember a damn thing of what I was watching because my mind was racing with all sorts of thoughts. Whether this was all a big set up. Whether there was a boyfriend in the bathroom ready to jack my ass. Or a cop ready to arrest my ass (for no valid reason, but he'd probably come up with one). Whether I should actually have sex with this woman. Whether she was tainted with STDs. Whether I could catch crabs from just being inside the Boston View Motel. Whether I would get the cripple pregnant and have to explain the situation to my parents. Whether I should just run out of there as fast as I could.
But, then, my phone rang.
"Dude, bail!"
It was my friend Russ.
"This is not a good idea at all."
'Maybe he was right,' I thought, and for a quick moment I thought about leaving right then and there while the cripple was in the bathroom.
"I'll leave in a second," I said and then I hung up the phone.
At this point, the cripple came out of the bathroom, sat in a chair across from me and then proceeded to take her pants off.
"Is this OK?" she asked.
"Um...yeah...."
She removed her pants, only to reveal a really bruised set of legs and a bunch of scars from where she had her surgeries.
"See...look at this. And then here..."
She showed me each and every one of her scars, maybe to get sympathy, but it really just resulted in turning me off from her completely.
At this point, my phone rang again. I answered it while the cripple hopped out of her chair and scooted back into the bathroom.
"Dude what the HELL are you doing?!"
It was my friend Andy.
"Get the fuck out of there!"
"All right, I'll be out in a second," I assured him, not knowing whether I was actually telling the truth. I'm not sure why I wanted to stay. Maybe because, if I left, I knew the woman would feel like shit. The best thing to do, I figured, was to wait for her to come back out of the bathroom and then I would politely tell her that I had to go. 'Yes, that's the best way to handle this.'
So the cripple came back out of the bathroom and I stood up from the bed, took a deep breath and began to tell her I had to split...but before the words could come out, she handed me a box of (what turned out to be) Durex-brand condoms!
"It's been so long," she reiterated.
I analyzed the box and noticed that the condoms had 'vibrating rings', which is a feature I've never been privileged enough to experience. I also noticed that it was a five-pack with only two left inside. 'Where did the other three go?' I wondered. Either she was lying to me about not having sex for four years or she's had the condoms since her husband died, which - I believe - would mean they had expired long ago. Suddenly, I really wasn't feeling so good about the situation I was in.
The cripple hopped into the bed - still wearing just her underwear with a long, black T-shirt - and slid beneath the sheets. All I can remember doing is standing at the foot of the bed, staring at the box of condoms, feeling part-retarded and not really knowing what to do.
But, then, my phone rang again.
"Dude! What the fuck!"
"Who is it?" asked the cripple, who could hear the shouts coming out of the phone.
"It's...uh...um...my friends. They want me to go now."
"Let me talk to him!"
She snatched the phone out of my hand, asked who she was talking to, said she "was the owner of the household!" - whatever that meant, said something else, and maybe another thing...but the next thing I remember happening is hearing a really loud BANG! BANG! BANG! on the door.
"Jesus!" said the cripple and went to answer the door.
She opened the door and there was Andy.
"He's coming with us," he said, pointing at me.
"No, he's staying right here."
"No, he's coming with us."
"Get out of my home!" yelled the cripple and proceeded to slam the door shut, but Andy stuck his foot in the door to prevent her from doing so.
"I'm calling the cops!" she yelled.
"Yeah right you're gonna call the cops. You probably got all sorts of drugs in here."
It was at this point that I knew the situation was going very sideways and that it was only going to get uglier if I stayed. I basically meant well by "hanging out" with the cripple, but now I needed to go.
"All right, I better go," I told the cripple. "I'm very, very sorry about this. It was very nice meeting you."
More words were exchanged between Andy and the cripple, and they weren't friendly ones. All I remember are the last three things that were said:
"Next time I see you I'm going to stab you," said Andy.
"I know people who will have you killed!" yelled the cripple.
"Bring it!!!"
And that was that. We left the motel and went to get late-night bagel sandwiches at Dunkin' Donuts.
But, yes, what a disaster the evening turned out to be, and all because I was drunk and basically part-retarded. I probably never should have gone back to the motel, even to be nice. Everything turned to shit, and that woman's life is probably more miserable now after my attempt to make it less miserable. I don't feel very good about myself.
The bottom line, I think, is that you can't win with booze. You really can't. Alcohol turns me into a person I don't like and feel ashamed about when I wake up the next day. It brings out a Hyde-like personality, not that I get belligerent, but - in many ways - I get very sloppy and make bad decisions that end up doing harm to either myself or others.
In fact, it was only a few weeks ago that a woman said she "heard stories about me" and that "you're a pig, Matt Burns!" I think the "stories" she heard mainly involved an innocent make-out session with some girl in an atypical place, but let me tell you something: I never thought the words 'pig' and 'Matt Burns' would ever be used in the same sentence together. Being called a 'pig' by that woman flabbergasted the hell out of me, because I always saw myself (and was perceived by others as) a 'good' man. I mean, I did well in school and went to a decent college and took CCD classes to learn about Jesus and volunteered at a Mental Hospital and all that shit. Deep down I'm really NOT a pig (I think), but I guess, when I drink, I do display piggish behavior...often. So I can see why I could be labeled as such.
And, on some level, I guess I actually enjoyed being considered a pig...because for most of my life I've been 'good' all the time (i.e. what society considers good), whether it be in school or on a moral level, and I've always been kind of turned off by that. But, at the same time, I think I've gone too far towards the opposite extreme - become too 'bad' - and I have to maybe find some sort of a mean now. Yes, indeed. A mean.
Anyway, as far as the cripple goes...if you're reading this...I'm sorry for giving you a bad night. All I ever wanted to do was give you a good time. I never meant to hurt you in any way. Sorry. Honestly, I am. And I hope things get better for you.
As for me and drinking...it will most likely continue.
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