Who's Your Daddy?

Chapter 23

Ziggy stood in the long line outside of the Mirror Ball, trying to act sober. He'd been drinking since...Well, he couldn't really remember when he hadn't been drinking. He was finding that vodka was compatible with a surprising number of beverages: Mountain Dew, Formula 50 Vitamin Water, and his friend Shereé's Organic Weightless Cranberry Tea. Shereé, a short, round girl who styled herself after Divine, the legendary drag queen from all those John Waters' movies, stood next to Ziggy in line.

Ziggy first met her at a party, where a skinny effete boy snootily accused her of being a cliché "fat fag hag." Shereé responded by grabbing the guy's nuts and shouting, "I am not a fag hag. I am a radical, dick-loving queer girl who will rip your balls off and chew them like Hubba Bubba." Ziggy had loved her ever since.

"Dude, stand up straight or they're not gonna let us in," Shereé said to Ziggy, who was getting wobbly.

"I'm good," Ziggy said. He grabbed her around the waist and pressed his face to hers.

"Keep telling yourself that," she said.

The truth was that Ziggy was far from good. He'd stopped going to classes and spent most of his days in bed. At night, he'd wander the city and hook up with guys on Scruff. He did anything to not think about the mistake that brought him to life.

The Mirror Ball line started to move and soon Ziggy and Shereé were nearing the doorman, a thick ex-military guy. He scrutinized Shereé license. Shereé barely looked 17, much less 21. But he nodded her in anyway.

Ziggy started to hand the doorman his ID, but he dropped it and almost fell on his face as he picked it up. Then he belched loudly upon returning upright. Shereé drew a tense breath. But the doorman waved them through.

"That was lucky," Shereé said, once inside.

"Lucky?" Ziggy said. "That guy fucked me, like, twice last week."

"Slut," Shereé said, shaking her head.

She grabbed Ziggy's arm and directed him toward the second floor balcony where they could look down on the dance floor. Ziggy felt woozy amidst the loud music and flashing lights.

"Oh shit," said Shereé, jolting Ziggy from his haze. "There's Andy, that straight shot boy I like. I'm gonna say hi."

Ziggy thought about stopping her. He'd learned firsthand that Andy was either gay or the world's best straight blowjob-giver. But he didn't have to energy to reach out his arm to her. Besides, he thought, people have to make their own fucking beds. How could he stop someone from making mistakes when he kept making so many of his own.

As he was immersed in his drunken thoughts, Ziggy felt a tap on his shoulder. At first he wasn't sure if it was happening in his head or actually occurring. Then he felt the tap again and turned around.

"You're Ziggy, right?" said a short nerdy guy with dark curly hair and thick-framed glasses.

"Who the fuck are you?"

"Arthur," he said, "you know like the king or the aardvark."

"What do you want, Arthur?" Ziggy said.

"I just wanted to introduce myself. I go to RISD too and we have a lot of mutual Facebook friends. Your name is always coming up as a 'People You Might Know.' So, I was like, let me introduce myself so that you are an actual person I do know."

A wave of drunken horniness came over Ziggy.

"Wanna suck my dick, Arthur?"

"Sure. I mean, yeah."

Even in the dark lighting, Ziggy could see Arthur's skin getting flushed.

"Let's go to the bathroom?" Ziggy directed.

"Oh no, I'm good," Arthur said.

A moment passed before Arthur's face registered that he'd misunderstood Ziggy's offer. "Oh, you mean to suck your dick? Here? In the bathroom? Now? No, I don't want to suck your dick now. Well, I mean, I do. But not here. But not really now either. I mean, I'd like to think that one day I could suck your dick. Like, I'd like to be in the queue for sucking your dick. I've thought about it. Even had a dream about it once although that's probably too much information—"

"Go the fuck away, Arthur."

"Sure. Sorry to bother you. But, um, nice to meet you anyway." Arthur started to walk away, but turned back around. "And you know all that stuff I said about your dick, about dreaming about it and all, I was just fucking around, trying to break the ice. I'm not, like, obsessed with your dick or anything. Seriously, your dick is safe with me." Arthur's face again turned a bruised red. "I mean, from me. Your dick is safe from me."

Ziggy turned his back to Arthur.

"O.K., then. Bye," Arthur said, walking away.

Ziggy wasn't sure why he'd been so mean to the guy. He just wasn't in the mood to be nice to anyone. Actually, he was in the mood to...

Moments later, Ziggy was standing on the wooden railing of the second floor balcony. His whole body seemed to wake up. All of the eyes in the place turned toward him. It was almost as if their collective gazes became a beam of light. Ziggy felt warm in the glow of it. He positioned his feet one in front of the other on the wooden railing. He let one foot slip over the side of the rail toward the dance floor. Then amidst an increasing roar of noise and people rushing toward him, he closed his eyes and hopped into the air.

Soon, he felt something that he'd never experienced before. He felt himself break.