More Nineties! Pagan Boy Part Four/Conclusion

Our bodies never quite fit together for PIV sex, though it wasn’t for lack of trying. But OH! The tongue on this man! He ate my pussy with such hunger and gusto, such speed and suction I could never quite even figure out what was happening! We had other ways of pleasing each other too, even one hurty afternoon with candle wax and clothespins, but the real treasure of him was kissing his wet, exhausted face after long spates of shivery, bewildered pleasure.

When he wasn’t blowing my mind or taking me dancing, we talked endlessly about books and music and movies. I read (and loved!) (Except maybe Watchmen!) every book he recommended. Thus began my love affair with Sandman and my on-brand tendency to style myself like Death, complete with the oversized ankh necklaces and the little eyeliner curlicue at the corner of my eye. We spoke mainly in quotes.

When I hear The Smiths singing about “spending warm summer days indoors,” I always think of Pagan Boy, of the absolutely GORGEOUS days we spent with the curtains drawn, sprawled on his living room floor watching MST3K or an occasional “should” movie. (I would gladly take the Godfather hours back, but Liquid Sky? I should watch that at lunch today!) 
 

Update: Liquid Sky is WAY too harsh for 2021 me!

Those warm summer days were where the mismatch came in, though. Where he was content to sprawl and lounge and kiss the days away with me, (Sounds pretty good now, actually!) I wanted us to sometimes go out into the sun.

For a while that summer, I tried to be what I thought of as a “real girlfriend” I tried to take care of him. He wasn’t a hoarder in the whole apartment, but his (BEAUTIFUL, treehouse-like) side porch was stacked with empty pizza boxes and soda cups. I did my best to clean it all up. I’m not sure what he was doing while I was washing and rinsing and stacking and bagging.

Once, we did plan a little hike. I wanted to go skinny-dipping at a local waterfall known for its nudism, it’s hard to believe we had a bad time there! But I was crabby, needy, and crampy, worrying about my tampon string, and he felt too self-conscious to take off his clothes. I sat in the shallow water at the creek’s side while lovely bodies frolicked nearby. Pagan Boy and I were an island of sadness.

I was painting him a small acrylic Moon Card when he called me (I was staying in my mom’s attic kitchen at the time) to break things off. I was sad and irritated and absolutely certain that the club should be mine.

Much later, as grownups, we were friends. I liked having coffee or pancakes with him whenever I was visiting my sister’s town. He was a little oasis of poly/kink/bi in the middle of family stress, though at times he could still be infuriating. I miss him every time I’m there now, or maybe I’m just a little haunted. It was love, or as much love as both of our depressed brains could share. I’m never going to let it go.

Perfectly 1993 Guy, Part One

 

 

OMG! I’ve been putting off the brain-treat of writing about requited love all summer! Time to set a timer and start.

 

The day after I graduated, I moved away from my suburban town to go live with Beach Aunt at the shore. She was renting me a room for some insanely cheap price: I think it was 170$ a month. I gave a way lots of my thrift store clothes and most of my high school (sometimes Jane’s Addiction related) art. I kept a lot of the ridiculous tchotchkes I’d looted from a friend’s Thrifty Shopper job: Lots of sincere-looking animal figurines in Seventies colors. It might be my overly poetic memory, but I think I carried a (Little) birdhouse (In My Soul) on my lap in Beach Aunt’s overstuffed-with-everything-I-owned compact car.

 

I left behind Bucky Fellini, the rabbit I’d purchased at the State Fair the summer before and named after a Dead Milkmen album. Don’t worry, we will eventually be reunited! And I think the Dead Milkmen are still together!

 

I had 300$ in graduation money, a dozen white roses from my mom, and a new set of oil paints I would (spoiler alert) never be unlazy enough to learn how to use properly. I had a tape from the coolest girl in the school: Mary’s Danish on one side, mix after the album ran out on the other. Push th’ Little Daisies by Ween. Sensitive Artist by King Missile. Nineties AF. I had candles and incense that had been too stinky to burn in mom’s house. I had a floral vintage suitcase filled with thrift store lingerie. I was ready for nothing.

 

The strongest emotion of living in Beach Aunt’s house was the feeling of WAITING FOR LETTERS TO COME. Come to think of it, that defined part of my California time too, and even now, a little bit.

 

There was a bus that carried workers from Beach Aunt’s town to Great Adventure, so she helped me to get a job there. Not ambitious enough to wait for a spot to open up in the old-time photo studio or something else nominally creative, I took the easiest job to get: Maintenance. They gave me Smurf-blue shorts, a bright yellow shirt, and a visor. Not exactly a look to look for love in.

(Serendipity side-note: The Mayor of Kittentown worked there that summer too! We never met, but I think I probably flirted with him on the ride he operated, which, after several enjoyable minutes of Googling, I’ve deduced was just prosaically called the Giant Drop. Love a big drop ride!)

 

Aside from some one-night concert friends I’d made at a Dead Milkmen show when I first got to the beach (“If you don’t have Ween, then we’re gonna raise a scene!” the band sang, paraphrasing an important plot point of Punk Rock Girl.) I was essentially friendless for the first month of the summer. On days off, I would either float on my own in the pretty blue waves or take the bus to the park to rise the roller coasters for free. It never got old!

 

During one particularly tedious shift clearing tables and sweeping up cigarette butts in the 1950’s-themed area of the park (They only had about 10 songs in rotation. One can only take so much “Leader of the Pack.”) I met My First Bitchy Gay Guy, my literal partner -in-crime for the rest of the summer. He would be the one to introduce me to the very most Nineties-dreamy guy in the universe, who would be my first sex-with-love around midnight between our two early-September birthdays. Oh swoon swoon swoon.