II.

i went into the almost-bare living room of my pathetic little apartment and sat on the old couch. that couch had been with me through everything--when i told my parents i was, in fact, gay (much to their despair), when i came out to my brother, (he knew already. i was the biggest butch in town.)..so many memories. you could almost see it in the camouflage pattern. ugh, it was so old.

i figured i had just enough time to vent some thoughts--i grabbed the yellow notepad on the little table and a random pen i found between the cushions.

♪ "'what do i do to ignore them behind me? do i follow my instincts blindly? do i hide my pride from these bad dreams and give in to sad thoughts that are maddening? do i sit here and try to stand it? or do i try to catch them red-handed? do i trust some and get fooled my phoniness, or do i trust nobody and live in loneliness? because i can't hold on when i'm stretched so thin--i make the right moves but i'm lost within--i put on my daily facade but then--i just end up getting hurt again by myself..."'

at that moment there was a knock at the door. --*--

>>I opened it to find tommy standing there, all dressed up in jeans and a pink button down shirt.

“What’s cookin’ good lookin’?” he said as he pushed past me into the apartment. One thing you have to love about tommy—he’s confident. And has no sense of boundaries.

“What are you all dressed up for?” I asked, my eyebrow raised. He sat on the couch and looked around, finally looking at me.

“Damn, girl, you look like shit!” He shot up from the couch, looking me over, putting a hand on his hip in that gay-old way.

“Gee, thanks..so why are you dressed up?”

He looked at me like I was stupid. “Because we’re going to the club, hellooo?? Did you not check your voicemail?”

I looked at my phone, again. There was a text from Kim:

Hey, I can’t come over..car broke down. Main st.

I texted back, ok, we’ll come and get you..

I told Tommy the news and we got in the car to go pick her up.

“So..you did it again, huh?” he said, barely dodging a blue minivan, going about 65 down Main Street.

“Yeah..” There was no playing innocent; when Tommy knew, he knew. “This girl named Hannah dropped me off last night…and stayed over.”

He turned to look at me, running a red light. I freaked and swerved the wheel over so we didn’t hit the nice silver Mustang. “Dude, watch where you’re going!”

“You little whore!” he said, winking at me and smirking. “That’s my girl. How was she?”

I scowled. “All I remember of last night was some open-mouthed kissing and dry-humping..so not too well I suppose..” I had a flashback of us naked on the bed, grabbing each other desperately. I shook the image out of my head.

He laughed. “Ah, I’ve raised you so well.” He reached out and held my hand just as we pulled up next to Kim’s broken-down Civic. She got her infamous backpack that had about a thousand severely-opinionated buttons on it and hopped in the backseat.

“Ello guvna!” she said in her amazing (but fake) British accent. I turned around in the seat to give her a quick kiss before we took off. “So where are we headed?” she asked in her normal voice.

“The club!” Tommy said excitedly. I blushed, turning to look at her to see what she thinks. She shrugged her shoulders and looked out the window.

“Honey, if you don’t want to go, we can go somewhere else,” I said sweetly.

She looked back at me with puppy dog eyes. “I just don’t feel like going out tonight. Do you wanna go to the strip joint?”

I smiled. I love this girl. “Anything for you, my dear.”