Things He Did

Genre: Fiction

Wearing only a moist white towel, Tobin More ran his fingers down his side, felt the cold ripples of bone beneath skin, breathed deeply, and turned to the side. In his mirror he thought he looked thin, not too thin, but maybe what one would call a naturally thin twenty-something. But he didn’t consider himself this. If he were a naturally thin twenty-something, he wouldn’t be worried about how thin he was. That’s not what naturally thin people do, twenty-anything – they eat hotdogs without shame, they order french-fries just because they’re craving some. Tobin More didn’t do any of those things. Tobin More stood in his mirror and hated those naturally thin people he so longed to be.

After he finished his pinching, his sucking-in, Tobin sat on the bed located in the kitchen of his no-room apartment, pulled on the narrow, piped legs of his dark denim pants, pointed his toes, pulled on his socks as to complete the transaction, and stood starring at a rack of shirts. He had decided long ago to always wear the same pair of jeans as to make dressing only half the effort, but his rack of shirts had only grown since then. Because buying jeans was out, he seemed to pick up new but used shirts at a rate of three a week. He chose a standard plaid, the one he always chose when the others didn’t seem to work, buttoned it to the last button from the top and kicked at the sneakers beneath his bed.

With his laces tied he felt accomplished. Fully dressed, he looked to the coat rack, realizing he was only halfway prepared for the blistering cold of New York in late December and tried to pick a jacket naturally, as though he wasn’t really thinking. He put on a gray nylon jacket, shoved his arms in and zipped it to just below where his shirt was buttoned. He reached for a vest. The brown one, the one with three carefully placed pins on the left breast, and put it over his jacket. Then he returned to his spotlight before the mirror and examined himself once again. He tilted his head, sucked in his cheeks, and thought ‘is this was naturally thin people look like when they bundle up?’ He certainly didn’t feel naturally thin at all, sighed, and chose a scarf and gloves. As he gathered his staples – his wallet, his Ipod, the small satchel which carried whatever book he was currently reading, his cigarettes, a lighter from the kitchen counter, and a handful of change from the bowl on the kitchen table – he ignored the torrid suction from the mirror behind him. It was calling for him, one last glance. No, he was late and had to be at work in 45 minutes. The L train could easily take an hour to cart it’s plain-faced passengers beneath the east river and shuffle them off to their respective jobs in Manhattan.

In his last seconds before reentering the world for yet another wind-blustered day he remembered his cell phone, only prompted by the list he once taped on the inside of his apartment door reading ‘cell phone, keys, wallet.’ He took the keys from the hook beside the door looked back as if too say goodbye to the space, stepped forward and shut the door behind him.

On the train, Tobin opened his satchel, took out his book (a beat memoir) and glanced upward to see who was watching. An older Arab man with thick eyebrows looked as though he was nodding angrily and repetitively at Tobin, but seeing the wires that trickled sneakily from the man’s ears, he realized the man was wearing headphones. Tobin looked down at his book and read for the remainder of his ride from Morgan Avenue to 6th Avenue in Manhattan. As he got off the train, kneading through the eager crowd of those wishing to board, he looked in the direction of the stairs. It was his custom to inspect each staircase as he approached and always find the least crowded of them. The idea of having another’s face so close to his own ass was unnerving to him.

Today it was the very last of the staircases that was most void, but only because by the time he reached it, the platform was nearly empty. He jaunted up the stairs, turned the corner, up the second flight and onto the street. He stood outside of Urban Outfitters, lit a cigarette and stood in the harsh light of 11am and scowled. He wasn’t sure if he should be smoking, but did anyway. Sometimes smoking before work didn’t go over nearly as well as he hoped. Sometimes it went over fabulously, other times, one time – he lost 300 dollars because of it.

As he took a pull from his cigarette, his phone vibrated in his back pocket. He slipped it out of his tight jeans, shifted his bag from his hip, transferred his cigarette to his other hand and cleared his throat.

“Hello,” he said, with some sort of emphasis on the Oh, almost like it was a question.

“Meet me on the corner of 6th Avenue and 13th,” the voice said, “I’ll be there in 5 minutes.”

He hung up, held his phone in his hand, had a slight flash of something between eagerness and fear, took another pull from the cigarette and stayed put. Tobin regretted his cigarette, thought about buying gum, put his phone back in his pocket and crossed his arms, as to imply casual thought to those that passed. He always needed this five minutes, ten would have been better, but five was usually just enough.

After about seven minutes, he walked halfway down the block, stood beneath some scaffolding and looked over at the corner of 13th. ‘Good,’ he thought, ‘I made him wait.’ Like always, he thought about turning around, swallowed at his nicotine-wet throat, and stepped off the curb.

“Hi,” he said, keeping close eye contact and stepping forward. His voice took on the sound it always did for work and the two of them started to walk.

“I live just round the corner,” the man said. He was older, near sixty, or maybe an very worn fifty, and pointed north, the direction Tobin had come from. “The doorman, he knows my wife, so I might talk nonsense when we go in, so he’ll think you’re a student.” The man’s voice was something like that of a British academic, but didn’t sound completely authentic.

Tobin nodded and walked beside him. The man looked at him with an inauthentic smile, as though he wasn’t feeling awkward and asked him to “maybe remove the scarf, a little less flamboyant, just because of the doorman.” Tobin wasn’t offended, only amused that said scarf was so carefully chosen. He removed it as they approached the building and absently shoved it into his satchel.

They passed the doorman, who barely looked up, turned the corner and the man said “the building is full of cameras, otherwise…” ‘Otherwise what?’ Tobin thought. ‘You’d kiss me?’ Again, he was amused and played his smile as though he was coy. They entered the empty elevator, the button was pushed, they stood in silence, and the door opened at the 7th floor.

“Very nice,” he said as he entered the very nice apartment. It was nice, but recognizing it with speech was only something he would say while working. Tobin was generally unimpressed by wealth and rarely validated it for anyone. But he found men who do ‘this sort of thing’ like to feel as though Tobin is silly and young and lived in a cardboard box by the river.

Nearly three words were spoken, the man pointed at the table where 500 in twenties laid, carefully stacked. Then a tongue was in his mouth, tasting faintly of cigar, his pants where being urged at with awkward hands, and firm stubble was abrading his smooth face.

First shoes, then shirts, then pants. He didn’t have to do much, the man was eager but took his time as though an hour was eternity. The man was hairy, with a firm gut, black briefs, and gray argile socks. He led Tobin to the bedroom, removed all the bedding and jumped on the mattress as though he were suddenly twenty-one. He reached for a condom, pulled down his small underwear revealing an average-sized penis and began pulling at it while struggling with the condom with one hand and his teeth.

Tobin put one knee on the mattress and stood, almost looking bored, over the scene. When the condom was out and on the slightly limp dick, Tobin said “Hmm?”

“I want you to ride me like a little pussy bitch,” the man said. “Get over here and get on my cock.” The man’s voice was so obviously unfamiliar with such a direct pattern of speech that Tobin nearly felt embarrassed for him. Nonetheless, he shuffled over the man on his knees, straddled his hairy torso and lowered himself over the penis, which was growing slightly harder in actuality, but more pathetic in Tobin’s mind.

The man entered, made a sounded as though he were relieving himself, and began clenching his buttocks and thrusting upward into Tobin’s unenthused ass. Tobin looked upward, where no one would see his boredom, put his hands on the sweater of chest hair, and began to make sounds. First as though it hurt, then as though he were growing accustom to the pain, then as though it were the most amazing pencil poking into a very excited donut-hole. He couldn’t have been anymore unaroused, but his erection grew almost out of ritual. He put one hand on the back of his neck and thought that it would be nice to be able to perspire out of ritual. In actuality, he wasn’t remotely warm, but acted as though there were a roaring fire beside the bed and a bearskin rug beneath it.

“I want to make you come,” Tobin said when he was sure 45 minutes had passed.

“I need to take the condom off,” the man responded. “Then you can suck it.” Tobin hated sucking and so lifted himself from the hairy torso, removed the condom, and began pulling at the cock with his face resting on the mans stomach. He suspected it wouldn’t take long, and he was right. Within 2 or 3 minutes, before it was demanded he suck, the cock spewed forth a meager three urged lumps of pale cum and the man was quivering and shaking, his torso exhaling short excited huffs.

To add sincerity Tobin planted a limp kiss o n the man’s ribs, lifted himself from the bed, found his clothes, and prepared for the cold.

On the street he counted the twenties, something he really should have done inside, and lit a cigarette. He walked towards the subway, exhaled longer than he usually did, stamped out the barely smoked butt, and trundled down the steps. He was home only an hour and a half after he left. He removed his clothes, took a shower, found his place on the couch, and clipped his toenails. When he was done he stood and looked in the mirror. He hadn’t eaten at all, since yesterday. He thought he was getting closer to naturally thin.