(I'm not sure how many words these posts can take, so for right now I'll be posting in chunks of ~500 until it is done. Also I threw in some Matt-is-bipolar and I hope that is ok.)
1. The First Time
The place smelled like gin and sweat when he walked in, a dive bar with a fast pass for getting wasted. In the back, he smelled lone beer drinkers (Michelob Ultra, weak), but those weren’t his targets. He wanted the rough ones, four shots in and hungry for the promise of a naked body underneath them. Someone that wouldn’t take no for an answer, even if Matt wanted him to. Luckily, those people were in the majority tonight.
Matt’s skin hummed off key as he passed through the crowd, aware of every dust mote, every breath. His heart was beating rapidly in his chest and spreading the vibration to his throat and his hands. The sweat in the bar was laced with arousal. Loud house music mingled with shouted conversations and threatened to overwhelm him. Somehow, a shot ended up in his hand and then another. Soon he was running on autopilot, numb to everything but his mission – get fucked, get hurt, and pay for hearing the cries of helpless people and doing nothing, nothing to stop it.
Outside of the bar, Manhattan screamed day in and day out with back alley rapes and muggings. Wine swished inside the crinkle of brown paper bags on sidewalks where homeless men begged for change. Unshowered drummers beat out patterns on buckets - ‘Even blind men can appreciate a little music.’ The clink of spoons and –swish- lighting of flames in heroin houses, needles piercing skin with a quiet, meaty sound. Prostitutes offered their wares; the slow click of their heels and wafting scent of perfume moved up and down the red light district. Domestic violence – beatings, beratings, and, worst of all, child molestation. The city he loved was rotting from the inside out, and only he knew how much had been eaten away.
For a long time, he had been able to tune this out. Stick trained him well in the art of filtering out stimuli to get to the core of what he needed to know about his surroundings. Sometimes he didn’t even have to use his training; depression would blunt his feelings and senses without any effort at all. Matt found the numbness soothing despite it being accompanied by a whole host of other problems. Win some, lose some.
This, however – Matt didn’t know what it was, but something had ramped up his brain like a roller coaster, negative stimuli bombarding him like wind beating his face. He spent hours in the gym trying to get rid of this foul energy so he could concentrate on school. The skin on his hands was cracked and raw from punching the bag without padding; blood trickled onto his textbooks when he read. Matt was acing all of his exams, but he barely knew what day it was or the last time that he had eaten. The roller coaster was approaching zero gravity and descent, and he just needed to push it there in penance. Hail Mary for a lapsed Catholic.
Fill 1/?: hail mary for lapsed catholics
1. The First Time
The place smelled like gin and sweat when he walked in, a dive bar with a fast pass for getting wasted. In the back, he smelled lone beer drinkers (Michelob Ultra, weak), but those weren’t his targets. He wanted the rough ones, four shots in and hungry for the promise of a naked body underneath them. Someone that wouldn’t take no for an answer, even if Matt wanted him to. Luckily, those people were in the majority tonight.
Matt’s skin hummed off key as he passed through the crowd, aware of every dust mote, every breath. His heart was beating rapidly in his chest and spreading the vibration to his throat and his hands. The sweat in the bar was laced with arousal. Loud house music mingled with shouted conversations and threatened to overwhelm him. Somehow, a shot ended up in his hand and then another. Soon he was running on autopilot, numb to everything but his mission – get fucked, get hurt, and pay for hearing the cries of helpless people and doing nothing, nothing to stop it.
Outside of the bar, Manhattan screamed day in and day out with back alley rapes and muggings. Wine swished inside the crinkle of brown paper bags on sidewalks where homeless men begged for change. Unshowered drummers beat out patterns on buckets - ‘Even blind men can appreciate a little music.’ The clink of spoons and –swish- lighting of flames in heroin houses, needles piercing skin with a quiet, meaty sound. Prostitutes offered their wares; the slow click of their heels and wafting scent of perfume moved up and down the red light district. Domestic violence – beatings, beratings, and, worst of all, child molestation. The city he loved was rotting from the inside out, and only he knew how much had been eaten away.
For a long time, he had been able to tune this out. Stick trained him well in the art of filtering out stimuli to get to the core of what he needed to know about his surroundings. Sometimes he didn’t even have to use his training; depression would blunt his feelings and senses without any effort at all. Matt found the numbness soothing despite it being accompanied by a whole host of other problems. Win some, lose some.
This, however – Matt didn’t know what it was, but something had ramped up his brain like a roller coaster, negative stimuli bombarding him like wind beating his face. He spent hours in the gym trying to get rid of this foul energy so he could concentrate on school. The skin on his hands was cracked and raw from punching the bag without padding; blood trickled onto his textbooks when he read. Matt was acing all of his exams, but he barely knew what day it was or the last time that he had eaten. The roller coaster was approaching zero gravity and descent, and he just needed to push it there in penance. Hail Mary for a lapsed Catholic.