A/N: All right, you know me, I’m not the lemon-queen of the writing world, but hell, I tried. XD Anyway, I fucked a little with personality traits and even gave Matsuda glasses. Opening tutorial over - get your read on.

Letters from Matthew

The fourth shot of scotch softened her features; those imperfections that were her eyes, her hips, her thighs, and she grew pretty. Even before Matt had lifted the glass to his lips, she had been flouncing around the bar and the boys had flirted with her and Matt wondered if he was just picky, if she had always been pretty from the moment she walked in, clicking in those three-inch heels.

Her eyes seemed to be the color of whatever drink she was holding, the soft glowing lights around the bar burning the colors into her eyes. The skirt she wore, a tacky purple leather stretched around her hips and her lipstick was too dark for her pallid skin. It all seemed too harsh but Matt sat at the far end of the bar and watched her over his drink, watched the way a young man touched her thigh and she coquettishly slapped his hand away. She smiled when she did it.

After the scotch, he dived headfirst into vodka and his cheeks were warm and the bartender was smiling at him, smirking, because he was getting wasted and was young, almost a beautiful sight. Matt saw himself in the mirror behind the bar, over all the bottles of the things he had spent his adult life with and barely recognized himself. His red hair was smoothed over his ears, combed with water from his sink. The goggles that usually shielded his eyes from the sun were hanging around his neck and his eyes, a limpid green, were lethargic in the light.

It had to be that girl, he told himself as he slurped the drink. His eyes wandered over to her, at the other end of the bar, the two of them separated by five stools and two men. People came and went but she stayed, swiveling around on the red barstool and laughing, a tall glass of Jack Daniels in her hand. Her jacket had come unbuttoned and her cleavage was large, sun spotted, and Matt figured she was either in her thirties or poorly-aged.

Everything looked different when he drank, even her, even himself. He bet his hair wasn’t really that neatly combed. It never was. Someone had told him once, when he was seventeen, that his drinking would land him in some very big trouble someday. Matt faintly remembered his mother telling him that after he explained the off-ground feeling he got from drinking. The state of flying or falling and the world distorted. She became upset and Matt tried to stop a few times after that.

The first time ended in failure. After only a week of sobriety, he was bumming some beer off of his friends again and thinking of his mother, of how he’d try again the next day. The second time ended here, in Wally’s, with his eyes all over that girl and the second glass of vodka clenched in his fist. He’d spent three months without a drink and everyday he had to walk for miles, usually walking around Wally’s, and headed home. But not tonight. No, the music was calling him, some static-snared Enrique Iglesias from the radio and the laughter from the patrons. The memory of the sting in the back of his throat from the booze.

“Come on, dance with me,” she trilled and took the hands of a man sitting at one of the booths. He seemed uneasy about the idea, maybe embarrassed because no one else was dancing. His friends eyed him with distaste but she was too drunk to notice or care. Matt watched out of the corner of his eye, his head tilted back to take in the last drop of the vodka.

Her hair was a dirty-blonde and she flipped it back over her shoulder as she led the young man out onto the floor. The song was something soft and there was a sweet tone to it, a violin like crying, and maybe it would have been romantic if she wasn’t so clumsy in those heels. She clung to him and was stepping on his feet and he muttered something like, “Jesus, watch it…”

“I’m sorry,” she said huskily and was looking into his eyes. She was giggling in little spurts and her dance partner was getting more and more pissed off. He seemed to be pulling away but she held onto him, held his upper arms as if she were holding onto her very livelihood and Matt ordered another vodka. The bartender brought it over to him and he nodded, kept his head down, thought of his mother and sipped slowly.

Then, a small yelp from the woman as she was pushed back. Her dance partner had a fire in his eyes, one that wasn’t the cause of the bar lighting, and he turned towards the door. His friends followed him out and the door closed and she was still standing there, her arms raised where she had been holding onto his arms and her eyes like empty brown pools. Slowly, she lowered her arms and went back to her seat at the end of the bar. The hum of conversation resumed and Matt watched the curve of her back as she slumped at her seat, the previous vigor gone from her body.

After a moment, he pulled out his wallet and paid his bill and he didn’t think she even noticed him as he walked out into the night.

It was a small parking lot out in front of the building. It was sandwiched between a nail salon and a pizzeria, both of which were closed at this hour. The lights from the bar were teasing Matt as he stood out in the cold and held the keys to his car in his hand. The keys shook slightly and the corvette was right in front of him, the frosty hood, the beat-up leather interior. But he wasn’t opening the car and, casting a quick glance towards the big barroom windows, he stuffed his key ring back into his pocket and walked into the alleyway to the right of the building.

The wind ruffled his hair as he leant against the wall by a garbage can and it was slightly sobering and with each passing minute, he wondered more and more, What am I doing here?

The only thing that answered him was the jingling of keys in his pockets and the wind whistling through the alleys. It was ten minutes until he heard the door open and by that time his ears were cold and his boot was tapping against the wall. He stopped when he heard clicking, the clicking of heels, and he peeked around the side and saw her walking briskly towards the parking lot.

His tapping foot was telling him to get his ass to his own damn car and hurry home. Hurry home to escape the vodka and scotch mixing in his stomach, mixing in his head, his fingertips. But his eyes were still clouded and his head was still flying and falling, he saw her thighs, her cleavage and wanted to dance with her, the way that other man hadn’t. She wanted someone, anyone, to come dance and save her probably and Matt was a someone. Matt was an anyone. An anyone in an alleyway and he thought to himself, If you’re going to do this, you better do it now.

His footsteps were heavy and he heard them in surround sound like those movies where the stalker follows his victims to their cars. He gets inside and puts a cloth of ether over their faces. But Matt had no ether, and he wasn’t a stalker, he was just greedy and maybe a little too drunk. She whirled around to see him and their eyes locked, brown with green, and Matt grabbed her upper arm the way she had grabbed her dance partner’s. His other hand was over her mouth before she had a chance to scream and he pulled her close to him, hugged her for warmth and dragged her towards the alleyway.

She was kicking and flailing and Matt squeezed her tighter just under her breasts. He kept glancing over at the bar until they were in the alleyway and he pulled her further in, straining against her muffled cries for help. With every labored movement, he felt wrong and dangerous. He couldn’t even imagine what his face must have looked like, staring down at her.

Matt let her go, tried to be gentle, but she was moving to rapidly, jerking too much, and when he released her, she tripped over a garbage can and fell into a small puddle. Matt dropped to his knees over her and pinned her down to the cold ground, felt her shift under him and they were face to face. She looked terrified, her mouth agape and her breath harsh and stale. She wore no makeup except the lipstick and it was smeared and her face was red from startled tears.

“Pl-please don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me,” she sputtered and Matt looked at her with a face full of worry. How does one answer a plea like that? How could he ease her mind with the lie that he wasn’t going to hurt her? It was a lie, it had to have been.

She wanted it. She wanted it from that man in the bar.

Matt was here to supply it. He was here.

He pushed her down with one hand and she struggled against it and for insurance, he said to her, “Don’t make a sound.” He was fighting with his jean zipper with his other hand as he said, “It’s going to be all right.” His breath was just as thick as hers and his hands were shaking.

Her eyes were large like a doe’s and she lay in the puddle motionless, subdued, and Matt had his pants pulled down and he pulled off her panties. She gasped sharply at the cold between her legs and the panties were white, a thing of purity in the alleyway, and Matt threw them to the ground. Her legs were shivering and Matt felt the goosebumps as he ran his hands over them. They were thick and shaven, smooth and sultry, but he was too caught up in them, in everything, the cars driving by on the street, a distant honking and she lay there, legs open, a doe.

“I-”

He leant into her and his soft penis was up against her sex, the soft hairs that made up her pubis. He was getting frustrated with himself, he rubbed up against her and she gasped again, watching his movements, her body rigid beneath him. He pushed his hips against her again and was surprised to feel a wetness between her legs, a dampness of her hair. She stared at him, her eyes clouding over and suddenly, his clouds left him, he was no longer falling but fallen and hit the ground with a thud.

Here he was in an alleyway with a woman pinned beneath him that he had, not less than a moment ago, had the full intention of raping. But where was that brash, reckless sense of lust he had? It wasn’t here. In this puddle. Behind the trashcans. He’d lost it and felt like a fool in front of her. He still had her scared. And why wouldn’t she be scared?

He was a monster.

Matt’s eyes widened in realization. Just what the fuck was he doing?

His hands, now shaking uncontrollably, flew to his zipper and pulled it up halfway as he stumbled to his feet. She let out a yelp of surprise and her legs were closed, squished together in the puddle beneath her. Matt mumbled some sort of apology, something that could never make up for his intentions, and he ran. He darted out of the mouth of the alley and towards the parking lot, his keys being pulled out of his pocket. He fumbled with them for a moment, as if someone was chasing him and he was in danger of rape, but he doubted the woman had even gotten up yet.

The engine started almost as soon as he got in and Matt started to back out, not looking where he was going. He just wanted to get as far away as he could. He didn’t want to see her again, didn’t want to see that look on her face as he grabbed her, as he touched her. Frightened, horrified… but expecting.

When he looked into the rearview mirror, finally, he was careening down the empty streets of downtown LA and tears rolled down his cheeks.

-

“Ah, jeez. Ah, man…”

Matt mumbled to himself as he threw open the door to his apartment. It was on the second floor and the walk up the stairs had been lonely, solemn, except for his crying. The place was mostly empty as he had only moved in two months before and kept putting off buying furniture. Matt walked in through the small living room and made his way over to the kitchenette sink. He turned on the water and, though it was cold, splashed his face. The water splashed his shirt and his goggles that still hung around his neck.

The water dripping down his face, he fell back to the refrigerator and slid down to the linoleum floor. No matter how tightly he closed his eyes, he saw her. He saw her expression; the horror of her body shaking beneath him, the fact that he had ripped her underwear off. Left them laying in the cold.

He could imagine her at a shop somewhere, taking the time out to buy those. To wear them out, just like her skirt, like her top and her earrings and high-heels that clicked on the pavement. Matt’s boots behind her. He had the full intention of taking her in that back alley, the full intention of giving her what he thought she wanted - what he knew she wanted - but he was a failure, a coward. The way she had flirted with the men in the bar, she wanted someone to dance with, to make love with.

He slammed his head back into the refrigerator, trying desperately to get those warm, chocolate eyes out of his mind.

Then, his blood racing too fast to allow him to sit there any longer, he rose quickly, hands gripping his tussled red hair. He felt like he would explode… had he really done something horrible?

He didn’t rape her.

Didn’t come close really.

He turned around, making a small whining sound in the back of his throat. There was a payphone in the hallway. Maybe he could call someone, tell them what he had done… the police. Let them lock him up before the sweetness of the booze would get hold of him again. Before he saw such a needy girl again. But that wouldn’t do. He didn’t do anything to her. He didn’t!

“Mom,” Matt whispered softly, gaze fixed on the door. He could call his mom. Come over, maybe, drive two towns over and come to her on his knees, begging for forgiveness, for love and hugs.

Stupid.

He continued to whine thinly, a little boy noise he had always made when in unimaginable trouble. When he was nine, he had broken the window in the kitchen by throwing what he thought was a dirt-clod. His mom threatened to tell his father when he came home and Matt spent the day in his room, his fingers tangled in his hair and whining, crying, lonely.

Finally, he walked to the closet with new vigor in his steps, the whining for now put away like an old toy. With one hand, he wiped the tears away and with the other, pulled out his ragged old suitcase he used to get here. It was maroon and worn but still held up and he threw some clothes into it, his toothbrush from the kitchen sink and looked in the refrigerator. There were only sparse cans of Coke and an aged apple.

Matt took the cans and threw them into the bag, zipped it up before he could put everything back and the door clicked softly behind him as he left the apartment. The tears threatened him again as he went back down the stairs, the bar thrown over his shoulder. But he was doing what needed to be done, wasn’t he? If he stayed. If he stayed, the police would find him, she’d file a report and they come for him-

Even though he hadn’t done anything…

-come for him and take him away. He could imagine the look on his mother’s face when he called her at two AM, his voice trembling and scared. He couldn’t do that to her.

The engine started and Matt looked up one more time at the building he’d spent the past few months in. It would be better if he left like this, quietly, in the middle of the night, and let his mom continue to think he lived on Alber Street. He turned out of the parking lot and into the busy street. He’d been getting by on occasional checks from his mom who lived in some old house in Pasadena and welfare checks that supplemented his drinking.

The checks from mom were a present, sent with cards and smiley faces doodled around his name. Dear Matthew, they said, I hope you’re getting along fine. I’m proud of you for finally going to AA. I know you’ll do us proud and maybe even come back home. Miss you, love you, little boy.

Matt had been telling her he was going weekly and that things were going fine and he had been sober for four months. He didn’t even know where AA met and the ‘us’ that she usually slipped up with probably made him want that drink all the more. His dad had been in the ground a good seven years.

Those letters, with the smiley faces and the faint smell of perfume were under the couch in apartment 11. The apartment he drove from, raced from, faster and faster.

It was twenty minutes later and the crying and sniffling had stopped abruptly. He had come to reason with himself, why should he cry? Why should her worry? The worst she could say to anyone was that he detained her from getting to her car for a few minutes. He hadn’t even stolen from her, for Christ’s sake. And he could have. Maybe even should have. But he didn’t, so what could she say of him?

It was just a few minutes, that’s all.

That’s all.

The red glow from the traffic light shown over his face and the glare was harsh. He looked to the right and saw a run down motel at the end of the street, but there was a neon vacancy sign and they were apparently open. Matt swerved over when the light was green and pulled into the parking lot. It was a good ways away from his other apartment and Wally’s bar was even further, so this seemed like a good place to stay for at least a week or so. His mom had sent a check last week and he had enough money for at least that long.

The place was a stained tan color on the outside and one of the windows on the side was busted, boarded up. But there was light in the office and it looked warmer than the car. Matt grabbed his bag from the passenger’s side and walked up to the office door, pushing the handle.

He shivered a little, out of delight at the feeling of heating. He hadn’t had that in his apartment. The office was bland, the same tan paint and a few potted palms in the corners. On the desk there was a sign-in book and another fake plant there, sitting in a purple vase. Matt turned his head and for the first time noticed a mural taking up half of the wall to his left - it was a poorly-painted depiction of the sea, bits of white to sparkle, and some unknown hand reaching up towards the sky, the heavens, and grasping the hand of God.

Matt brushed some of the hair out of his eyes and before he could think anything of it, there was a call to him, “Hello?”

Matt looked ahead at the desk and a man stood there, his brown hair in wisps over his forehead and brown eyes peering at Matt through thick glasses. The red jacket he wore was dusty and wrinkled and bulged with his stomach. Matt approached him with a smile, something half-friendly, and begged himself not to think of the woman in the alley.

“Hey, I just wanted a room,” he said and, in his mind, saw those white panties.

The man nodded, opened a drawer behind the desk and took out a black pen. “It’s fifty for four days,” he said levelly, and held the pen.

Matt took it easily, felt sort of good that he could afford it, and signed his name in the book. He reached into his back pocket and grabbed his wallet and set two twenties and a five down on the desk.

The transaction done, the clerk seemed to be a little friendlier and he pointed towards the hall to the right of them with a finger. “You’ll have room 6. There’s a television in there, black and white. You have hot water and a bath. The phone in your room only calls other rooms in the hotel,” he said and Matt gave him an odd look. He continued, “It’s so if there’s a problem, you can easily contact me or housekeeping. The numbers are on a slip by the phone, if you need anything.” A pause as he slipped the room key across the counter smoothly. “I’m Isaac.”

“Matt,” he said, though Isaac must have seen it written in the book. He took the key and held it between slippery fingers.

“Well, Matt, please enjoy your stay. Would you like me to show you…?”

“Oh, no… that’s okay,” Matt said and walked towards the dimly lit hallway. “I’m sure I can find it.”

Isaac watched him go. “On your left,” he said.

Matt turned and left, giving the man a limp wave. He had butterflies in his stomach. As he walked along the hallway, he imagined himself younger and loving this, being on the run from the police. Back in the aftermath of the seaside storms, the gravel on the roads would be warm under his bare feet and his next door neighbor, whose father was a real policeman, would run after him, shouting, “Stop, thief!” Matt’s young shadow would flash under the streetlights and he imagined stealing purses from women on the sidewalk. Always, taking things from women.

Matt looked up at the semi-golden number on the door and pushed his key in through the lock. The room was dark and Matt felt around on the wall for the switch. He found it and there was a flicker of some bulb that was on its way out and the first thing he noticed was the draft, how the window across the room was cracked and he walked over, past the bed that was pushed up against the wall by the window. He shut it with a little force and sighed, turning his back to the window and depositing his bag onto the bed.

The room was small, maybe even tinier than his apartment but it wasn’t too dirty and, he noted, at least he hadn’t gotten the room with the boarded up window. Matt sat on the bed, the stiff mattress that had probably seen more atrocities than Matt ever would. He began to take off his boots and didn’t get any further than the left foot before he fell to the bed in a tired heap.

-

When Matt dreams he dreams of his brothers and sisters, the hurricanes.

He was young and lived in Clearwater Beach, Florida and the intensity of the seaside storms there knocked over full grown palm trees and houses. His neighbor’s house. Adrian was the fourth son of a cop and he and Matt had chased each other around playing different versions of cops and robbers. Matt was always the robber and when it was time for he and Adrian to go their separate ways for the night, Matt would rob in his own house. He would steal things like his mother’s hairpins and laugh to himself, hands planted over his mouth, as he heard his mother in the hallway, crying in confusion, “Has anyone seen my bobby pins? I swear…”

Adrian was a thief too, and Matt thought it was odd and slightly copy cattish for him to steal things from his own mother. But Adrian stole five dollar bills from her purse and they went to the corner store to by coconut ice pops with it. He took a ring too, a beautiful emerald ring and they accidentally dropped it in the river on their way back from showing it off to some girls. Matt mourned the thing more than Adrian did. He stood at the water’s edge and sighed and never told his mother because his father had a whip and it was often used.

Then, when Hurricane Connie came off the coast and straight into Clearwater, Adrian’s stash of stolen things were whirled away. Connie took a lot of things, precious treasures and secrets. Adrian became quiet when he and his family had to move into a hotel because of their destroyed house. Even though his mother drove him over once a week to play with Matt, he was never interested in shooting Matt or tackling Matt and he talked about stealing things more valuable than emerald rings.

At the time, Matt didn’t know anything could be more valuable than a stone like that.

Adrian finally moved and Matt still can’t remember where. He once had their new address on a piece of a napkin somewhere in his old room. He thought of writing a letter and never did. He thought of sending one of his mother’s bobby pins and never did. When Matt was thirteen, he and his family moved to Pasadena and he felt separated from his siblings, from Connie and Gerald and Tiffany and Ben. The stronger, older siblings he felt could take anything away.

-

The only ray of sunshine came through the window curtain and lay across Matt’s face. He twitched in his sleep and opened his eyes, turning away from the light. When he was on his side, he was confused at his surroundings and sat up as if he expected to be in his crappy apartment and not in a crappy motel.

But then it all came flooding back to him in succession - the bar and the chills he got from standing outside in the shadows. Her bare pubis beneath him.

“Fuck,” he hissed, realizing that he might have been hoping it was all a dream. But the sun was harsh reality on his face, his back, and he got up to face it.

He walked across the floor barefoot, his socks in his boots underneath the bed, and went straight for the small bathroom to the left of the bed. The linoleum was cracked and dirty and the tub had grime around the rim. But Matt couldn’t remember a time that he’d lived on his own where the bathroom had actually been cleaned and went on without qualm. The water was rushing into the tub and when Matt looked up to adjust the shower spigot, he found there was none there and inwardly groaned.

His clothes came off and they landed in the sink and on the toilet and his goggles were somewhere within the pile. When the warm water touched his skin, he felt a chill spider up his back and hit him with some kind of gentleness. He sat in the water and let the bath run until it was up to his shoulders.

I’m here. I really did it. I tried to rape her and now I’ve really left my apartment and am running away, he thought with some kind of dull horror. In the time between running away to his car and leaving her in the alley and slipping into the bath, he had found some kind of awkward acceptance. Awkward, because he had never done anything wrong before. Stealing bobby pins was one thing. Cheating on his Biology exam in tenth grade was another. Spitting on graves while drunk was even another.

But she was amazed too. That she was there beneath me and I ripped her panties off. She probably heard about things like that happening in a big city. Girls get raped. All the time. It’s just something you hear about. But she… it was HAPPENING. To her. And I was her rapist. I was going to…

Matt slipped lower into the water, all submerged but his nose as if snorkeling, and he looked up at the world above as if a spectator.

That’s it, we were spectators watching a rape scene. But it never happened. It was just an accident. That’s all.

There was a distant sound.

That’s all.

“Excuse me?”

Matt didn’t register the voice all at once and looked to the side, holding his breath as his nose went under. Then, he saw the bleary figure of a man just outside the bathroom door and he jerked his head out of the water. He came up, red hair dripping wet and his cheeks flushed from his submission.

“I’m sorry,” the man said kindly, his eyes flashing chocolate brown behind a pair of round-rimmed glasses. He held towels in his arms and behind him, Matt could see the apartment door opened and a cart of towels and cleaning supplies in the doorway. “I’m housecleaning and I… I didn’t think you had any towels.”

Matt was breathing harder than usual and he nodded, murmured, “Thanks. Set them on the toilet or something.”

He nodded and his black hair fell over his eyes as he crossed into the bathroom to set the towels down. Matt’s breathing quickened and the tears that were before unseen because of the water were now cascading anew and Matt shook lightly, turning his face into his hands.

The man halted as he left the towels on the toilet lid by the bath. He looked up through his thick bangs and hesitated to ask and finally said nothing. He straightened and watched Matt cry, shoulders and fingers trembling and his lower lip quivering as if he were suffering intense cold. But it was too much of a hassle, maybe, or just too embarrassing and weird and so the man left the bathroom and walked away to straighten the rest of the rooms and Matt was left alone again.

He took his hands from his face and wiped his eyes with one of the towels the man had just bought. He wasn’t sure if he was crying for her sake or if he was crying for his sake or what.

Or if he was crying because he felt small and in trouble and what if mom found out?

What if mom found out her son, who she had once called beautiful Matthew, tried to rape a girl?

By the time Matt thought he would start crying again, the man who had given him the towels was in the doorway once more. They locked eyes, green with brown, and the man found it in himself to ask timidly, “What… what’s the matter?”

“I raped somebody,” he said, sniffling.

“Oh…”

He didn’t know how to answer that, and Matt didn’t blame him, actually found it sort of funny that he wouldn‘t just run away. But what really killed him was when the man looked aside, as if conflicted, and then back at the rapist sitting in the tub and said, “Don’t cry. It’ll be all right.”

Matt gave a half-hearted laugh and rose out of the water, droplets raining off of his body and into the tub. He wrapped the towel around his waist and walked across the tiled floor to the scratchy carpet and felt like if he was going to be an outlaw, a true outlaw, it would benefit him not to think and just do. Just go with his body like when he evaded Adrian’s tackles by swinging around the trunks of palm trees and rolling underneath bushes.

Matt took the man’s thin wrists in his hands and held them down at his sides. “I’m running away from the police,” he whispered in the man’s ear and he thought he had him paralyzed. But he didn’t. As he leaned in to capture the man’s lips, he was surprised to find the kiss not only returned but enforced.

And they didn’t know each other’s names until Matt was knee deep in the other man. They had fallen to the floor in a meld of lips and Matt kicked the door shut with his foot and his towel that had been wrapped around him was somewhere forgotten about. There was some sort of tea on the other man’s breath that tasted refreshing and Matt was sure his breath was horrible but there was no complaining. They pulled apart from one another for a breath and, really, to see if the other would continue, and Matt was panting as he looked into the other man’s eyes.

He seemed to smile, the way he had when had walked in on Matt. “Your lips are soft,” he said.

“T-Thanks.”

“What’s your name?”

Matt’s eyed him suspiciously and said, “Matt,” and attempted to get up.

But he was pulled back down, the man’s arms wrapped around his neck and he said, “I’m Matsuda.”

“Matsuda… right,” he sighed, pushing their lips together again simply because Matsuda thought his were soft. They opened their mouths to each other and Matt busied his fingers with undoing the buttons to Matsuda’s shirt.

Matsuda was kind and Matt hadn’t expected that. He had read about encounters like this: where two strangers meet and have rough, angry sex but Matsuda wasn’t angry and Matt wasn’t rough. Matsuda was soon damp from rubbing against Matt on the floor and his pants and underwear were discarded like the towel.

Somewhere in the back of Matt’s mind, he worried about not being able to get an erection. Like maybe it wasn’t the fact that he might have been taking the woman without her consent or he was doing something sinful, maybe he just couldn’t. He kept worrying, even through all the touches and nips and Matsuda’s tongue dragging down his neck, biting on the way. And he was blushing furiously when Matsuda thrust his hips upwards and their groins came into contact. The friction was enough to blow Matt’s worries away.

He pulled away from Matsuda’s cheeks where he had been placing fevered kisses and trailed them down his neck and torso, leaving wet spots behind. He touched Matsuda’s body as if it were fire with the palms of his hands flat on the man’s chest as he raised himself up and looked down on Matsuda – his glasses askew and his lips pink and wet.

“This is okay,” Matt mumbled to himself questioningly.

Matsuda didn’t hear what he said but nodded, as if goading Matt into continuing. Matt sighed and bit his lower lip in indecision.

“I…”

Matt was pushed down onto the floor before he could continue and Matsuda had rolled on top of him; was smiling down at him. Matt shifted uncomfortably under his gaze, through the glasses hanging at the tip of his nose, and Matt realized the carpet wasn’t so soft, instead itchy and dirty.

“I’m interested in you,” Matsuda said softly, trailing a finger down to Matt’s penis and grabbed him there earnestly. “In what you feel like.”

-

Matsuda attacked him in such a way that persuaded Matt to assault him back. Matt’s shoulders and chest was decorated with red bite marks and his back lined with scratches. They rolled each other around on the carpet and Matt found comfort in being beneath Matsuda sometimes, until neither of them could take the anticipation any longer and Matt managed to push Matsuda up onto the bed that had just been made.

In what was really only a very short amount of time, Matt felt like he found out quite a lot about Matsuda without the help of words. Matsuda was curious in what kind of things Matt would like, even though he had no real responsibility to make Matt grunt and moan the way he had. Matsuda kissed Matt’s chest and held Matt’s bare hips in a constant pleading for him to continue.

The sun was on Matt’s back as he leaned over Matsuda’s form on the bed and buried his head into the crook of his neck, holding onto his shoulders and placing himself between spread legs. Matsuda whined as he felt the head of Matt’s penis penetrate him and placed more pressure on Matt’s hips. Matt hissed in the back of his throat and moved further inside, clenching his muscles in an attempt not to come so fucking soon because how many humiliations could he endure?

But it wasn’t as easy as clenching muscles because Matsuda was tightening his as well, constricting Matt’s movements.

“Ma…” Matsuda cried out, and it really was like crying, or at least Matt thought it was. Matt turned his head, his eyes covered with sweat-drenched hair. Matsuda was turned to him, cheeks flushed but eyes dry and he said, pleadingly, “Matt, don’t s-stop.”

Matt nodded and thrust his hips upward suddenly, eliciting another cry, and again, and there followed the crying. Matt soon found his rhythm and the bed springs were creaking beneath the two of them, the covers then in disarray by both of their legs moving around. Matsuda spread his legs even wider and Matt hooked his left arm around his leg to give himself better access.

The little whines and sudden outcries that sounded like sobbing held off Matt’s orgasm and although they were disturbing, he was somewhat grateful for them. He had no real reason to wait off and give Matsuda an orgasm because they were strangers and had no real responsibility to one another. Though Matt felt it was courtesy, he was not so quick to be completely caring and ignored Matsuda’s flushed erection that lay flat on his stomach and didn’t plan on touching him unless he asked for it.

He didn’t ask. He seemed quite content to lay there and cry and grasp the sheets when Matt plunged in deeper. Through the crying, Matt soon found he couldn’t hold on much longer and as he let out a violent shudder, Matsuda arched his back and grabbed Matt around the neck, forcing their bodies together. Matt felt something warm and slick spread across his abdomen and pulled away from Matsuda’s embrace, yanking himself out of the other man and came on Matsuda’s stomach, grinding his hips down.

There was a long pause, just the sound of heavy breathing and Matt finally sat back on his heels, looking at the mess he had made; his semen mixing with Matsuda’s. Looking further at the serene expression on Matsuda’s face, he felt awkward and unsure of everything, realizing that like the woman in the alley, he had had sex with a total stranger.

He eyed Matsuda wearily for a moment before asking, “Do you want a towel?”

“Mm?” His eyes which has previously been closed were now open and bright and his glasses were on the floor somewhere. He propped himself up with his elbows and looked at Matt. “No.”

Matt was thrown by that answer and then ran all out of ideas. He started to get off the bed, to find some clothes, but Matsuda stopped him, placing a foot on Matt’s thigh.

“Here,” he said, patting the spot next to him.

Matt raised an eyebrow but crawled over anyway, sitting with his back against the cool wall and it felt great on his scratches. He glanced over at Matsuda, who lay completely comfortable while naked and his foot bounced on the bed idly.

“It… it wasn’t really rape,” Matt said nervously, popping his knuckles.

“Wasn’t it?”

“No. I didn’t do anything to her.”

Matsuda looked up at him, confused. “It was a her?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why did you have sex with me if you’re straight?”

Matt didn’t know how to answer that; didn’t want to say the obvious answer: that he was just a horny bastard who would do anything that handed him a towel. And it was more or less true despite the fact that Matsuda was only his third lover and only male. Matt’s sex drive had been plaguing him since the eighth grade when Tawny Breslin walked out of the girl’s locker room with her uniform undone and Matt had seen her Scooby Doo training bra. She saw him looking and smiled, leaving him alone in the corridor with a budding erection in his pants.

Tawny teased him the rest of the spring semester, always bringing lollypops to Gym and leaning on the back wall as she sucked on it harshly and inexpertly. But Matt thought it was probably the hottest thing he would ever see and followed her around. He had little competition as Tawny was not half the girl Holly was – the red-headed, well-developed queen of the eighth grade – with her crooked pigtails and braces but she was good enough for Matt. Good enough for Matt to talk into meeting in the back of the baseball field by the school.

He had been annoyed by her whining that it was uncomfortable and told her he didn’t think it was supposed to be comfortable. The lawns had just been cut and he could smell the freshness of the grass as he pushed inside of her and she held onto him as if he were life. When it was over in a few minutes, her panties were thick with dried come and some blood and when his kisses couldn’t calm her crying, he stopped kissing her and went home.

Matt told a version of this story to Matsuda, a version that made him seem like some sort of romantic hero. He wasn’t sure if Matsuda believed him or not but if he didn’t, he faked it well. “Then what did you do to the woman you didn’t rape?”

“I, uh, I touched her. I dragged her into the back alley and touched her.” He fiddled with his fingers and looked along the floor for his towel. “I was pretty drunk at the time. But I sobered up real quick and got the hell out of there. So…”

So, you see, I didn’t do shit.

“Then why are you running?”

“Because,” Matt said and blinked upon realizing there was no simple answer for that either.

Because what if she says I did?

Because maybe I did do something wrong.

Because I couldn’t stand being anywhere around her.

Matt didn’t like the way this was going. He was practically sweating again but Matsuda was just fine laying there, playing with the congealing come on his stomach absent-mindedly. Matt wrinkled his nose slightly and decided he’d lain there naked for too long. The bed bounced with the loss of his weight and before he moved away from the bed, he felt a hand on his wrist. He looked over and Matsuda had grabbed him again, looking up at him with big brown orbs.

“You don’t want to talk about it? All right. But, um. I’m hungry.”

Matt raised an eyebrow and wondered just what he was supposed to do about that. Matsuda pulled him back into the covers and held his hips down as his mouth took in Matt’s limp member. Matt gasped out of surprise and some melting pleasure as he adjusted to the warmth of Matsuda’s mouth.

“Wh-what are you…” he trailed off, exhaling shakily as he looked down and noticed the brown “eyes staring up at him as the man’s head bobbed up and down. “Jesus,” Matt sighed, closing his eyes when he felt Matsuda’s tongue circle around the tip and then slide down the underside. Saliva trickled down Matsuda’s fingers as he pumped the rest of Matt’s length and the sheets grew wet beneath them.

Matt grit his teeth and sat up, pulling himself away from Matsuda’s grip. He seemed confused, but willing, as Matt took him by the shoulders and threw him face-down to the mattress. He spread Matsuda’s legs and kept a firm hand on the man’s neck and, in a few gasp’s time, Matsuda began to cry again.

-

“Hey.”

“Mm?”

“You cry during sex… did you know that?”

“No, I don’t.”

“… I… I heard it though.”

“You’re hearing things.”

-

Matsuda left because he had other rooms to clean. Matt watched him from the foot of his bed as he sorely bent over to pick up his clothes in the noon light coming from the window. His dressing was quiet; a fumble of zipping and buttoning and he sat on the edge of the bed to put on his shoes. When they were laced up, he looked to Matt at his sighed and smiled, a brightness in the dreary of the room.

“Bye,” he said and got up.

Matt watched him go without valediction. The door shut softly and Matt paused to hear the wheeling of the cart Matsuda pushed through the corridors. When he could no longer hear the soft rolling of the wheels, he stood up and went for his suitcase, fishing around for some clothes and his toothbrush.

The entire room smelled of sex; that thick, fleshy smell that wasn’t particularly very great and it was all over Matt. He walked into the bathroom and thought maybe he would have to take another shower before going out. Because after last night, Matt thought it would be in his best interest to perhaps find an AA meeting nearby.

The thought made him almost physically sick, really.

Sitting in a room with a crowd of people chewing Mentos to hide the liquor on their breath. He had seen things on TV that didn’t look all that inviting: the mentor talking to you about your problem and pointing at you and telling you how dangerous it is. How there are so many people like you.

Matt brushed his teeth hurriedly and dressed. It had to be done. He promised his mom he would take care of his problem-

“Before it gets out of hand, Matthew… please.”

-and aw, shit, it had gotten out of hand all right. Matt thought of his mother’s gifts of fifties in the mail and her smiley faces. Her encouraging conclusions that said: I know you can do it, baby. Matt didn’t want her to know that, okay, maybe he wasn’t such a sweetheart or a good boy and maybe he can’t do it. Maybe he’s a guaranteed fuck-up all around who actually will rape a girl one day and who will have sex with guys that hand him a towel and who are okay with him raping girls.

The pleasing tightness of Matsuda’s ass had left him desolate and angry, similar to the way he felt after coming down off vodka or gin. Matsuda had left him sober and he hated the feeling, absolutely deplored looking in the mirror with his toothbrush hanging out of the side of his mouth and the rings around his eyes. The look in his own eyes was that of a movie villain, someone who was destined to harm the world with delusions of doing good.

He had seen that in himself when he had just graduated high school. But he didn’t want to hurt anyone. He hadn’t wanted to push that girl down into the puddle, he hadn’t wanted to make Matsuda cry.

Matt spit in the sink and picked his goggles up off of the floor. He tugged them down over his eyes and looked at himself again: veiled and alien. The way he should be.

When Matt was out of his room, he looked down the hallways to see if Matsuda was around. He imagined, for a moment, they way Matsuda operated throughout the day: going down the corridors with the squeaky wheels beneath him and entering people’s rooms, waiting for someone to take him like Matt had. Matt wondered if he offered himself to everyone like that, if he was some sort of whore. In a way, it was comforting to think about. Matt wasn’t the only fucked up person out there. But in the end, he decided as he locked the door behind him, that it was best not to think of Matsuda as someone who he had anything in common with. It was best to forget about him so he did and the hallway was empty and Matt made his way to the foyer.

The office was different in the daytime, less sad and depressing, and more like an average lobby. The sun came through the glass doors and speckled through the canvas of the mural on the wall. In this light, Matt could see that the plants lined around the walls were fake and the pots were covered in chipped paint and cracks.

“Good morning,” Isaac said, catching Matt’s attention from behind the desk. Matt smiled and returned the greeting even though it was afternoon.

“Good morning,” he said, walking up to the desk. “Hey, uh, do you have a phonebook or something?”

“Sure.” Isaac bent down, disappearing behind the counter and grunted, lifting a heavy phonebook and plunking it down on the desk. “I can help too, if you can’t find what you were looking for. I know this area pretty well.”

Matt nodded hesitantly, taking the book in his arms and stepping a few feet away. “I think I got it,” he hummed, flipping the pages. He tilted the book upward so there was no chance Isaac could see what page he was looking at. But Isaac didn’t seem too interested and turned away, his eyes on the mural on the other wall. The closest central office was a few miles away, on North Hope, and how convenient really, and Matt should have been looking at the ad with hope and reassurance but there was none in his heart, only dread.

He stared at the page for what seemed like a second but was really about three minutes.

“… Something wrong?” Isaac asked and Matt jumped a little, startled to see the man looking over at him so intensely.

“N-No. Thanks,” Matt said shyly and handed the book back to him, closing it softly. He turned for the door, hands in his jacket pockets and just as nudged it open with his elbow, Isaac called to him once again.

“By the way, did housecleaning come by this morning?”

“… That’s right.”

“Okay. Sorry about the trouble; I didn’t think we’d have any visitors so late last night so that room hadn’t been cleaned in a while. I hope Matsuda didn’t disturb you.”

“No,” Matt said, nose reddening. “He was fine.”

“That’s good. Have a nice day.”

Matt let the door swing closed behind him and walked out into the cold. It wasn’t as bad as it had been the night before, everything had some sort of serene coating that was not yet snow. The November air always used to do something to him, used to give him some sense of security. In his high school days when he would walk through the crunching leaves in the courtyard, the wind rustled his hair and he felt absolutely invincible. He had boundless dreams with no direction and the reflection of possibility in his eyes.

But the November winds left him with his car and a bottle and he started the engine quickly, like he could drive to catch up with his lost dreams.

He started down the street, pulling out of Motel 18’s parking lot. There was frost on the hood of the car and Matt leaned back in his seat, enjoying the feeling of the heater on his lap and face. He turned on the radio to quell the fear rising in him and for a few minutes it worked.

It worked until he neared the busy intersection of North Hope. Then the sickness came back and he resisted the urge to make a large U-turn and head back to hide in the warm covers of his bed. Hiding in his room to wait for his addiction to slowly break him down to small pieces and destroy him.

The building was clean and white-washed, the words Civic Center in bold black above the revolving doors. Matt stared from the window of his car, stricken by fear but forced himself into the parking lot, driven by the remembered words in his mother’s letters.

Dear Matthew, we are so proud of you…

He cut off the engine and sat there in the cooling car, his stomach growling furiously from not being fed. But all he could hear was-

I know it’s not easy…

And-

… but someday you’ll feel a little better.

Matt closed his eyes and held his hands in place on the steering wheel. If he concentrated, he could smell her perfume coating the letters. His fingers used to trace the curves of her words and he thought about her in Pasadena at the kitchen table, crying tears of joy and writing to him. Her money in his pocket.

He opened the door with force and closed it weakly, his confidence coming and going like the tides. The walk up to the revolving door was long. People walked past him both to the parking lot and to the building in longer strides and faster. Matt felt as if were in some sort of bubble and the world was passing by around him but he was determined, in some sense, to cross into that world and opened the door for a woman before entering himself.

She turned to him and said, “Thanks,” with a smile as she headed for one of the elevators to the right.

Matt watched her go and his boots clicked on the marbled tile of the floor. The lobby was large and bright with the aid of florescent lighting above. Matt tilted his head upward and looked at the lights dazedly, the glare bouncing off the lenses of his goggles and a whistle caught his attention. He turned his head to the left at a receptionist’s desk, where a woman in bright red, both dress and lipstick, called to him. In a sea of purpose, he suppose he seemed lost.

He walked over and she said, “Sir, are you all right? Do you need something?”

“I’m fine,” he mumbled and she tilted her head so he repeated: “I’m fine.”

She watched him for a second, unsure, and when someone else walked up to the desk, she flipped a blonde lock out of her face and answered his question. Matt stood there, staring down at the arrangement of business cards on the desk. Some were for conventions, others for stag meetings and then there was one that read Alcoholics Anonymous in a gentle print. Matt reached out and took one with a shaky hand and slipped it into his pocket, hoping it went unnoticed but the receptionist saw and smiled at him.

“That room,” she said confidently, “is on the second floor, room 213. The next meeting is in a few hours if you’d like to stick around.”

Matt eyed her suspiciously. He didn’t like being talked to like a basket case on the verge of committing some mass murder. Her voice was hushed and confidential but Matt felt like everyone in the lobby was listening and could hear, even over the soft music playing through the speakers above.

In his pocket, he crumbled the card.

“I don’t need it,” he said and turned.

“Wait,” she called and he could feel her hands on his shoulder. He looked back at her. “I’m going to that meeting too. Would you like to go together?” She seemed sincere and Matt looked down at her bosom, at the nametag pinned there. Aliyah, it said.

He shrugged and turned his back to her once again. “I’ll think about it.” There was nothing to think about. He wasn’t coming back. He hurried for the door and pushed past the people on the steps, nearly tripping over his own feet to get to his car. He held on to the hood for a second, before leaning into a bush and vomiting a very thin bile. He thought, Sorry, mom.

-

A few hours later, Matt was sitting in his car with his feet on the dashboard, his seat leaned back and a bag of McDonald’s in his lap. Wrappers were crumbled up and there was an empty soda cup in the cup holder; fries were littered along the floor and there were grease stains on Matt’s fingers. He lay half-asleep, leaning back in the seat, the sound of cars rushing by lulling him into some security.

He had driven around for a while after leaving Aliyah and the Civic Center. Matt recognized the look in her hazel eyes, the look that said: I can help you, if you want.

She didn’t know him though. She couldn’t help him. The mentor at the meetings couldn’t help him. No one knew what he had done in that back alley, or what he meant to do. Only Matsuda, the cleaning man back at the motel. And he didn’t seem so judging, but that was just because he had probably done something similar, sometime in his life.

Don’t cry.

Right.

Matt had cried already. When he was ordering through the driveway at McDonald’s, he was sobbing so hard it took a few minutes for the man inside to understand him. His eyes were ringed red and his goggles were resting on his chest, gently rising and falling with his breathing. As Matt drove, he looked into the darkened alleyways that lined the streets, sometimes full with dumpsters or stray cats or even men that loitered homeless and broken in the mouths of the passages. Women gave the openings wide births, like even in the daytime, they were dangerous maws that would suck them in, consume them. Matt couldn’t agree more.

Matt stayed in the McDonald’s parking lot until it was dark. The sun had set over the rising buildings. He started the engine and took off for the grocery store down the street for some supplies. In the room he had at the motel, there was a small fridge and he thought it would be wise to stay there for a while, to hide and stay away from the Civic Center and room 213.

There was nothing for him there.

The store was lit up and inviting in the foreground of the night sky. The parking lot was sparsely populated and there was an employee in a green apron pushing carts back into the store. Matt followed behind him and grabbed a cart out of the line, eased by the heat washing over him as he walked through the doors. He bought things he thought he could eat quickly and often like sandwich fixings and powered Gatorade.

He glided through the isles as if he were the only one in the store. In the quiet, it seemed as if he was, until he saw someone from behind, a figure of a man standing in front of a mango stand, his jet black hair wisped over his neck. Matt thought it was Matsuda for a moment, a long moment, but he turned and was with pierced eyebrows and was not Matsuda.

Matt gathered the rest of his items and checked out somberly. He put his bags into the back seat of his car and drove back to the motel, or home, as he was already thinking of it in his head.

It was far from his room in Pasadena, in the basement of the house by the furnace. His posters of girls all over the walls and his television that, for a while, had HBO and Cinemax and had softcore porn playing in the early morning. Matt had a shelf full of encyclopedias he won in the fifth grade by way of a lottery drawing and never used them but his mother said, Keep them. When you’re in college, they’ll be useful and when you’re out of college you can sell them.

It was certainly nothing like that, but it was a welcome sight when he pulled up to it that night. He walked through the doors with three bags in his hand and Isaac, standing there without much purpose, perked up and adjusted his glasses.

“Do you need some help?”

“No… thanks though,” Matt said and tried to ignore the wavering smile Isaac gave him. He must have been bored, standing there all day, waiting for someone. Matt walked down the hall and found room 6 once again, putting his key in with a little difficulty and walked in. The smell from earlier had subsided and now it just smelled a little fetid and stale. He sat the bags down on the bed and went through them, crumbling the bags as they emptied.

He shrugged off his jacket and, touching a pocket, he felt something inside it and reached in, thinking it was money. It was the rumpled AA card. Matt sighed, holding it for a second before straightening it out. He smudged the name with his thumb but there were two numbers beneath the room number, one to call for times or meetings and another redirected line for ‘emergencies.’

Matt looked over at the telephone on the nightstand by the head of his bed. He wondered if he was in an emergency. But then again, that phone only called numbers inside the motel.

“It’s so if there’s a problem, you can easily contact me or housekeeping…”

Matt sat down on the bed heavily by the nightstand. He looked at the small piece of paper by the phone and the lamp and a notepad and pen. Isaac was number one and housekeeping was number two.

If there’s a problem, Matt thought. An emergency.

He picked up the phone and, setting down the AA card, pressed the star button and then 2. It rang three times and during those three rings, Matt wanted to slam the phone down, because this felt like a mistake. But there was an answer finally, Matsuda’s voice in his ear: “Housekeeping. What’s your room number?”

“This… it’s Matt,” he murmured, fist tight on the phone.

“Oh, Matt. What is it?”

“Well, I…” A long pause. What could he say? This was stupid. He should just hang up, after all, they were strangers and it was best to keep it that way. He sighed, “I…”

“Stay there.” There was a click and then the line went dead.

Matt put the phone back on the hook and groaned, holding his head in his hands and falling to the side, into the pillows. He curled into a fetal position, his shoes still on and dirtying the bedspread. He wasn’t even drunk and he was still making mistakes. He had been trying to ignore the itch all day but it was there, in the back of his head, like a buzzing, a calling, and he ached every time he had passed by a bar or liquor store. The buzzing wouldn’t go away and he felt like it was some sort of emergency.

In a moment, there was some jingling at the door, the sound of keys and it was opened and Matt looked between his fingers to see Matsuda standing in the doorway. His hair was shiny and just-washed but his clothes were the same from that morning, wrinkled and probably semen-crusted.

Matt lifted his head as Matsuda closed the door. “You came,” he muttered, surprised.

“Yeah, of course,” Matsuda said. He stood in the middle of the room with his large key ring in one hand and the other twitching at his side. “What’s wrong? You sounded weird on the phone.”

“I, um. I don’t feel so good.”

“Really?” He came and sat beside Matt, looking at the groceries at the edge of the bed. “You went shopping, huh? How long are you staying?”

“A few days.”

He nodded and returned his gaze to Matt. “What doesn’t feel good?”

Matt blinked and looked aside to the card on the table. Matsuda saw it and made a small ‘oh’ sound and placed a hand on Matt’s shoulder.

“I don’t know what to do. I shouldn’t have called you, I know. But... This phone doesn’t call outside the motel,” he finished lamely, and reddened with embarrassment. He whispered softly, “I didn’t know who else to call.”

“I don’t mind,” he said cheerily. “It’s sort of flattering. But don’t you have any family that could help you?”

“My mom is… Well, she’s a few hours away. And I don’t want her worrying about this stuff. About me.” Even as he said it, he recited to himself her number: 525-7801. Because everyday, he came so close to dialing it.

“I don’t know about drinking problems,” Matsuda said carefully. “But I can try to make you feel better right now.”

“All right,” Matt said, nodding.

“The feeling probably won’t last though.”

“That’s okay,” he urged and closed the distance between them.

-

The food had been all kicked to the floor and the covers were tugged every which way. Matsuda and Matt were on the floor as well, to the left side of the bed, their bodies covered in sweat and each other’s semen in the midst of the fourth round that day. Matt’s pants were still tangled around his ankles and Matsuda still had a hand in the sleeve of his shirt but they managed and Matt, though content to be inside the other man, was feeling the exhaustion creep up on him.

His knees were skinned to the point of almost bleeding as he held onto Matsuda’s shoulders and slammed into him. He groaned thinly and sighed when he had to change position because his knees and hips ached and he hiked Matsuda’s legs up over his shoulders. Matsuda didn’t seem to mind, grasping as he was, for anything he could claw: Matt’s hair, back and hips all bore the scratches for Matsuda’s ardor.

Matt liked the sex just fine without kissing but Matsuda almost insisted on it. He would grab Matt by the hair and force their mouths together, clash their teeth together, scrape their tongues against each other. Everything was heavy and wet and Matt didn’t have time to notice that the buzzing was gone, or rather, replaced by some new longing. He wanted to stay like this, keep Matsuda happy beneath him even though he was crying so hard he sounded like he wasn’t at all happy.

But every time Matt looked down to see if maybe he was too hard or thrusting in too deep, Matsuda’s eyes were still dry and he was still kissing everywhere he could.

He would buck his hips up sometime in an attempt for Matt to come in contact with his erection that always lay against his stomach, untouched. Matt forced him down sometimes and angled him different, fucked him a little harder to satiate him for the time being. Matt didn’t want to touch him, to please him so much because at this point, they were on the verge of not being strangers anymore and Matt liked the idea too much of still being a vacuous shadow to Matsuda.

If he wanted to, he could disappear and not feel a thing and Matsuda wouldn‘t feel for him either.

“Ma… M-Matt, please,” Matsuda cried in Matt’s ear, sounding so desperate and pitiful.

Matt grunted in response, pulling out suddenly and Matsuda whined in disappointment but it was cut off as Matt grabbed him again and forced him on his knees with his stomach against the wall. Matt came behind him and pinned him there, spreading Matsuda’s legs with one knee and penetrated the entrance once again. With his other hand, he reached around and took Matsuda’s stiff penis in his grip and began to pump furiously up and down the length.

He threw the idea of rhythm away and pushed his face into the crook of Matsuda’s neck, enjoying the guttural groans he was causing. The thought that someone might hear them crossed his mind, but only for a second, and then he felt Matsuda’s warm seed dripping down his hand and pulled out again to come on the man’s back.

Matt sat back with a thud up against the bed and watched through blurry vision as Matsuda leaned tiredly on the wall. Matt’s come was dripping down the globes of Matsuda’s ass and the serene, glossy look that came across Matsuda’s face was comforting.

“Do you feel any better?” Matsuda asked gently.

Matt was hating himself for it but couldn’t deny the truth that: “Yeah, I do.”

-

“Do you… do this kind of thing with other people?” Matt asked as he finished putting his forgotten groceries in the small fridge. He closed the door with a heel and looked over at the bed, at Matsuda hanging upside down over the edge naked. His hair was in wisps just above the floor and his eyes were bright and alive. Matt came from around the counter separating the small kitchen from the rest of the room and he was only in a pair of boxers.

“What kind of thing?”

Matt sat beside him, looking down into his brown eyes through the goggles he recently donned. “Sex. Hanging around in their rooms. I don’t know.”

“You called me here.”

“Right…”

“Plus, I feel bad for you,” Matsuda said, gaze redirected at the ceiling. “You were crying when I met you and you still seem like you’re crying. I want to help…” He glanced at Matt then back at the ceiling. “But this is all I can do right now.”

“But I mean, isn’t there some kind of rule? Won’t you get in trouble with Isaac?” Matt asked timidly.

Matsuda laughed suddenly, covering his mouth with both hands until his giggles subsided. He sighed happily and looked up at Matt, lowering his voice to a whisper, “I don’t care what Isaac thinks. I like you, Matt.”

“T-Thanks…”

“Besides,” Matsuda exhaled. “I won’t stay here forever.”

Matt glanced down. “Oh? Where’re you going?”

“To France.”

Matt was about to give some generic response until he realized what had just been said and blinked. Matsuda laughed, having watched his change of expression. He said, “Everyone I tell that to thinks I’m a stupid dreamer but I’m not. It’s okay though, you can laugh if you want to.”

“I… well, it’s not stupid. I’ve known people who wanted to go there too. I don’t know if they ever got there though… It’s pretty expensive,” Matt mused, resting his chin in the palm of his hand.

Matsuda sat up suddenly. “That doesn’t matter. When I was in high school, I took French classes and fell in love with it. I was going to go to college and study abroad there but…” He turned towards Matt. “Somehow I ended up here.”

Matt lowered his eyelids in thought and, after a pause, said, “Can you tell me something? In French?”

Matsuda seemed to have been waiting for such an invitation and said breathlessly, “Je veux aller à Paris. Vous pouvez venir avec moi si vous voulez. De cette voie… ce ne sera pas si solitaire.”

“A-And what does all that mean?”

“I’m inviting you to go with me.”

Matt blinked and looked away. He should have never started this. He wasn’t cut out for being some kind of criminal on the run and he certainly wasn’t cut out for someone like Matsuda who wanted to take him to France and Matt hadn’t the heart to tell him he was a stupid dreamer.

“Sure,” he said. “I’ll go.”

-

Matsuda left somewhere around midnight, after he had spoken some broken French, laced with English, in Matt’s ear and refused to tell him what it all meant. When Matt woke up the next morning, he was in a puddle of his own sweat and felt hot and annoyed. He had tossed and turned through the night, and dreamed about crazy things like swimming through the deepest oceans and dancing on stars. But somewhere amongst the fantasies was his mother, beneath him in an alleyway. She was crying but her eyes were dry and by-passers stood to watch Matt with his pants around his ankles and her panties in his hand.

It was the last thing he wanted and the only image he had ever seen he honestly could not stand to think about. He tried to push the dream to the back of his mind as he bathed but there it was, like bulb flashes behind his eyes.

He was still damp as he wrapped the towel around his waist and sat on the bed, facing the nightstand. He eyed the AA card distastefully and overlooked it to take the notepad and the pen in hand. Sitting back into the pillows, he began his letter with: Dear mom, I tried.

Then scratched it out and put: I’m trying.

He wrote about the girl from Wally’s and what he had done to her and even though it wasn’t that bad and even though his mom wasn’t who he really should apologize to, he apologized to her. He told her about Matsuda and thought about leaving out certain pieces, pieces that would break her heart, but he thought by then her heart was in shards on the floor. He tried to remember what Matsuda had said in French and wrote it sloppily.

His pen paused as he recalled his dream and saw his mother’s sweet face, full of worry and tenderness, beneath him in the darkened alley.

After a moment, the pen began to move again and moments turned into an hour and the hour turned into two and three. When Matt was done, he looked down at the pages of notepad scattered around on his bed and gathered them all up, in no particular order. He folded them in half and stuck it inside his bag on the floor, zipping it up.

It was his attempt to feel free, less weighted and haunted in a way. He told his mother what her baby boy had been doing and yet she still didn’t know. But it remained the same, that woeful greeting of: I’m trying. So stupid that he was a grown man and still trying to please her and kept failing and was failing as he dressed and walked for his door, was failing as he walked down the hall and saw Matsuda with his cleaning cart wheeling up the corridor.

“Matt-” he called, blinking as Matt nearly ran passed him, neglecting eye contact.

Matt was in the lobby once again and Isaac was standing in front of the mural on the left wall. He stopped and turned around, his hands clasped behind his back. “Matt, hello. How did you sleep?”

“Fine…” He took a step towards the door, then stopped and glanced up when Isaac came towards him, head tilted in a submissive manner.

“Matt,” he said, placing a gentle hand on the redhead’s shoulder, “listen, has Matsuda… been bothering you?”

“Bothering me? No… well, what do you mean by that anyway?” Matt asked, a curiosity sparking behind tinted lenses.

Isaac faltered, “Well, it’s just that I’ve heard other guests complaining. Noise from your room. I just don’t want you to feel… encroached upon. You understand? I can tell him not to go to your room for the rest of your stay.”

“Right… I’m fine with him. He’s nice and sometimes… sometimes we just talk is all. I’ll make sure we’re not so loud though,” he said and backed away, letting Isaac’s hand fall from his shoulder.

Isaac smiled. “Well, good. Have a good day then.”

“All right. Bye,” Matt muttered and left into the wintry air.

The day was slightly colder than the one before and he jumped into his car, the red paint dusted lightly with frost. He turned the heater on full blast and pulled out of the parking lot, heading down to North Hope once again. The letters in his suitcase were driving him, buzzing around the back of his head with the urge to stop off on Jones Avenue and duck into the liquor store. And his mother’s words from a long time ago.

As he drove, the alleyways around him were open and gaping and he kept his focus on thoughts of the Civic Center and Aliyah there, her offer of help. Even if it was just something a receptionist was supposed to say, maybe there was a reason for it. He could stop trying and succeed for once, leave the motel and go back to his apartment. Leave the bars and go back to school. Leave Matsuda and hang around people like Aliyah: her golden hair and red lips.

Leave the alleyways and go back home.

North Hope was just up ahead and just beyond the buildings, Matt could see a corner of the Civic Center. Cars filled the parking lot and he couldn’t see any open spaces and, turning right instead, he parked in a Subway parking lot just across from the building. He turned the engine off and watched for a moment, taking in the sight and pulling in the courage from the warmth lingering at the vents.

In one swift motion, he opened the door, got out and shut it, and no sooner did he look up towards the front doors of the restaurant that he saw that familiar tussle of dirty-blonde hair thrown over a shoulder. Matt’s heart was beating loudly and she turned and recognized him too, the widening of her brown eyes. She held in her hand a sandwich bag and under her arm was her purse. Though she was not in the skimpy outfit of a few nights ago and her makeup was brushed lightly over her face, no longer a desperate force to hide her age, he remembered her.

“I,” he croaked, the aimless syllable lost in the cold air.

Her bottom lip trembled lightly and he could see the tears in her eyes. She took in a deep breath and wrapped her arms around herself as if the cold was becoming unbearable. Facing Matt again, cheeks flushed and eyes watering, she said, “You were… at the bar, weren’t you? You…”

Matt lost his voice. In the face of her tears, he tried to say sorry, to say forgive me, to tell her she shouldn’t hate him and if she could find it in her heart to forgive him, please do. Tell her that he would never hurt her or his mother.

But he couldn’t.

He inhaled quickly and opened the door to his car again, having been bent over it for minutes. He threw himself into the seat and jammed the key into the ignition. Distantly, like something in a dream, he heard the clicking of high-heels on the concrete and was startled to see her by the window, knocking on the window desperately and holding out the sandwich. Matt was crying and looked up at her through pale green eyes, his goggles shaken to his chest.

She cried freely and called to him through the glass, “We can share! We can share!” She held the sandwich out to him.

Matt pulled out and careened away, leaving her once again, with nothing.

-

When he arrived back at the motel, he staggered in with his head in his hands, sobbing the way he imagined she had sobbed over the days since Wally’s. Isaac was on the phone behind the counter and saw the way Matt’s eyes were red, the tear stains down his cheeks and the saliva over his chin.

“Matt, what’s wrong? Are you okay? Did something…” He paused, came around the counter and left the phone off the hook face down. “Matt, did someone hurt you? Should I call the cops?”

“I-I-I couldn’t even say I’m sorry… I dreamed about apologizing if I-I e-ever saw her again and I couldn’t even say I’m sorry,” he sobbed, shaking his head violently. He stared up into Isaac’s startled eyes. “I made a mistake, Isaac. But I s-swore, I promise, I thought she would love it but I could see it there… in her eyes, that she… she… saw the mistakes. Mistakes that I made all my life… m-mistakes that are huge, Isaac, that my mother doesn’t know and n-now I’ve fucked up someone else…”

Isaac swallowed over some large lump in his throat and fidgeted, didn’t know what to say, and he held Matt’s gaze for as long as he could until Matt tore away from him and walked down the corridor, no longer hiding behind his hands.

Isaac watched him go and, slowly, came back around to pick up the phone once more. He sighed into it: “Sorry. N-No, nothing’s wrong.”

Matt could barely hear him and lost all interest in the idea that maybe crying to Isaac like that wasn’t the best thing to do. He opened the door to his room and left it half open when he walked in and gathered his few pieces of clothing and his toothbrush in his bag. He had barely eaten any of the food in the refrigerator and felt thinner than usual from his days of not eating. He walked across the room as if in reverie, or a nightmare, and saw her face in front of him.

He pulled out the bread and peanut butter and as he turned around, she was there, laying bottomless on the counter. Her eyes wide and asking.

Expecting.

Matt put the items in his bag and zipped it up and reached down in the side pocket to make sure his letter was still there - it was. The old tears on his cheeks were dried but new ones always appeared and ran in new streaks towards his chin. He pulled the goggles back up over his eyes and walked for the door, closing and locking it one final time.

The walk from room 6 to room 2 was short but each step he took, he felt as if he were doomed. There was no guarantee Matsuda would even be in his room at this time of day and if he was, what would Matt say to him?

Ask him to come away with him, even if it’s not to France?

Tell him maybe their time together hadn’t been such a good idea because maybe Matt’s found himself a little attached?

Or maybe just apologize.

It doesn’t matter if Matsuda hadn’t been wronged. Just to apologize to someone would be…

The door opened and Matsuda’s glasses were on the tip of his nose. He held the door open widely immediately, filled with some childish joy at Matt’s arrival, and he finally looked down and saw the bag in Matt’s hand. “Matt? What is it? Come in,” he said, moving to the side.

“I can’t stay long,” Matt muttered, coming in. He hoped Matsuda understood, because Matt knew full well if the other man offered him sex, he wouldn’t be able to refuse. He’d have to appease Matsuda, one last time, if only because they truly were no longer strangers.

Matsuda’s room was surprisingly untidy for someone whose job was housekeeping but the room was more furnished: a desk in the corner covered with magazines and pictures and a television that was slightly larger than the one that had been in his room. The lamp on the desk lit up the room and the curtains were closed. Matsuda took off his glasses and sat at the edge of the bed.

“Sit,” he invited.

Matt shook his head. “I can’t… I’m leaving.”

There was a pause. Then, “Oh, okay.” He looked to the side and made a small circle with his fingertip on the bedspread.

“A-Aren’t you mad at me?”

“What for?”

“I… I can’t go with you to France,” Matt said and glanced away. He didn’t want to see Matsuda’s face if he was sad.

“Oh,” Matsuda said airily, “no one ever goes with me. I’m not mad. I like you too much, Matt.”

Matt nodded. “So, how many people have you asked…?”

“Not many.”

Matt had a feeling the number was astronomical and he finally face Matsuda with what he hoped to be a confident expression. “Hey. Why do you cry during sex? I know you said you didn’t… but always…”

“I cry for the same reason you do,” Matsuda mused, tilting his head. “Although I don’t know what your reason is.”

“Ah…” Matt shook his head slowly. “No, I don’t… I don’t cry…”

“I wouldn’t lie to you, Matt. You cry and I cry back. That way, it’s almost like you aren’t with someone else. You cry and you say things like I’m sorry.” Matsuda paused when Matt was still shaking his head a little and he got up from the bed and came over to Matt, holding the redhead’s face in his cupped hands. “But you don’t have anything to be sorry for. Votre intention était toujours bonne, chère Matt.”

Matt closed his eyes and kissed Matsuda’s fingertips at his mouth. “I’m an outlaw,” he said at length, green eyes opening. “And I guess we cry sometimes.”

-

Matt left his room key on the front desk in front of Isaac and didn’t return the goodbye. He threw his bag into the passenger’s seat and turned on the heater and drove, not stopping until he nearly ran out of gas. The gas stations along the highway were dirty and no one there looked at him with sympathy as Isaac had or knowingness as Matsuda had or even the small bit of neediness he had seen in the woman’s eyes.

The goggles he had worn to shield his eyes from the world, to take away that movie villain edge he thought he always held, were thrown into the back seat. Amongst the fast food wrappers and old beer cans they lay.

Evening turned to night on the horizon of the skylines that lead away from the heart of Los Angeles and Matt wondered if Aliyah was still in the Civic Center, waiting for him to come back for the meeting. If the woman from the alley was still across the street waiting for him to come back and split her sandwich with him and talk about the mistakes they had made that night. Wonder together if there was some possibility for something between the two of them.

Because she needed someone.

And he needed someone.

He drove and saw the coastline distantly, racing with other cars to get there first. He saw himself in the shiny reflection of a black Mercedes’ rims and his red hair was flying back across his forehead and pinked ears. His windows were cracked and he accepted the cool air to dry his tears.

When he pulled up into the driveway of 451 Almond Street, it was nearly sunrise and his fingers were frozen to the steering wheel. The palm trees that lined the street seemed untouched by the oncoming winter chill and the mailbox he remembered from high school days, with the blue flag and bent white pole, was at the mouth of the driveway. He turned off the engine and grabbed the jumble of papers out of his bag, walking with rising vigor up the newly paved way.

The house stood over him, the dawn light just visible over the roof, and kneeling at the front door, Matt slid the papers underneath the crack. He sighed and sat with his back against the door and knocked heavily, waiting for the sound of footsteps down the stairs.

End.

A/N: Thanks for reading. As with every oneshot, it will not be updated under any circumstance. Hopefully, if you made it this far, you can give me some feedback. Questions will always be answered ASAP.