Hotline

by Thomas Robert Kearnes

for Ben

One [newspaper] did set up a "Godarchy hotline," a telephone number you could call to hear recorded suggestions for action.

-- Thomas Frank

If the boy before you has lost too much weight too quickly, and you would like to cut off his supply, please press "1."

If the boy before you has done too much dope and is experiencing a dissociative episode, please press "2."

If the boy before you has shown you a story he wrote and this has led you to question your own life, PLEASE STAY ON THE LINE.

This is unusual. Most men press one or two, or hang up. Or they're so wired they forget the phone while I'm still on the other end. I hear so many things. So many sad, strange things.

First of all, put it down. Whatever he wrote. The manuscript pages. The story that plucked you from your endless, needle-nerved days of fucking and phone calls and cash-counting and smacked you against a skyline of emotion you could not escape until you read his last word. Just put it down. He wasn't supposed to do that.

You wanted someone safe and simple. You wanted someone who buys the ounce, then bends over. You wanted someone slim and smooth. You wanted someone who appears only when the phone rings and vanishes when it rings again hours later. You wanted to forget you once wanted something else.

Don't be angry. He doesn't know the rules. Either that or he obviously doesn't care. The sex was fantastic; you felt connected. You were a bit embarrassed to admit your excitement to finally have him alone. He turned off the plastic moans of the porn and slipped open the blinds, and sunlight bounded through the room. You grabbed him and the words fled each of you like children from the afternoon bus. The whole time you were inside him, his gaze never left your face. Intimacy. And now here he is, clothed before you, asking for more.

Ask him what the hell he's thinking. Tell him to go back to the country. Go back to the sticks. Take his pages and cram them where you just were. Tell him it was a great fuck and for a moment toward the end you lost yourself and you hadn't expected to and you're grateful he thinks enough of you to show you this story and he made you feel worthy and worthless in the same moment and you want him to fuck off so you can go fuck someone you'll forget before the door clicks shut behind you. Tell him you "liked" it and put it down. Hurry.

He's still there, so whatever you said or didn't say, it hasn't worked. Of course, maybe that's why you called me in the first place, why you started shoving dope up your nose or slamming it in your arm, why you hide from goddamn everything and why you need me to tell you how to hide from this boy who wants more than your dope, more than your body.

He reaches for your hand and smiles. It's not hunger or desire or greed. Those smiles you can satisfy. This boy before you wants and knows he may not receive. But he wants anyway and he does not care if you fail.

How do I know this? How do I see all this from over a phone? Because it's me, you idiot. You lovely, broken fool, it's me. I'm the voice on the other end. I never thought I'd find you and this story is the only way I can be certain you'll remember me. I'll be the boy who showed you a story and you'll be the boy who saw more than my body. You'll be the boy.

Hang up the phone. There's a boy before you. Hang up the phone and look at me.

© 2008 Night Train and respective authors/email support AT nighttrainmagazine.com