Dirty Mouth

“Clear your schedule, Maxi-Boy, we’re going out.”

I guess I was supposed to be thrilled about that. I hadn’t really gone out since I moved to the tiny metropolis known as Rogersdale, Ontario six months ago. But to be completely honest, I couldn’t care less. I didn’t like to go out, meet new people, or see new things. I liked to stay by myself in my shitty one-bedroom apartment on the North side. I liked to be alone with my TV shows, my record player, my dog, and the cracked walls. That was all I needed to be moderately happy. But ever since I got that cooking job at old Marty’s diner on 8th street and made friends, I wasn’t allowed to be a comfortable loner anymore.

My name is Max Aries. No, not like the Aries in those stupid horoscopes, either. It was just Aries, and I was just Max. I was born in New York in 1982 to Helen and Rick, who at the time had been happily married (with three other kids, might I add). My parents sure liked to get busy. They got so busy, in fact, that they got tired of one another. They divorced when I was six, and I guess you could say it screwed me up pretty bad. I went from having one home with my sisters, mom and dad, to having two homes and a family that had been torn apart by the legal system. It was pretty confusing. I ended up moving in with my old man and he moved us out to Toronto so we’d be closer to his family and farther away from mom. I grew up there, but New York was still my home. I think it always will be.

Anyway, Toronto was alright. It was just a smaller New York with less hopeful eyes. I went to school, had some girlfriends and some real best buds. Well, I did have all those things until I turned 16 and things took a turn for the worse. I started smoking pot and drinking a lot. I got into a “bad scene.” But really, there’s no such thing as a bad scene. Teens are always fucking up and doing drugs, whether they want to admit it or not. It’s just the kids who choose to make it known that they’re different that get shit on. I think that’s bullshit but no one really listens to me rant about it so I don’t bother much anymore. Anyway, I ended up gaining a black Mohawk, a couple tattoos, and I got my lip and eyebrow pierced. I started to wear more metal and black stuff, too. And that was all it took for society to take its big stupid stamp and declare me different. I guess I am different, but not in the way everyone thinks.

When I turned 18 I didn’t want to live in Toronto anymore. The big city had lost its attraction for me. So I parted from its busy streets and my father, leaving them behind for the smaller 3,398 population town of Rogersdale. I like it here now. I lost my Mohawk and grew my hair out, enough so I could wake up and leave it as a spiky dark mess. I got my own place, a Jack Russell named Sid, a job, and now some annoying friends who want me to go out with them. I’m really living the life.

It’d been a long Friday night flipping greasy burgers at Marty’s for our truckers n’ whores customers. I was pretty roasted. We were closing up and I was hanging my apron up in the back room when Tad came up behind me and jabbed me in the ribs with the end of his broom. I was about to lay into him, ‘cause I hate it when he does that, but he didn’t give me a chance.

He told me we were going out, like I had no say in the matter. I narrowed my eyes at him. Typical Tad. I called him out for being a douche bag once or twice since I’d known him but it’d all been in good fun. But tonight, I was really tempted to bring my hand to the side of his blonde head and knock that stupid Boston Bruins hat onto the floor.

“I don’t think so,” I replied with a harsh laugh. I was tired. I really just wanted a cigarette, a bottle of whiskey, Sid, and some pay-per-view.

“Why not?” Tad whined. “You never come out with us.”

“Yeah, because I don’t want to,” I mumbled. “If I wanted to spend time with you lot after work, I’d be doing it, wouldn’t I?”

“C’mon, Max, we’re going out to a bar. You like drinking, you like smoking...and you like women, don’t ya?” He raised a thick eyebrow at me.

“You dipshit,” I spat. “Course I like women. I’m not you, I’ve told you that.”

Tad was a gay. He wasn’t a flaming one or nothing, he was just gay, and that was that. No one had a problem with it, and they shouldn’t. If anyone did have a problem with it, Tad would lay them flat on their back in a second. I’d get in there too if he was ever in serious trouble, ‘cause even though he could really piss me off, he was still my friend.

He chuckled at me, coughing a bit. He really needed to lay off the smokes. “Well then you’re coming, no argument.”

I rolled my eyes, about to blurt out more excuses, when Mandy walked between us. She used her long, tan index finger to brush across my stained wife-beater as she walked. She was something; all legs, tan skin, dark brown hair, hazel eyes, and perfect assets. I won’t lie, I’d caught myself checking her out once or twice or maybe a dozen times. The only thing about Mandy was she was a bit of a slut, and she’d openly admit it to you if you asked. I didn’t mind a girl that got around as long as she still managed to be clean. I didn’t know for sure but I think Mandy was clean. She sure was flirtatious.

“Oh, stop being so stubborn, Maxi,” she said in her breathy voice. “Come out and have some fun for once. What else could you possibly be doing?”

I looked down at my scuffed up converse. I didn’t do shit-all. I sat at home all day getting high and watching TV. Occasionally I try to teach Sid new tricks but he basically knows them all. He even uses the toilet, ‘cause I got tired of running down four flights of stairs so he could pee. Other than that I just played my music and played with myself.

“Nothin’,” I muttered. I couldn’t argue with Mandy very well.

“Exactly! So get your sweet ass dressed up and Tad and I will pick you up at 10.” Mandy winked at me before slipping into the women’s room to change.

“Yeah, Max! Get that sweet ass dressed up!” Tad barked a laugh.

I chuckled along with him and dug my smokes, lighter and keys out of my pocket. “Whatever, gay boy.”

“Don’t knock it till you try it,” Tad winked.

“I think I’m good.”

We started walking out the back to our respected cars. This place was a dump. Picture a typical run-down old diner on the side of the road and you’ll have Marty’s. There was a reason the only traffic we got in there was truckers and prostitutes. It wasn’t a family place, that’s for sure. If I didn’t work there, I sure as hell wouldn’t eat there.

“Hey, you might find the girl of your dreams tonight, Maxi,” Tad was saying. He was lighting up a cigarette and pretty soon a cloud of blue-grey smoke had engulfed his head.

I laughed, lighting up my own dart. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.”

I wasn’t looking for a girl to get tied up to. I’d screw around, yeah, but I didn’t want to get serious. Getting serious meant emotions and emotions only led to pain and I wasn’t prepared for that. I’m not an emotional guy. I kept my thoughts to myself. I didn’t cry anymore, and I certainly wasn’t about to cry over some dumb female.

“Aw, a handsome mess like you? The girls will be all over that!” Tad coughed.

I shook my head, opening the creaky door to my ’89 Chevrolet Cavalier. She was rusted, but she was my baby.

“I don’t think there’s a lot of my kind of girls in Rogersdale, Tad,” I said. I’m not sure what my kinds of girls were, to be totally honest. I couldn’t be picky where I lived but I ended up being the pickiest bastard to ever live anyway.

“How would you know? You never get out to see.”

“Shut your trap. See you at 10.” I got in my car and drove away to the sound of Tad hacking and laughing. What a kid.

It’s not a long drive from work to my apartment. It might take me fifteen minutes at the most, thirty if traffic sucks. There were a lot of idiot drivers in Rogersdale, but that’s no different from any other place. Today I managed to get home at 8:53. I pulled into my parking spot and shuffled towards my apartment building. They weren’t the prettiest places on the outside, but the rooms weren’t too shabby. They had a bit of issues, but every apartment did. One can’t expect a fucking masterpiece for $500 a month. I climbed the four sets of stairs to my room. As soon as I put the key in the lock I could hear Sid bark once and then he was scratching at the door. He did this every time I came home.

I opened the door and the little guy was jumping up on my scrawny legs. I offered him my free hand to lick while I kicked off my shoes. His tail was wagging so hard his entire backend was moving with it. Out of all the shitty things and people in the world, Sid was my slice of paradise. I loved the little guy. I’d gotten him five years ago when I found a pregnant Jack Russell behind my house. I’d brought her inside and she’d had her pups, right there on the couch. We gave all of them away but I’d kept Sid because he was the runt. I liked runts the best. They were like the underdog; their brothers and sisters always stepped all over them but they kept going. Plus, he and I connected right away. He’d been my best and in some cases only friend for five years. I’d be screwed without Sid.

“Alright, alright, calm down,” I said, pushing him off my leg so I could walk. He trotted along beside me as I went to the kitchen and grabbed a beer from the fridge. “I suppose you want something too, don’t you?”

He barked as a response, his butt still shaking, and I grabbed him a treat from his container on the cupboard. I tossed it at him and he caught in his mouth, obediently taking it over to his mat by my recliner in the living room.

I cracked open my beer and took a sip on my way to the bathroom. I hadn’t forgotten I was going out tonight, although I wish I had. I was kind of awkward in social situations. Not in the quiet, anxiety-ridden sense, but in the overly-obnoxious, always-says-the-wrong-thing sense. My problem was that I never knew what to say or do around people I didn’t know, so I always ended up doing stupid shit. If they liked me for it they liked me and if not, well, I wasn’t losing any sleep over it.

I set my beer down by the sink and turned on the light. It flickered on with its loud humming noise and I caught my stare in the mirror. I was pale, almost sickly pale, but I didn’t care. My mom always worried about it whenever she saw me. She’d say, “You look like you have cancer, Maxwell!” Fuck that.

I shaved off the stubble that’d begun to pepper the bottom half of my face, fixed the bar in my eyebrow and switched the stud in the middle of my bottom lip to a hoop. Oh, I was getting real fancy tonight. I tried brushing my hair, but it just stuck out all over the place no matter what I did to it, so I left it. It was an unruly black mess but I was a fan of a little chaos in the appearance.

I changed out of my greasy wife-beater into a clean zombie t-shirt and threw my favourite worn out leather jacket overtop of it. Normally I wouldn’t have cared how I looked, but I couldn’t get Tad’s words out of my head. What if I did meet a girl tonight? I wasn’t counting on it, but there was always that what-if that lingered in my hopes. Damn that what-if, because I knew it’d keep me up tonight whether I met someone or not.

I’d had plenty of girlfriends before. None of them had lasted longer than six months, but they still counted for something. I remember my first girlfriend, Samantha Bryant. She was a bomb waiting to explode, but of course I thought I loved her. I was only 14 for god’s sake. She was really good-looking, Sammy. She had long, pin-straight hair the colour of milk-chocolate and eyes to match, a lean body and a sharp tongue. She definitely wasn’t the kind of girl you’d expect to see with someone like me. We lasted for five and a half months before things got toxic. She hit me around a lot if I messed up, especially if I embarrassed her in public. Like I said, I tend to get obnoxious, and Sammy didn’t like that one bit. If I ever said or did something even the slightest bit out of line, she’d wait until we were in private and she’d slap me hard. She’d scream at me and I eventually stopped trying to console her. I quit apologizing. It just wasn’t meant to be.

Every relationship after that, especially when I got a bit older, turned out bad. Some even started bad, but that didn’t stop me. In every relationship of mine there was a lot of yelling, love-making, and lately, substance abuse. It’s like I have to be drunk or stoned to enjoy being in anyone’s presence but Sid’s. I’d become a Class A hermit. I didn’t like people.

See, people are all hypocrites. They all say one thing and mean another. Everyone talks behind the backs of their so-called friends. No one can be trusted on this stinking planet. You can’t tell anyone anything, because one way or another they’re going to spill your secrets to anyone who’ll listen. Some people don’t even have to be drunk to spread intimate details. A lot of folks just like to light the match and watch everything around them burn while they sit on their manicured lawn with a cold brewski in hand. It’s sick. That’s why I like to keep to myself. I can trust myself. I agree with myself. I get along great on my own. I got Tad and Mandy, and they’re alright. I’ve had good times at work with them. But I never tell them too much. Mandy, well, she’d definitely gossip. I’ve heard her on her break and she’s got quite the mouth on her. As for Tad, there’s no telling who he’d tell, but I didn’t want to find out. Sometimes I tell Sid things, and that’s fine. He’s a dog.

A lot of folks would tell me it’s a bad thing that I keep to myself so much, but I really don’t think so. I don’t mind going to bed alone and waking up by myself. I get more comfort in that than I would if someone else was hogging my mattress, I think. I manage, anyway. That’s all I’ve ever done, from the time I was six up until now. I’ve just managed, and I’m still alive to contest that that’s okay. Sometimes all you can focus on is waking up and surviving another day.

I flicked through channels one-by-one on TV. Cable was so monotonous and boring. Half the time the only channels worth watching were the news or cartoons. Needless to say I usually chose the cartoons. I didn’t mind them. Sometimes they were pretty mindless, but when you’re inebriated that’s just what you crave. Mindless television, mindless actions, mindless self-indulgence. I looked over at my box of Kleenex and bottle of Jergens on the coffee table. I smirked and just took another sip of beer. Masturbation passed the time but I wasn’t feeling it tonight. Maybe something’s wrong with me, I don’t know. I was feeling a little feverish.

Sometime between then and an episode of Sailor Moon I guess I fell asleep. My wake-up call was the phone ringing in the tiny kitchen. Groaning and rubbing my eyes I got up to answer it.

“What?” I snapped groggily.

“You fuck, we’re outside!” It was Tad. He sounded rather impatient with me.

“Oh, cool.” I yawned.

“Get off your dirty couch and let’s go!” The line clicked dead before I could respond.

“I don’t even have a couch,” I mumbled to myself, hanging the phone back up.

Sid was sitting at my feet and looking up at me expectantly. He always seemed to know when I was going somewhere. I leaned down to pet his perky ears.

“I’m going out for the night,” I said softly. He whined at me. “I know! Tad and Mandy…you know how they are. I’ll be home later. If I come home and find a mess in this apartment you’re gonna get it, boy.”

I slipped into my black Chuck Taylors, grabbed my house key and left. I took my sweet time heading down the steps. I’m kind of an asshole. I could say being alone all the time hardened me up, but really it’s just who I am. I’d always been a bit of a prick, just ask my sisters.

Finally I hopped into Tad’s dirty Jeep, squished up against Mandy (which I totally didn’t mind). Tad tossed me a dirty glare and Mandy just giggled.

“What?” I asked. “I had to piss.”

“I bet you did,” Tad snarled. He peeled out of the parking lot and took a right-hand turn down the street.

I stretched out, slipping my arm behind Mandy. “What’s this bar called, anyway?”

“The Horseshoe,” Mandy answered lustily. She was counting her cigarettes.

“That sounds weak,” I scoffed. “Tad, is this a gay bar?”

“If it was you wouldn’t fair too well,” he mumbled.

“Oh, quit being so sour! Lighten up!” I reached across and tapped the back of his head.

“If you boys start fighting I swear to god,” Mandy said, holding up her hands. “I don’t want to be in the middle of it.”

I smirked and put my lips closer to her ear. “Sure thing, Manny. You’d probably like it too much, wouldn’t ya?”

She only smiled.

We pulled up to this bar when it was starting to get really dark outside. It was small; your typical seedy bar. It even had the flashy neon signs out front. I could hear muffled guitar riffs and voices coming from inside when I hopped out of the Jeep. I haven’t been to a bar in a long time. I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d get into a fight.

“You ready, Maxi-Boy?” Mandy asked.

“Ready for what, drinking? I’m always ready for that.”

She rolled her eyes. “You really need to get laid. You’re becoming a real dick.”

I chased after her towards the doors. “Wanna help me out?”

“Not tonight, baby,” She tapped my cheek and walked inside.

As all bars typically are, it was almost as dark inside as it was outside. Only the dimmest of lights had been installed in the place. I could barely make out faces as we walked inside. I followed Tad to a table in the back. Mandy disappeared the instant we got inside and I can only assume she was in some guy’s lap. It made me a little mad, since she could’ve been sitting in mine. But whatever, I wasn’t in the mood to let it bug me.

A girl came over to our table and we both ordered beers. They came pretty quick and I took a long haul of the cold, bubbly liquid.

“What do you think, Maxi?” Tad asked, nudging me with his elbow.

“I think we’re definitely at a bar,” I smirked.

“It’s definitely different than the Wolf’s Den, huh?” Tad shook his head. “I can’t believe you go there to hang out, out of all the places.”

“I like it there.”

The Wolf’s Den was a special little spot in Rogersdale, located just under the bridge on the West side of town. It was coated in graffiti and crawling with drug addicts. I’d found it when I went for a walk in my second month living here. Although it doesn’t sound very appealing, it has its little quirks. Sometimes people light things on fire there and people just sit around on ratty furniture, drinking and getting really high on any drug you can think of. It was more my scene than this stinking bar was, anyway. Plus they played great punk music there on a shitty little ghetto blaster sometimes. The Horseshoe was playing some knock-off shit. Music is typically what sold me on a place, and right now The Horseshoe was losing.

“That place will ruin you, man,” Tad said, swallowing a sip of beer. “I’ve known great guys who found the Wolf’s Den. They were never the same.”

“Nah, you just gotta be smart, that’s all,” I said. “If you’re not smart you’ll get your ass beat, just like any other place.”

“Whatever you say.”

After that I got pretty bored. No one was dancing, not that I blame them. The music fucking sucked. Everyone was just keeping to themselves in their precious little private booths, drinking their girly drinks as their eyes darted out every now and again, judging their surroundings. I’d gotten pretty good at figuring people out from a distance with all the time I spent by myself. I learned a lot of body language. It’s a pretty helpful skill, I guess. It’s not like I use it for much, though.

I could feel that familiar obnoxious bubble threatening to pop inside me. It was really bad when I was bored. I needed to create something I could work with, whether it was chaos or humour. I just needed to do something.

“This fucking sucks, man,” I sighed. “The least they could do is change the music…”

I got out of my seat and put one dirty shoe on top of the table. I used my chair to hoist myself up.

“What are you doing?” Tad sighed. At least he was used to me by now.

I got up on the table and pointed to the bartender. “Hey, you!” I shouted. I could feel eyes on me from all over the room. You wouldn’t think an anti-social prick like me would enjoy that, but I did.

“Uh, yeah?” The bartender said.

“Doesn’t this place ever get a little bit lively?” I asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Well you could change the music, give us something to dance to,” I waved my arm in the air, sloshing a bit of my beer out.

“Oh yeah? Like what?”

“Like some real punk rock, not this weak shit you’re playing!” I grinned at him.

“But what is real punk rock?” He laughed at me.

“Let me back there and I can show you.”

“Nah. Get off the table, my man.” He shook his head and went back to cleaning glasses.

“Fucking coward,” I spit.

So that was a bust. Honestly I’m not even sure what I wanted to gain out of it. I just needed an excuse to do something. Tad grabbed at my ankle, trying to make me fall over, and I kicked at him.

“You shit,” I laughed, doing a little dance on the tabletop to avoid his fingers.

“I’m a shit?” Tad chuckled. “Look at you!”

“Yeah, you’re a shithead!” I yelled at him with a crooked grin. I don’t care who heard me. It was all a part of my obnoxious alter-ego’s plan.

“You’re the shithead!” The voice wasn’t Tad’s. It was female and it came from across the bar.

My head shot up and I looked around to see where it’d come from. I thought it might be Mandy, but she was nowhere to be found. My eyes locked on a faraway face that was looking straight back at me. I saw wavy blonde hair, thick eyeliner, a red lipstick smirk, and one long extended middle finger aimed in my general direction.

And that was it. That was all it took for me to shut the hell up and get off the table. Because now I was on a mission, and it started right there at the table with Tad and ended across the bar with that girl. I should’ve known it was a bad idea from the very start, I really should’ve. No blue-eyed beauty had ever slipped me anything other than an insult and poison. But for some dumb reason I thought I had a chance with this one. Did I ever mention I’m kind of an idiot? I really am.