I am back with yet another very silly and sarcastic concept.
This has been sitting on my computer for quite a while, and the sole reason for posting it is that I can not make any progress with some of the more serious projects I am working on.
Ever feel frustrated with the sickenly sweet and invariably good sex the protagonists of our stories have (as in contrast to your own love life)?
Do you experience a feeling of aggression and a strong urge to roll your eyes when Sarah experiences her umpteenth orgasm and you privately think to yourself that she should be lucky to have even one?
Well, in this case this might just be the story for you. A story where everyone brags and nothing works. Enjoy!
(Don't hold me responsible for the silliness, and embarassing stories of romantic encounters gone completely wrong of your own experience are highly appreciated as inspiration).
Note that the story will have to be moved to the category M later on...
Sarah Williams pushed her way through the throng of people crowding the little shelter at the bus stop and surveyed the unfamiliar street where she had gotten off the bus.
After a moment of squinting through the unpleasant drizzle, she spotted the building she was looking for.
It was a grey, blocky and distinctly dull concrete affair with a dingy little entrance. A chipped metal sign next to the door announced that the dating agency "Matchmakers" could be found within on the second floor.
After contemplating the cheesy loopy writing on it for a moment, she squared her shoulders and opened the smeared and stained glass door.
'Well, here we are', she thought to herself upon entering the dimly lit nondescript room on the second floor. The décor was slightly outdated, consisting of cheap wood-imitate tables arranged in the middle of the room and garishly orange plastic chairs grouped around them. The carpet was a revolting mushy-pee green colour and the whole room smelt musty and stale.
Lovely.
Some of the other 'guests' had already arrived and were currently standing unobtrusively against the walls, the cheerful whistle of one of the guys being the only sound that broke the otherwise strained silence.
Sarah confidently strode up to them and found her own place against the wall, looking for all the world as if she belonged here and knew exactly what she was doing.
She let her hair fall into her face and surreptitiously eyed the other attendees of tonight's speed-dating party.
If the ambience had already put a damper on her enthusiasm for this little adventure, it was nothing compared to some of the available candidates her trained eyes quickly assessed and categorized.
Seriously, a good half of them were so repulsive that it was downright scary.
Ample bellies in too tight t-shirts lined up next to impossible hairstyles, and she suspected she could smell one guy's sweaty armpits from across the room.
It had been a stupid idea from the beginning and the only reason she did not walk straight back out again was that she had promised her friend to give it a try.
She remembered how her best friend Myra had wheedled her into displaying her wares on this sad little meat market.
"Oh come on Sarah! It's fun, nothing too serious and all totally laid-back and casual, just the thing you need now. And you know, if you don't like the one guy, it's over in five minutes and zoop – the next one comes. It's great really, you should try it!"
Sarah snorted.
Yeah right, laid-back and casual, just the very things she wasn't and that was exactly why Myra had suggested this in the first place.
Why was everyone insisting that she was too tense, too orderly and too set in her ways? In her opinion she was doing just fine, thank you very much.
And since when was it a bad thing to have a well-organized mind and a spotlessly clean flat?
No need to accuse her of obsessive-compulsive disorder because of that.
True, she had had a spot of trouble in the romance department lately and, if truth be told, some guys even went as far as to call her repressed, but then again it was not her fault if their performance in bed was about as exciting as a cultured bridge tournament for the over sixty years old.
But Myra had been adamant. "Just relax Sarah and go with the flow. You will see it will do you good. Flirt, have a few dates and maybe a good…"
Sarah had rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I get the gist, no need to get overly detailed. I will try but don't expect it to be a big success!"
And so here she was, determined to keep her promise and show everyone that Sarah Williams could be very spontaneous and relaxed indeed, if she wanted to.
Just as she was contemplating possible ways to get out of the ordeal without breaking her promise, the door opened again.
The first thing she saw were a pair of bad-ass motorcycle boots that encased slim but toned legs, shown-off to their best advantage in a pair of very tight leather pants.
Well hello! Maybe the evening turned out to be not a complete waste of time after all. She let her gaze travel further up and finally arrested her eyes on his face.
Oh fuck.
Jareth was just about to kick-start his motorcycle for the third time when a lorry rushed past, spraying him with the contents of the deep puddle that had formed in the pothole- riddled street.
He cursed. Why in the name of the gods did he have to choose a motorbike with a kick-start mechanism?!
Oh right. It had seemed a good idea at the time, much more manly and impressive. Just turning the key in the ignition was for pansies, everyone could do that after all.
The motorcycle was his newest fad and he greatly enjoyed the exhilarating speed combined with the vicious, growling noises from the engine.
He was getting pretty good at riding it too – he had fallen over only twice today.
Luckily both times had happened in little frequented side streets, and the second time he suspected he might just have managed to make it look like a completely deliberate stunt rather than the clumsy and inept fumbling of a total beginner.
The downsides of the motorcycle were of course that one was continuously exposed to the elements and the terrible helmet hair marring his usually pristine looks. But no worries, nothing a little magic couldn't fix.
The kick-start on the other hand was starting to seriously piss him off. Had he been back in his own realm, he would have bogged it long ago.
After the seventh trial the blasted thing could finally bring itself to roar to life and Jareth lost no time to put it into gear and putter further down the street.
When he reached his goal, he parked the bike ostentatiously for everyone to see right in front of the door of the depressing concrete eyesore he was headed for.
He was, as usual, fashionably late and he fully intended to make a grand entrance, as it befitted the king of the goblins.
Speed-dating was the second hobbyhorse Jareth had recently acquired and he had quickly grown very fond of the curious little mortal invention.
It certainly had greatly improved his general mood and was far more effective against the occasional bouts of depression he was so prone to lately than the goblin-made tonics his house physician had insisted on shoving down his throat.
The truth was that he had not been quite himself for a while now. He felt washed-out, grey and nothing seemed to be as exciting as it once was.
The ever-same antics of his goblins annoyed him more than they amused him these days and his everyday routine bored the pants off him.
Sometimes it seemed that everything had been said and done just too many times and he was doomed to experience an endless loop of repeating the repetition.
His temper had grown even more unpredictable and explosive of late and the goblins had quickly learned to scurry out of his way when he strode down the corridors like Darth Vader with a serious case of diarrhea.
But not even bogging was half the fun it used to be, and on many days Jareth could simply not see the point of his whole existence anymore.
Worse yet, his general dysphoria had even begun to permeate his love life.
It seemed that nothing wanted to work anymore with his bodily functions - either every form of cooperation was denied to him in the first place, or then he was too early or could not finish at all. It was beyond frustrating.
Not that he was lacking variety in that department – quite the contrary- but the perpetual string of capricious and demanding fae women was starting to wear him out.
He had grown heartily tired of them all and feared that he might be losing his edge.
Finally, he had voiced some of his concerns and problems to a good and trustworthy friend of his – and had gotten an answer that was as unpleasant as it was surprising.
"Honestly Jareth, I think you are merely experiencing an attack of mid-life crisis. Nothing to worry about, just go out and take your mind off things. Try something new for a change and you will see things we will back to normal in a jiffy."
Mid-life crisis? Him?
Ridiculous! Something like mid-life crisis had no business existing in a being that was supposedly immortal, it did not make any sense.
But what to do then?
As the king of the goblins he could not very well walk into the office of the next best shrink and tell the poor person about his trouble with the goblins and the insatiable appetites of the garden-variety fae woman.
He had instead heeded his friend's advice and taken an extended leave Aboveground.
The first thing he had done there was buying the massive, chrome-laden monster machine that was currently attracting curious stares from the passers-by on the sidewalk.
His hunting grounds had of course also been relocated to the Aboveground together with his extensive wardrobe and the rest of his belongings.
Dating mortal women would be his chosen distraction and he had no doubt that he would excel in the new sport.
To his chagrin though, he came to realize rather quickly that sitting on his motorbike and flashing jaunty smiles in the direction of passing women was apparently not enough anymore to impress said females.
More often than not he had been simply ignored and a few times he had earned himself annoyed glares, eye-rolling and the occasional muttered 'show-off'.
He had therefore abandoned this strategy and searched instead for another easy way to get in contact with mortal women when he found a little newspaper add that immediately caught his interest.
Speed-dating – it sounded like the perfect solution to his problems.
Uncomplicated, anonymous and, most importantly, quick.
However, the first speed-dating event he attended had taught him that the picture was less rosy than it had appeared from afar.
It transpired that only the very bilgy dregs of the dating pool would be hopeless enough to try and acquire a partner via this market.
To Jareth this mattered very little – on the contrary, the more desperate and guileless the candidates, the easier his game.
It had been such a boost to his self-esteem.
As soon as he entered the location, the assembled wallflowers would swoon at his very sight by the dozens and fall for him hook, line and sinker.
It was not surprising therefore that Jareth entered the seedy room on the second floor with a distinct swagger.
He overlooked the new terrain regally, satisfied that the present company was yet again not fit to hold a candle to him, when his roaming eyes fell on a woman standing closest to the door.
His mouth fell open.
Well, let him be damned if this wasn't little Sarah Williams.
