This Is Your Strife

Chapter Eleven

When he got home, his mother put her hand on his shoulder. "We need to talk." She led him to the sofa, and they sat there. "I know why they've been bullying you. I know you think you've kept it hidden from me, but I know."

"Because I'm a loser. A misfit nobody wants."

"I know you don't mean that."

"But that's what they think."

"That's not all that they think. Tell me why they're really bullying you."

"Because they're jealous of my intelligence? Because I obey the rules? How should I know what stupid reasons they have for hating me?" She stood and started to unzip the couch cushion, and he grabbed her hands to zip it back up.

"Are you going to tell me why you don't want me to unzip this cushion? Or do I have to do it?" He sat there, frozen. She knows. I'm totally fucked. She took his silence as a cue to finish unzipping the cushion, and his hands fell limply away. She turned the cushion over and pulled out some copies of Young Physique, a beefcake mag showcasing fit male bodies in g-strings. His jaw dropped in abject mortification. "Let me guess – you read them for the articles."

Knowing that insulting her intelligence by actually trying to sell that excuse would only make things worse, he simply looked away, anywhere but those handsome men, and said, "No, I don't."

"Why would you do this to yourself?"

"Do what?"

"Entertain these hopeless fantasies? Why would you do that when you have something real, something good, in Cheryl?"

"I do love her. I'm guess I'm just a little bit bisexual."

"You've got to get your mind off this stuff and focus on the person you can actually build a life with."

"You think I haven't tried, like I'm doing this intentionally? I don't want those thoughts running through my head; it makes me sick! But I can't help what I feel."

"No, but you can certainly stop feeding those thoughts. Do you think looking at these will help those thoughts go away? Or just intensify them?"

"I've tried so many times to stop, but I can't! I just can't!"

"How long have you been struggling with this?"

"Like, ten years."

"I want you to be happy. But honey, this isn't going to make you happy. It's only made you miserable."

He shook his head. "But that's not true. These magazines, they make me feel good, better than anything else in my ridiculous farce of a life."

"Better than Cheryl makes you feel?"

"Yes. Better than she's ever made me feel. It's utter bliss."

"So you get a few minutes of bliss fantasizing about men. But at what cost? To be miserable for the rest of your life? I want things to get better for you, not worse."

"I want to change, but I just don't know how."

"Maybe the reason you're retreating into these fantasies is that you're reticent to be intimate with Cheryl. You're worried about it because you've never touched a woman's vagina and aren't sure how to please her." He grimaced at the thought. "Maybe you should give her a call."


"So, we're going to do this," said Waylon, facing Cheryl's naked body on his bed as if looking at a minefield. "Whoop-dee-doo."

"I'm ready when you are."

"Okay." He stood there, shirtless, his pants unzipped slightly and his fingers hovering over the zipper. "Um... I guess I should unzip my pants now."

"Yeah, that sounds like a good idea," she said with a hint of irritation. Sometimes her boyfriend's awkwardness was less than endearing.

"Okay. I am unzipping my pants," he said as he did so, letting them fall to his ankles. He sat and finished removing them. "So, um... why don't you get started, and I'll be ready in a minute." He slid his underwear down while facing away from her. I'm really about to do this. She's going to make me normal, and I can put all this ugliness behind me once and for all.

"Don't you want to get me started?"

"I wouldn't really know what to do – I mean, it's my first time, and –"

"I'll show you," she said, taking his hand and placing it over her clit and moaning at the touch. Touching her like this made his stomach churn, as if he were committing a violation. Not of her, since she wanted it, but of – what? Their friendship? The trust she had in believing this was something he wanted? His own true nature? "Faster." She guided his hand lower to her entrance. He recoiled as he felt her wetness. "What's wrong?"

"Oh, uh – nothing, nothing's wrong. Just, I, uh – really want to be inside you now."

"Take me now, Waylon. I need you inside me."

He tried to arouse himself by looking at her, then lowered his hand to stimulate himself. Images of men from his sexy magazines flashed through his mind. His thoughts turned to Mr. Burns, and the way he'd fallen asleep against him, and he felt a sudden rush of arousal. "Okay, where's the condom?" She handed him a packet and he tore it open and put it on. "Here goes nothing," he said, inching his way inside her. If the manual stimulation had felt awkward, this was even more so. "Is this okay? I'm not hurting you, am I?"

"It's a little uncomfortable, but it's getting better." Her breath hitched in her throat. "Oh, yes, that's good. Right there."

"So, you like this?" She nodded. "Good, I'm glad." At least one of us does. He was starting to lose stamina, so he thought of his dreams of Mr. Burns and came shortly thereafter. "So, um, it was good for you?"

"It was... pretty good. I mean, it's our first time..."

"Right."

"You seemed really nervous. But you shouldn't be nervous. I don't expect you to be some expert lover. You care about how I feel, and that's what's most important."

"Right. I'm glad you enjoyed it." He looked around nervously. "Well, I think I'll go take a shower and hit the hay."

"I think I'll shower, too." She twirled a lock of hair. "We can shower together."

"Oh, no, I couldn't possibly. You'd be much too distracting. I'd be liable to get weak in the knees and slip and crack my head open. I'll be back soon enough, sweetheart."

He donned his robe and went inside the bathroom, locking the door immediately, leaving his glasses by the sink, discarding the condom, and dropping the robe to the ground as he turned the shower on. He let the water wash him clean and scrubbed himself repeatedly, then brought his hands to his face and began to cry. It's the most awful thing I've ever done. Whether it was the dishonesty inherent in the act or the sheer physical repugnance of it that made it so awful, he couldn't be sure.

This didn't fix me. Is this going to be my life? A life of stomach-churning sex paired with normalcy and respect, or a life of fulfilling sex paired with demonization and ostracism. It was a terrible choice to have to make, but he knew inexorably what he was going to do.


Waylon got down on his knee and opened a ring box. "Cheryl, will you marry me?"

"Of course I will!" She took the ring and slipped it over her finger, then hugged him tightly. "Oh, this is so exciting! I can't wait to tell mom and dad." She kissed him, then rested her head on his shoulder.

"I have it all planned out, the way I've always dreamed of. We'll have orchids, and doves, and Queen Anne's Lace, and –"

"And a harpist!"

"How did you know?"

"Well, you're always harping about how much you love the harp." She held her ring finger up to the light. "So, when do you want to have the ceremony?"

"About... four years from now."

"Four years?"

"After I finish college. I want to provide you with a nice, big house, and everything you could desire."

"I don't care about those things. I'm happy just to be with you."

"I just want to wait to get married until we can settle down together. Have that idyllic life we've always dreamt about." He rubbed the palm of her hand with his thumb. "Besides, it'll give us lots of time to make the ceremony just perfect."

"Why don't we get married in two years? That'll be plenty of time to plan the ceremony."

"Okay. You've got it. In two years, we'll walk down the aisle, and you'll make me the luckiest guy around by saying, 'I do.'"