“God, I just came from that disc jockey’s presentation. What an asshole!” I whispered. At the desk across from mine, sipping her coffee, Breanne nodded. It was career day and Breanne and I had met up in home room earlier to make sure we had at least some of the same presentations to visit. We had become friends at the beginning of that year, meeting before school every day to talk about whatever caught our interest.
“You were trying to make jokes weren’t you?” I am not an overly complex person, and Breanne had me figured inside and out. I wasn’t content to sit in a group taking up space. I had to entertain.
“Well yeah. I mean, you know me.” I definitely had a tendency to run my mouth. “I shut up after like two minutes, though. He kept staring at me.” I did my best imitation of the stare the disc jockey had given me. “You know that stare guys give, where it’s like they’re saying ‘what the fuck, man?’” Breanne rolled her eyes. She did that every time I used a simile or a metaphor, as I had a tendency to make them outrageous. “He didn’t have to be a dick about it is all I’m saying.”
“Is this your definition of two minutes, or his?” Yeah, she definitely had me figured. I crossed my arms, in defense. Breanne arched an eyebrow.
“I swear to God! I watched the clock.” I pointed at the clock for emphasis. “I was talking for maybe two minutes. Tops. And the bell hadn’t even rung yet. I wasn’t using any of his time.” It was at least, technically true. I had a way of putting groups into disarray that made them hard to get back under control when I had given them up.
“That’s not what happened when the Air Force recruiter came in.”
“That guy was an asshole! He was trying to trick us into signing away years of our lives in exchange for hats. Fucking hats! It didn’t even fit!” This had bothered me greatly at the time. I felt like I had been handed a yarmulke with a brim. Everyone else had looked like Air Force cadets. I looked like someone’s giant retarded brother wearing a beanie.
Breanne held up two fingers. She did that every time she wanted to make a point. “Okay, one: nobody has hats that are going to fit your melon. He’s not going to carry around one giant hat in case he meets you. You look like George Lopez’s white brother. Second: you wouldn’t let him get a word in. The guy was like nineteen and scared to death.” She pointed at each finger in turn.
“Yeah…” I said, knowing this was true, so I finished with a “but still.” This is something that is always safe to say when you have run out of actual arguments, but wish to hold your position anyway. So I took it and held it fast.
“That’s what I thought.” Breanne took a sip from her coffee and grinned. Before I could rebut, the bell rang and the architect came in. He took his position at the podium, put some papers down, looked up at the class, appeared to jump, and started to stare at me. I turned to look at Breanne as if to say “see?”
She turned and shushed me before I could say anything. I ignored her warning.
“What the hell is wrong with everyone today?” I whispered. “Do I have a booger hanging out of my nose or something?”
“It’s probably all the gravity coming off your cabeza. Draws his eyes right in.” She muttered.
Still giving me intermittent glances, as had the disc jockey, the architect began to talk about the joy of building. I mimed snoring when he wasn’t looking for Breanne’s benefit. Then he started to talk about the financial realities of being an architect in the Harbor. I was about to raise my hand and ask him about why he lived in the Harbor given the financial realities, before Breanne beat me to the punch. Trying to protect him from me no doubt.
“I was just wondering what the starting pay is like after you’ve graduated.” I looked at her and silently mouthed “I was just wondering what the starting pay is like after you’ve graduated” in the funniest face I could imagine. She scratched the side of her head with her middle finger. I mimed a sneeze that ended with both my middle fingers extended by my sides. As we played our silent game of insult, the architect said the words that brought the entire day into focus.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw the architect looking at me. Time slowed as he breathed in… and then the words came, dispelling mystery like the clear waters of understanding. “Well, I’ll be honest, when you start out in this field you get paid in penis.” Penis. Not peanuts. Penis. Something fumbled into place in my mind. A key found a lock and began to turn, the tumblers falling like inevitable truths.
Penis penis penis.
Breanne and the class started to laugh. I sat still. Penis penis penis. My back suddenly went ramrod straight. The blood jumped from my toes into my face with such force I had to close my eyes against the burning pressure lest my eyes pop out. The events of the day linked together for me like boxcars on a train, all chugging along toward the same conclusion. The momentum slammed into me, threatening to drive me temporarily insane.
My penis had, at some point earlier in the day, fallen out of my pants. And it was laying outside of my pants at that very moment. My penis. Was outside. Of my pants.
This was not in itself entirely surprising. Either my penis is naturally curious, or there’s something funny about the way I walk. I have never been able to determine which is true, or if its a combination of both factors. In either case, on any walk longer than ten minutes my penis is guaranteed to work its way through the front of my boxers. It is a fact I have learned to live with as blind people live with lack of vision. I have an escape artist for a penis.
In private, this is a trivial matter which can be corrected in moments. On those occasions this has happened while I am in public, the procedure is a bit more complicated. I have to find something on the ground that seems like it requires immediate inspection. Sometimes I drop to one knee and lean over to the side like I’ve noticed that one side of the object requires special observation. There’s no end to the nonsense I have to spew to justify my actions. Hopefully by the time I’ve done all this, maybe after I’ve stood, pretended to lose my balance, and hopped on one leg for a moment or two, my penis will find its way back inside my boxer shorts where it will remain free from chaffing. Sometimes I just have to grin and bear it grinding against the front of my pants.
As you can imagine, this phenomenon has instilled in me a deep appreciation of a good zipper. There are many ways for a zipper to break. Sometimes the pull tab will break off before you can finish closing it. Then you have to unbutton your pants, put your fingers on either side of the slider, and pull up as hard as you can. Other times the slider manages to lose sync with both sides of the teeth, and there’s a hole left in the middle of the zipper that will gradually work its way open. Still other zippers have an almost magical quality in that they seem to have no internal friction. A slider that has been pulled up will slide down all of its own accord.
I had a pair of blue khaki pants in high school that I liked to call my “What the fuck are my fucking pants with the broken zipper still doing here? Why the fuck haven’t I thrown these away? This is an accident waiting to happen!” pants. However, on that morning of high school career day they were simply called my blue khaki pants. I had only in that moment realized something was wrong.
I had put them on, walked to school, checked into my home room and selected an itinerary with Breanne. I had made it through the veterinarian’s presentation with no problem. There had been no stares there. All he had said was that people try to stiff you if their animal dies on the operating table. He had also said that start up costs were extremely high and people never believed you had no specialty in their exotic animals. Nothing remarkable, at all. Then I had gone to see the radio disc jockey, and that’s where things had begun to go awry.
No wonder he had been staring at me! No wonder he’d been freaked out that I was sitting there without a care in the world. The whole time I had been cracking jokes, from his unique vantage point in the room, he could see my penis hanging out the front of my pants. When I stood up my fleece fell to cover it, so no one had seen when I went from room to room. And I was so used to it working its way out of my boxers that the chaffing hadn’t really drawn my attention.
If I had walked outside… if only for a second… the chill winter air would have warned. But as it was, I only had to walk downstairs to the architect’s presentation. And now… penis. Penis.
Not peanuts. Penis.
Sitting down, I pulled my fleece down my lap as far as I could. I dared not risk trying to put my penis back where it belonged, even as the class had broken up laughing. Any action on my part might draw their attention. As it stood only two people had seen my exposed organ. They would both be gone tomorrow. If I could simply make it through the presentation, I could wait for the class to empty, stand up, run to a bathroom and make my repairs but for now… I would have to sit.
The laughter died down. The architect caught my eye. My red face told him all he needed to know.
“Yes, I know my penis is hanging out of my pants.” I said with my eyes.
“Wow, and you’re just going to fucking sit there while your cock is out?” His bewildered and nervous face asked.
My bitten lip and tear filled eyes replied “Yes. Yes I am going to sit here until you and everyone else is gone, and I don’t care how psychotic it seems because you will be gone tomorrow but the people here I will have to see forever. And oh yes: MY PENIS IS HANGING OUT OF MY PANTS IN A PUBLIC PLACE!”
“I still see you as some sick fucking kid that likes to hang brain in public.” My face got hotter and hotter.
“Are you okay?” Breanne asked, laying her hand on my shoulder. I flinched away from her as if her hand was molten iron. If she saw it… I might as well kill myself because there would be no recovering from that.
“Yeah… it’s just uh… when he said that it was really funny.” I could feel my penis against the fibers of my fleece. I could feel each individual fiber of the material against my head and shaft and marveled at the bizarre set up of the human body that I could not feel it before. My penis felt huge and obvious. Sure to draw attention although it had not done so all day.
“Are you sure you’re okay? You got quiet all of the sudden.”
“Breanne, please. I beg of you, do not speak to me for the rest of this presentation.”
“Come on, BC. What’s wrong? You can tell me anything.”
My penis shriveled like a turtle trying to crawl back inside its shell. “Breanne, you do not want to know. And even if you do, I would not tell you even on my death bed.”
I sat there for another ten minutes, feeling like I had been stretched out over hot coals. Every time Breanne looked or spoke to me it was like being lashed with a whip. I wished to God that I had a prehensile penis, so that I could move it like a monkey’s tail and hide it back inside my pants. But it remained flaccid, laying atop my pants and under my fleece. Laying there for all the world to see. As helpless as an animal dying of thirst in an open desert, surrounded by buzzards.
At the end of the class the architect stood by the door, shaking hands and accepting thanks where it was given. He was there even after I left time for the class to empty. We did not exchange a word or a handshake. There was a rush of heat as I passed him, as though his knowledge of my penis was a force that carried weight and slammed against me. I walked face turned down to the bathroom, put my instrument away, zipped up my pants and walked home as quickly as I could. It had fallen back out by the time I got there.
Breanne asked me the following Monday what had happened to me. I told her I had started to feel ill. She didn’t believe, but she didn’t ask questions. Breanne had me figured out like a book.
