monster.co.ck

Gargoyle at Bayeux Cathedral, Cross Duck, used under CC2.0 BY-NC-ND 

As soon as I enter the supermarket the loose woman energy hits and every second man has his antennae up. It radiates off me like heat off an engine. Somehow my jacket clings erotically, somehow my ankles look flirtatious, somehow every movement I make is a choreographed performance of knowing that I’m being watched and pretending not to care. Public space is a sticky, fuck-y web of snatched glances and animalic aura. I’m just here to buy avocados. I guess it’s nice to know that if I really had to I could pick up at the supermarket, like if there was a massive solar flare and the internet stopped working and we were in extreme survival mode. I guess we’d have bigger problems then, but I’m pretty sure I would still want to fuck. I’m hypersensitive to microexpressions and infinitesimal variations in posture right now. I’m like the Clever Hans of being horny. He wants it. He wants it. He’d risk everything for it. He might want it, or might think that I look insane. Fair. I feel rangy and sweaty, my eyes are hollowed out underneath and my hair’s on day three of dry shampoo. I’ve slept fitfully all week, waking from odd dreams parched and roasting under the duvet. Tall guy ahead, maybe hot, turn around so I can see your face. Not really hot. I concentrate on the shelves. This honey is gently creamed. “Gently creamed”? Zero seconds since last horny. What am I here for? I self check-out with my artificial sweetener, oat milk and courgettes. 

Being horny is like feeling sick and coming is like throwing up. I know I’m being disgusting, but at least I’m honest with myself. What if I was in denial and channeled all the energy into being a massive bitch at work like Gayle? I’m actually really emotionally brave and my therapist says I have a high degree of self-knowledge. I know exactly what’s wrong with me. It’s an illness. It’s a state of emergency. My infrastructure is crumbling. Yusuf left town two weeks ago, RIP. Another great ride lost to Melbourne. I had to block Cole because he was treating me like shit and it was the only way to stop myself from running to go see him anyway. Spencer is still texting me, but he’s cancelled on me so many times lately that I’ve given up on him. You think you’re in dick city and then it all comes tumbling down. The last time I saw Yusuf I asked him to spit in my mouth. He’s one of the best-looking people I’ve ever seen in real life. His spit tasted clean. Zero seconds since last horny. Before he even left, after I knew I’d seen him for the last time, my body started grieving. It was like my heart dropped into my pelvis. It occurred to me for the first time how big his dick was. It makes me feel all the worse missing him, like maybe nothing else will ever hit like that again. After Yusuf I can’t abide the thought of a weak, tedious survival fuck where I have to coax some nervous young man into driving it hard enough for me to feel something. I’m spiraling. 

Some may wonder why I don’t avail myself of the many fine citizens who make love on camera so the rest of us can watch. Would you also suggest that a starving person suck on a pebble? Would you throw a drowning person some bubble wrap? That would be completely missing the point. My horniness isn't genital, it's existential. I need to collide with someone else who can match my energy, nothing else can put a dent in it. If anything I should be at the gym tiring out my body enough to relax afterwards. I’ll start tomorrow, it’s too late tonight. And so I find myself, unable to sleep, swiping through hundreds of guys who all look the same. I may have already met everyone fuckable on this app. If I need to, which one of my standards should I lower first? Inside me there are two wolves. Both of them are horny, but one has slightly more self-respect than the other. That one gets its ass kicked and runs away yelping. I start googling.

Grindr for straight people
Women allowed on grindr? 
Tinder for sex 
How to tell if guy is hung
Dating site for hung guys 

This is the scammiest shit I’ve ever seen in my life. I sign up. 

***

I’m at work and I should be like negative horny here, but the thrumming of my laptop beneath my fingertips is shooting right through me. I’m a little raw from last night. The site has hardly anyone in the same hemisphere as me, but a bunch of guys messaged me anyway.  I was up until 4am sexting a middle-aged Italian-American man. And a 20-something builder in the UK. And a German guy. None of them are good-looking, but it doesn’t matter. It’s all about the pipe. I’m dying to check my messages right now but I can’t risk it on company time. I’m not feeling too bad despite the late night, a buoyant and optimistic energy animates me. I have to give a presentation to some clients and I hit all the right beats, making witty little asides while I stare right through them like a Sibyl gazing into fuckworld. 

***

I get home from work and promise myself that I’m just gonna check my messages quickly, then go to the gym. I spend a solid six hours on the couch sexting. I’m annoyed with myself but on the bright side, once I come up from the underworld I’m exhausted enough to fall asleep at a reasonable time. I don’t dream of anything. 

***

I don’t make it to the gym until Saturday. I stay there for a long time to try to compensate for such an unproductive week. I check my messages between sets. Locked into my phone, my sexual energy is less unwieldy. I can move through the world acting like a normal person. I’m ashamed that I’m kind of addicted to sexting, but it’s happened before and I know it will pass eventually. I get a message highlighted in green. It’s from the site admin. 

TRY PREMIUM 30 DAYS FREE! YOU ARE IN THE TOP 1% OF PROFILES VISITED! CLICK HERE TO REDEEM THIS OFFER

Hell yeah, now I can message people first. I don’t even have to enter my credit card info to sign up. A new tab appears that says “NEARBY”. I tap it, grant location permission, and a map of my city appears. I’m surprised to see a red dot on the outskirts of the map. I tap it, but it just says “PROFILE UNAVAILABLE”. I wonder if he can see me, whoever he is. I know I should be more cautious about stuff like that, but it’s not like I’m showing my face on my profile. My philosophy is that if I live my life afraid that something bad is going to happen to me, then I’m already letting something bad happen to me. I do what I want and so far the worst consequences have been having a boring date or bad sex. I message a few guys who are on free accounts, hoping they’ll reply with something hot. I wrap up my workout, go home and make a quiche. I’m cleaning the kitchen when I notice cold air coming into the room. I don’t remember opening that window today. I wonder if the latch is broken, but it seems fine as I close it. I get changed into my pyjamas and settle in for another evening of sexting. I check the NEARBY map, but the only red dot is me. 

***

I’m livid. I wake and check my messages only to find that everything’s been erased. Fucking bullshit scammy site! My connections are gone and my recently viewed isn’t loading. I hope this is just a temporary glitch. I cycle through my other apps then check again. This time there’s one new message. It just says “THE DOCTOR IS IN”. What the fuck? It’s not even showing me who sent it. I check the nearby map to see if that’s broken too, but it’s still showing the map with my dot in the middle. I tap it and it says “PROFILE UNAVAILABLE”. My stomach drops. Maybe I’ve been banned? I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong, but it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve run afoul of some rule. I close the site and take a shower. It’s 9am on a Sunday and I’m already on edge. I wasn’t planning on sexting right now, but I need to know that it’s there if I want it. I’m invested in seeing all of my favourite dicks again and I need the message history so I can go over the hottest parts again and again. I make the water really hot and zone out as it hits the back of my neck. Maybe this should be my moment of clarity. Maybe it’s time for me to cut this shit out. I’ll delete my account as soon as I get out of the shower. I’ll quit dating apps altogether and work out every day and get insanely hot and get into a real relationship. I’m thinking about where my future boyfriend’s family’s holiday home will be when I go back into my bedroom.

Someone has left a dildo on my bed. 

I silently back-track into the ensuite and lock the door. Shit, my phone is still on the nightstand. Why didn’t I grab it? The bathroom window is too small to shimmy out of and it’s a 3-storey drop underneath anyway. Ok, think. Somebody was or is in my apartment. I didn’t lock the door when I was showering, so if they really wanted to hurt me they could have just done it then. I lie on the tiles and look under the bathroom door, there’s just enough of a gap for me to see if there’s someone standing outside or hiding under the bed. Nothing. The apartment is small and there’s not really anywhere else to hide. If I go to grab my phone I’ll pretty much have a clear line of sight to the rest of the interior anyway. And it will have a clear line of sight to me. I plug in my curling iron and set it to the highest temperature. Maybe this is some sicko harassment by a property manager or former tenant. There are cameras at the building entrance, they’ll get caught for sure. I’ll have to note the time and take photographs of everything when I get out. I check under the door again, grab the curling iron, unlock the door and open it as quietly as I can. Everything is still. I consider shouting that I’m armed, but I don’t want to give up the element of surprise. I hate that I’m so afraid and I try to be angry instead. I picture searing his flesh if I catch him. I need to do it now before the iron cools down. I creep towards the bedroom doorway wielding the iron. There’s no-one there. My kitchen and living area are exactly as I left them last night. I check the front door, I can’t see anything through the peephole either. I put the chain on. I’m kicking myself for not getting into the habit, I’ll do it every time I come in from now on. But what if someone comes in when I’m out? One step at a time, first I’ll photograph the crime scene. I retrieve my phone and I’m about to take a photo of the dildo when it moves. The shaft bunches up like a caterpillar and it pushes itself to standing. It wobbles a little balancing on the balls. I hit it with the curling iron as hard as I can. 

***

The dick is trapped in a tupperware container. It’s cramped, but it was curled in on itself when I returned from the kitchen and the box fit neatly over top. I slid the lid underneath like I was catching a spider. Now that I’m not panicking it’s clearly not a dildo. It has the matte, soft look of flesh and the drape of the nutsack is something that manufacturers would never bother to replicate. The foreskin is functional and dynamic. It’s still alive. I’ve watched it move several times, testing the lid. I feel like I’m going insane so I’ve been trying to catch it on video, but it goes limp every time I hit record. I don’t know what to do. I’ve thought about putting it in the freezer, but I’ve never killed anything that big before. I already feel bad for smacking it with a hot iron. There’s a red mark on one side, but I think it had cooled down enough by then to not burn too badly. The dick seems to settle, bent at an angle, resigned to its captivity. Maybe it will suffocate. I retrieve a bigger storage container from under my bed and dump out the summer clothes inside. I line it with a pillow and put the smaller container on top, unclipping the sides then quickly putting on the big lid. The dick tentatively frees itself from the little container and stretches out on the pillow. I can’t help but notice the perfect taper of the shaft. “What are you doing here?” I ask. It bends to point its head towards me. 

***

I’m watching Emma (2020) with my feet up and drinking a glass of wine. Doc is curled around the back of my neck, giving me the best massage of my life. He’s completely prehensile and strong enough to knead my muscles into putty. His balls drape across my shoulder as he snakes around the other side for a kiss. Zero seconds since last horny.