CHAPTER ONE
THE SCENE
I wanted more. Much more.
If every story has a beginning, then the beginning of this story has got to be The Scene and it all started at a nightclub called CPA.
“Damn,” I muttered. “How long does it take to get a fucking drink here?”
“Yo, fuck these assholes,” Blake said in his thick
“Here,” I said, handing him a twenty. “Hold this shit up high.”
My spiky-haired roommate held up the green bill like a sign. He might as well have been waving a white flag of surrender. We weren’t getting served here.
“Fuck this,” I said. “Let’s try the bar out by the cages.”
“Hell yeah,” Blake replied. “I want to see those girls in skirts showing their panties again.”
We left the crowded square bar and headed towards the room with cages.
Blake and I entered the cage room and saw another packed bar. CPA was definitely bumping tonight.
“Damn,” Blake cursed. “This place blows the fuck up on Wednesday nights.”
“At least we got some talent to look at.”
“Hell yeah,” he replied and stared at the girls dancing in the cages. “Look at those blondes diking-out. I love this place.”
“Yeah, man,” I said, “me too.”
But my own eyes were fixated on a group of young women at the corner of the bar. They were all hot upperclassman. Two blondes, a brunette, and a
Blake followed my lustful stare. “Yo, that’s the hottest girl in here,” he said.
“Definitely,” I agreed. “She knows it too. Look at the way she’s posted up at the bar, like this whole club is revolving around her.”
“It is, yo. It is.”
We orbited around the pack of beautiful girls and attempted to gain access to the crowded bar. There were no openings, so Blake and I stood behind a pair of metrosexuals and patiently waited for them to be served and to be gone.
“So Allison was pissed you came here?” Blake asked.
“Yeah,” I said.
“She yelled, huh?”
“Yelled, cursed, screamed, and then peeled the fuck out of the parking lot.”
“Ha ha! That
“She can definitely be a crazy bitch when she wants to be, but that aggressive energy is amazing in the bedroom. She loves to fuck.”
Blake snorted. “Like I don’t know that shit. I heard you two going at it this morning. Fucking dorm bed slamming around in there sounded like you were banging a dryer with a metal pole.”
“We like it rough.”
Blake chuckled. “So why didn’t she want you to come here tonight?”
I shrugged. “She thinks the wandering eye is the mass murderer of relationships in Tallahassee.” My gaze drifted to the
Blake saw where I was looking and smiled. “You haven’t cheated on her since it became official, have you?”
“Just that shower I took with Lisa and I felt guilty as hell afterwards. I’m not gonna do anything like that again.”
Blake smirked. “Whateva, yo. If Lisa comes knocking tonight, you’ll hit that shit twice and once in the morning.”
“She won’t. Lisa’s scared of Allison.”
“She should be,” Blake chuckled. “Allison will judo toss her ass.”
My gaze shifted back to the group of older girls and I made eye contact with the
“Allison doesn’t trust you, does she?” Blake asked.
“I think it’s more about not trusting the nightclub environment. I tried to tell her the only reason you and I came here tonight was to hang out with our big brothers. Speaking of which, where’d they go?”
Blake shrugged. “Kronic is downstairs somewhere with Pete. Borelli is probably hitting key bumps in the bathroom with all those other cokeheads in there.”
A space finally opened up at the bar and we slid in to take it. I pulled out the twenty again and tried to flag down one of the bartenders.
“Pete is a fucking tool,” I said. “Did you see him and Casey trying to hit on that shooter girl? I hate the fact that those two guys are our fraternity brothers.”
Blake chuckled. “They’re not that bad.”
“But they’re not studs either, are they?”
“Nah,” he grinned. “Definitely not.”
A few seconds passed before I mumbled, “Not last picked and not first picked.”
“Huh?”
“I’ve come to the conclusion that too many of our brothers fell into that category in High School gym class.”
Blake laughed. “Hell yeah. They’re some mediocre motherfuckers.”
It was taking entirely too long to get a drink, so I started waving around the twenty dollar bill like I was swatting flies. A sexy blonde bartender with fake tits took notice and she was not pleased with my signaling tactic.
“What do you want?” she asked with a snarl.
“Can I have two Crown and Cokes?”
“Yeah,” she replied curtly and reached for two cups.
I leaned back and grumbled, “You’d never guess she was working for tips, would you?”
“Nah,” Blake agreed.
When the bartender turned around to grab a bottle of Crown Royal, we both realized why she could afford to act like a bitch. She was wearing very tight jeans that showed off an amazing ass.
“Yo, this girl is hot,” Blake whispered to me. “Her legs are muscular as shit too. I saw her in the gym yesterday training with that big black dude with the huge arms.”
“Who? Wesley Pipes?”
“Yeah.”
My eyebrows arched. “That dude has gotta be juicing.”
Blake nodded. “For real, yo. I saw him doing one arm pull-ups the other day with two 45 pound plates chained around his waist.”
The bartender had stepped in front of us again and was pouring whiskey and coke into two plastic cups filled with ice. She looked angry and this was affecting the form of my fantasy. I stared at her fake tits and imagined what it would be like to just lay back and look up at those things as she furiously bounced up and down on my cock.
“Fourteen dollars,” the blonde said and slid our drinks forward on the bar.
“Thanks,” I replied and handed her the twenty.
She grabbed the bill from me like a pissed off stripper who got touched one too many times during a lap dance.
“What the fuck?” I mumbled to Blake. “This is a college bar. Fourteen dollars is bullshit.”
“You shouldn’t have ordered Crown. She didn’t even give you a long pour. This girl is a bitch.”
I grinned. “I know, but that makes me want to fuck her even more.”
The bartender handed me my change and I dropped her a two dollar tip which was snatched up without even a nod of gratitude. I didn’t care. Two dollars was well worth the visuals she had given me to stimulate the next jack-off session I would perform when my girlfriend was unavailable.
“Come on,” I said to Blake. “Let’s go find Kronic and Borelli.”
“Alright, cool.”
Blake walked off and I was about to follow him when I felt my arm being grabbed. I turned around and stared at magnificence. It was her. The
“Hey,” she said.
“Hi,” I replied, silently wondering how far Blake would get before he realized I was not following him. I’d let his ass walk to
“I’m Sky,” she said. “What’s your name?”
The
“Darren,” I replied.
“Darren…Darren.” She said it twice as if she was testing out how it sounded. “I like that name.”
I was a cocky kid, but for once in my life I didn’t know what to say. Fortunately, the older girl had no problem taking control.
“I think you’re adorable.” she said. “Will you come do a shot with me?”
I wanted to tell her I would do anything with her, but I simply nodded my head and said, “Sure.”
Sky led me to the bar and waved a finger for the bartender’s attention. The bitchy blonde came to her beckon almost immediately and she was all smiles and deference.
“Hey, girl!” she exclaimed. “You look great! What can I get you?”
“Darren and I want four redheaded sluts.”
The bartender stared at me like she wanted to fuck. It was as if she didn’t even remember I was the same person she had treated like shit just a few seconds ago.
“You got it, Sky,” she said. “Coming right up.”
“Thanks, Diane.”
As the bartender walked away, I faced my new companion and asked, “Are you two friends?”
“Yeah, I guess,” she replied and her thick lips curved into a beautiful smile. “You’re really cute. How old are you?”
“Twenty-one,” I lied.
“How come I’ve never seen you before?”
I shrugged. “It’s a big school.”
“Are you in a fraternity?”
“No,” I lied again.
Sky smiled another award winning smile. “That’s good. That’s really good. I hate fratboys. They’re so full of themselves. But I should’ve known you weren’t Greek.”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“Because of this,” she said and slid her hand up my back to rub my head. “They probably wouldn’t let you pledge with a shaved head, but I love it. It brings attention to your face.”
“You’re gorgeous,” I immediately replied, “but I bet you hear that all the time.”
Sky laughed, not bothering to deny my accurate speculation with false modesty. It was a pleasant sounding laugh followed by an intriguing response.
“Darren,” she said, “I don’t hear it enough from the right people.”
Diane reappeared with our shots. I noticed the bartender had made two for herself and seemed eager to do them with us.
“Here ya go, Sky,” she said and stared at me again like she wanted to fuck.
“Thanks, girl,” replied the
Sky slid one of the shots in front of me and took one for herself. I touched cups with both young women and we downed the red liquid. This sequence was repeated with the remaining three shots, but when I set down my empty cup, Sky seized me by the back of my neck and kissed me. Her lips were thick, soft, and wet and she tasted of cranberry and peach schnapps. When the sultry beauty pulled away, she stared at me like we had just shared an intimate secret.
“Hey, Sky,” Diane asked, “what’re you and your girls doing after this?”
Sky irritably flicked her eyes towards Diane as if the bartender was a mosquito. It gave me smug pleasure to see the bitchy blonde treated like a social inferior.
“I don’t know yet,” Sky replied. “Probably going to that after-party over at Andrew’s. Call me.”
The bartender nodded, gave me another look of yearning, and then faded away to serve her next customer. I realized that we had not been charged for the shots. It was amazing what a beautiful girl on your arm could do for you.
“Will you walk with me?” Sky asked. “I want you to meet my friends.”
“Yeah,” I replied eagerly. “Let’s go.”
And so it began. The older girl took hold of my hand, led me around the nightclub, and introduced me to all of her sexy girlfriends. She proclaimed to them how cute she thought I was and frequently kissed me in front of them to prove her attraction. I felt like her boy toy, and in all honesty, I kind of liked it. With Sky as my guide, I was given my first glimpse into the inner circle of popularity at
The social stratification of the nightclub became vividly clear when Sky led me through the crowds near the dance floor and I saw three of my fraternity brothers standing awkwardly off to the side. Talking amongst themselves and watching the other patrons of the nightclub, they seemed like spectators of a show they were prohibited from joining. This moment was the beginning of my awareness that there was an exclusive social network to belong to that I was not yet a member. It was a social world of the beautiful, it was a social world of the popular, and it was a social world of the elite. It was The Scene.
My guided tour of The Scene came to an abrupt end when I saw several of my girlfriend’s guy friends standing together at the bar. Fucking snitches. It was not an easy decision to make, but I left Sky upstairs and did not return.
Borelli and Kronic were waiting for service at one of the busy downstairs bars. Joining their company seemed like a time distortion. With Sky at my side, I had experienced the intense VIP lifestyle that existed on the other side of the velvet rope, but now I was living in slow-motion again among the rabble.
“Where’s Blake?” I asked them.
“The dance floor,” Kronic replied. “Hugged up on some little hootchie.”
I grinned. “Nice.”
“Do you want a drink?” Borelli asked me.
“Nah, man. I’m straight. I just did like ten free shots.”
“Free?” Kronic said with disbelief.
“Yeah…it’s a long story and the ending is sucking right now.”
Kronic chuckled and returned his attention to the bar. It would have been impossible to explain to him what I was feeling. Walking down the red carpet of The Scene was just something you had to experience for yourself to understand.
When the 2 AM ceiling lights came on, we exited the club and waited for Blake to come outside. He never showed.
“He’s not picking up his cell phone,” I said.
Kronic shrugged. “I bet he left with that little slut.”
“Let’s just go,” Borelli said. “If he calls, I’ll come back and get him.”
We walked to Borelli’s car and drove home.
Allison called me at 8:02 AM. Since our parting words last night were heated, I didn’t know what to expect.
“Hello?” I answered.
“Darren…I miss my boyfriend.”
“I miss my girlfriend.”
“Can I come over?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll be there in five minutes.”
“Okay. Bye.”
I climbed out of bed and headed to the bathroom. Blake was walking in the front door when I entered the common room area of our dormitory suite. His spiky dark hair was messy with grass, his wrinkled club clothes were covered with dirt, and there was mud on his face.
“Holy shit,” I said in surprise. “What the fuck happened to you?”
Blake scowled. “You fuckers left me at the club. I had to walk home.”
“We thought you left with that girl. We tried to call you.”
“I lost my fucking phone.”
“That sucks. What happened with the girl?”
He made a shucking noise. “Man, yo…I was hooking up with that broad, but I had to go to the bathroom. When I found her again, she was kissing on some other dude.”
I stared at his filthy appearance. “So why do you look like this?”
He made the shucking noise again. “Man, yo…I slept in a ditch over by
“You what?”
“I fucking walked home and I must’ve passed out or something. I think I tripped.”
I laughed my ass off.
“Fuck you, yo. I’m never going to CPA again.”
Blake stalked into his bedroom and slammed the door shut behind him. I chuckled and headed to the bathroom.
Allison arrived five minutes later and we had an enjoyable round of makeup sex, but when she left for class, I stared up at the ceiling and remembered what I had seen under the bright lights of the club. I thought about Sky and her popularity and the social power she wielded so effortlessly. I thought about the bitchy bartender and her fake tits and the way she looked at me differently with Sky at my side. I thought about all the beautiful people Sky introduced me to and how the other patrons of the nightclub seemed to orbit around us as they desperately tried to participate in a show they were only permitted to watch. And I remembered how I felt afterwards when Sky was gone and I was once again a spectator on the outside of the in-crowd.
The seed had been planted. I had tasted The Scene and I had been poisoned by its forbidden fruit—power, status, lust, attraction, popularity. And like a child who gets a taste of something he likes, I wanted more. Much more.
