Date: Wed, 21 May 2014 07:01:32 -1000
From: Christian Joudon <christian.joudon@gmail.com>
Subject: Bad X-ample

Author's Note

I don't know if I am going to finish writing this story. It's the first
time I've ever written anything. I'm just seeing if people like it, before
I continue on. So, do send me comments if you would like to read more from
me. Nothing frothy has happened yet, but I assure you lots of juicy details
later.

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The Beginning


Beep...beep....beep

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen, looks like today's gonna be a
scorcher. In fact this hot weather is gonna last us though the week. Pull
your flip flops out and get yourself to the nearest body of water, we have
a heat wave on our hands. You can expect the lows to creep down to a chilly
95 and the highs to be, well, hotter than hell."

Ughhhh.... I slapped the alarm in protest. I didn't want to catch too much
good news so early in the morning. I went to roll over and found that the
sheets were stuck to me with sweat. So had my shirt and everything else in
my immediate vicinity. I took a deep breath and nearly choked on the
humidity in the room. Staring up at my ceiling two things became abundantly
clear to me; this week was going to suck, and the fans in my room that my
mother had bought were merely decorative.

As I mused at the similarities between the fan and my mother, I made my way
to the shower. When I entered the bathroom, the mirror greeted me with it's
usual news. I'm not a schizophrenic, I'm an entirely lucid person.  My
mirror talks to me because my father owns several tech and genetic research
centers in Silicon Valley, and he gets to bring goodies home. This
particular goody was alerting me to the fact that the weather was as shitty
as the radio said it was going to be, and that I had several text messages
waiting on my phone.

"Alfred command initiate shower, temperature 68"

"Yes sir" the sound of rushing water confirmed that the command had been
understood. Alfred was my favorite toy that my father had brought home. He
was a super computer with AI capabilities, and the ability to infect any
network. Originally XRC-97, I thought it would be a prudent choice to
rename him with a more cuddly name, so I picked the butler from Batman. He
was primarily built for counter insurgency purposes, but the military
recognized that if anyone was able to replicate him, the ensuing cyber war
could possibly destroy both nations infrastructure. My father was unable to
throw away years of work so he repurposed him to our home mainframe and
personal devices. And instead of battling terrorists, he had much more
terrifying task of trying to keep up with my mother's expectations.

As I stepped into the shower I added, "Command dictate unread messages."

"From Mother Dearest: would you drop your sister off at school I have a
terrible headache from this new cleanse I'm doing. You should try it dear,
it might improve your mood a little.". She meant well, but the things that
came out of her mouth suggested otherwise.

Alfred continued on,"From Eric: I saw the most beautiful man at the gym
last night. He was a total babe. You should have been there, but instead
your fat-ass was sitting at home eating twinkies." I looked down at my
stomach and inspected it, the muscles danced in the dimly lit room, and
when I pinched it the only purchase I found was skin. As for the twinkies,
I'm pleading the fifth.

Alfred listed off a few more texts but my attention drifted towards the
mirror. I had inherited my mother's heavily lidded green eyes, and her
mothers red hair, but thankfully I hadn't been blessed with pale
freckle-prone skin, but a golden Mediterranean complexion.  My body was
tempered from years of surfing, gymnastics, and weight lifting. All in all
it was a pretty good package.

I finished what I needed to and made my way to the kitchen. My mother stood
at the kitchen island sipping a concoction that I swear had something
lurking beneath the surface. Seated next to her was my younger sister,
Alice eating a bowl of Gluten Free Panda Puffs. We had discovered early on
that Alice had coeliac disease, and everything in the house with traces of
gluten had been removed. Hence why she ate her gross little cereal and I
resorted to sneaking twinkies in the dead of the night. I tried to give her
as much support as possible, but every now and again my will would
crumble. I didn't seem to be the only one in the family who had trouble, a
year or so ago I snuck into my fathers study looking for his keys and I
happened upon a stash of cinnabons in his minifridge. I hadn't given up his
secret yet because I was saving my blackmail for the day I would need it.

"You can take her, right?" Hope sparked behind my mothers eyes. I can't
recall a day when my mother didn't have a headache or some other ailment
early in the morning. Her curious case of low grade early morning flu
symptoms seemed to start the day I got my drivers license. Unable to say no
to either women in my life I relented.

"Of course, are you ready for your first day of school beautiful?"

Alice nodded her head in agreement, and I grabbed a quinoa pop tart and
threw the little brat over my shoulder.

"Let's blow this joint." I grabbed our backpacks and slipped on my high
tops, halfway crunching the soles. I have to confess I have a slight sexual
fascination with boots and high tops. I'm not a foot fetishist by any means
but the thought of a man in nothing but boots did something for me. It was
one of the many small kinks I enjoyed. Consequently most of the shoes that
I owned were converse or boots. I shuffled out of the house and dumped my
squealing cargo into my car.

After dropping her off at her first day of school I went to go to my first
day of school. This year I would be a senior in high school and I could
feel my disinterest with high school almost palpably. High school was
surprisingly not difficult for me as an out gay teen. I was smart enough
that I could apply minimal effort to stay above my parents Gradar, handsome
enough to not get picked on, and witty enough to have friends. I also lived
in the most liberal place in America; Southern California. High School
wasn't unpleasant it was simply stagnant.

I made my way towards the entrance when I was nearly tackled from behind by
Chloe. I turned around and gave the most serious fake frown I could muster.

"Oh, I thought you liked it from behind, my bad." She said while patting my
butt and adjusting her signature bun back into place. No matter how little
effort she put in she always looked impeccable, she was too beautiful not
to. Her dark brown hair was stained by the sun and so was her olive
complexion, set atop was the face of Brigitte Bardot. But her beauty wasn't
what enthralled me so much, it was her wildness that drew me in. She wasn't
wild in the sense that she was a party animal, it wasn't a disrespectful
behavior either, it always felt like she could break any rule she wanted to
at any moment, but she simply didn't. It was a feeling that I shared with
her. It always felt like I was a very large glass of water that somebody
had tried to pour into a much smaller ice cube tray of rules and
regulations and I kept spilling out all over the place.

I laughed and kissed her on the forehead as we made our way into class. We
sat in our seats when I heard a squeal at the front door. I turned to see
Eric rushing towards us, dressed in some very bright manicured
clothing. His cherub like features were misleading, he was no angel by any
stretch of the imagination. He hugged us both excitedly and plopped down
next to us.

"Omg did you see the new transplant. He's soooooo beautiful, he's straight
from fucking Italy, I call dibs by the way." -Eric

"I don't know if you can call dibs on a human being, I think dibs are
reserved for the last slice of pizza or the last chicken wing." -me

"Well, sure you can, don't be silly. I've called dibs on possibly half this
school, no one seems to listen to me however. But if anyone gets to call
dibs, I do. I'm foreign and so is he. " Chloe was also a transplant, she
moved from England freshman year.

"No, dibs go by who called them first. Plus you said it yourself you
already called dibs on half the school."-Eric

They continued to bicker for a while but I stopped listening because the
object of the conversation had just walked into the room. He was stunning,
I'm not one to stare impolitely, but I could not remove my eyes from
him. He had steel grey eyes and dark curls. It looked like he hadn't shaven
in a week and had a small shadow on his perfectly square jaw. He was
wearing a tank top that did little to hide his thick ropy frame, and when
he walked there was a slight swagger in his step. My heart nearly dropped
out of my chest and started flopping around on the ground. The school bell
luckily rang before that could happen.  He went to sit down in his seat two
seats behind me and slowly the world shifted back into place around me.

I interrupted their continued bickering "What's his name?"

"Mattheo Sansone. Don't even think about it I called dibs on him!" Eric
replied in hushed indignant tones.

" I hate to break your heart sunshine but I don't think that he's gay. He
looks pretty normal to me." Whispered Chloe in retort.

The truth stung a little bit more than it should have, but when doesn't it.
I would just have to file him away in the small area of gray matter that I
had labeled fantasy box, along with James Franco and Daniel Craig where
they could all keep each other warm at night.

Class began and the teacher started to talk about the syllabus when I felt
a tap on my shoulder, I turned around to see Mattheo's inappropriately
handsome face.

"May I please have ...umm..." He gestured at the writing utensil in my
hand.

I finished his sentence "A pencil"

"Yes, may I please borrow a pencil"

Already turning four different shades of red I shoved my pencil at him and
turned around hoping he didn't see the blush forming on my face. Penciless
and red, I realized that it might take a little more time to file him away
than I originally thought.

He ended up in three more of my classes, and by the end of the day I was
emotionally exhausted. To add insult to injury the heat wave had short
circuited the cooling system and we were assaulted by the 103 degree
weather. I was a puddle of sweat and nerves. There was no way that I was
going to want to make it to cheer practice today. But it was tryouts and
everyone had to be there because it was a "cheerocracy", although anyone
who had met Roxanne, the head cheerleader, would know that it was actually
a "cheertatorship", and she was definitely a "cheerbitch". We decided to
move the tryouts outside next to the football field so we wouldn't have to
be stuck inside without air conditioning. The usual vapid skanks showed
up. But my attention was drawn towards football tryouts where I saw
Mattheo.

I turned to Eric, who seemed to know everything about him already, "He's
trying out for the football team?"

"Yeah, apparently he was captain of his rugby team back in Italy."

I could see that very clearly, he was crushing it out there. Catching every
throw, knocking people around like bowling pins, and generally being a
badass.

"I think that somebody has a crush". -Chloe

"I do not"

"No, your just watching him intently to make sure he doesn't have a bomb
strapped to his chest."-Chloe

"Someone has to watch out for the safety of the children"

"Mmmmmm," she pursed her lips and gave me a very unimpressed look before
turning her gaze back to the hopefuls in front of us; thankfully letting
the subject go. My eyes had not wavered from him however, and they didn't
for the rest of tryouts.

I got home and took the coldest, longest shower of my life. I left my
shower and nearly crumpled into my bed. As I stared up at my ceiling, I
decided that it was going to be a very long week.