Off Limits(48)

“Sounds boring as shit,” Chris dismissed with a laugh. “Tell you what, let me tell you a story instead. I promise—you're going to love it.”

I knew that in this condition, Chris wasn't someone I wanted to fool with. Even drunk, I'd seen him fight three men and kick their asses like it was nothing, walking away without a scratch. While I could probably take him, I didn’t want to hurt the one man that had given me a lifeline. Better to humor him, let him get it out of his system. Then I could look at maybe deflecting his attention somewhere else. Besides, getting into fights with my roommate was not the sort of person I wanted to be anymore. I set my book aside and sat up, paying attention. “Sure, go ahead, man.”

“Well, it's about these two boys, so it's kind of a buddy-buddy story,” Chris began, leaning back in the chair and crossing his hands over his stomach. “These two boys, oh, let's call them Tris and Boyd, they grew up together and raised a lot of hell together back in the day. Now, both Tris and Boyd were from well-to-do families, but deep down inside, both of them were disgusted by the boring nature of their lives. They tried the normal stuff that boys do, sports and games and toys and whatever, but life was just bleh and in tones of gray to them. It was only in each other that they were able to find some real fun.”

I had a growing sense of disquiet as I listened to Chris talk. He was obviously talking about him and Lloyd, telling me about them growing up. There was something else he was trying to say, but I couldn't tell what yet. I decided it was best to listen carefully. “Go on.”

“Well, starting in high school, Boyd and Tris found something that could at least partially relieve some of the tedious boredom that was their lives. That was sex. Now, before you start thinking anything, it wasn't with each other—they weren't into that. On the other hand, both of them absolutely had high interest in women. They developed this sort of game of one-upmanship, seeing who could score the greatest accomplishment. Oh, the two boys, they ran through the normal gamut. Boyd was the first to get a girl to give him a blowjob, Tris was the first to do some ass f*cking, Boyd had the first threesome, stuff like that. By the time they were juniors in high school, they had reached a sense of boredom again. So, one day Tris said to Boyd, we need to up the game. Now, Boyd was an adventurous spirit, so he was more than willing. They started betting each other, seeing what the other one could pull off. At first, the bets were for real money, a hundred bucks or so, but soon enough, that same hundred-dollar bill had been passed back and forth so often that it became a symbol, a trophy more than an actual bet amount. The first challenge that Tris gave Boyd was to see who could screw their math teacher—a soon-to-be married young woman of twenty-four who'd just started teaching the year before and gave just about every boy in her class a nice set of blue balls along with his homework. Tris was able to bag that one, along with video proof, of course.”

Chris grinned, and I was starting to feel sick to my stomach, not liking where this was headed.

“Even after Boyd had to move away, the two boys kept up their little game, emailing proof back and forth. Some of the proof ended up on the Internet, of course, but the boys were careful, making sure that their faces or voices were never identifiable in the videos. Some of the games were dangerous, but both of the boys eventually found a prize that they both enjoyed. That was in finding a woman or girl who at first would say no, then with some convincing, whether a little or a lot, would end up on her knees, begging for it. Then . . . well, then it went up a notch.”

“Like how?” I asked, my throat dry and parched as I saw the true Chris. I'd seen him before, of course, but it’d been in firefights—in combat. I thought it was just the side of him that every soldier had. As Shakespeare wrote so much better than I could think of putting it,

In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility,

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger:

Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,

Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage,

Then lend the eye a terrible aspect.





I knew that separation, and I thought that I'd only seen that in Chris and Lloyd in those times. Little did I know that the side I saw in combat was the real man, and the joking, easy-going guys I'd called friends were the false side of their natures. “What did you guys do?”

He seemed to ignore that I knew he was talking about him and Lloyd. “Oh, they started with alcohol, which is after all pretty easy to get their hands on and so effective more often than not. You see, Tris and Boyd were both handsome fellows. A lot of the early women, they didn't need much more than a little encouragement, something to help them let go of their inhibitions.”

“Later on, with some of those women whose morals either refused alcohol or just couldn't be pried by other means, they got their hands on some of the little helpers that are so mislabeled in the media. A vial of this stuff in their drinks, whether it be water, beer, or even, say, orange juice, and the girl was out like a f*cking light in about two minutes.”

“Date-rape drugs? Fucking sick,” I said, getting to my feet. “I don’t know if this is just fiction or a true story, but I think I've heard enough, Chris.”

“Oh, we’re just getting to the best part, Dane. It’s just getting good. You see, Tris and Boyd, they reunited when both of them joined the Army, although by then Boyd had picked up a battle buddy. Big, tall, handsome f*cker, but dumb as a goddamned stump. Let's call him . . . Bane, why don't we? Anyway, Bane had the potential to be as much a player as Tris and Boyd—he certainly had the tools for it. Bane would have been a great player in the game, except for this little problem of his noble streak that ran bedrock deep in him. Tris and Boyd didn't mind, though. Bane was good in a fight, and like I said, he was as dumb as a rock. But reunited, the two friends were able to take their game to whole new levels. They’d finally reached the nearly penultimate level of their game, which they somewhat mourned, but knew it had been a shitload of fun anyway. You see, Tris and Boyd were both going to try and get a fresh, un-plucked cherry and turn her into a total mind-numbed slut. I mean, straight up ruin the bitch. Tris thought he had the edge. He'd found a total hottie who hadn’t even graduated high school. She was stacked like a goddamned porn star, but as innocent and sweet as a Disney character. Nobody could have topped that, Tris was sure. He sweet-talked her, of course, pretending he was willing to wait for her. After all, this one would’ve sealed a victory. She was just about to give it up to him when the Army came calling, sending the boys to the big sandbox called Iraq. The thought of getting that precious cherry when he was back was what got him through it. Little did he know that Boyd had his own plans.”