Rocket Science

You interact with people long enough, and what happens is, you realize ninety-nine percent of what you meet is a waste of your time. Throwaways to get past. You move through the crowd as you'd leaf through the pages of some facebook, lingering over some, barely glancing at others, but rarely spending a stitch of time registering the worth of anything you've seen.

I'd hit that.

But it rarely goes any further than a momentary glint of recognition. A thought, lasting a few seconds at most, that there's something worthwhile about a passing face. You don't stare. You don't work toward holding eye contact. You don't do shit, because you're forever on to the next, and the next after that.

That's New York.

That's how it happens here, and you have to just keep moving before that hand finds its way to the back of your collar, stalling you, eating into the countdown we're all on in this city. Until we leave. Until we move up. Until someone slides out of an alleyway and cracks our skull with a brick.

That one can't keep cocks out of her mouth, they say.

Then someone does or says something that bangs a dent in the process. Wait. You flip back to that page, read it again and again. Study it. Hand the book to that one and show them your page -- the one with all the basics, sans blemishes. And maybe you've given them pause, too. Sometimes you can.

I'd hit that hard, you say. I'd break that in half.

And then what happens, is you sit around and think, because when you've marked a certain page, it's not quite as easy as when you're in riffling mode and all the superfluous shit doesn't matter much. You're paying attention.

And you want to tear that shit up.

The pages are read and reread to everyone's initial satisfaction, and then a different type of study begins. Maybe they've heard some shit about you, from sources other than what you've offered. Clarifications ensue. Claims are made. "Sure I'm an asshole," you say, "but nobody's going to figure that out in eight weeks." You're sparring, and it's not the way you'd carry it on with throwaways who wouldn't be able to counter.

You sit back and think about splitting that straight down the middle.

It's on your mind throughout the day, coming across at frustratingly random intervals. You've heard and seen enough to know you'd tag that when given the chance. After a while, the ones who aren't throwaways, they figure this out. That they're not throwaways, that is.

And that's when some girls give mention to vibrators.

You don't wonder why, of course, because you'd be a hypocrite in saying you didn't understand. Any guy would. It happened for me in junior high, when I tried to sleep with a pillow under my stomach and ended up dry humping the thing because it simply wouldn't stop feeling better. So I know. We all do.

But I can help.

Every decent looking girl could, with a nod, have a thousand guys lined up, ready to retire her Magic Wand. Five of these may actually have the capacity to hold her attention in the afterglow. For the ones we dwell on -- the ones for whom we'll stop -- triple this figure. With so many of us roaming the world like dogs in heat, none of this adds up.

And yet, the Pocket Rocket.

Occupying the spaces we'd prefer to be. Serving the functions we'd happily enlist ourselves to carry out, all without having to pay for a goddamned thing. Motoring up and across and back down again -- a free damned ride without the hassle of having to figure out how she likes it. Nothing needs to be implied when you've a handle and batteries.

To be that Rocket.