The 8th Mile

Day drinking generally leads to night drinking out in San Diego. I had spent the entire day at an event called "over the line." I was slamming shots, gulping mixed drinks, and shotgunning beers from 11:00 AM to roughly 7:00 PM. When I finally made it back home I knew I needed to get something in my stomach to suck up the alcohol and rally quickly or face a certain defeat in the form of succumbing to sleep.

Barely a block away, I spot people drinking and eating on my front lawn. It's my room mates and all of their friends. According to drunk people that were there, they had been drinking in front of the house since roughly 2:00 and were ready to go out have fun at the bars. I smashed a few bites of a hamburger and a hot dog into my face, showered, and threw on some clothes all in matter of about 10 minutes. We ended up at a roof top bar where drinks were over priced and the wasn't any talent besides the people we brought to be found in the entire place.

I made an effort to try to convince the group to have a change of scenery and get out of the lack luster atmosphere and into a place more suited to our mood. I managed to convince two guys to make moves due to the fact that their "ladies" were pre-occupied with the other girls (like they had been all day). We walked a block and a half to my favorite drinking establishment in Pacific Beach, "Millers Field." Once inside, my eyes lit up. There were all kinds of opportunities to be had and we had the entire night to make it work.

I slapped down my card and got the first few rounds. I spent the next two hours using the guys as pivots,
"Hey girls, these two are having a terrible night, how would you cheer them up?"
"Hey have you met Brian? Well you have now, what's your friends name?"
"Me and my two friends agree, you guys are definitely not from around here, try and guess where we're from and if you get it right, one of these guys will buy you a shot."

The options were endless and time was on my side. I managed to meet a lot of talent. After a bit of running around on my own, I slip towards the back of the upstairs to have a smoke and relax. I saw a blond girl with a very mediocre body standing a few feet away, not talking to anybody.
"You can talk to me if all your friends left you behind. It could be worse," I glance to my right and point using my head in a "look that way" fashion towards a fat guy with a flat brim hat who was having trouble standing up, "I could be that guy."

She walked over and we hit it off pretty quickly. Her name was Jamie, she was a little heavier than what I was used to. She had a tangled mess of dirty blonde air and rough featured face. She was sported skinny jeans, converse sneakers, and long ratty shirt. Not the spitting image of "stunning." I finish my cigarette and her and I continued to talk and laugh.

She really wasn't much to look at, but she's had one hell of a sense of humor. She claimed she did a lot of amateur stand up at a few places. It could have been that I had been drinking for over twelve hours or I enjoyed her jokes. I hadn't met a sharp funny female comedian ever and I was a little enthralled. She offered to take me up to a few comedy clubs she preforms at and encouraged me to try it if I had the balls to go with her.

Jamie was loud, boisterous, witty and blunt. She had some type of accent that I couldn't put my finger on despite being from southern California. She was very opinionated, anti-establishment, and anit-pop culture; and I dug it. I'm not sure if it was the liquor or Jamie's general demeanor, but I was impressed by something. Every once in a while I'll go for something that is off the beaten path just because it's clearly so different. I can understand that it sounds lame, but most men my age really only focus on aesthetics and I can admit that I usually do as well. But I was enjoying myself. A few drinks later we start making out.

It wasn't long before Jamie was whispering dirty things in my ear while rubbing my crotch in the bar. "I want it now." She would say kissing my ear.

"Well all these people might be a little upset if we just did it right here on the bar?" I'd say winking

"I'm really good at giving blowjobs" She whispered kissing my neck.

I started laughing at how easy and absurd it the situation has become, "I'm really good at legos. And making french toast."

Jamie pulled back for a second confused then she laughed and leaned in to kiss me, "mmm. French toast."

After a few minutes of that I decided it was high time to leave behind I was going to take the funny girl with a personality home rather than the retarded pretty girls I had been so accustomed to chasing. I said goodbye to a few disappointed groups of people and walked arm in arm with my "prize."

During our five block walk back to my house she described with self deprecating humor some her previous encounters with guys that were for lack of a better term "assholes." Interjecting one of the famous lines I hear all to often, "we're not having sex, just so you know." Considering that moments earlier she was practically jerking me off in a bar, I really didn't take any of that line very seriously. It's like going to a theme park and saying, "we're only going to stand in line for the rides, we're not getting on any roller coasters today; are we clear?"

I think women say "just so you know, we're not having sex" so they can rationalize their behavior in the morning. It's something that either has been ingrained into women's behavior from what their parents had taught them; "Sex is Bad!" Or maybe it's just what they've read in some stupid magazine that says "even though you want to, you should resists at all costs and wait until date number five or later." I'm sorry I'm not governed by ridiculous made-up timeline or a preconditioned set of rules that dictates when I can act out what behaviors I want to engage in.

I've talked to many people that have these rules and apply them to everyone they meet. I think each person is different and you should feel it out as it goes. I'll admit it, I've had relationships last a long time despite our first date resulted in sex. If I like someone, I'll tell them I like them. I don't need the stupid frustrating games that make me think you're incapable of thinking for yourself, that's when I lose interest.


As we neared my place she shared a final story of being dicked over by a guy and I had change the subject. I'll admit it, most every guy is plenty capable of being a dick. But not all of us are evil and besides if you keep making insinuations that I fit that mold, chances are I'll fulfill that prophecy just out of spite.

The sad thing about this girl was had developed a sense of humor and worked on it diligently as some type of compensation for her lowered self worth. I decided to stray from the tried and true style of using the nights momentum to slide into a precarious situation once in my room. It would be very easy to let the "heat of the moment" catch us and let clothes fly off once we got into my room. But I thought this girl could be different and instead I decided to go with a different angle for this girl. She had the makings of a great girl but had never be treated as such. Think of it as me trying to do all I could to turn her perceptions of one night stands into something way better that everyone would walk away happy about.

Looking bad on it now I kind of cringe, because every once in a while I'll do this and it's still kind of lame but I enjoy it. I lit candles all around my room, I turned some some John Mayer/Jack Johnson, and soon we found ourselves intertwined making out on my bed. Moments later we had pulled each other's shirt off and I flipped her on top of me while I unhinged her bra. Rather than going in for the kill, I paused.

"How do you feel about getting an amazing oil massage?" I ask her.
"I'm not sure, nobody has ever given me one." She said looking at me skeptically.

"What? Hows that even possible," jumping up from the bed and pulling out an array of massage tools and oils.

"Well there's a first time for everything then isn't there." I said as she smiled and layed down.

While john mayer's guitar whirred in the background, I massaged her shoulders and back making swirls with my hands. I spend a good 30 minutes working on just her back and shoulders and talking to her about her life and aspirations. We talked out how we both ended up in San Diego; it was nice. I finally asked her about her accent but she didn't understand what I was talking about, so I dropped it. Part of me felt it was a good karma gesture to do something like that for a girl that doesn't usually get this type of treatment.

As I neared her lower back I paused, "Hmmm, I think these pants are going to have to come off."

"No. They're staying on." She said.

"Well I don't want to get oil on them" I say laughing a bit while leaning in to kiss her neck, "if I stop here that's only half of a massage."

She turned over she looked up at me giving me the people's eyebrow, "When I first got over here I really wanted to have sex with you, and I was totally ready to. But you're actually a really cool guy."

"Well thanks," I said shrugging and batting my eyes at her.

"But I think I'm catching feelings for you and since all of this, I don't think I would feel right having sex with you tonight. I think we should hang out a few times and see where this goes."

I cocked my head to the side, "What? I don't understand?"

"You seem like a really awesome guy and if I put out on the first night, you'll never call me again."

I start to laugh, "Did you read this in a magazine or something? I started plenty of relationships that start with physical activities"

"No I just know you're supposed to wait when someone like this comes along." she folding her arms.

"Someone like what? You're telling me, if I had treated you like some bar slut we would be having sex right now, but because I decided to treat you like a human being you don't want to have sex." I said sitting up.

"Well ya, that's before I realized you were a cool guy. We can have sex after our second date." She said running her fingers through my hair

"How the? Help me to understand, if I had treated you like garbage we could be having sex, but since I didn't, we no longer can do that." I ask a bit perturbed by the recent development.

"Well yeah, I think you're now date-able material where as before I didn't, so now I just don't want our first time hooking up to be a result of a drunk night." She says.

"Ok I might be drunk but that's not the result. We don't have to have sex but there are plenty of things we could do that might be just as fun. What about the blowjob you were talking about at the bar?" I ask wiggling my hips a bit.

"I want to know that you're the right one. If you are, then you can wait." She said smiling.

I pause waiting for her to interject something like "I'm just kidding! Let's fuck like otters!" But nothing, she was serious. By treating a barslut like a real person I had in turn boosted her ego to a level beyond anything that I could reason with thus cockblocking myself in the process.

"Did you see this shit in some lame movie or something?" I say becoming confused and pissed off at myself.

"What's that supposed to mean." She said angrily.

"Damnit! This is why people treat girls like crap. You really can't win. Do you see what you're teaching me to do in the future." I said throwing myself off to the side.

"I am really attracted to you, but I just want to do it after I know you'll call me again. We can kiss but that's all I'm doing tonight." She says rubbing my arm.

"You were rubbing my dick at the bar!? How is this any different?" I exclaim

"Well that's before I saw that you could be a caring guy. Freal." She explains. "Come on, we can kiss and snuggle till the morning."

"Holy shit." I said laying next to her looking up at the ceiling trying to figure out how I had ended up in this position.

Ten seconds of silence later, I got up blew out all my candles in the room and turned off the music. I was too tired to try to make this work. I laid back down and pulled my comforter over us. Within minutes I had passed out.

In the morning I'm awoken to movement next to me.

Jamie is trying to wake me, "Ey! Ey! Yo I'm tryin' roll out. You got a ride cause I ain't tryin' to walk."

"What the fuck?" I say confused by her ebonics. For some reason Jamie was speaking in slang/ebonics. It turns out that her "accent" was actually ebonics and I hadn't picked up on it because I was so drunk.

"I gotz sum stuff I, you know, that needs to be done and all and I ain't trying to walk back."

"Oh my god, when did you start talking like this?!" I say still drunk and trying to get my bearings on what was going on. "What is this a rap video? When did you start talking ghetto?"

Had already put on her shirt and bra and was now standing by the door. "Huh? Eh come on man, I'm just tryin' to roll out. It ain't chill, you can go back sleep'n afta' you get me back home."

I start laughing squinting at the clock, it's only 7:15 and I was still quite drunk, 12+ hours of drinking will do that to you, "Listen up 50 cent, my car is in Clarendon (which is a city in Northern Virginia and not California), perhaps you can get a ride back to the 8th Mile with Eminem."

She starts using ghetto hand gestures reserved only for the highest quality gangsters "Nah man, that ain't even cool though. It ain't like that, I need a ride."

Laughing even more hysterically I say, "There's no way I was this drunk to pick up on this! Yo! Somebody drop this girl a beat! Oh Dayum!"

"Man! You trippin' and busted anyway," Jamie shouts walking out of my room.

"I can't hear out of my left headphone!" I yell after her while laughing as I hear her rushing down the steps to leave my town house. I downed a glass of water and layed back down to sleep for another few hours. I never heard from her again.