Weakness

No matter what anyone else says, I can erase the past.  I can also mould the future. I don’t buy into the weak bullshit everyone else believes in so devoutly. There is no higher power except me; I am my own maker. 

Of course, I didn’t always know this. At some point, I was just like you and all the rest. I figured I was just here on the sidelines, resigned to my fate of watching everyone else having all the fun. My friends were the same way. My weak ass father was that way. Most people were.  Most people stood by while to so- called ‘Great Men’ swooped over society like vultures; fucking all the women and scooping up all the money left behind by everyone who were too weak to go after it themselves. 

When you look in the mirror what do you see? I can answer that for you: Weakness. You’re probably afraid to look yourself in the eye.

When you smile, when you talk, when you fuck, you can’t help but think ‘Gee, I hope I don’t look stupid.’ Or ‘oh boy, I’m not sure I’m ready for this’.  Sometimes, you walk through a room and worry you might trip over your own feet. You wear the clothes you see them wearing on TV but you’re not fooling anyone. That new hair cut you are trying out? Sorry, but it isnt really ‘cutting it’. Even your own grandmother thinks you're a total loser.

You try to exercise and eat well but it doesn’t do a thing for you. When you go home at night. When you take off your clothes you look in the mirror and flex you look prepubescent. Especially from a side angle— what a scrawny little pussy you are.   and when you crawl into your bed alone— that’s when it hits you.

You can hear that cute secretary reaching climax with your boss. You can see see your ex-girl friend with a dick in her mouth— the one she chose because your baby dick didn’t satisfy her.  The images flood over you you like massive pillars of ice and you try to sleep it off, dripping in a cold sweat and the sticky remnants of ejaculate you couldn’t wipe off.

Everything you’ve ever done or tried to do ended in hopeless failure. You look down at your dick and contemplate how tiny it is. You have a baby dick. The fruits of your efforts have been noting but shame. 

 It’s not the lonliness that shakes you,  but knowing the reasons why. Knowing that it’s your fault. How do I know you so well? Because I was just like you at a time; I was weak too. 

...

I was seven years old when my beautiful baby brother was born.  My parents went ahead and named him Dean after James Dean. My brother was a blonde, blue eyed gift from God. He was an immaculate little angel boy. 

Everyone fawned over the little prince. The little Casanova. He was the second coming of Christ. They all forgot about me, Little Richard. The worst part, is that as Dean got older he loved me. He actually looked up to me, despite how pathetic I was. Despite everything, he loved me.

I could consciously measure just about all the ways Dean bested me. There were all those large and more obvious ways like for example, how he was a music prodigy, and an all star athlete, and how he had the looks of a catalogue model, while I had inherited my father's limp fragility and grey eyes. 

By the time he was four he could play piano like the reincarnation of Mozart and sing like a baby Pavarotti. By seven he could throw a football further than me, Richard, who was still awaiting my growth spurt, at the ripe age of fourteen.  

Going out in public as a family, we were often accosted by people asking my mother if little Dean the 'vunderchild' would be interested in modelling for this, postering for that, or acting in whatever movie or TV commercial. 

He even lost his virginity before me.  By the time he was 12 he was already as tall as I was. His muscles had started building. He had won nationwide swimming contests and singing contests and indeed, was becoming something of a celebrity in town. 

Gloria was a girl working at a mall kiosk across from the camera store I manned during my first summer off from college. Gloria had the painted face, curvy body and the sluttish etiquette which made people passing by turn their heads and take interest in whatever bargain basement crap she sold at her kiosk. Indeed, it was some miracle acne treatment that, of course, I ended up buying, and of course, made my acne even worse. 

In spite of my complete lack of charm and sex appeal that I demonstrated, Gloria somehow ended up in my little camera store one day. 

“So, you take photos?” 

She asked, holding up a camera by her heaving breasts, forcing me to ogle her indiscriminately. 

I attempted to clear my throat 

“Ack— umf- erm- Yes, erm- I do take photos” 

I said, with my best Sean Connery as James Bond smoothness. 

“I’m looking for a photographer. “

She said. 

“I’m a photographer” I replied, with eager desperation oozing through me. 

“I figured.” 

Said Gloria,  rolling her eyes. 

“How about we meet on Saturday by Rosalind park? You can show me your photographing skills. I’m willing to be your model” 

I couldn’t believe my good luck. 

I had two days to get a hair cut, a new outfit, and do more pushups than I’d done in my entire life in its culmination. 

We found a setting beside the riverbed  where there was a flat surface of smooth rock with a spot of sun beaning directly upon it. Gloria undressed from an oversized t shirt and cut off jean shorts into a gold coloured two piece swimsuit. She loosened her hair from a baseball cap and let it fall down like a dirty blonde storm. Taking off her sunglasses her blue eyes sparkled against the sunlight and stared directly into my chintzy manhood. 

“Ready?” 

My greedy eyes feasted on her voluptuous figure and struggled not to stare at her round (and possibly fake) breasts. 

I cleared my throat again

“Agh-irk-ahem, yes. Ready as I’ll ever be” 

I spoke in my unconvincing Sean Connery as James Bond. 

We shot until it was growing dark, and then the unthinkable happened: Gloria suggested we went back to my place. 

After choking and then trying to regain my inner Sean Connery, without expelling all my jizzm, I agreed, adding with tremendous excitement as well as trepidation,  that my parents were away for the weekend. 

She seemed to almost flinch at the latter detail. 

“Wait, you mean no-one is home?” Gloria asked. 

“Uh, no, uh, that’s not true,” I backpedalled 

“My little brother should be home. Is that okay?” 

Gloria looked relieved. 

“Yeah, okay” she smiled. 

...

When we got to the house I saw a pile of bikes leaned up along the side of our house.  

Oh fuck,  I thought to myself 

“I think my brother and his friends are here.” I said to Gloria. 

We walked in and a stereo was blasting with a guitar solo. 

Dean and his stupid Rolling Stones crap, I thought. 

We walked into the kitchen which rang with laughter. The table was scatettered with beer bottles and pizza boxes and poker chips. Dean and his friends and some of their girlfriends were there. 

Dean greeted me with an elated grin while everyone else grimaced at the sight of me.

“Dean, are you serious?” I said, my voice boiling. 

“Hey, relax,” said Gloria with a look of disgust.

“It’s a party.” 

The boys all gawked as Gloria pulled a chair up along Dean’s right side. On his left side was another girl, Lacey, whom, even I thought, despite me being seven years her senior, was actually kind of hot. 

“Deal me in” said Gloria as Lacey stared over, red-hot with anger. 

“Luke, man, grab this lady a beer” 

Said  Dean, laughing as Gloria pulled his head towards her and whispered something in his ear . 

“Hey Gloria,  I was going to show you my dark room upstairs. You know, for the photos?” 

I said, trying desperately to salvage my hopes at losing my virginity to Gloria Tananbaum. 

Nobody heard me. 

“Gloria, I’ll be upstairs in the darkroom, the one on the, uh, lefthand side. Um. Come up after?” 

I tried again. 

I worked away tirelessly, hoping that, perhaps, some good photos may help me redeem myself after all. 

It was well after midnight and the house had grown quiet. 

I went downstairs and the kitchen was empty. All I could hear was the sound of the TV in the living room.

I walked closer and another sound entered my ears— a voice. No... two voices. 

Inside the living room, I saw Dean’s chiseled naked body seated on a chair— my dads chair, with Gloria, straddled naked atop him, her head reeled back, her breasts jiggling as she bounced up and down. 

...

It’s been a few years since Dean’s body had mysteriously disappeared and then resurfaced along the stream at Rosalind park.  

I ended up having to move from my old town to escape the memories. All those memories of my beautiful younger brother were painful. His memory haunted the whole town. His funeral was heartbreaking enough to the entire town to shutdown in his memory. Nothing was ever quite the same after that. 

I don’t really talk to anyone from my old down anymore and I’m sure they can understand why. I’m sure they can understand the pain I’ve had to endure is simply, too much. 

I've reconstructed my life now. I now run a successful camera lens manufacturing company. Our team has some of the best minds in the world. We have revolutionized photography with our cutting edge camera technology. 

Despite all my success, I’ve still been haunted by the events of my past, so much so, that I’ve felt I had to do something to get away from it all. I’ve felt like I’ve had to change myself as a person entirely and start fresh. I wanted to be a new man. I knew I had to be strong. 

So I learned to be strong. I learned to take my life into my own hands. I learned how to ditch my old life and start over.

That’s why I decided to dye my hair blonde, hire a personal trainer, and get facial reconstruction surgery. I've even changed my name. The old Richard is dead.  

When I look at myself now, I see someone new. I see a man. I see a strong man. A real man. I see a man who makes money, who fucks beautiful women, and who knows a thing or two about really living. I’m through all that weak bullshit I grew so used to as Richard . I’m tired of being that Richard. That Richard is dead. 

I’m sitting in my office on the thirtieth floor of the building and I’m overlooking the rainy streets far down below. Bored, I debate fucking my receptionist in my office, or to go for a walk and perhaps stop and see Kristen—one of my girlfriends—at her apartment for some afternoon delight. 

I decide to get out.

I stand infront it my office mirror and smile at my beautiful reflection as I smooth out the sleeves of my Armani raincoat. 

Walking towards Kristen’s, people clear the path for me as I stride on past them.  I glare at every chick I see, size up every well dressed guy, and I peer in through  shop windows along way. Eventually I see something in a window that makes my stomach turn. 

It’s not what is behind the glass that bothers me, but what I see in the glass. It’s in the reflection smiling back at me. As the sight strikes me I grow weak at the knees. It’s the reflection of a person whom I didn’t know still exists— a person whom I thought was dead.