FicWad

Josh Rogan occasionally narrated particularly dismal anecdotes in his life through inner monologue, with the unstated aim of some day collecting them into a book so that the rest of the world could know how very much he had suffered, and take pity on him. From a distance, of course. This particular one, he decided, would start in the same way almost all the others did. It was all Thompson's fault.

That very afternoon, he'd been sitting in his apartment, in a frayed T-shirt and jeans, staring at the computer without actually doing anything. His most recent play - /The Seven Bowls of God's Wrath/, in which Rogan had played the Antichrist, and hadn't been at all surprised - had ended a few days previously, and he had been halfheartedly looking for work and mostly enjoying the delights of having money. Unfortunately for Rogan, Jimmy the Bastard had been visiting. He had been talking to Thompson and, in Rogan's eyes, being a bastard. He'd eaten the last of Rogan's Tim Tams.

"So," Jimmy the Bastard had said, chewing on the biscuity goodness, "what are we planning to do tonight?"

Rogan had said nothing, silently adding another thousand years to the Bastard's well-deserved punishment for each crunch of Tim Tam.

"We could go to a club," Thompson had suggested. "They do it in movies."

Jimmy had stared at Thompson for a moment. Rogan hadn't. Long years of experience had taught him to accept anything Thompson said. He was, perhaps, the best person in the world to interpret Thompson Thompson - maybe the /only/. He was considering "Thompson Thompson interpreter" as a life choice.

"They do go to clubs in movies," Jimmy had agreed. "But we, Thompson, are not in movies. Only one of us is even an actor, and he does /plays/. /Plays/, for God's sake!"

Five million, three hundred and twenty eight thousand years, Rogan thought to himself.

"Come on, Jimmy. There'll be fun! We can be a part of the fun!"

"I'm not going," Rogan intervened. "Which means you're not taking my car. Which means it's public transport, or you think of something to do here. Or, you know, /somewhere that isn't here/." He hoped he had been subtle enough.

Jimmy stared at him for a moment, then slung an arm around Thompson's shoulders. "I need to confer with Thompson for a moment," he stated, and dragged him away.

"This bar," he said, an interrogator looking at the face of a man who could ferret out an entire stack of gold.

"The Mottled Oyster," Thompson filled in.

"The Mottled Whatever. Will it be sleazy?"

"Not to the best of my knowledge, no," Thompson replied, cherubic.

Jimmy's face fell.

"It might be moderately sleazy?" Thompson said.

"Well, sleaze doesn't really matter. Will there be young, attractive women there, come to couple with the males of the species?"

"So I'm told." Thompson blinked. "Also there's a buffet."

Jimmy turned Thompson back around, and marched to the side of Rogan's computer. "It will do you good to get out of the apartment," he said.

"No."

"Come on, man. When's the last time you left for something that wasn't your play or groceries?"

"Wednesday last week. Fifteen days ago."

"And what does that sound like to you?"

"Heaven. Leave me alone."

"I'll tell you what it sounds like. It sounds like a sad bastard, old before his time."

"You're the Bastard, Jimmy. Renowned for it."

"Yes, but I'm not old before my time. I'm young after my time."

"Someone once told you that was a good thing. I'd like you to check that opinion right now."

And so the argument had continued, and finally it had got on the subject of rent, vis a vis Rogan's rent that Jimmy had paid the last week, and if Jimmy didn't get to go to a club that night, well, he'd just have to pursue some more expensive forms of entertainment and then he'd just have to call in his loans, and it had all ended in Rogan sitting at a bar with a fancy drink with a stupid name and hating everything in the world, especially, especially, especially Jimmy the Bastard.

Jimmy returned to the seat by Rogan, passing by a furiously dancing Thompson Thompson as he did so. He'd only been slapped twice this evening but, Rogan told himself optimistically, the night was young.

"I'm pretty sure she was a lesbian," Jimmy the Bastard said, nodding sagely.

"Strange that so many women at these bars are," Josh Rogan replied. "Is it just me, or do all your pick-up lines start with 'Hey, baby'..."

"I stick with what works."

"When have they ever worked?"

"Bound to, eventually." Jimmy the Bastard sipped his drink. Rogan thought it was called a 'Transexual Orgy', and had strong suspicions that Jimmy only drank it for the name. He did seem to wince with every drink from it.

"How can he possibly be enjoying himself?" Jimmy continued, pointing the 'Transexual Orgy' towards Thompson, who was gyrating madly on the dance floor to a Sarah McLachlan song, while everyone else slow-danced and gave him odd looks.

"Thompson needs no dignity to enjoy himself," Rogan replied. "It's endearing, in an annoying kind of way."

Jimmy stared for a moment. "It makes sense. A valid lifestyle choice. In fact, an excellent lifestyle choice. A lifestyle choice that more people should choose! It's happy, it's carefree, it's damn near blissful!"

"And it makes you look better."

"And it makes me look better."

"Which is something you sorely need."

"...You know, Rogan, that cuts."

"And I was just thinking that I'd left my knife at home. I was wondering what I'd do." Rogan took a sip from his own drink - a 'Maltese Falcon', as Rogan also stuck with what worked - and tried not to notice the attractive brunette walking towards him.

"Hey," she started, sounding endearingly shy in a manner that Rogan immediately decided was completely manufactured. "This seat taken?"

"Abandon hope, all ye who enter here," Rogan muttered.

"What was that?"

"I said not to my knowledge."

"Hey, baby..." Jimmy the Bastard started. The woman ignored him.

"I just saw you sitting here and you looked so /forlorn/. It seems really wrong to be alone when there's so many people around, right?"

"I don't know," Rogan said. "Alone has its points."

"Hey, baby, should I call an ambulance?"

"Yeah, but at a /club/?"

"The best place to be alone. Everyone at a club probably should be."

"'Cause it must have hurt when you fell from heaven!"

"Come on. You don't believe that."

"Who are you to tell me what I do and don't believe?" Rogan asked, sounding nettled.

"Look, lady," Jimmy the Bastard said, shallow patience exhausted. "That guy? Lost cause. I mean, all he does is brood. And all these girls were hitting on him, and they were really hot, and he just ignored 'em. And he never comes to these sort of places, and all he does is stay at home and take care of his friend, and... /the man is in plays/! He's in /plays/!"

At the end of Jimmy the Bastard's recitation, the woman hastily scrawled a series of digits on a napkin, pushed them at Rogan, stated, "That's my phone number, if you ever need it, not that I'm suggesting you will, but you know, if you ever want to do anything", and walked away with some speed, turning back to glance over her shoulder every so often.

"That's the /third one today/," Jimmy grumbled, taking another sip of his 'Transexual Orgy' and wincing.

"Yeah, well, I'm no happier about it than you are."

"/Everyone is hitting on you/. How can you not be happy?"

"'Cause I'd rather people leave me alone. I'd rather be /home/."

"Then what brought you out here?"

"You threatened my economic well-being!"

"It was for your /own good/!"

"It was so you could get laid! Something that doesn't look to be happening in the near future! Or in any future, for that matter!"

"Because you're stealing all my prospects!"

"/Prospects/?"

"Women, then! Whatever!"

"Maybe you should consider the fact that you call them prospects before you blame me for your single status!"

"Damn you for being so liberated!"

"Damn you for being so shallow!"

"Damn you for being so brooding!"

"Damn you for being so irritating!"

/Fumbling Towards Ecstasy/, at its pumped-up volume, finished. Jimmy didn't notice, taking the opportuinty to shout at the top of his voice: "Damn you for being so sexy!"

The club, as a whole, turned to stare at Jimmy and Rogan.

"Not that I find him sexy!" Jimmy was quick to point out. "I don't! Because I wouldn't! Because I'm not gay!"

"Persuasive," Rogan chuckled into his glass.

Jimmy stopped talking for a moment, and then seized his opportunity to point both index fingers at Rogan. "He is!"

Rogan raised his eyebrows.

"He sleeps with men! All the time! It's what he does! They call him Mansleep McSleepswithmen!"

The next song started.

Jimmy sat down, satisfied.

Time passed.

Jimmy was less satisfied.

"I don't like it," he opined. "The drinks are tasting worse as time goes by. Thompson's still flailing around like a monkey." He paused, apparently considering that insufficient. "A retarded monkey on crack cocaine/," he finally decided. "And I've still not gotten a single look and now you're getting hit on by /both sexes."

"Yeah, thanks for that. I think I've already told you that what I want most in all the world right now is /to go home/."

"Yeah, well, this bar sucks anyway." Jimmy drained his 'Transexual Orgy' and visibly shuddered.

Rogan stared. "Did I hear you right? Are you actually saying that you'd be willing to accomodate my happiness?"

"Don't intend to make a habit of it."

Both of them stood, and turned to the dance floor, where Thompson had gone into a dance step that appeared to mainly involve throwing himself into the air and spinning as many times as possible before landing on his hands. He waved enthusiastically to Jimmy and Josh before falling over.

"On the other hand..." Jimmy said, uncomfortably.

"...that's happier than I've seen him for some time, and he's always pretty happy," Rogan finished.

Both of them looked at each other, silent pleading in both pairs of eyes.

Then they sat back down.

"Maltese Falcon," Rogan said, waving his hand at the bartender.

"Trans..." Jimmy started, and then stopped. "What he's having."

"Wise man," Rogan said.

Jimmy still winced when he sipped his drink, but it was decidedly less pained.