What's Your Sign (Part 1: Bitch Breakfast, Lesbian Lunch)

In an ideal world, any story that starts with an erection and a bottle of Cherry Coke would end with ecstasy. Sadly, I don't live in an ideal world. In my world, I was a closeted Deaf education major living in a city I hated. Every morning I would drag myself out of my cot-sized bed, take a shower, throw all my books in my backpack, and head to the dining hall for breakfast. A bowl of cereal and a bagel later, I'd be ready for whatever classes the day held for me: Calculus, ASL, French, Spanish, Elementary Education, Teaching English Composition, Set Design, Technical Theatre. At some point in the day I'd take a break for lunch either in the dining hall or the theatre. Just after lunch the rain would fall, filling the city's antiquated drainage system to capacity and filling the city with the stench of sulfur. When the sulfur faded like The Red Sox's hopes for winning The World Series, I would return to either the theatre or Only Hall for more classes. Lather, Rinse in sulfur water, Repeat.

But today was different. An erection, mine. A bottle of Cherry Coke, with a note:
Safe,
Thanks for the help with comp homework. A+ & thanks to your tutoring, I even new enough to give an empromptue (sp?) report for the class, giving me another A. Call me when you get up. We'll go out for drinks.

I sat up on the bed, stared at the TTY for a moment, and decided to hold off on calling him. I had just began to stretch when Alex waved at me from the window.

"wake up lazy shit" he signed.

"¿time for late bitch? - wrong - ¿breakfast?" It was one of my lame jokes. The first time Alex came over to hang out I'd intended to ask if he wanted to go out for breakfast, but had inadvertently used the sign for bitch.

"no early lesbian - sorry - lunch."

"fuck you"

I let him in and let him use my laptop while I went into the shower. When I came out, he and one of my suitemates, Dan, were harassing someone on AOL. "¿ready?" I asked.

"ready"

"¿you go future h-y-p-n-o-t-i-s-t?" I asked when we were in the dining hall. "maybe funny - ¿maybe you h-y-p-n-o-t-i-z-e-d?"

Incredulous look. "¿how he h-y-p-n-o-t-i-z-e me? ¿he sign instructions?"

I hadn't thought about that. But over the course of the discussion I convinced both myself and Alex that it was possible that a real hypnotist would be able to tap a person instead of snapping to get them awake or in a trance. I also imagined it was possible that a hypnotist who could sign would be able to give instructions in ASL. The odds of the hypnotist that was performing that night being an ASL fluent hypnotist, I admitted, were slim.

"don't want go - ¿You?" he asked.

Raised eyebrow and shrug. "maybe - ¿you doing?"

"both of us go-to (sign I don't understand)"

"don't understand"

"drinking"

"k - telephone me when ready"

After lunch, I went to the theatre to work on the set for a Christmas play one of the student directors was working on. It was hard for me to come to terms with the approaching holiday season. It was seventy degrees, and well, seventy degrees alone. I had the same problem when I was living in Icarus Arizona, but that will get its own entry this December under the heading "Worst Xmas Evarr11!!1".

While I was ankle deep in drill bits and cotton, my roommate, Matt, yelled to me from the balcony "Hey, Safe! I'm going to Taco Bell. You want anything?" Not feeling in the mood for botulism, I declined. "Ok, then I'm gonna head home from there. See you Monday."

I secretly cursed him for living a mere two hours from college. I was hundreds of miles away from any relative besides my grandfather, and after the miserable time I'd had with him during Thanksgiving (which will get its own entry this November under "Worst XGiving Evvvvvvvvvar!!11!!1), I had no immediate plans to revisit him. In fact, I was debating dropping out of college and moving back to Cranberry Lake.

I made plans to spend the night in my empty room downloading and masturbating to as much gay porn as I could find, and then deleting it all before my roommate or other suitemates stumbled upon it. I had forgotten that I'd made plans to go drinking with Alex until I was on my way into my room for the night. He was in the rec room, playing pool with Dan.

"hey z - wait - dan (cut-throat gesture)"

"k - me go wait (point to my room) jerk-off"

"funny - me wait ¿2 minutes? ¿3?"

About five minutes later, he showed up with a six pack of Heineken and a bottle of Bacardi. "¿thirsty?"

"very"

"¿where guitar?" Guitar was Alex's sign name for Matt, who had a habit of carrying around an acoustic guitar and playing Melissa Etheridge and Indigo Girls songs for no apparent reason. He was the first male lesbian I ever lived with.

"home"

"cool" After pouring ourselves each a drink, and putting the rest of the alcohol in the mini-fridge, we alternated between harassing people on AOL and signing to each other. "Hey, baby" he typed to some woman in SuulfurCityW4MCollegeStuds "Me and my sweetmate looking for a hot time. What are you wearing?"

I waved at him. "s-u-i-t-e-m-a-t-e not s-w-e-e-t-m-a-t-e"

"know that - but me live here not - not s-u-i-t-e-m-a-t-e me"

"¿you and me boyfriends now?"

"¡yes! blow me"

"¡face-first-love! me very horny now"

He reached into his pockets. I assumed he would be making a lewd gesture, but instead he pulled out a ziploc baggie of pills. "¿want?"

"what (pointed to pills)"

He smiled in a very Cheshire Cat manner. I didn't imagine it would be long before his body disappeared. "e-c-s-t-a-s-y"