Pee On Water

INFECTIONS

William sat by the dry reflecting pool and ate his bagel without Justin. Here they would sit on a Sunday, after a long night of blowjobs and iTunes. William poked extra cream cheese out the bagel’s hole, letting it fall to the concrete. Like all city parks, Rittenhouse Square idealizes the nature everyone is missing out on, William would say to Justin. It’s a biblical fantasy. Parks make trees a fetish thing. But Justin’s thoughts would be lost in the refection pool, then full, approving how his eyes and nose and mouth made aesthetic sense together, while the faces of other park-goers seemed genetically slapped together, mutated into adult finality.

In Anatomy, William and his group were given a dead body. The hardest part to saw apart was the teeth. William let the girls do that part. It was an old woman’s body and having never seen one in real life, he was unprepared for the intricacy of a vagina. The skin is divided into folds, lying between the legs like a lizard in the sun, William wrote in his notebook. It feels as though the lizard hasn’t moved in hours, but might at any second slowly shift its weight. William nudged closer for a better look. He pushed his rubber-gloved finger against the vagina. The other boy in the group raised his eyebrows at William, implying. William informed him that he was gay. The boy looked at him. William said something in a gay-sounding voice that made the girls smile. Then the boy moved closer to William and the vagina. “Well, usually this part is way more pink, and it’s sort of wet over here, like with an oil or shine or something.” The girls squirmed as he described this.

At Woody’s, the dance floor was crowded with muscle-flexers, as usual. William danced near a cute boy with glasses. An older unattractive man danced towards William. In a series of moves, William escaped from the unattractive man. He danced up to the cute boy with glasses, but the cute boy danced into the center of the floor. William’s dancing slowed as muscle-flexers filled the spot abandoned by the cute boy.

Drunk leaving Woody’s, he tripped on the pavement. Blood ran up to the surface of his scraped knees. William knew that in humans, oxygenated blood was bright red. He knew that deoxygenated blood was a darker shade of red. Also, there was a rare condition, sulfhemoglobinemia, that resulted in green blood, blah blah blah. He knew all about it. He looked at the blood on his knee and felt privileged to have his body. He didn’t bother cleaning the dirt from the cuts.

Justin’s homeless friend was sleeping in the doorway when William wandered back to his apartment. William looked with interest at the man’s slender arms. If the man were dead like in Anatomy, then William could touch the man’s arm. The man woke and looked at him, “Justin home?” he said. William wiped at his bleeding knees.

“Justin has left his home forever.”

“Shame.” The man put his fingers to his eyes, “He leave his anti-anxieties?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t check. Maybe. I don’t know.”

“He’d been giving me his anti-anxieties. Made him too dizzy.” William considered the man. If he were the man, he would get more tattoos. Sometimes, one looked lonely alone on an arm. William looked at a scratch on the man’s knuckle. “Hey, that looks kind of infected.”

“That so? You tell me, Medicine Man.” William smirked and went inside.

* * *

In the bathroom, he brushed his teeth with his new natural toothpaste. As he sat on the toilet, he stared at the stupid inspirational poster Justin had left behind. Learn to watch snails. Plant impossible gardens. Make little signs that say Yes! and post them all over your walls. Yeah Right. William stayed up late looking at his diseases textbook, skimming for the strange and unusual. Black hairy tongue was a harmless condition sometimes caused by Pepto-Bismol.

William found himself on the website where he met Justin. Justin’s profile still read the same. “I used to be religious. Turns out I just like mythology.” William reread the whole thing, idly highlighting with the cursor. “My hair often has its own ideas about how it wants to be styled.” Some sentences in the profile rang false, “I often have dark circles under my eyes because I love to sleep.” Also, “I am a cross between Angelina Jolie and young Robert De Niro.” Yeah Right. Then he highlighted what he hated, “You could spend a lifetime with me and never get to know every facet of my personality, though you'd have a great time trying.” That was not true. William highlighted the whole thing blue, then unhighlighted. He considered starting up a fake profile and using it to flirt with Justin. Only if things got boring. Or stressful. If things got so boring or stressful that William felt suicidal, then he would instead start up this fake profile. As a gift to himself. And maybe also if he got slightly suicidal, he might let Justin’s cute homeless friend live with him, because the apartment was so big and lonely, plus it would be a good deed!

* * *

It was the semester when William and his classmates were paired with different doctors. So far he’d had the dermatologist and the pediatrician. Tomorrow was the oncologist. William searched the medicine cabinet looking for Justin’s medicine and found bottles and bottles of it. He gave some to Justin’s homeless friend and took some himself when he missed Justin. Which was most times. He stared at his desktop background. He checked his knee and saw no infection. In some ways, it was a shame. Once he had a staph infection and it was not an entirely bad experience. He scrolled down his iTunes library, giving random ratings to each song. When he came to his cousin’s album, he gave each song only one star, just to be mean.

On the day of the oncologist, William felt light-headed, but it was just the anti-anxieties. The oncologist poured coffee for him and William, “It’s good to make your patients wait a little, makes them respect your time.” The oncologist talked as they walked to the first patient of the day. “Ms. Kespetrova’s situation is complicated by a breast implant procedure 10 years prior to the cancer.” They strolled down the hall side-by-side. “She has an accent.” William kept up the pace. “She’s a real trip.” The oncologist sighed, fingering the cool metal part of his stethoscope. “This is just for show,” he joked to William as they walked inside the room. Ms. Kespetrova sat in a fur coat on the examination table. “I go half crazy in these rooms waiting. Sometimes I go all the way crazy!” She smiled at William. “That is what a doctor should look like!” She nodded approvingly at William. The doctor spoke to William about the left side tumor, showing the most recent ultrasounds.

“I’m just a student,” William explained and introduced himself. “I’m sorry to hear of your condition,” he continued politely. The Russian woman laughed. “Do not be sorry!” The doctor looked uncomfortable. Ms. Kespetrova screamed, “I get to have it all!” She tugged her fur coat emphatically, “First no breasts, flat chest like a boy, then little tiny ones, then bigger and bigger, healthy full breasts, then bigger breasts for breastfeeding,” she sighed, “then tired breasts, swollen nipples, sagging, then surgery and implants and bouncing breasts, and now lump, machines, x-rays. So much attention on my perfect breast and its imperfection, this one,” she took off her fur coat and was topless. She shook her large left breast at William, “Soon this breast will be cut away. It will be trash in the bottom of a can. My chest will be lopsided, one-sided, original. My body is always changing.” The doctor checked something in his cell phone. Ms. Kespetrova continued, “Aging does not necessarily have to be a disappointment. I had beautiful grey hair young. It made all the girls want to go and dye it like that. A girlfriend of mine, she had a humongous wedding ring. Diamond the size of a dinner mint. She was walking in Miami Beach late at night, a man on the street cut off her finger. At first, pain and despair, but now everyone admires her for it. She gave something up.” William nodded encouragingly. The doctor shook his head. His eyes narrowed on a clump of dust on the floor. “We must be going now, Ms. Kespetrova. Dr. Muller will be in shortly.” The doctor motioned to William and they went back into the hall.

“My wife wants me to pick up the kids, but there is no way I’ll be out of here in time. The kids are at day care,” the doctor said to William. “I need her to pick up the kids, or at least call the other parents to see if they will drive theirs and ours. I, in no way, have time to call the other parents.”

* * *

Staring at the poster, William tried to think of a cool way to ask the homeless man to move in. He didn’t want it to seem like a come on, but why would it seem like a come on? He smiled when he remembered the Russian woman. He knew just what she meant. Sometimes being sick is interesting. Cry during movies. Cultivate moods. He was going to have to destroy the poster. What had he been thinking before? The homeless man. Justin? Something about the woman. Like when he had his staph infection, it was so gross and painful and horrifying at first. But then he got used to it and on medication, the pain lessened. He was no longer afraid of the infection. He was intrigued. His body had made something that needed him. He had to change its band-aid each night and check its progress. He had to care for it. Gently, he’d press the infection to ooze out pus. He liked thinking the pus was cum. Also, blood would come out, not dripping out, but in little balls. Balls of blood. Balls of cum. His body had made him something.

* * *

The class had to write essays about the week with the different doctors. William’s was titled “The Illness as Interesting Life Experience” and was returned to him with a failing grade. “Wha-at?” William asked the paper. His classmates were packing up their books. He ducked out of the classroom. He looked to see his thesis circled and question marked. ‘In addition to sympathizing with the patient, the doctor can also treat the illness as an experience, as a creative capability of the body.’ William rolled his eyes to himself. God, the medical world is so closed-minded. He started running instead of walking, crossing over to Center City in a hurry, sneaking onto 24^th street while the hand sign was blinking red. They’re taking the body, a strange, unpredictable, wonderful mess, and they’re boiling it down to a syllabus! William breathed in some car exhaust. He stared at the mutant woman on Market Street, her wig plastered to her head, her make-up like a voodoo mask stuck on from last year. Luckily, life can’t be contained in a stupid fucking syllabus.

* * *

The homeless man cleaned up so nice, just as William had suspected. It was fun to show him the apartment. “This is Justin’s mother’s couch, but it’s mine now. It’s ours,” he said to include the homeless man. “It’s yours,” he said to be generous. “It pulls out.” Together, they pulled out the bed. It was nice to come home and find the man deep in reading the cookbook and the anatomy book. By now, he claimed to have memorized the anatomy book.

Class was all review for final exams. William leaned back in his chair. Looking at the boys’ bodies, he pretended they were corpses and he was to dissect them and re-sect them to form the perfect man. That was the Final Exam. Then he would put the creature back to life like in Rocky Horror and have to blow the creation to get an A. If the penis hadn’t been correctly re-attached then an erection would be impossible. It would have Anthony’s hair, Jake’s full lips, Phil’s arms, and Jennifer’s eyes, if that were allowed, if he could take one thing from her. Maybe her eyes would mix everything up. The teacher scrawled study questions on the board. William had once heard someone describe a coma as the best rest of her life. Sign me up, he said to himself.

Once, after his wisdom teeth had been taken out, William had taken OxyContin and briefly gone into daydreams. The dreams were convincing. They’d have him in a scene with someone he knew and then someone would tell a joke or share an idea or nothing, then suddenly switch to a new scene. That was how William wanted to live life anyway, a little bit of this, a little bit of something totally different. He didn’t want to be one person the whole time.

* * *

Sitting cozily in their living room, the homeless man quizzed William for the exam. William could only recall 3 of the 11 facial nerves. He thought that lumber puncture was when the spinal canal narrows and compresses the spinal cord, but that was spinal stenosis, said the homeless man. William didn’t remember anything about the medial branches of the posterior divisions of the upper six thoracic nerves. “I haven’t been having an easy time studying. The internet is soo distracting.” He mixed up mentencephalon and myelencephalon. Whenever he heard pancreas he thought about pancakes. “I’ve been dizzy. Studying makes me dizzy.” William took a cigarette from the man’s pack and got up. He took a piss in the bathroom, cultivate moods, ripped down the poster, and went back to the living room.

“Your turn,” he took the anatomy book and quizzed the homeless man. The endocrine system was communication within the body using hormones made by the hypothalamus, pituary, pineal body, thyroid, parathyroids, and adrenal glands. A sacrum consisted of five bones that were separate at birth, but later fused together into a solid structure. William wiped some sweat from his neck and smelled his hand. “Are you looking at the answer sheet over there?” William looked for a lighter.

“Answer sheet? This is my job application,” he flashed the answer sheet at William. William looked up from his cigarette. He could see the homeless man looking flattering in slim-fit scrubs. The homeless man starring in Grey’s Anatomy. He could see the ‘Homeless to Famous’ story being churned out of newspaper-making machines.

* * *

The homeless man scored William some painkillers like he’d wanted. He stood in William’s doorway and tossed William the bottle. He scratched one arm with the other arm. One of these days, William was going to lend him money to get another tattoo. The three-legged dog would look great with something completely different underneath it. Like a name with a date or something.

William signed onto the dating website as his fake name, Skyler. A boy had sent him a message. Bored, William scrolled down the boy's profile. His pictures showed him drunk on two different holidays, then once playing devil sticks in his living room. William took one of the Percocets, then went back to the computer. He looked at profiles, “I was a computer science major at Temple, although I think I'm ultimately going to become a shaman of some sort,” but then his eyes didn't want to do that anymore. He pushed his burning Powerbook from his lap. Running windows on a Mac made him love the anonymity of windows. The gay dating site wasn't up to par. Like it left this aftertaste of disgust. Was that how dating sites worked? Was there a way around that?

William felt for his cell phone because there was a noise it had to make. For tomorrow, if he was going to wake for the exam, then there was an important noise for the phone. A girl stuck her gum to a sign post and then walked down the street. William watched and realized she was part of the drug. In a car, it was him and the homeless guy. The trees passed. The street passed. Totally random. William was happy the drug was good at being a drug. Like what if the drug was only good at looking good in a bottle? Justin sat down, “You see I got this haircut, but it’s making me hate myself.” “I don’t want you to hate yourself,” William said, giggling. For some reason computers always asked if they should save files, when the files hadn’t even been changed. It was a nervous habit of computers.

William sat with his uncle in a church. “I wanted to see a bunch of little scenes. I wanted life to move fast, but I think it’s moving slow.” His uncle nodded and said, “I mean that’s why I moved away. It wasn’t a right fit. Everyone looked at me strange because I was tall.” William waited in line in a restaurant, “I thought it would be scenes.” Wind blew each leaf on a tree. The clouds looked nothing like animals. The drug was making scenes. His “Illness as Interesting” paper had made sense in the computer. All the letters were straight next to other letters. There was a lot to celebrate about having a body. Justin said, “Now we can talk about Skyler.” William said, “Who?” William’s Dad said, “Who?” In the dark, it was obvious again that William would not transform into a doctor, “That’s alright, guys. We don’t have to talk about me. We should talk about something important. We should talk about the election.”

If the blood, for instance, got mixed up with some dirt, then the body would start a war with the dirt, forming a pus wall to block the virus. The virus wants to live and then there’s this conflict taking place within the body. William imagined an infection as a fly stuck in an egg yolk, as a bad smell traveling through a car window. A thing clinging on that didn’t belong. Justin infecting the New York gay/queer/trans social scene. William infecting UPenn Med School.

The body can start sending out bad messages. The body can make things you don’t want it to make. The paper must’ve been in the completely utterly totally incorrect font. Many eyes wouldn’t have been able to comprehend the font, maybe. Possibly, it was just a wrong font.

Then it changed back to William and the homeless man in the car. The homeless man drove quickly wavering in and out of the lines. From the passenger seat, William looked out his window, then at the beautiful face of the homeless man. The homeless man was swerving. His eyes looked like he hadn’t gone to sleep for most of his life. The homeless man turned and said, “If you want me to drive, I could just drive instead.” William didn’t understand. The homeless man drove on, gripping the wheel. He missed another line. He looked at William and said, “Man, your eyes look like you bought them used.” The car drove half on the grass. A stick got stuck in the tire, then snapped. The homeless man looked at William, “You don’t have to drive the whole way. I know you, you get tired.”