February 26, 2005

After four exhilarating days on the road, I got home last night and unpacked my bags, throwing everything on the floor. My bedroom became a swirling mess of toys, tapes, water bottles, jeans, cum-stained underwear, memories…

Laura hijacked her parents’ car Tuesday morning and came to pick me up with smiles and coffee. We were giddy and excited to be rushing out so suddenly towards nowhere and I had a hard-on. “We need booze,” I said. “And sardines. And a hat.”

We bought booze in Fergus and stopped in Mount Forest to get high, healthy, and happy. I bought myself a bonnet and we ran through the city to pee and look inquisitively at Mennonites. When Laura felt sufficiently happy, she jumped on my back and I carried her back to the car.

In two hours we reached Owen Sound, where we roamed the streets starving and looking for a place to eat. Owen Sound is absurd in the winter: men shovel non-existent snow for hours; broken words adorn buildings (“I feel this”, “this is heart month in the tsunami”, “importance to miss”); and ships and beer bottles float in the frozen harbour.

“Where are you from,” the waitress asked us when we finally found a restaurant.

“Waterloo. We’re on a road trip,” I said with boyish enthusiasm.

“To Owen Sound?” I knew our trip sounded ridiculous, and didn’t say anything. Laura held my hand and we laughed.

After dinner we picked up three cans of sardines, nuts, and two bottles of water. The weather turned to shit as we left the city, and we rushed towards Tobermory with Janis Joplin blearing in our ears and mud dancing happily on our windows. She steered the car expertly with her left hand and prodded me gently with her right.

We reached the nothingness that is Tobermory at sunset and got a room at the only motel still open in the winter. Everything in Tobermory was blue, even after the sun went down. A blue haze consumed the night, the harbour, and the moon. We opened a bottle of wine and sat down in front of the window to talk and touch.

And when we closed our eyes our voices trembled and our lips met, and the room was filled with sighs, moans, and whispers. Flesh circled flesh with wet, glorious kisses. In the middle of the night she ran naked onto the balcony, giddy with excitement. I closed the door behind her, and when she came back, cool and open as the night, she pulled me to her and kissed me fiercely.

“I never want to hurt you,” I said, and her flesh trembled in pain beneath me.

“You have to,” she said, and pushed her body hard against mine digging her nails into my back. I tried to make her pain go away with a thousand kisses, until we fell asleep naked, sweaty, and full of tenderness. And that was the first day and the first night, and it was good.

I’m going to write my story involving a car, a girl, and a boy in three parts. This is the first part; tomorrow I’ll tell you about hiking in the winter, peeing in the snow, and riding naked towards St. Catharines.