though my manager said I should start getting chicks to sign an NDA, and honestly, it’s not a bad idea. It’s the principle of the whole thing. It’s like nothing’s sacred anymore or something.” He raised his beer to his lips and took a long pull.
Craig shook his head. That meant sympathy.
“I could tell she was crazy, but I thought it was the good kind of crazy, you know?” Jake shot a significant look at the crown of Craig’s head. “You saw her that night, man. Dancing in front of the stage, making a show of herself. She came to fuck. So we fucked! And then what does she do?” He slapped his hand down on the table. “BAM! She twists things around so it looks like I’m the bad guy.”
Craig lifted his head. “It’s fucked up, man.”
“It is fucked up!” Jake shook his head, baffled. “I swear, I will never understand women.”
Craig made a noise that meant I agree. Craig had problems of his own—his ex-girlfriend from a couple months back had called earlier to say she’d been to the doctor and it turned out she had chlamydia, so he should probably go see a doctor himself so he could get some antibiotics. “It’s very treatable,” she’d said, as if that were some kind of consolation. He wasn’t about to tell Jake, though. What, and get his balls busted for the next six months? Nah.
“The more I think about it, the more I feel like I’m the one who got violated or whatever, you know? Think about it: I let her into my house, I have sex with her, which she was begging for, and then I’m the one who gets the shit kicked out of him. She gets to tell her side of the story and suddenly everybody thinks I’m some kind of sick pervert. How is that fair?”
Craig grunted. He didn’t have insurance at the minute. Fuck. How much was this doctor’s appointment going to cost him? Maybe he could try the free clinic, though somebody might spot him there and he’d have to explain . . .
Craig took a swig of his beer. He’d Googled chlamydia after getting off the phone with her, and now he couldn’t get the pictures out of his head. Holy fuck, man. That shit was no joke.
Jake leaned back in his chair. “What’s crazy is, all the attention from the article has made the new single blow up,” he continued. “My manager called this afternoon to tell me he got a couple calls from promoters, wanting to set up a national tour. So maybe I owe her a thank-you.”
Did it mean that she’d been sleeping with other guys when they were still together? Was that how she’d picked it up? Craig made a mental note to Google the gestation time when he got home, and then changed his mind. He didn’t want to know.
“Have you read the comments section? They’re crucifying her. Not that they know who she is. ‘Anonymous,’ my ass.” Jake shook his head again and finished off his beer. He signaled the waitress for another round. “I told my manager I was going to out her, but he told me it might make me less sympathetic. People might want to interview her, and she might make up some bullshit that would make me look worse.” He shrugged. “I still wish somebody would out her, though. It’d be funny as hell.”
Craig’s brother-in-law was a pharmacist. Maybe he could just call him up, ask him to swipe a pack of antibiotics for him. It wasn’t like he was asking for Oxy or anything.
Jake grinned at the waitress as she set their beers down on the table, and she smiled back. “Might have to get her number,” he murmured to himself as he watched her walk away.
Nah, his brother-in-law would never agree to that. He was too much of a wuss.
“Okay, so maybe I was a little rough, but most chicks love that shit. Women like being dominated, period. They act like they want to be all independent, but deep down, they want a man to tell them what to do and how to do it. It’s just human nature. Ain’t nothing wrong with it.” Long swig of beer, suppressed belch. “But what’s crazy is that what she did to me is legal. Can you believe that? I mean, I believe in free speech as much as the next guy, but this shit is like . . . slander or something.”