"It doesn't count as cheating if you're tired," Jorge said to Sprinkles, bring my attention to the conversation at hand. Jorge couldn't pass a chance to impart some of his wisdom on the newest and youngest member to our friend group.
Sprinkles was the youngest, but it wasn't an easy life that had brought him to where he was. When Sam and I had found him, Sprinkles had been huddled under a paper grocery bag he'd torn open to use as a blanket. While he wasn't as clueless as the others seem to think he was, he always took the others' constant mentoring in stride.
This time, Sam was quick to jump in. "Don't listen to Jorge, Sprinkles. It's always cheating if you're in a committed relationship and the other person isn't aware and hasn't given their consent. All the time, even if you're tired."
Jorge leaned over the table so he could be heard over the pounding music. "You mean to tell me if I fall asleep with a man, and he starts touching me in the middle of the night, and I respond to those touches, and then we make dirty, filthy noises all night, that's somehow my fault?" His words slurred together. Not only was Jorge a lightweight, but he hit these nights out like a racehorse sprinting toward intoxication.
Sam pushed the empties from the center of the table to the side and leaned his narrow face into the space he'd created. The light overhead made his bushy eyebrows even bigger. "Yes, even then. That is cheating."
I sat back in my chair to give the others more room to square off. didn't know why the club lined the dance floor with these small circular tables. They were only big enough for two, but there was always a group that ended up huddled around each one. The table was already cluttered with empty glasses—and Jorge's elbows—and was about to get a lot more cluttered as Jazz worked his way from the bar back to us. His red curly hair bounced with each step.
Jazz carried a tray with several shot glasses full of brightly colored liquid on its surface. He caught my gaze and shot me a wink cheesy enough for a toothpaste commercial. Jazz was so unapologetically and authentically himself that I always had a great time whenever he was in town. Tonight, he'd declared the drinks would be on him and had kept the booze flowing at a rate I would feel the next day. I wasn't too tipsy yet but only because I'd started skipping every other round.
Most nights, my friends and I hung out at a place closer to where we all lived and more suited to our prospective incomes. We didn't always drink a lot, or at all, but down in the city at night was one of the best times to find people in trouble. Sam had founded the You Belong Outreach when he had been in high school. At that time, his outreach was just him, walking around and passing out items he'd been able to collect to those in need. In the time since, Sam had grown his one-man operation into a city-wide movement. He'd opened a physical shelter that specialized in offering LGBT youths a safe, clean place to sleep at night and, with the help of employees and volunteers—like myself—canvassed the streets on a daily and nightly basis, handing out information, hygiene products, and food to those in need.
But, while the mission was important to us both, not every night was for outreach. Especially not nights when Jazz came into town. It was too hard telling the boy no for one, and for two, a night out with Jazz was guaranteed to be an amazing time. In comparison, this night had been fairly tame.
That man swam into mind. The feeling I'd gotten when he'd come in the room hadn't been tame. Not at all. It had felt like…being seen. Like that moment when you're dreaming and realize you've gone to school without your pants on again. I bit the inside of my cheek hard. I had no reason to think of that rich douche again.
Especially since we were out with Jazz. He didn't live in the Seattle area like the rest of us. He floated around the country, which wasn't so odd compared to the lifestyles of the rest of my friends. The one quality that united us was that we all lived our lives marching to our own drummers. The true miracle had been finding so many people whose drums pounded similarly to mine.
"Who's ready to taste the rainbow?" Jazz sung the question like he was in a campy musical.
Sam glared at the drinks. "These all keep looking like drinks I'll be tasting a second time tomorrow morning."
"Nonsense. You'll pee it out first. Then you'll throw up bile." Jazz smiled. Only he could make the word bile seem sort of charming. He had one of those big mouths that could smile incredibly wide. I liked to think he simply had a face that was meant to be happy. "Good thing that's a problem for future Sam to worry about."
Sam tried not to smirk, but it was useless. The world was putty in Jazz's hands.
"When you were at the bar, did you see that guy?" I asked Jazz, pointing my forehead toward the VIP steps.
"What guy?" Jazz followed my gesture to the second floor. "Oh. Yeah. I saw him. Why?"
That hadn't quite been the response I'd expected. Jazz normally effused with a tad more vigor. I'd seen him nearly faint over men not even half as attractive as that guy. I shrugged. "I don't know. He felt…" I shook my head.
I couldn't always trust my feelings. Not when they weren't always my own.
Sam and Jorge turned their heads toward the VIP section while Sprinkles lifted his hand and pointed. "You mean that guy?"
I lunged over the table to rip Sprinkles's arm down or off—whichever would stop trying to kill me by way of utter mortification. "No, not that guy. It was no one, actually. Let's move on—"
"If he's got you this worked up, there must be something special about him," Jorge added. "Want me to relieve him of his wallet, and you can work your mojo?"
Jorge's journey to his present self had been colored and included several years of stealing what he could to survive living on the streets. He'd since given up his life of a pickpocket, but I had a hunch he went out to keep his skills sharp every once in a while. I didn't approve of the stealing, but I understood being backed into a corner. I also understood how, having gone through something like that, he'd never believe the life he had at the moment would be the life he'll always have and wanting to make sure he had his survival skills to fall back on.
My mojo. Sometimes it felt more like a curse. But on most days, it was my blessing. One day when I was very young, my life changed. When I touched things that belonged to other people, things that they'd had around or on them during particularly emotion-packed moments, I felt the emotional history of what I touched.
I thought it had something to do with sensing energy waves or auras, but it was easier to describe to my friends by just calling it my mojo. It wasn't a skill I was ashamed of. I'd be a hypocrite if I were, since reading auras from people's things was how I afforded to live at all. I offered fortune telling to the tourists on the sidewalks. The schtick was they would ask a question. Then I would ask them to give me something of theirs. Most people handed over a watch or an umbrella. It didn't matter. The emotions were almost always enough to make an educated guess.
It was a gamble each time, and I just had to hope an item didn't carry a bad aura. Objects that had been present during horrible events were the worst. The negative emotions clung to me like memories refusing to fade. It was the same when an object had a happy history too. Basically, I was tofu, and there were some flavors, some emotions, that I did not want to soak in.