One.

I was flat broke on this Good Friday. Paranoia rose and bubbled over my mind like heated magma. I truly did not know what I was going to do if this deal did not go through. I strode across the international bridge and passed the obese customs agent with his eyes filled with hate and paranoia. I swear they can smell fear.

I dashed or more like hobbled over to the Café Percolator. I had three dollars to my name. Three dollars which I had borrowed from my forever suffering landlady in Juárez. I obviously have been mismanaging my money. I can’t understand how quick it went this month. Here it is the end of the month and I haven’t centavo one – the last meal I had was a meager sandwich for lunch the day before. At least I still had cigarettes. My borrowed three dollars held a distinct service, I needed it for coffee. I needed it to use to wait.

I sat at a table staring out the large pane windows at the warm spring day. Nearby, a group of hipsters sat on the overstuffed couch. One was a black goateed man with tattoos and black clothes – shorts, buttoned shirt. There was a girl who resembled a strung out junkie with ratty hair and plump – ahem, I mean curvy physique – and the obligatory third wheel queer who sat and laughed at everything the goateed hipster would utter in his baritone voice. The fag was nerdy and timid. Probably still a virgin. Or molested all his life by his father or uncle. There was sadness in that face.

“I like my piercings. Even the one on my dick.” He rumbled.

“I like septum piercings. Even on dicks.” She points to the fag, “Not your small dick, but his big dick.” She coyly smiles back at the tattooed guy. Yes, female, keep the fag in his place.

“When I was I was locked up, we’d always check out each other’s dick in the showers.” Smiled the tattooed man.

“Really?” Asked the fag faintly. “But, most of them men are gross.”

“Let’s go drinking at 8 ½!” Blurted the girl. (8 ½ was the local gay bar where straights hung out to be edgy and cool)

“Yeah!” Rumbled the tattooed guy. “I get free drinks there all the time.”

“Babe!” The girl blurted. “I need to get to the pawn shop and get money for this necklace. But, I don’t have an I.D.”

Enough of this putrid dialog. I took a walk through the city. Spring has definitely arrived. The hip-hop youth swagger boys be-bopped around half naked with their pinch-faced, hickey covered females in tow. The air was hot and the sidewalks simmered. Though I attempted to lighten my mood in lieu of the much saught after change from cold to hot in the weather, I simply could not shake this depression. As I walked down the sidewalks passing scowling face after scowling face, it was too much. I returned to the cafe.

The barista who I want to fuck was generally concerned with my manic mood. That is why I can never hope to attain a relationship. Seriously, who on this wide, wide planet is going to deal with my depressive shit? I wouldn't.

On the advent that I would literally force myself out of this trap I had stuck myself in three years ago, not only did I just up and leave my apartment in El Paso for Juarez, but now I am selling my high end electronics. Starting with my xbox. No loss there. It hindered my writing time, anyway. Instead of spilling my thoughts like I should have, I usually spent day and night attempting to beat that next level. My long time friend and biggest fan of my work, a cat named Miguel, had agreed to take the offensive machine off my hands.

As five in the afternoon rolled around, Miguel was punctual and the transaction was completed. After a slew of fluffy pleasantries, Miguel dropped me off at my flat back in Juarez. Immediately, I raced to the rotisserie chicken and purchased dinner. God I was fucking starving! I devoured the meal back home and fastly fell asleep. I awoke around eight. Showered. Dressed. I wanted a drink, so I walked the two blocks by my house to a bar called Olympico. Notorious for a Daddy Bar - Mexican style.

I entered the swinging metal door and not even time for my ass to warm a stool some doe-eyed twink sides up to me and asks for a beer. He wasn't bad looking and had a hell of a sense of humor. Sure, why not?

His name, so he stated, was Edgar. We spent the next few hours talking, drinking, coyly flirting and when eleven rolled around, we found ourselves rolling out of the bar, stumbling down the street and up to his apartment above a tortilla factory. Nice place. He said he lived with his mother who owned said factory. She was on a weekend sojourn to Chihuahua City. We drank two shots of tequila each and then found ourselves committing crimes against nature well into the night.

The following morning we sat at the table, chain smoking cigarettes and drinking very strong Guatemalan coffee when I asked, "So, Edgar...you are really scrawny. What kinds of food do you like?"

"Anything that is fried in fat." Edgar smirked.

"You don't follow the current health trends like the good Lord intended?" I said.

"You only live once. Why limit yourself to the approval of others opinions?"

I blew gray smoke up to the ceiling and laughed. I think I am in love...