..::Place disclaimer here::..

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Sometimes I'm not so sure about love.

Which is pretty dumb of me seeing as all I've ever gotten in life was love, love, and some more love.

My parents love me, they pay my college tuition and keep me clothed and fed in an apartment that I share with my friend Race.

Girls love me. At parties they flock to me, asking for my number and I've spent many nights with a pretty girl next to me.

But that's not love love. It's not the love people experience in movies and on TV. It's the kind of love everyone gets. It's not romance, it's…typical.

My name is Skittery Dilger and I think I'm gay.

Well that sounds stupid.

My name is Skittery Dilger and I live in San Diego. It hasn't rained here in five months. Even when it's a cloudy day, the sun shines. I live in Dorchester East, a slightly sleazy apartment complex. Just a few miles away is Tijuana, a city with a split personality like Superman. During day it's a tourist haven, at night it's quite easy to get thrown in the drunk-tank. All we do is party and go to the beach. Life here, on the outside, is perfect.

That sounds even more stupid.

My name is Skittery Dilger and I'm too afraid to tell my "friends" what I think. What I am.

As Race and I walk to Ralph's to get the basics ((water, beer, vodka, and chips)), I contemplate some of the mysteries in life like:

Why does my head hurt?

"Race, why does my head hurt?"

"How the hell am I supposed to know? Do I look like the keeper of your head?"

"Well you didn't drink last night…so"

"Oh yea…you ran into a wall. On purpose. Caroline laughed for hours. And then Joe got into this big fight with Sonia so she was distracted and we just left you out in the courtyard. Then Pat brought you back to Chicago and that's why your head hurts and how you ended up there."

"Oh," I suppose I drink too much. But not as much as everyone else in Dorchester.

Dorchester is a lot like Melrose Place. There's a courtyard and a pool. Except I think our apartment complex is a lot dirtier with a lot more broken beer bottles adorning the property.

Everyone who lives there is from California, except for Race and I and Joe and Pat, hence our apartment being "New York" and their apartment being "Chicago".

Joe and Pat are one person. They talk alike, dress alike. Every week they get into some ridiculous fight. They love to scream "CHICAGO IN THE HOUSE!"…it annoys me.

Sonia is a short girl with dark hair and big eyes who is always happy to see you. She has skin the color of our kitchen table, dirt brown. Caroline is tanned and blonde, loud and crazy. I've never seen her in anything other than a skirt or a bathing suit. She works at D'Lush, a trendy coffee place and always has one of their trademark hot pink cups or a plastic cup of beer in her hand.

There wasn't anybody like that in New York.

They complain that I'm too quiet. Race is too sarcastic. We're so "East Coast". We don't say "For sure" or "Hella". I never hook up with girls, Race has a steady girlfriend from Arizona who actually goes to her classes.

We're the weird ones.

And I'm at the peak of my despair. I miss tall buildings, dirty homeless people. I hate parties…I hate kegs. Everything is a golden skinned façade. Being gay is unacceptable at Dorchester. Nothing fits. I'm the piece of the puzzle that was put in the wrong box and isn't the right colors or shape.

Then one day it hit me. In the pit of my stomach I had a feeling. A voice in my head was saying "Go to the pier at Mission Beach". And I'm one of those hopeless dreamers who listens to those voices so I went.

I climbed the stairs to the pier and decided to walk the length of it and look out at absolutely nothing but the Pacific Ocean. People fishing adorned the edges of the wooden boards and I was one of the few people wearing jeans and a long sleeved shirt. Then I saw someone just like me.

Dark hair. Fully clothed. No fishing pole. He didn't have the sun-soaked look to him that everyone else had.

I stood next to him staring out at the ocean. Why I had caught him out the crowd, I'll never know. It was that voice, still nagging: Go closer, meet him. He'll solve all your problems.

"I'm Bumlets."

"I'm Skittery."

"I'm from Hoboken."

"Manhattan…I hate it here."

"It's not too bad…now."

I smiled.

He was me. Only better.

"So the semesters almost over…" he observed. We had nudged closer together, talking as though we had always known each other.

"Yea…my exams are done but I'm leaving next week," For one last week of partying, which I won't enjoy.

"I'm done too…I'm leaving tomorrow," he sounded kind of sad. "Do you want to come with me?"

The voice screamed HELL FUCKING YES!

And so off home I went. I packed everything in record time. Race asked what was going on and I told him.

Everything.

"Uhm...ok" was all Race said.

Had I made a mistake? I didn't even know that much about Bumlets. He was gay, the kiss on the cheek told me that, I knew his name, his address, but we only talked for thirty minutes.

The night went on. Everyone said goodbye, the boys didn't touch me. The girls giggled about going shopping with me.

I really hate shopping.

I tried to sleep, I couldn't. I blamed it on the noise being caused by the Dorchester residents but I was too nervous to shut my eyes any longer than a blink.

I got up at six. Put on my east coast clothes, had some coffee made in my own kitchen and not at a fancy coffee place.

I was about to call Bumlets up, to tell him to go without me.

Then the doorbell rang.

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Challenge Eight…hope you liked it. Inspired by my visiting with my brother who, for some unexplained reason, lives in San Diego and likes to get drunk five days a week and is the typical frat boy...minus the frat