Sabotage

WARNING: This fictional work involves doll fantasy reenactments and deals with sexual assault, human trafficking, and suicidal ideations. It contains crude language.

If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health or substance use problem, please click here to reach out and seek help.

---

It’s almost eleven am and Chrissy’s just waking up. He checks his phone. There’s a text from Fred.

“Hey, I caught the plane just in time. Phew.”

Fred stayed over last night and overslept when he needed to leave early to fly out to a photography gig out of state.

Chrissy’s fingers are still typing a reply when an email pops up. It’s from OnlyDolls. He feels cautious but giddy. Maybe it’s the person from the other night, who gave him fifteen bucks? But they haven’t responded to Chrissy’s text.

He immediately sits up when he reads the subject: Account terminated.

“What in gay hell…” Chrissy clutches his phone. He opens the email. The words register in his brain, but he doesn’t understand the meaning.

He reads the email again. Then again. Then again.

Account permanently terminated. Violations of terms of service and community guidelines. Subscriber interactions revoked. Existing subscribers cancelled. Profile removed from platform. Fourteen days for final appeal.

No. No, please.

He opens his laptop and frantically tries to log in to his OnlyDolls account.

“No. No, no, no, no, no…”

He tries resetting his password.

User isn’t found. Fuck.

He rubs his eyes. What the hell is happening?

He looks at his inbox. Another email had come in a few hours before. He hadn’t seen that one. He must’ve still been asleep. That one was a warning.

If only he’d been awake. But it’s moot now. Everything is moot.

How? Why?

Then it dawns on him. It was that text. He had texted the person outside of OnlyDolls. They must’ve snitched on him.

He grabs a pillow and screams into it.

“Fuck.”

He knows he’s also lost his fifteen dollars.

The worst part is, there’s nobody he can talk to. Back in the day, he could pour his heart out to Manuel. Manu would understand. They would offer a different perspective. They would say something funny that would make Chrissy giggle. And suddenly everything would be bright again.

But also back in the day, he never had to worry about money, about surviving.

He can’t talk to Fred. Fred mustn’t know about his money issues. Neither should Billy.

His phone dings. Another text from Fred.

“Hey, please, please, please don’t shoot the messenger, but Josh made a video about meeting you. It’s… Not good. But whatever you do, DO NOT READ THE COMMENTS.”

It always comes in waves, doesn’t it, Chrissy thinks. It’s never just one-and-done. It’s always one and then another.

He can feel his hands tremble as he responds to Fred. “Thank you.” And then he adds, “Do you think Billy knows?”

“Not sure,” Fred texts back, “but I’m about to tell him. He was kinda mentioned in the video, dunno if Josh’s viewers will find it was him and review-bomb the store. Again.”

Chrissy cringes. He remembers the attacks Priapus received. Billy didn’t care. He even said business boomed. Then he remembers that Matt’s construction company, BILT, and Takeshi’s Lick It ice cream store also took a hit.

Trouble seems to follow him everywhere.

He puts on his headphones. He watches his fingers go to DollTube and type in “Josh porn star.” It’s the number one video that pops up. He rolls his eyes when he sees Josh wearing a keffiyeh in the thumbnail.

Then he’s awash with envy.

Two hours ago. The video was just dropped two hours ago and already it has 37K views, 3,8K likes, and 1,1K comments. Josh has 238K subscribers. What Chrissy wouldn’t give for that kind of exposure. He couldn’t even get more than one paying customer on his OnlyDolls. One. Not that it matters anymore. It’s gone now. All because he got desperate and did something stupid for fifteen fucking dollars.

Does he really need to watch this video? Probably not. Does he really want to watch it? Also, probably not.

But it’s too late now. Josh’s face fills the screen. Chrissy wants to punch that scowl off of Josh’s face.

The assault starts almost right away. Chrissy. Zionist. Apartheid. Genocide supporter. War criminal. Baby killer. Ambush. Fascist. Racist. Right-wing. Violent.

“He was gonna jump on me,” Josh says.

What?! No! That’s a lie!

Wait. Was it?

No. He was.

He did step forward.

Just the way he did in the ice cream store with that guy who vandalized Wade’s poster.

It’s true, then. Chrissy thinks. He is violent. And wasn’t he just thinking about punching Josh’s face?

Josh’s still spewing his screed when Chrissy scrolls down to the comment section.

Lawsuit, someone commented. Psycho zio. Free Palestine. Destroy him, another one says. Find out where he lives. Free Palestine. Old bitch. Nazi. He should take a dirt nap. Free Palestine.

Scroll after scroll of vitriol.

Maybe they’re right, Chrissy thinks. Maybe he should just disappear. What is he good for anyway? Almost nothing. And the things he’s good at are inconsequential.

So he can design. Big deal. So he can sew. Big whoop. Millions of others can, and a huge percentage undoubtedly can do better than he does.

Why should he be alive when he contributes nothing? All he does is turn oxygen into carbon dioxide. All he does is pollute the earth with his waste. With his existence.

It feels like moving through molasses. His headphones feel like they weigh a thousand pounds. He struggles to take them off. He crawls to the other side of the mattress. He sees himself rummaging through one of the boxes, taking out a cutter.

The next thing he knows is he’s in the bathroom, his face wet with tears.

He kneels in front of the tub and turns on the water. It gurgles and gushes, filling the tub.

Warm? Cold? Searing hot?

Does it matter?

His stomach is in a knot. The box cutter lies on the edge of the tub. He doesn’t know if he’s ready. But then again, how can you tell if you’re ready to die?

Nobody will miss him. Not Matt. Not Wade. Not Manuel.

Well, maybe Fred?

Fred must still be up in the air, flying to his dream gig in Chicago. He’ll be gone for a few weeks. Everyone’s moving up while he stays stuck in the muck of his own doing.

He extends and retracts and extends the retracts the blade of the box cutter. He feels it clicks in his hands.

What if he survives? What if he slashes his wrists and has a second thought and calls 911? Think of the hospital bills.

He snorts. It’s too expensive even to kill oneself.

And if he succeeded? Billy wouldn’t be able to rent out this unit, at least not for months.

Chrissy turns the knob off. Such a waste of water, he thinks. Just like him. Wasteful.

Selfish.

He splashes his face with the water and pulls the plug. He sits in front of the tub until his face is dry and the last bit of the water is gone, guzzled down by the pipes. Then he sits some more and starts crying again. The metal blade of the box cutter glistens under the fluorescent light.

He needs to go out. Take a walk. Touch some grass.

Grass? In Pico-Union? The only grass around here that’s not covered in dirt or dog shit is the one people smoke. Should he start smoking? Yeah, that should shorten his life.

Wouldn’t that be nice?

His brain tells him to get a grip and get up, but his body anchors itself to the floor. No. Enough of this.

He retracts the blade of the box cutter, grabs the edge of the tub, and pushes himself up.

Phone. Glasses. Hair-tie. Key. Shoes.

The Los Angeles heat hits his skin as soon as he opens the metal door of the building. His shorts have no pockets, so he slips his apartment key in his sock.

He looks to the right. There’s a high-rise construction ahead. He can hear the clangings and the bangings, so maybe he’ll walk the other way.

The air smells like copper and concrete. But other than that, it feels… Rather nice?

There’s no use crying over spilt milk, right? He can always open another OnlyDolls, or use a different platform like Just4Toys.

And maybe the Josh thing would even give him viewers? Right? Maybe he could even post a video rebutting Josh? That’d go viral too, right?

Yeah, no. He’d most likely get buried under an avalanche of comments, poking fun at his gay voice, saying how he looks and talks like an unhinged airhead. He’d get ratioed. And he’d be back to zero, possibly lower.

Or worse: nobody would even see the video and he’d just be dumping his feelings into the void.

He lifts his hand to shield his eyes from the sun. Should’ve brought his sunglasses.

The outside walls have just been repainted. When he moved in almost a year ago, they were covered by graffiti and gang tags.

A cool breeze caresses his neck, a welcome respite from the burning sun. It’s been a while since he went out without covering his head.

Wait. A breeze? Oh, shit. He’s not wearing a hat. Or a hoodie. His pink hair is exposed. His heart races. He turns around and fast walks back to his apartment.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Two men are walking in his direction. He lowers his gaze and his head, hoping they won’t recognize him. He wants to laugh. Who the fuck are you? Barbra Streisand? Then again, the locals probably won’t know who Streisand is. He wants to kick himself. Even when he’s at his lowest, he’s still bitchy towards others. And racist. Definitely racist. Typical right-winger.

He steps to the side but the two men do the same. Are they… Are they wearing masks? Panic grips him. No, please. The door to his building is just a few steps away. But if he entered, they’d know he lives here. They’d grab him before he could put in the code to unlock the door.

Should he scream? Would anyone hear him? No. They’ll just think he’s racist. A Karen. Another fodder for another viral video.

“¿Qué onda, chica?” One of the men stops in front of him. He’s wearing a gray gaiter. “You lookin’ for the Pride parade?”

Chrissy’s stomach drops.

The other man, the one with the olive gaiter covering his face, laughs. “¿Chica? Nah. Este puto maricón.”

The hair at the back of his neck stands up. Chrissy doesn’t speak much Spanish, but Manu used to teach him a few words and phrases here and there. And when he was in his teens, he had a Guatemalan boyfriend who used to pimp him out to his friends and uncles for booze and cigarettes, so he knows what the men were saying.

“No, por favor,” Chrissy says. That’s one of the phrases Manu taught him.

“Phone, puta.” Olive Gaiter gestures with his hand.

“No, please, please, I don’t have money to buy another one.”

“Not our problem, bitch.” Olive Gaiter roughly pushes Chrissy onto a dumpster.

Chrissy squirms. He can feel the hot metal on his skin. The smell of garbage pierces his nostrils. Tears roll down his cheek when Gray Gaiter’s fingers caress the side of his mouth.

Olive Gaiter wrestles the phone from Chrissy’s hand. “Shit, man… cheap-ass phone. Old too. Bitch poor as fuck. Even my mom has a better one.”

Chrissy tries to push Gray Gaiter away, but he just laughs at Chrissy’s weak attempt to free himself. The sharp corner of the dumpster cover digs into Chrissy’s shoulder blades.

Gray Gaiter laughs. “Yeah, you stole that one for her. Ey, pendejo, didn’t your girl dump you?”

“Yeah, so?” Olive Gaiter says, playing with Chrissy’s phone, twirling it between his fingers.

“Wanna have fun with this puta?” He grabs Chrissy’s throat.

Chrissy looks at the two men in horror. Broad daylight. This would never happen in Pasadena. He shouldn’t have gone out of the apartment.

“Dunno, man, I mean, it’s still a dude.”

“Gotta get used to dudes in prison, man,” Gray Gaiter says.

“No, please… Please, let me go…” Chrissy tries to get Gray Gaiter’s hand off of him, but the man’s grip around his neck just tightens.

“Damn, you pretty. Wish I had a soft bitch like you when I got locked up. You live round here, maricón?”

“N… Not here. I was… going to the bus stop to go home…” Chrissy’s fast thinking surprises himself. He definitely can’t let these two guys know he lives here. Please, don’t let them find the key to his apartment.

Olive Gaiter looks around. “Ain’t nobody here.”

Gray Gaiter laughs. “Vamonos.” He leads Chrissy by the neck and throws him down next to the dumpster.

Chrissy coughs and holds his throat, the two men towering over him. “Please, please don’t…” Chrissy says. In broad daylight? Behind the dumpster? “Please, you can have the phone, just…”

“Shut the fuck up, puta!” Gray Gaiter’s fist lands on Chrissy’s mouth, knocking off his glasses.

Chrissy tastes iron. His lower lip splits against his teeth. His head spins. Not thirty minutes ago, he came close to taking his own life. Now he’s pleading to keep it.

“Shouldn’t go out lookin’ like a bitch. This is Pico, not WeHo, maricón.”

Chrissy hears laughter. The two men are proud of that stupid joke. He doesn’t know who’s saying what. It doesn’t matter. His vision is confined to their knees.

But the noon sky turns pitch black and bright lights burst from the alley.

“Fuck! La jura!!”

Someone flings Chrissy’s phone at him. It smacks the back of his head and falls on the concrete. The two men take off.

Chrissy rubs his head and scrambles to get his phone, hoping it’s not damaged. He can’t afford to get another one. He puts on his glasses and squints as the bright lights turn into a blinding blast for a split second.

A figure emerges from the light. It stands still for a moment before collapsing.

There’s thunder. Then rain. Not mist, not spray. Heavy rain. Is he dreaming? Is he dead? Did the two men kill him? He could swear it was sunny just a few minutes ago. No. He can’t be dead. His head still hurts from when the phone hit him moments ago.

His heart pounds in his chest, but he gets up and shuffles toward the unconscious figure.

He looks down at the person. There’s a large knife in his hand. No. Not a knife. A machete. Chrissy flinches. The blade is bloody. He can see various cuts and wounds on the man’s body.

He needs to call 911. He tries swiping his phone, but the screen won’t light up.

“No, please no…”

Is it because it’s wet? Is it because of the fall?

What should he do? He starts hyperventilating. What should he do?

His mind reels. Rain soaks his clothes and socks and shoes. His glasses are blurry. He purses his lips, but lets go because his lip throbs and hurts. He takes a deep breath and counts to ten. Calm down, bitch. Calm. The fuck. Down.

Check if the person is still alive. Yes. That’s what he needs to do. He’s trying to recall what Gar taught him in the first-aid class at Gar’s Gym. He curses. Should’ve taken the self-defense class too.

Chrissy puts his fingers on the man’s neck. He can feel a pulse. It’s strong. Good. Now he needs to roll the person onto his side so he can breathe better.

“Fuck, you’re heavy,” Chrissy says, grunting as he tries to lift and push.

But when the unconscious man finally rolls over, Chrissy gasps and falls back.

That face.

That face is his.