Magical Thinking - Augusten Burroughs [86]
So Dennis didn’t press the issue often. But he didn’t like it. Especially the bad moods.
Usually, I felt irritable on the second day following my testosterone injection. So once every ten days I was grumpy and hostile for no apparent reason, and the next morning it passed and I would be apologizing with toothpaste foam in my mouth.
But when I was in one of my foul moods, the tiniest thing could enrage me. Something Dennis said, for example. Such as, “How’s my sweetie?”
He would have no idea that my testosterone level was approximately that of a Neanderthal chasing a wild boar.
“I’m having one my moods,” I would tell him through clenched teeth, our code for This is fucking not a motherfucking good time.
He would take this opportunity to go out for coffee or a run or see a movie. I would be left alone in his apartment and often, I would clean.
One Saturday, I decided to channel my fury into vacuuming. Because we live near the West Side Highway, a thin coating of dust settles over everything, every day. On typical days, it’s simply irritating. On Roid Rage days, it made me want to stomp down to the highway, pull drivers out of their cars, and bash their faces into the pavement. Suck up that dirt like a good little Electrolux, Jersey boy bitch.
Dennis had decided he’d go for a run. He was gone for a few hours, and when he returned, I was still going at the walls with the brush attachment. “What the FUCK are these little specks?” I was shouting as he set his keys and wallet down on the table.
He maintained a distance between us of at least ten feet. “Um, those are . . . cracks in the plaster.”
His logical reply infuriated me, and I suddenly felt extremely homicidal. “Fuck those motherfucking cracks,” I hollered, stabbing at them with the brush, mashing the bristles into the wall. “Those fucking fifties architects didn’t know shit about walls. Mies van der Rohe can kiss my ass.” Steroids induce a primal feeling of me against the world. Picture 1,000 Helen Reddys.
Dennis took the wand of the vacuum cleaner out of my hand like it was a hatchet and suggested I watch some television. “Why don’t you just relax. You’ve done so much cleaning already. Maybe there’s a nice complicated pregnancy on The Discovery Channel. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? A breach birth or maybe a preemie?”
Even in my wild animal mood, Dennis knew how to soothe me. I nodded my head and flopped on the bed, remote control in hand.
Dennis is suspicious of this man, my primary-care physician. “Ask your Dr. Unscrupulous if there’s anything he can do for your horrible moods.”
So I did ask him, and he was surprised I had such moods. He asked me to describe them. I said, “It’s weird. The day after I get the shot, I’m usually fine. It’s the day after this where I turn into somebody capable of committing a triple homicide, then going to a Ben Stiller movie.”
Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything he could give me to nice me down. He suggested yoga.
So of course, Dennis talked to his therapist about it, and his therapist was: (a) alarmed that I was taking steroids, (b) disgusted that a physician was prescribing them, (c) concerned about me in general as long-term relationship material.
Actually, Dennis’s therapist annoyed me. A therapist is an extremely influential person. And the fact that this guy sat in his plush office and formed opinions about me and then passed them onto my boyfriend infuriated me and caused me to behave in ways that made me live up to his warnings about me.
Still, I couldn’t argue my way around those moods. The only good thing was that they didn’t always happen and they never lasted for more than a day and I hadn’t used a box-cutter on anybody. Yet.
To nobody’s surprise, steroid use is common among gay men. When you combine a love for men with a love for drama, you end up with a guy on steroids.
As a result, it’s easier than ever to spot a gay man in a room full of men. He’s the one with the superhero chest and the arms that look like breasts, when flexed. And