A Tribute to the Rebound Fling

A Tribute to 'The Rebound Fling'

by Ezekiel Tyrus



Dear Angel,

I remember the day I first laid eyes on you.

It was at The Penny University Coffee Shop and you were standing in a light rain smoking and openly bitching about your boyfriend who was standing there among friends. You were wearing a hipster thrift shop white dress with ruffles and cowboy boots and people were laughing at the things you were saying till your boyfriend shouted at me, complimenting the t-shirt I was wearing shirt which advertised Ned’s Atomic Dustbin.

You remember that band?

When I saw you alone a few weeks later at The Parthenon Nightclub, I laid the charm on thick enough you took me home, or the house (or duplex) you were house-sitting for that hippie chick that later became your roommate, -what was her name?

In the morning, really late afternoon, I decided to call my two gay roommates who I had came to the club with and let them know where I was and that I was alright.

When I called those 2 queens weren't even aware I was gone.

We dated casually but I really did like you a great deal. My head and my heart were not in a good place at the time. I had decided before I met you that I was definitely moving to San Francisco, and also, I had just gotten out of a relationship with a woman who treated me badly.

The irony is I was looking for her, my ex-girlfriend when I stumbled across your page, and please don’t anticipate a thorough trashing of her, especially after all these years but she carried around a lot of baggage from a previous abusive relationship and two very traumatic events during her teenage years.

She’d treat me (and everyone else) shabbily and if you tried to make her apologize or take responsibility for her actions, she’d bring up her traumatic past, somehow make you feel guilty for it.

I wanted to break up with her for a solid 6 months before we finally did & my first two weeks away from her felt like a vacation & for a little while, I was unable to get close to anyone I dated or let myself like anybody too much.

I stopped hating, resenting her over a decade ago and genuinely hope she's happy and got the help she needed but if I discovered her image on Myspace, the feeling would be bittersweet, a whole myriad of emotions would go right through me but when I discovered your image instead, all I did was smile, laugh out loud and smile again.

I was actually surprised at how happy and delighted I was to see your face after all these years. If I’m 35 now, I was 24 then and if you’re 32 now, you were only 21.

Fuck, we were kids then.

Like I said, we dated casually, never serious, never exclusive and we bickered sometimes because I’d put down your hippie friends but that’s only because I came from hippies, totally and to me, in those days and the proceeding years, making fun of hippies was my way of rebelling but today, I recognize that I am a bit of a hippie, just don’t look like one but personality-wise, I think I may be more hippie than some hippies I know, except for that whole peace and love thing, which seems to have escaped me.

Interestingly enough, my hippie father, who you met once, outside a coffee shop in Hyde Park, lives in Gainesville. He and my step-ma have a nice house there but right now they are in Europe. I don’t know when they’ll be back. They’re subletting the house right now, I think.

Funny, I was visiting them back in March, first time I had seen them in a decade, this being shortly after arriving back to Florida. Had I known you now live in Gainesville and manage a nightclub there, I totally would have stopped by and said Hi.

I remember coming to your duplex shortly after a few so-called friends sold me some potent acid and then abandoning me in Ybor City. I showed up unannounced to you and your friend’s duplex high, tripping off my ass. You two brought me in, thank God, took care of me till I calmed down.

Since I never properly said ‘Thank You,’ I do now, ‘Thank you.’

I remember one time you and I were watching a rented movie in the living room at my apartment, the one I shared with those 2 gay guys. You had this short pixie hair-cut and we were snuggling till we fell asleep. When they came home, they thought you were a boy and were disappointed in the morning to discover you were you.

Of course, as they got to know you, they thought you were adorable.

I regret not appreciating you as much as I should have.

Now this is where my email gets most bizarre and pathetic.

During my first week in San Francisco, I was standing in a cold thick rain without a place to stay. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a sheet of paper that had your full name and address written on it. I opened up my backpack, grabbed a tiny soft-leather phone and address book, and took both items, threw them in a gutter and watched as they surfed down a hill and into a sewer.

While living in Tampa, I tried to move to London and was back within a few months. Then I relocated to Atlanta and was back so quickly that some people were unaware I was even gone. When I announced plans to move to San Francisco, everybody said, “Yeah, you’ll be back.”

If I got lonely and homesick for Tampa, I’d call my friends, I’d write them letters and in the days before email and cell phones, the easiest way to burn your bridges was to destroy your personal phone and address book.

I grew to regret that decision after a few years as I was genuinely curious to know how some people were doing and thought it’d be nice to send or receive the occasional Xmas card.

However, when I did research some old cohorts during the late 1990s, I discovered one old friend was killed by a drunk driver along Bearss and 30th and another old friend, still angry over a bogus misunderstanding from too many years ago, wanted nothing to do with me.

I never memorized or even knew your last name, as simply Angel seemed to fit you so well, and had no idea how to find you, so I never bothered to look for you.

You may find the next 2 facts very interesting.

Shortly after arriving in SF, I enrolled into a liberal arts college that had a great writer’s program and one of the first things I did was write a short story based on my own experience working as a bouncer at DNA on Nebraska Avenue back when that was a rough industrial waste land ghetto.

The story is about a bouncer who is a dark, moody guy named Dred who had a bartender girlfriend. a girlfriend named Angel who was based on you and yes, you were there and we were together when the events described in this short story actually took place.

Angel, the bartender in my story, is flippant, funny, tough, sexual and opinionated and the only character able to criticize and make fun of the macho bouncer, who resembles myself during this period in my life, as well as other bouncers I've known.

The Angel in my story physically resembles you and I even incorporate one of your own sexual escapades into my story. (Everybody knows they've got to be careful what they tell me or do around me because there's always a chance I'll use it for my fiction.)

(Remember telling me about the time you went to a video store around closing on a lonely Valentine’s Day and took the cute nerd behind the counter home with your copy of Repo Man.)

Most of what I wrote when I was 24 isn't worth keeping but this story is cool and there are plans for using it as a skeletal/outline for a future project, of which, I had always plan on using Angel as the girlfriend’s name and the girl I remembered you to be as the model for that character.

As a matter of fact, the duplex that Dred and Angel share was modeled after the one you and your hippie friend stayed. Bet you had no idea you were a bit of a muse for me, did you?

Several years into my time in San Francisco, there was a billboard in downtown off Market Street that featured a model with a buzz-cut that looked like you. I use to stroll by daily, look up and think about you. The first time I was walking downtown and realized the billboard had been replaced, I was sad. Wished I took a picture.

Enough about the past.

I expected you to be married with several kids as that was your chief ambition when I knew you but I guess you do refer to a previous marriage. It also appears you've
worked in the fashion industry. -Designing clothes? That’s great because I do recall you being an exceptionally stylish girl.

I saw the website for the club that you manage and a number of cool bands have passed-through. Tell me about that. Maybe I’ll come up there to see a show.

I’m proud of you, Angel.

However, don’t be concerned, I’m not looking to recapture some lost youth nor do I harbor any fantasies of rekindling an old flame, but I’d really like to see you again.

I lived in Palatka for 2 and a half years when I attended the art school there and my pals and I use to party in Gainesville weekly. I got some great G-ville stories and memories. It’d be worth a day-trip just to see you, check out your club and see if you’re as good a bartender as I remember you from 11 years ago, then reminisce about some long-gone clubs and bars and coffee shops from almost (yikes) 15 to 20 years ago; Hardbacks, University Club (my first gay bar,) TJ Morrissey’s, The Florida Theater, Cafe’ Depresso, Skeeter’s, the old drive-in, and I’ve got a great priceless, too-good-to-be-true story about River Phoenix picking me up when I was hitchhiking.

I use to spend a lot of time in St. Augustine and even considered relocating to St. Augustine when I first arrived back to Florida. Do you ever go there?

I’d also like to mention that I’ve gotten back in contact with various Tampa friends I abandoned on a cold wet afternoon in San Francisco and plan on spending some time visiting Tampa in the near-future.

Oh, how I miss The Tampa Theater.

Currently, I live in Melbourne, FL which is where I grew up.

I’m happy.

Thanks for saying I look the same but people change so much in 11 years. How could they not? And I’m sure your last 11 years have been an awesome and I’d love to hear about it. You were always so much fun to be around. Let me buy you lunch, or coffee or a drink somewhere, sometime.

Best, Elijah Beau Trocchi

p.s. I legally changed my name in 2000. I go by Eli but will answer to Beau.

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Angel told me the email ‘tickled’ her and while she conceded she did not have the steel-trap memory that I do, she said she remembered me as being 'funny,' ‘good company ,' 'a pleasure to be around ,’ and that if I had stuck around longer, 'a real relationship may have blossomed .’

The things that stuck out most in her mind, as she told me, was the fact that 'we went out dancing a lot , more so than any other guy she ever dated.’ She remembered my gay roommates, Frank and Paul, 'who were hilarious' and making my year, putting a smile on my face, she remembered the sex as ‘being especially good ,’ but interestingly enough, Angel never expressed an interest in reading the autobiographical short story I wrote featuring a character based on her.

If any writer, friend or foe, wrote a story that featured a character based on me, I'd devour that piece within seconds.

Though I moved back to California before we had a chance to meet again in person, we're still friends on other social networks and chat once in blue moon. She's doing well and seems happy. If I had never moved to San Francisco the first time, who knows? But memories of Angel as the perfect rebound fling? Heavenly. Blissful. She was exactly what I needed to feel attractive and sane again. I'll always be so incredibly grateful I met her when I did.