A Thousand Tiny Failures : Memoirs of a Pickup Artist (12 page)

As we drifted off to sleepy land I imagined
Frenchy
at home, sucking his bong and watching his short films, cursing my name. I’m sorry friend, you can’t win them all. I should have got his number; he’d make a good wingman.

Abode (Superman)

My new roommate was weird. He slept all day in his
stanky
room, and refused to socialize except when cooking his lunch, which he would lecture on about with great gaiety. “It’s all about the whole grains and organics. Don’t eat that crap out of a can.” Then he would return to his room and lock the door, probably to furiously masturbate to
kiddie
porn.

I gave my notice on the third day. Eventually, out of pity, I told locked door-man about the dating sciences and why I was practicing pickup, how great it was, and why he should check it out. I offered to teach him, free of charge. He told me I was weird and a manipulator of women. He was quite upset. After that I saw even less of the guy. The Spanish
homie
asked me what happened, but we couldn’t communicate so I spelled it out in Google Translator. He typed back, “He is shit. I don’t like him.
Ja
ja
ja
ja
.”

I
texted
Sarah a few times to hang out, but she replied with, “I’m really busy with school. I’ll call you.” So I took this as, “Not gonna happen again.” I wondered where I’d screwed up. Maybe it was calling her a good girl, or all the damn cock-block battles. I’ll never know. Most attractive women are very unforgiving. You make one mistake and it’s game over. It’s not like they need us. They can make good money, they have employment insurance, they have their sex. If you mess up, they find a guy that gets it right, or they slut around looking for Mr. Universe until they’re fat and single at thirty-six, sitting by the nickel slots and wondering where all the, “real men,” have gone.

I was realizing that in order to figure this out, I would have to piss a lot of people off. I wasn’t quite cool with that, but it’s either be a creepy
douchebag
—or lonely for life. I’d heard that meaningless sex can’t fulfill you, but it’s hard to relate when you need to work your ass off just to get some.

My meaningless sex was fantastic. I would love to have loads of meaningless sex, at least until I met my goddess. I had to get about twenty solid phone numbers, not counting the twenty or so bad ones, to get one girl to meet me. It sucked. It shouldn’t be this hard. But I still felt inspired, like a birdie falling out of its nest and flying away to avoid poachers.

I looked online for a new roommate and met
Alexandro
, a thirty-one year old Venezuelan. I went to his apartment to meet him. He looked like Superman, tall, tanned, buff. When I met him on his doorstep, I asked if he had a girlfriend. He chuckled.

“Man, man, man! I’m a fucker man! I have two girlfriends.”

It was perfect. Here I was, moving in with what the pickup nerds called, a natural: A real ladies man, as opposed to the guys that read books on how to get laid. He told me that in his country, boys are taught to pickup girls at a young age. It was discussed over the dinner table by your father. In fact, if you couldn’t pull ass by fourteen, there was something wrong with you. Maybe you were gay.

Alexandro
said, “Yeah man, let’s pick up some girls. We can share them.” And by share I’m sure he meant spit-roast. You know, one end in the front, the other in the…
y’know
, like a pig over a fire-pit.

I told him about a dating coach named Neil Strauss, and how he said you could create a threesome by initiating a move called a, “dual-induction massage.” He laughed at me, “What is this bullshit man? Dual what? Man, man, man! Sebastian! You are learning from nerds. Just pull your dick out and tell them what to do. They like it that way. If they give you shit, you laugh at them and kick them out.”

“
Woa
. That’s badass.”

“Yeah man. Be a badass.”

Here lay the wisdom of the Latin man, born of maize fields and Inca gold. He teased me a lot. I’d tell him about something I’d read; he’d mock me and then mock the guru who wrote it. It’s hard to argue with a guy who’s been with over a hundred girls, had countless threesomes and open relationships. He really did have two girlfriends; one Spanish and one Asian. He called them Spanish girl and Asian girl. He’d been with both for over two years. They never came over without a large bag of groceries, and if they arrived empty handed he’d send them to the grocery store, so they always had food. He liked to cook, so they’d help him by chopping the veggies and washing the dishes, then he’d teach them Salsa in the living room and fuck them silly. He shared some of his dancing and his advanced sex techniques with me, which I was always grateful for.

“You want to hold her over the edge of the bed, so she feels like she’s going to fall, and your strength is saving her. If you let her go, she falls. But you’re still fucking her, so it’s really hot. Sometimes I get her ass in the air and put my foot on her face, hardcore dominance, man. They love that shit, being treated like a slut. They love it! Don’t listen to what anyone says. They’re all dirty!”

He was also somewhat emotionally abusive. I heard the girls crying from time to time. “Alex. I let you fuck me however you want, I bring you food, you never come out to meet my friends. I let you sleep with whoever you want! Maybe you want me to leave?”

“Fine! Leave then! Get out! Get the fuck out!” He’d yell. And he’d kick them out, just like that. “She’ll be back in a week man,” he’d say. “She can’t find a man like me, not in
Canada
. Nobody can fuck her like me and nobody gives her what she needs like I do. The men here are pussies who can’t fuck.” And he was right, apparently, because they always came back.

He would ignore her text messages for seven days, and then she’d show up on his doorstep with groceries. They’d cook, dance, and bang. “It’s all about orgasms man. You gotta give it to her like a man. They’ll always come back if you treat them like crap. Treat them like crap and love them like they’ve never had it.”

You may think these girls had low self-esteem or were stupid, retarded even, but they weren’t. They were attractive women with university degrees and good jobs. They just reacted well to being treated like shit from time to time. They were addicted to the emotions. Not all women want to have a sweet man all of the time—they get bored. Sometimes they need drama just for drama’s sake. Imagine your entire life you had men trying to please you, to make you comfortable, and all you want is a little danger for once, or someone to call you on your bullshit. Try walking up to a group of girls and saying, “What’s up sluts!?” and see what happens. Try it ten times with positive energy, not hateful like, and I guarantee that at least eight of those attempts will elicit positive reactions. They will laugh. I know because I’ve done it many times.

Sometimes when I talked to his women, they would flirt with me and
Alexandro
would get jealous. He tried not to show it, but he’d grind his teeth and make comments, mocking my clothes, or posture, or choice of food. “Why always rice man? Beans. Beans are good for you,” and, “Get to the gym. Become a man.”

I couldn’t help it, I was becoming attractive to all women. My energy was different. I didn’t have to try anymore, I just was. Women will often flirt with friends of their man unconsciously. It’s like they’re testing our abundance. Show jealousy or neediness and you risk losing your woman. I think he was smart enough to recognize how he was projecting himself. Many men can’t control jealousy at all. Jealousy is a disease of the mind. Why be jealous when any hour you can walk out your door and meet more girls? If a woman doesn’t want to be with you, fuck her. Seriously. Most chicks only cheat when their emotional, sexual, or monetary needs aren’t being met. But if you don’t plan on marrying, or paying for her shit, don’t worry about it. Just be prepared to find a new girlfriend every few years. And you better know how to make her laugh, intrigue her, lead her, and give her orgasms.

I spent many nights talking to Alex and learning from him. I’d tell him about my pickup adventures and though he thought I was weird, he learned a few things about game from me too. I started bringing various girls over and he was always impressed, though he’d bust on me about their age. “Bro, you need a woman. Not these… girls.” I’d ignore him though. I think he was jealous.

Despite all his sexual abundance and open relationship status, he wasn’t a happy guy. He had demons. I made note of that as well. Even physically beautiful people are fucked up. He didn’t like
Canada
or Canadians. He thought we were boring and cold. He’s probably right. Would I have such a hard time meeting women in
Venezuela
?

During my time living with him, I picked up a crazy nineteen year old named Samantha. It took me a month of texts and Facebook messages to finally have her meet me. I had to go to her house five times before she let me bang her, which for me, was a lot. She stopped letting me fuck her because she figured I was too old for her. Then I picked up a twenty-nine year old French girl who wouldn’t fuck me until I met her friends—so I met her friends and they all spoke French so they ignored me, and she stopped seeing me. Then I picked up another eighteen year old at a café by asking her about her book. She was reading The Diary of Anne Frank. I told her I used to sleep in a secret annex for fun. That got her. We didn’t last long. She was Jewish, I wasn’t. Then I picked up a twenty-one year old ballet dancer. She had the best legs ever, but just wouldn’t stop shit testing me with, “You should get a haircut. You should get a good job. You should blah, blah, blah,” so I ditched her. She wasn’t hot enough for me to deal with that crap, or so I told myself. Then I picked up a short haired twenty-five year old at a dance party. All I did was reach out, grab her hand, and pull. That was that. She took me home, did all the work, gave me a blowjob on her couch, and kicked me out. Never heard from her again. And it went on, and on with the girls, the phone numbers, the parties, the after parties, the bands, the festivals. And all this time I still got up every day to work in the Call Center of Doom.

Montreal
wasn’t the place for permanent residence. It was a fantasy world of debauchery and short term relationships. At least it was for me. Finally after one and a half years in
Montreal
, I was getting results. But even though I was having all this sex, I was lonely.

I mostly hung out with Jeff and another guy, Charlie. Jeff was a good wingman and Charlie was good enough, a really smart dude. Charlie was a friend of Mark’s, and told me a story about how he painted this girls house in the hope that she would fuck him. “Friend, there’s a better way,” I told him. A few days and a few e-books later Charlie was a devout follower of all things pickup.

“It works!” He exclaimed.

After a few weeks of going out, he picked up a girl at
three a.m.
on a street corner. She had no money for a cab, so he took her to his house. A few weeks later, he slept with a nineteen year old blond girl he met at a party. Game worked, and I’d taught him.

Prior to meeting me, he hadn’t wet his wiener in twelve months. All he needed to do was quit being so… pathetic. Charlie remains my friend to this day. He ended up dating that girl he picked up on the street corner long term. She was crazy and alcoholic, go figure. But because of him, I gained confidence in teaching.

One day I got an email from my mother, telling me my sister was getting married. I got on the Internet and bought a one way ticket back to B.C. I was homesick.
Montreal
was a good time, but I was an outsider. I wanted to know if everything I’d learned would be applicable back home. I wanted to show my old friends the new me.

On one of my last nights, I posted a notice on Facebook:

“Friends. I’m leaving.
Montreal
was great but my adventure ends here. Buy me a beer tomorrow at Bar
Biftek
. Love Sebastian.”

The next night I sat there in the bar waiting like the Godfather, and random people would show up, buy me a beer, hug me and leave. I counted them, twenty-seven in total. It felt good to be popular. When I left at the end of the night, I had a girl on my arm and fifteen friends and acquaintances chanting, “Sebastian! Sebastian! Sebastian!” Most of them I cold-approached, or met through people I worked or lived with. Eric stopped by and bought me a beer. “I’ll miss you man!” He looked skinny and paler than usual. He told me he was going to live on a raw food vegan commune in
Alaska
. Good for him. Mark didn’t show up, and neither did Olivia, or any of the girls I’d banged. I’d been in
Montreal
for just over a year.

I couldn’t fall asleep that night, laying there listening to my girl-of-the-moment breathing softly. I didn’t want her. Her breath was bad and she needed to lose weight. What’s wrong with me? I thought. Why am I still fucking sad? Why do I feel lonely? Do I always need a warm hole to feel good about myself?

I had a great night, threw a party in my name, banged a willing woman and I feel empty? Maybe I don’t even care about women. Maybe all I want is attention and validation. I looked at the girl and she started snoring. There was a little bit of drool coming out of her mouth, onto my pillow. I pushed her over and tried to fall asleep. I needed to get up early to catch my flight.

“Goodbye
Montreal
,” I whispered to the dark.