A Thousand Tiny Failures : Memoirs of a Pickup Artist (9 page)

Lara (Maybe you care too much?)

Another bar I liked was The Green Room; a small club popular with the neon kids. This night I bumped into two guys from the lair. One was tall and wearing a fedora and the other was shorter, in a blazer, a bit chubby with a shaved head. They were leaning up against the bar.

“Hey bro, how’s your night? You
sarging
?” the tall one asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m about to. How about you guys, done any approaches?”

“Nah,” the tall one said. “We don’t approach. We let them come to us. I’ve been getting approached a lot.”

“Really? Awesome! That never happens to me,” I said, truthfully. “I never have it easy. That’s why I’m learning pickup.”

I studied these guys leaning on the bar, and then checked out the room. There were quite a few pretty girls, but none seemed remotely interested in approaching us. I didn’t blame them. It’s not like we were exquisitely handsome compared to all the fit French dudes in the club. Even though we were
puas
, nobody knew or cared.

“So what do you do? Just stand here until a girl talks to you?” I asked.

“Yeah man. We don’t chase.” The shorter guy said. “So what’s your style? My name’s Jeff by the way.”

“I’m Sebastian. My style? Well, I don’t know. I just get in there and let the magic happen. Hope I don’t get blown out or whatever.”

“Right on,” Jeff said. “We should go out sometime.”

“For sure,” I agreed. “I’ll be your wingman.”

I sipped my beer and said goodbye. “Well guys, I’m gonna go talk to that girl over there. Wish me luck.”

They leaned back and watched as I approached my first girl. She was wearing what looked like a kimono so I said, “Did you just return from
Japan
? Konnichiwa!”

She stopped dancing, smiled quizzically and said, “What?”

“I like your kimono!”

“Oh… thank you.” She didn’t seem impressed by me, not at all. A feeling I was becoming used to. A sort of insignificance, like I was a flea to be swatted away. If some of these bitches would just give me a chance, we could have an adventure. Why does everything have to be a threat? I know that life is scary for girls, but I’m scared too. Scared of missing out on the human experience.

“Did you just get back from
Japan
?”

“Me? No.” She said.

She wasn’t holding eye contact and kept deferring to her friend. They looked back and forth, back and forth at each other, so I called them out, “Hey. You guys keep girl coding each other. You want me to go away?”

Kimono said, “No, it’s just that we haven’t seen each other in a long time and we want to dance. Sorry.”

“I can dance! Check it out.” I did the robot, which should have amused them, but she just smiled awkwardly and looked away. Slowly, I will peck at their shells until they love me.

I noticed a girl that had been staring at me since I arrived. I worked with her at the Call Center of Doom. She had a very pretty face with big almond eyes, dark, straight shoulder length hair and giant boobs. She’s a little bit thick but not fat, very womanly. I don’t mind a bigger girl if she isn’t straight up obese. I don’t want to slap her and ride the waves in, or roll her in flour to find the wet spot. I don’t want that or any other fat girl clichés. I suppose it’s the same as a pretty girl not wanting a boyfriend with a shitty job and no status.

The kimono girls were ignoring me. This was typical when I cold approached chicks on the dance floor since I sucked at dancing. I’m so white. I gave them the low five and left them alone. It was less corny than a high five and it doesn’t look like I just got brutally rejected. It just looks like, “peace out girls. See you around…friends!”

The bar was too small to look like a loser; I’d be forced to leave the venue out of shame. If girls see you get rejected, they all reject you. If they see you doing well, they all want to meet you. I was becoming very good at making rejection look cool. It all goes back to cavemen and all that. The head caveman gets all the women, so all the women want to be with the boss.

The big
boobie
girl was still stealing glances at me. Olivia was out of town anyway.

I walked straight towards her and said, “Co-worker, hug me!” And just like that she nuzzled straight into my neck. Does game even matter? It’s like once again, all a girl needs is to know that someone else knows me, or that I know someone they know. It’s so stupid.

We made irrelevant small talk about how much working sucks, and our hips met each other. My cock was awake. After all, my cock is the ultimate judge of a woman’s attractiveness. Me and him, we have a relationship like Master and Blaster from Mad Max. He’s the Master, I’m Blaster. He chooses—I act. It’s not a healthy relationship, but we get the job done.

“I always thought you were hot,” she said, grinding her butt into my crotch.

“Yeah? I thought you were, alright.”

She punched me in the arm. “Asshole! Be nice.”

“Nice guys die alone.”

“Maybe you want to be alone Sebastian?”

“Do you?”

“No.”

Her name was Lara. I leaned in to kiss her, and had to squeeze through her breasts to do so. We sucked tongues on the dance floor surrounded by ecstasy riddled hipsters, and the lair guys were still watching me, which I enjoyed for some reason; like an egotistical rock star with his fans. Their passive strategy failed while my active one worked.

Guys that don’t get laid much always say I care too much about getting laid. But every time I pick up a girl that I went out of my way to approach, it proves my philosophy. It’s too bad regular guys have to approach a hundred girls just to find a cute one willing to give them a shot. I wonder how many men die having never been with a beautiful girl, forever resentful, with raw cocks from too much Internet porn. That’s why I’ve never wanted to be a regular guy. I’m no fucking
Muggle
… I’m a dick wizard, and when I have sick game, and I’m famous, I’ll have my pick of the greatest women on the planet.

I hoped I’d bang her so I could write about it on the seduction forums, and get some street
cred
. Am I an asshole for thinking this? I dismissed this thought and replaced it with, “In the name of science”, and, “for personal growth.”

Self-delusion is a wonderful tool. As smooth as I may have appeared to the lair guys, I was still a scared ex-nerd pretending to be a player. It’s a lot of work to get a hot girl—far too much work. I’d already decided she was too fat, and though I’d sleep with her, I’d do better in the future. It’s human nature to reach beyond your station. Even though I was in no position to be picky, I was already looking for something better.

Standards and delusions of grandeur.

“Where do you live?” I asked her.

“Just over on
St. Laurent
. Why?”

“Oh, we should go. Chill out.”

“
Hmmmm
, well, ok.”

I refrained from yelling “Hell yes! Hallelujah!” And instead said, “
Hmmmm
, Yeah it’s not too late. Sure. For a bit, I suppose.”

As we exited the bar I stopped and said farewell to Jeff and the tall guy. “It was nice seeing you dudes. Talk to you later.”

“Yeah man, have fun,” Jeff said. “I was getting horny just watching you. Bang her good.”

“I will.”

I noticed that little voice from deep inside my head telling me how cool I was, and how lame they were, and I agreed with him. I didn’t know that Jeff would eventually become a good friend. But then, my ego was chirping like a tiny Emperor
Palpatine
grinding his bony fingers and saying, Yes! Yes! You are better than them my young PUA.
Muuuahahahaha
!!!

We caught a cab back to her apartment. She was twenty-seven, loved yoga, drawing, and traveling. She hated her job like most people do, and liked her roommate because she was awesome, and wasn’t going to have sex with me tonight… or so she said. I agreed completely because sex is, “
Ewww
, gross.”

I’ve read that when a woman says you aren’t having sex it means she’s thinking about having sex and that means you’re definitely having sex. She wants to bang, but it’s not supposed to be her fault. She can’t be a slut, even though she is, or wants to be. It’s some weird anti-slut-shame mechanism.

At her apartment she hushed me past her roommates and into her bedroom. “I’ll be right back,” she whispered and closed the door. Her place was nice; a typical giant
Montreal
bedroom with squeaky wood floors and red brick walls. Her room was covered in pictures from her world travels. She’d been banged in all corners of the globe I figured. She came back carrying two big glasses of water.

“Thanks,” I said. “Nice place.”

“Yeah. It’s ok. Do you want a sandwich?”

I stared at her for a few quiet seconds and I moved closer. I didn’t want a sandwich, I wanted to bang. We kissed again. I climbed onto the bed and crawled on top of her. She lifted her shirt up as I pulled my belt off. In a few seconds we were both in our underwear.

“Umm, we can’t have sex though. Can we just take it easy?” She asked impishly.

I stopped, pulled back and smiled at her. “Yeah, totally. I don’t care. Let’s talk about the state of political affairs in eastern Europe.”

She giggled.

“Sex is gross, “I said.

She giggled again and we made out some more. I rolled over and pulled her on top of me to do the reach around and slowly pushed my fingers inside of her. It was a sneaky move. She whimpered and swayed her hips gently. I snapped her bra off with one hand and her tits, in all their fantastic glory, fell into my face. I stuffed one nipple into my mouth and continued massaging her clitoris in tiny, light circles, listening to her encouragements for guidance. She was very wet. I pushed her off and got on top of her so I could access her G-spot with my fingers.

Up to this point, I’d only read about it. Hers was where they said it would be, just inside, up and to the right. I massaged it with a, “come hither,” motion in between bouts of hammering up as hard as possible for thirty second intervals. It worked. She moaned in delight and began to climax. I’m a sex god, I’m Siddhartha, I’m the guy from the Paris Hilton sex tape.

“Oh my god! Oh my god!” She whimpered. I could tell she was about to come but my hand was burning with fatigue so I slowed down. I needed more practice.

“Oh don’t stop! Ok, ok, do you have a condom?”

Yes, you do. But I don’t like them.

Silence you!

It’s hard to feel things!

You want babies?

Maybe!

Shutup
.

Nein! Nein! Nein!

I leapt off the bed, tossed off my boxers and grabbed a rubber out of my pants. I slapped it on and got back to it. The whole process took about thirteen seconds. I finally pushed it in and it went easy so I started hammering away at her with swift, deep strokes, then shallow, slow circles, and then deep and fast again. I watched her giant breasts bounce and listened to her melodic howling as I slammed away, and within about thirty seconds I sensed my explosion. I had no control, I was an amateur.

“Oh, oh, oh shit, I’m coming. I’m sorry,” I said.

“Ok!” She said, squeezing my butt encouragingly.

“Oh fuck. Fuck.”

And it was done. DNA delivered. Fuck yeah, Captain Awesome.

I was embarrassed, but happy. My first bar conquest. She lit a cigarette, and I checked my text messages. There was one from Olivia saying, “Hey, I’m back! What r u doing
tmrw
?” I turned around and saw Lara reading over my shoulder. She didn’t say anything.

“That was really fun,” I said.

“Yeah it was.”

“I have to work tomorrow. I’m gonna crash here if that’s cool.”

“No problem.” She puffed up my pillow for me. “I have an extra toothbrush.”

She snuggled up to me. I wasn’t sure if I should cuddle her or not. But I did anyway. I wondered if she felt guilty about banging me so quickly, but decided not to ask. Instead, I tried to fall asleep, which didn’t come easily for some reason, even though I felt rather content. Then I felt a little bad, guilty, and wasn’t sure why. It was a feeling I would become familiar with. I dismissed the thought and tried to sleep in this stranger’s bed.

Epiphanies (Heroes)

I sat in the café, sucking my Americano and staring at my cell phone.
Montana
the cat girl wasn’t replying to my text messages, someone else was. They said:

“You have the wrong number, please stop texting us.”

Fuck. All that work for one measly blowjob memory, and I was over-texting like a
newb
, getting all riled up over no-reply’s. This didn’t come with the player package. They aren’t supposed to flake on you; they’re supposed to fall in love with you. I didn’t want to just fuck a girl and never see her again. I wanted to have the choice. I wanted to have super powers. Charm Boy! Come touch his wiener and be astounded!

After five months in
Montreal
, going out almost every night, I was more confident with women than at any point in my life. However, strange things were happening. The previous night I had a nervous breakdown, or like, a waking dream. I saw numbers falling all around me like in The Matrix. I fell onto my bed and laughed hysterically while this hallucination lasted about thirty seconds. Ok then… I thought. Maybe I should chill on all this self-actualization stuff. My obsession with pickup was making me mental.

I moved further off of
pua
material and was reading philosophy and biographies. I was particularly taken by
Freidrich
Nietzsche and his vision of the
Uberman
, or Superman. Apparently so were the Nazis, but that’s another story. I wrote about some of my favorite quotes in my journal.

“Admiration for a quality or an art can be so strong that it deters us from striving to possess it.” Don’t worship your heroes. Become the hero.

“Ah, women. They make the highs higher and the lows more frequent.” All the rejection I face, the negative emotions, must not be focused on. This will leave me immune.

“And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” Pretty much self-explanatory for anyone who spends an inordinate amount of time feeling sad.

“Art is the proper task of life.” I’m happiest while I make my art, whether that be writing a poem, a song, or seducing a woman. Creation fulfills the soul.

“He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.” To learn any great skill will require a great deal of dedication. Years perhaps.

“I assess the power of a will by how much resistance, pain, torture it endures and knows how to turn to its advantage.” There is no growth in comfort. Embrace the bad times as a grand learning experiences.

“If a woman possesses manly virtues one should run away from her; and if she does not possess them she runs away from herself.” Word to that, brother.

What a guy. He could have been a great ladies man if he read a few seduction books. Instead he grew old and lonely, went insane and died. Then his sister gave all his writing to the Nazis and they used it to create an army of racists.
Oopsies
! I only hoped I could be as prolific a writer as he was. Hopefully I won’t create an army of pickup Nazis. My sisters are too sweet to be evil.

I’d been mentoring my roommate, Mark, on the ways of seduction—because he was a pathetic beta male. He had a date the prior week with a girl he met at
Korova
bar. I came home one evening and he was running around the kitchen preparing a dinner in between trips to the rooftop patio.

“Sebastian! Go look on the roof. I set up for my date.”

I got up there and there was a blanket on the ground surrounded by a dozen candles, with flowers, a few of Eric’s paintings and a guitar. He had a three course meal set up. To get that stuff up there he had to climb two vertical wall ladders and hop over three low risers, so it obviously took lots of effort. I went back inside, deeply troubled. My
ebooks
didn’t agree with his strategy, not at all.

“Dude,” I said, “that’s insane.”

“Yeah man, isn’t it great? She’s gonna love it.”

“When did you meet her?”

“Oh, last night.”

“Last night?” I asked, frowning.

“Yeah man. Awesome huh? She’s so fucking hot bro. She’s Latino. Her ass is like a beach ball. I like her man, she reminds me of my ex.”

One night when Mark was strung out on blow (for about a week after every payday,) he told me that his last relationship was with a beautiful Jewish girl. They were together for two years and were madly in love…well, he was in love. But they never fucked. That’s right…never had sex in a two year monogamous relationship. Did he want sex? Maybe? I don’t understand how a twenty five year old man can be with a modern girl for two years and not get laid. But she didn’t want to bang Mark…so he waited. I figured he was clueless as I used to be, or just a pussy. Now I wonder if he wasn’t a closet homosexual.

Young men—understand this: until you bang her, there is no relationship. You have a friendship.

“Umm. Don’t you think that’s a bit much effort for someone you just met?” I said, watching him frantically uncork his twenty dollar wine bottle.

“Huh? No way. What girl wouldn’t love this? It shows what a great guy I am.”

“
Ummm
. It shows you really, really want her to like you.”

“Yeah man. I sure do.”

Face Palm.

I left him to his date with despair because I was going to meet Jeff at the Green room to relentlessly hit on every hot girl in a ten block radius. I wasn’t going for phone numbers anymore; they almost always just flake anyway. It’s too hard on your soul. So I decided to escalate like the Terminator for quick make outs and hopefully, same night bangs. I’d go full-douche bag, because that’s what seemed to work. Until now, almost every girl I’d slept with was a status lay, because I was in a band, or a journalist. Status is the ultimate aphrodisiac. Not anymore. I was a regular guy.

I hunted with Jeff for a bit. The guy was fearless, not what I expected. Now he relentlessly opened every woman on the block. He didn’t seem to care if I got a chance to try my luck, but I didn’t mind. I was getting really emotionally burned out with all this pickup stuff anyway. I wanted to go camping, or see some bands, or go to a potluck, but my life was all about approaching girls that didn’t want anything to do with me. I had a few chicks to call, but I wasn’t interested in seeing those ones, not much. I wasn’t even that excited to see Olivia. The hunt was more fulfilling than sitting around and hanging out, doing nothing. I’d rather be making art.

Our night wasn’t fruitful. I learned a few things about my bar game, like I’m too quiet and I still slouched. I needed to work on my vocal projection and become much louder. And I shouldn’t be afraid of groups. Most groups are just co-workers or friends of friends. Most guys aren’t looking for trouble and if you show them a little bit of respect, they’ll let you hit on their women.

I said an early goodnight to Jeff and walked home. I saw
Montana
the cat-blowjob girl roll by on a bus, but she didn’t, or pretended not to see me.

Fuck her dude. You can do better.

Maybe I’ll find her on Facebook later. I got another text from Olivia. Good. I liked her but not enough to be exclusive. I didn’t want to go monogamous with the first girl that would have me. I wanted to become a great and powerful
pooah
. She was cool but always seemed to be on morphine, or something, just far away. I called her a teeny bopper, and she agreed that she was indeed still a teeny bopper. I wanted her to read more books so we could talk about literature. Still, I was attracted to her youth and looks. Mostly I liked her because she liked me. She was one girl that didn’t flake on me. That was worth something.

When I got home, Mark was drinking red wine alone in the living room with Dinosaur Junior blaring off his IPod; half a
mickey
of vodka was on the table beside him, dark hair hanging over his forlorn face as he pecked away on Facebook.

“Hi Mark. How did your date go?” I said, grabbing a beer from the fridge.

“It was fine I guess.”

I cracked it open and took a long swig.

“That doesn’t sound good.”

You should teach him! To be like you!

“I don’t get chicks man,” he said. “We ate dinner and then she just bounced. I was gonna take her out, but she said she had plans… or some bullshit.”

I sat down and patted his shoulder. “
Ummm
, did you tell her how much you liked her?” I hoped he would say no.

“Yeah I did, numerous times. I wrote her a fucking song too, and played it for her. Bro she loved it.”

Another face-palm. Mark didn’t understand that most women don’t want to be wined and dined and serenaded by a dude they just met at a hipster bar. Well, some do, but not because they want to bang. Maybe they’re just bored and hungry. She must have realized that he was a giant pussycat who wasn’t ever going to step up, and left for greener pastures. He’s just too nice, the poor bastard. He picked up his guitar and started strumming it.

“Bro. It’s a good riff. Check it out. I’m gonna teach it to the guys and gig it.”

“It’s good.”

He had his music, his guitar, and his band. We’d been jamming a bit, but I didn’t like his style. It was very nineties grunge. Been there done that. But I noted how he dropped the rejection by focusing on his band. If you’re thinking negatively about something, it’s best to move your thoughts towards the positive. I like to think of Dolphins, or Dinosaurs, or my pretty ex-girlfriends.

A week passed and of course she never returned any of his dozen texts or phone calls. So one fine day I explained to him how women operate. I gave him a copy of The Game, David
Deanglo’s
Double Your Dating, and showed him a Mystery Method video on You Tube. I also told him that I go out to practice pickup almost every night, and if he’d like to join me he was more than welcome. I’d initiated my first pupil, or so I thought.

He was very interested for about ten minutes, and then he changed his mind. “That’s fucking creepy bro,” he said, in mocking disgust. “I always wondered where you were going every night. And you’re always talking about girls. Like, constantly.”

“Really. I am?”

“No, well, yeah. I’m kidding. It’s all good. But you should just relax a little, let it happen. I don’t like this Mystery guy. What a fucking douche-bag. I mean, look at him; he wears makeup and a top hat. What the fuck? Pickup artist? He looks like a circus freak.”

This dude is clueless. Teach him your ways, master Jedi.

“He’s a genius,” I said. “I know he looks weird, but check him out. I’ve been watching his videos all summer. I’ve been meeting new girls every night… this stuff really works. He’s not the only teacher. There’s a whole bunch of them; just Google, ‘How to pickup girls.’”

“Yeah...” He shook his head, looking at the bedroom floor he’d cleaned for his date. “But I’d just rather be myself. I don’t want to manipulate girls.”

Sighing, I pulled up a chair in front of him. “It’s not manipulation, it’s more like art. It’s just being awesome. It’s learning how to express your best-self, not give a shit what people think about you, and treat women like women, not cherished jewels.”

“Really? I don’t think so,” he said. “This is art.” He picked up his acoustic guitar and started plucking.

I hesitated before speaking again, picking up the bong and taking a long hit.

“Art is expression of soul, “I said as I coughed. “It’s creating something great out of something simple. You’re blowing it with these women. You don’t even see it. What I’m saying is you’re putting the girls on a pedestal. You need to be more teasing, more abundant. You need to be more of an uncaring asshole. Like, making that girl dinner and putting it on the roof? It’s so, needy. Don’t aim to please her just because she’s a woman. Make her earn that shit, like you would any potential friend. All you had to do was go for a walk, have a drink in one of the awesome local bars. You don’t even have to pay. Tease her a bit, make her work for your affections.”

He looked up, one eye poking out from behind his grunge hair. “I don’t want to be like that. I like the way I am.”

“Then you’ll keep getting what you’ve always gotten.”

He strummed his guitar and took a drag from his cigarette.

“I just don’t want to be like that,” he repeated.

Fuck this guy bro. Go be productive.

“Be like that? Be like what… confident? Charming? Do you like not getting laid? You enjoy being rejected?”

“It’s not like that,” he said. “I just haven’t met the right one. It’s not all about sex, Sebastian. You need to relax.”

“Mark, you haven’t been inside a vagina in four years. Things need to change.”

He stood up and slammed down his guitar, making the strings buzz. “Shut up, shut up, shut the fuck up with this pickup bullshit Sebastian!”

We sat in silence until he reached down and picked up the bong, took a toke, and passed it to me. “Yeah, I suppose I need some help. I still think Mystery is a creep. Hey, wanna jam? Go get your guitar.”

I didn’t want to jam. I used to be like Mark. I can’t say I’m better than him, even though I was more confident with women. Hell, if it wasn’t for pickup I wouldn’t even be in
Montreal
. I’d still be living with the stoners in
Vancouver
, doing nothing, rotting in depression the way Mark was now. I definitely wouldn’t have slept with all of these pretty girls. I’d probably have shot myself by now.