Attempted fiction

David was a generous lover, or so he thought, or so he liked to believe.

He was never actually told this. He assumed as much.

Not that his various bed mates ever gave him words or grunts to that effect, but still, one likes to assume that one is proficient in the bedroom unless one is told otherwise. David was never told otherwise and so lived happily in the bubble that this ignorance granted him. Walking down the street of a morning, he would stride with confidence past the shop windows, occasionally catching a glimpse of his reflection and, again assuming that what he saw was indeed a good thing, smile to himself that he had, if not all, then most of what was required to make the complete package in a modern man.

Despite this enthusiasm, David felt incomplete.

Not so much metaphorically, but literally. He was literally missing something.

A testicle, to be precise.

It was a warm February evening in 1987 when the tragedy occurred.

David, either being too young to remember or too shocked to record the memory, always drew a blank when he tried to recall that summer night.

He would furrow his brow and make complex faces as he tried to encourage some kind of flashback. Sometimes he would simply sit in his room in complete darkness, and in the silence he would gently hold his remaining testicles in his hand and try desperately to reach some kind of inner plain – to provoke a revelation within himself that would bring to life the memory of the parting. But to no avail. The repercussions of that night would be felt for the rest of his life, yet he could not even tell you how much he had laughed before the accident or whether he eaten any of the sausages that his father had barbecued to blackened sticks.

He could remember parts of the day when he and his brother Jacob had climbed over the green wrought iron fence of the private girls school opposite their home and how he had pleaded with Jacob not to piss in the drinking fountain and then watched horrified and excited as Jacob proceeded to piss in the drinking fountain. Memories of his youth, but with one glaring omission.

The missing testicle.

The sad truth was that David was the only party to the theft of his manhood. He was alone when it happened. It was not until he ran into the kitchen screaming to his mother clutching his now bloodied crotch that a witness to the massacre could be found.