Some days you get so horny you feel like you’re gonna die.
It’s 4:15 am and you’re sipping your last Pornstar Martini and staring at the aftermath of a sultry club scene in the heart of Accra – chairs strewn aside, tables lopsided, heat like a gushing hydrant grilled in the sun. Of course, also the few remaining bootylicious women sashaying across the pole for their own entertainment amidst drunken laughter.
Skimpily-clad women and tight-shirted men that twirled in the club in the wee hours of morning have dwindled to the seven at the corner of the room eating their mouths and bodies out in reckless abandon. One of the girls, whose bum swirls like a disco ball, winks at you and clicks her tongue.
The heavy-set man behind her smacks her cheek, sinks his palms into her bum, and yanks her face to him, spitting into her mouth and then swallowing her tongue. She winces at first then kisses him back with a steely strength that betrays her petite frame. You smirk. Tale as old as time. The woman who would give in to an abusive sex partner because the money is the goal. She would probably get into an insulting spree with her girls later in the day and pour vials of blasphemy on his name. Probably curse his entire lineage. And with some kayamata, she’d be back on her feet with more offerors. This is just how things went. A woman had to do what a woman had to do to get by.
Or perhaps you’re wrong. She just loves the kink.
And then there you are. At the bar when it’s closed 45 minutes earlier, downing your favorite drink when you should be getting in on the action at the corner. Sure, the girl winked at you as a signal to join in, but you just can’t. Today is another day you showed up at the club at midnight to drown your boredom in ass and Pornstar Martinis and weed. Yet you just can’t seem to continue the full regimen right now. You just stare aloof at the corner where the four men and three women are ramming into each other like rabid dogs and grunting ugly noises in the wake of smut.
You have a good friendship with Akwasi, the owner of the club so he lets you linger on after the club closes. He always asks you why you stay behind. And you always reply you want to set off at 5 am to arrive at Tema at 6 am sharp so you can sleep the rest of the day, wake at 3 pm, do all your freelance work till 9 pm, jerk off and watch TV till 11 pm then reach the club around 12 midnight, stay till 5 am, and then do it all again.
Your dick is your god and your lust is a cistern that never runs dry. And you were very content to indulge it as a young boy at 12 that sneaked into his classmate’s bed when her parents left her over with yours for babysitting and you made her squeal with delight with your immature thrusts into her. From then on, you knew the power of ecstasy would stay with you for the rest of your life.
Porn became a friend months later and when you were hitting your adulthood, your body count spanned over a 100, spread over three continents. Lust is what got you through when you couldn’t make sense of the world. Like when you lost Ami after cheating on her with voluptuous Tessy and you jerked off like crazy ‘cause you didn’t know why you fucked up so.
You loved Ami but damn, Tessy’s body was just like the pornstar you loved from Russia with a waist as constricted as a rubber band and boobs and butt that seemed to bulge on like an uninterrupted wave chasing a surfer. You jerked off because it made you forget the momentary pain, even if for a few minutes. You never really had time to edge when you were frustrated. You just needed the pent-up release to be done with quickly and in the momentary spurt, think of yourself as the one in control and not your emotions.
Whenever it looked like all your job applications were going to naught, you devoured your penis to manage your anxiety. And when all your fuck buddies were busy for one reason or the other, you slapped your meat till it got sore.
You knew this was bad. Mom hadn’t taught you this. She was an evangelical leader. Maybe Dad taught you this. He had cheated on Mom when you were three and Mom divorced him straight. She didn’t care that it would dent her image as a preacher. She always told you when you were 10 that she’d rather be single and lonely and gossiped about by church members than condone a man who didn’t respect her and oh, found her unworthy to fuck till eternity.
You laughed and were amazed that those words would come out her mouth, but then it hit you, even at such a young age. Everyone needed to be loved singularly, or better said, wanted to be loved singularly and fully. As for Dad, maybe his cheating taught you that lust had no traffic light. And you hated barriers to free flows. So you indulged. Lust guided your every action without inhibition, a sticky gooey mess of lather frothing higher and higher from a bucket.
Now you had freelance jobs that raked in good money: data entry jobs, AI assistant jobs, and even copywriting jobs, even though you studied Land Economy at KNUST and didn’t know a wink about tech and advertising. But you know what, desperation is a gift, because with freelance work, once you get the hang of it, you build an empire with it, literally.
Now back to the club, where sweat is dried on your back from so much dancing with the short and pencil-figure woman that you dance-fucked to Wizkid’s “Joro” hours earlier. You don’t know why you danced with her. She would never be your type but she sat on her chair at the rear end looking so lonely, it broke something in you.
It reminded you of how lonely you were, though you thought you had jerked off to soothe you. How you ran through women like a cyclone but were never sturdy enough to build something solid in even one of them. How jerking off was your attempt to eat light when it only sunk you into darkness. How you’d feel like a loser after every drip of semen onto your stomach as you lay naked and prostrate on the floor in your apartment. How jerking off really, felt like faux joy, a guillotine waiting for the right time to finally screw you over.
So you danced with her, took off your shirt and she slid her arms against your torso and pushed her weight onto you. She smelled like untamed desire and cheap perfume but you didn’t care so you tossed her over and she pressed her bum into your crotch and grinded on you like you’d never been grinded on before.
You felt your penis getting limp after a few minutes and excused yourself into the bathroom. Perhaps the alcohol was ruining your game. And saw yourself in the mirror.
You looked spent. Gaunt. Like a man that would never find his way. Somehow after all the animalistic desires you’d nursed since childhood, something still felt woefully missing. So, you washed your face, amidst the moans that seeped out from the stall at the farthest right and walked to the chair you’re currently sitting on and just watched everyone in the club. They seemed happy. Like you should be. Or were they? Or was there someone in the crowd that would understand that feeling of dancing your life away and dreading the morning because life just doesn’t feel complete. Just doesn’t feel worth living when all you do is fuck yourself all night and some sexy woman from God-knows-where in a stall most dawns.
You clasp your pouch, tip the bartender packing the chairs and walk out. The wind outside slaps your face as you near your SUV. Yes, you were able to buy an SUV from tech and advertising work. It is definitely booming up there.
You sink into the driver’s seat, shoulder’s slumping, and stare at the empty parking lot. Then something stirs within you, and you leave your car, locking it as you run back into the club. The flame of the orgy seems to have weakened out and the woman with the big bum is getting into her clothes. You grab her fiercely. She laughs. I know you wanted me. She points at you, laughing even harder, her eyes disappearing into slits. Come to my place. Come sit on my face. You beg. You don’t even know why you’re taking her home. The stall always does the trick. Ah well, whatever. That ass deserves all the time and space in the world. She stills and offers a coy smile, then tells you to zip up her back. The other men and women who were engaged in the orgy are now walking towards the bar. Possibly for their last drink of the dawn.
As you walk with this woman to your car, she says her dad named her Larteley, and her mom died giving birth to her. She loves fucking and working the poles so might as well make some good money to send to her father who is struggling with diabetes. A weak smile escapes your face. You don’t know why she’s giving you all this info. All you want is her ass not her backstory.
You know this road leads to nowhere, but you grab her hand in yours, open the passenger door for her, and drive home, an erection muddying all the conversations you have with her about how hard things are in Ghana and how God will punish its leaders.
Your dick is your god and your lust is a cistern that never runs dry. You wonder why you even engage it and as you ram into Larteley on the balustrade in the hall leading to your bedroom upstairs, the swell of her bum finally yours to knead, your left hand clutching her lips and stifling her moans, you wish you never walked into the guestroom and fucked your classmate at 12. You wish you had stayed put in your room and read a book and just slept. You wish you had never sneaked into the hall on Saturday at midnight to watch cable TV porn when Mom’s laughter wafting into the corridors had finally morphed into heavy snores. You wish you had never become a horrendous version of your cheating, philandering father. You wish you had banished lust before it ever became a persistent lover, before it turned more lethal than choking smoke and fire. You wish you had never become a slave to your desires. Because truth be told, you’re freaking tired; all you want is to be free.
David Agyei-Yeboah is a poet, fiction writer and musician from Accra, Ghana. Instagram: @davidshaddai, X: @david_shaddai
Cover photo credit: Paweł L