In the early to mid 1980s, I went through my motorcycle period. I was single at the time, in my early twenties, and several of my newest friends each had a motorcycle; so I decided to join in. I bought a new 1983 Suzuki GS-850. I loved that bike, and rode it until I met my wife Poopann, who refused to let me keep it. Basically it came down to her or the bike.

It was a tough call.

But in those freewheeling years before the iron ball was permanently clamped to my leg, I spent a lot of my time out on the open roads. With the wind in my hair and bug guts on my visor, I felt freedom like never before. (Or since.) I actually found it to be a healthy mental release from my normally neurotic self.

Long Island, New York, is not exactly the most motorcycle-friendly place in the world. There's simply too much traffic and not enough open road. The road system on Long Island is actually one huge bottleneck surrounded by water on three sides. If you wanted to leave by car there's only one direction you can go: west, towards New York City. Which happens to be one of the most congested metropolitan areas in the world. As a result, my friends and I often took long weekend trips away from Long Island, mostly through upstate New York and New England. Those were great times.

One of our regular riders was a guy named Craig. He was a cousin of one of my friends, about ten years older than the rest of us. Craig had type-1 Diabetes and had to take regular insulin injections. As long as he was careful and watched his diet and physical exertion, he was usually okay. Once or twice I witnessed him have an insulin reaction, and it was a little unsettling. But he normally calmed down after getting some sugar in him. In time Craig had also developed Celiac Disease, although it wasn't diagnosed for nearly a year. He was starting to lose weight and had developed some gastrointestinal problems. Celiac Disease creates an intolerance to the gluten found in grains such as wheat, rye, and barley. The allergic reaction to foods like breads and cereals will cause the villi in the intestines to flatten out. As a consequence, food is not digested properly. Fortunately, with proper diet, the Celiac sufferer can live a normal, healthy life.

It was August, 1984. We were taking our bikes up through Massachusetts. Craig had not yet been properly diagnosed, so he was still accustomed to eating things that were no good for him. He had joked on several occasions about how his bowel movements were becoming more problematic, but I just shrugged it off as typical male braggadocio.

Normally after a long day of riding and sightseeing we would stop at the nearest large town for the night. We generally looked for an inn or motel within walking distance of the nightlife. Then we would get something to eat and search for the loudest place we could find. On the night in question, we found ourselves seated in a large tavern that featured a live band. They were unbelievably good. The bar was already loaded with bikers when we got there -- the big, muscular Harley Davidson variety. (My group all rode Hondas and Suzukis -- information we quietly kept to ourselves.) And even though my friends and I worked out at the gym regularly, we still looked like little kids in front of some of these guys. They looked like they could crush us with their tattoos. In fact, their women looked like they could crush us with their tattoos.

I remember we had a considerable amount of beer that evening. I particularly recall Craig becoming pretty loud. At one point he made a gesture with his hand and accidentally broke an ashtray with his beer mug. The bartender then asked us to leave for being too rowdy. During our drunken walk back to the motel, we actually felt a stab of pride over the fact that we were tossed out of such a tough place. What a bunch of assholes we were.

We had rented two rooms between the seven of us. Each room had two double beds. I shared a room with Craig and two of my buddies. I also shared a bed with Craig.

Generally speaking, I really hate sharing a bed with another man. I mean, it really creeps me out. I have to give women a lot of credit here. Let's face it. Men are disgusting creatures. They make loud noises. They smell. They have skanky feet. I remember lying on my side of the bed, wide-eyed and coiled like a pit viper. If one of Craig's toes so much as grazed my leg, I would have sprung out of bed like a spooked cat.

After about half an hour I heard the other two guys sleeping soundly in the other bed. Meanwhile, Craig was tossing and turning, clearly in some sort of distress.

"Dude, this is not gonna be good," he said.

"What?"

"Just don't listen, okay?"

He stumbled out of bed and over to the bathroom. And then it sounded like he was trying to start up a chainsaw in there. Between each crank, he would follow through with an "Ohhh, boy." Finally, after five or six cranks, the engine popped and he was blasting away. I never thought shit could spew from someone's asscrack for such lengths of time. It seemed like he could rev for a minute at a time before idling again.

This was really beginning to mess with my head. I'm a Shameful pooper, and I find it difficult to listen to such a brazen display. Especially since this guy intended to jump back under the covers with me in a few minutes. I found it difficult to separate the man from the beast. And so I was quite a bit unsettled. Meanwhile, my two other friends were snoring away in a drunken stupor.

Finally, after nearly twenty minutes, all went silent inside the john. A few minutes passed, then I heard some movement, and finally a flush. Then the light went on. Then another flush.

Finally Craig emerged, looking like he had just been beaten up.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah. I don't know what's going on lately. I gotta see the doctor again."

I was about to say something else when suddenly it struck. A stench pocket hit me in the face with such force that I was stunned into silence. It was an unholy thing, not at all human, and its mere presence made me want to pray out loud. It was as if an entrance to hell had opened up and every rotting corpse in mankind's sad history was breathing its foul breath into the room.

Suddenly my two sleeping friends in the other bed started to gag. They could have been in an alcohol-induced coma and it wouldn't have made a difference.

"Oh, my God."

"Holy crap. What the hell is that?"

"It's not me," I said.

"C'mon man, I'm sick..." Craig said defensively. He seemed truly embarrassed.

"That's not sickness, that's death," my friend Bob said. "Something crawled up your butt and died."

"Oh God. Oh my God. I'm gonna throw up."

The next few seconds were like a sequence from Jaws as we all scrambled to safety, climbing over anything or anyone that got in our way. Moments later we found ourselves standing outside in the parking lot in our shorts, gasping for oxygen. It was a balmy August evening and there was no wind at all.

"Thanks a lot, Craig."

"Hey, man, I'm sick."

"Well, there's no way I'm sleeping in there tonight," I said. "I'll sleep in the other room. I don't care if it's on the floor."

Everyone agreed that was the only solution.

"Well, someone's gotta go back in and open the windows at least. You know, so it can air out." We nominated Craig, since it was all his fault.

A few minutes later we were settling into the other room with the remaining three members of our group. They were none too pleased. Suddenly it dawned on me that my overnight bag, along with all my clothing, was trapped inside the necropolis next door. Paranoia took over and I began to imagine microscopic stink-molecules attaching themselves to the fibers of my clothing.

"I gotta go back," I said.

"Good luck, man."

I stood outside in the motel parking lot and started some deep breathing exercises. Fortunately, I have very good lung capacity. I've never smoked and can hold my breath underwater for up to four minutes. I took a final deep breath and cautiously stepped through the door into the stink room. I felt like Sigourney Weaver entering the egg chamber in the Alien movies. Any false move on my part and I would be on the ground with one alien creature strangling me and another incubating inside me.

I found my bag in the corner of the room. Naturally, it was empty -- as usual, I was the only one who put all his clothing inside the dresser drawers. I'm such a neurotic dickwipe at times. I scrambled about the room grabbing all my clothes and toiletries. Had I slowed down a minute, I would have probably made it. But in my haste to get out quickly, I burned up too much oxygen in my lungs. Without thinking, I gulped in a half breath of fetid air. The stench of necrosis caused me to gag and I coughed out all the fresh air in my lungs. I instinctively sucked in a full breath and went into full panic mode.

"Augggghhhhh auggghhhhhh---"

I stuffed the last of my things in my overnight bag and rushed to the door. Back outside in the parking lot I hyperventilated for a minute or two in an attempt to purge my lungs of any remnant of the death cloud. Once back inside the other motel room, I showered and finally fell asleep on the sofa.

The next morning we sent an away team to do recon. They came back visibly shaken.

"It's still there."

Since I had already gotten my stuff out the night before, I had little sympathy for these guys. I quietly watched television as they went back inside the crime scene, one by one, to retrieve their stench-marinated possessions. It was like watching death-row prisoners walk the green mile. Not much was spoken afterward. We quietly checked out of the inn and put some distance between it and us. Craig rode far ahead, clearly troubled by the incident. We gave him his space.

In the following months, Craig's condition got worse before it got better. Finally he was properly diagnosed and put on a strict diet. Within weeks he had put weight back on and was looking healthy again. A few months after that I moved about forty miles away. We went on a few more road trips after that, but finally we lost touch. Last I heard, most of the guys, like myself, had been forced to give up riding after they got married.

I ended up selling my bike to my brother-in-law. He still has it and it's in pristine condition. To this day I hate him with every fiber of my being.

-- Poopster39