Scott Wicklund wasn’t supposed to be this kind of guy. He was a clean-cut, church-going, Bible-study-leading, mortgage-paying, family-man kind of guy. The kind of man who believed in firm handshakes and mutual funds. The kind of man who mowed his lawn every Saturday and had a wife who reminded him which beige sweater vest to wear to Sunday service.
And yet, he was drawn to me like a moth to a very drunken, very reckless flame.
I wasn’t a great influence, and I didn’t try to be. He was looking for something—an escape, a thrill, a way to scratch an itch that had been buried beneath decades of “yes, dear” and quiet desperation. And I? I was all too happy to provide the lighter fluid.
Our friendship escalated quickly. Late nights, heavy drinking, bad decisions, and even worse ideas. Scott had never met a world like mine before, and I was more than willing to introduce him to it.
~
One of our first real adventures together was a trip to Portland. A buddy of mine had plans to hit DaVinci’s—a place that barely qualified as a nightclub, more like an open market for depravity. Techno music, women in cages swinging from the ceiling, fire performers, people with hooks in their skin—pure sensory overload.
Scott had no idea what he was walking into.
By the time we arrived, he was obliterated. Not just drunk, but gone. He looked less like a man on a fun night out and more like a confused time traveler who had just stepped out of a malfunctioning machine.
Inside, the air vibrated with bass, the lights pulsed in time with a collective heartbeat of intoxicated souls. The whole place had an unspoken agreement that whatever was happening was exactly what was supposed to be happening.
Scott wandered off, lost in his own head, his pupils blown wide, moving like a man who had discovered a new color that no one else could see.
Then, just as I was settling into the energy of the place, Scott reappeared—wedging himself between me and my buddy Big G, squeezing into a space that wasn’t there.
And then, in a moment that should have been scripted, he turned to the tall man behind him—some shadowy figure in sunglasses, of all things—and leaned in close enough to rest his chin on the guy’s chest.
“Have you found Jesus?” Scott slurred, eyes wide with a strange mix of sincerity and whatever liquid demons were currently controlling his body.
The man smirked but said nothing.
Scott, undeterred, pushed on. “You need to find Jesus, man. He’ll save you.”
I grabbed Scott before he got himself punched and shoved him in front of me.
“Behave,” I muttered.
Then, the ringmaster of this circus took the stage. A greasy-haired man in a blue tuxedo bellowed into a microphone:
“Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to… Miss Nude Portland!”
The crowd didn’t cheer—this wasn’t that kind of place. Just a subtle nodding of heads, an acknowledgment of the moment, like some sort of secret ritual.
She emerged, wrapped in nothing but strategically placed electrical tape. She moved with the confidence of someone who had long since stopped caring about what polite society thought.
Scott was transfixed.
She danced her way through the room, making her rounds, engaging the audience, and before I could stop him, Scott had drifted to the front, standing there like a lost boy at Disneyland.
I leaned toward a couple in front of me and, without thinking, whispered, “If you tell him to take his shirt off, he’ll do it.”
The woman looked at me, then at Scott, then back at me.
And then, without hesitation, she leaned in and whispered something in Scott’s ear.
His whole body language shifted, like a golden retriever about to chase a tennis ball.
“Really?” he asked, excited, hopeful.
She nodded.
And then—without hesitation—Scott ripped off his shirt and flung it into the crowd.
There he was, bare-chested, C-cup man boobs out for the world to see, standing before Miss Nude Portland like some kind of offering.
She laughed, twirled a finger, and Scott took it as a cue to start swinging his shirt above his head.
That was the moment security stepped in.
Four enormous bouncers descended on him like he was a criminal mastermind, grabbed him by all four limbs, and dragged him outside.
I followed, making sure they weren’t beating the shit out of him.
“He’s not coming back in,” one bouncer said.
Fair enough.
I handed them a twenty and said, “Can you babysit him?”
Then I went back inside for a few more drinks.
Two hours later, when Big G and I emerged, Scott was nowhere to be found.
“Where the hell is he?” I asked the bouncer.
He pointed upstairs.
“He’s in the massage parlor.”
Of course, he was.
When he finally stumbled down, his hair was wild, his face drenched in sweat. Whatever had happened up there, I wasn’t going to ask.
It was time to go home.
~
The drive back took us over to Milwaukee, Oregon, where Big G and I had a tradition—Jack in the Box tacos.
We pulled in, ordered $40 worth of those deep-fried, regret-filled monstrosities, and parked to eat in silence, enjoying the greasy satisfaction of bad decisions.
Scott was shifting uncomfortably in the backseat.
“I gotta shit,” he muttered.
He had been saying this for the last hour, but now there was urgency in his voice.
He got out of the truck, wobbled, stumbled, fell flat on his face on the asphalt.
He got up, brushed himself off, and started wandering aimlessly around the parking lot, clutching his stomach like a dying man.
The only problem?
He had chosen to do this right next to the Sheriff’s station.
“Scott, do not shit near the Sheriff’s station,” I called out.
He didn’t answer. He just kept wandering.
Then, without warning, he dropped his pants, bent forward, and—
What happened next defied physics.
A violent, torrential spray of liquid shit exploded from his ass with the force of a goddamn fire hydrant.
The sheer volume was astounding.
The distance? At least three, maybe four feet.
The impact? The side wall of Coney Island restaurant.
It splashed. Dripped. Coated the bricks like some unholy crime scene.
Big G and I sat there, tacos halfway to our mouths, completely stunned.
Silence.
Then—
“Jesus Christ,” Big G whispered.
Scott, without a single ounce of shame, pulled up his pants, tucked in his shirt, walked back to the truck, sat down, and started eating tacos.
Like nothing had happened.
~
That night changed Scott.
Portland had awakened something in him.
He had tasted freedom.
And once a man tastes freedom, he will chase it into the abyss.
Scott wasn’t going back to the Bible studies and quiet Friday nights.
Scott was gone.
And this?
This was just the beginning.
