My Life in a Celebrity Polycule
I first spoke publicly about my experience with A-List ethical nonmonogamy at Write Club, a live literary competition in Chicago. I was assigned the topic “CLEAN” and instructed that I should bring a 7-minute written piece to the event. Here is a slightly revised version of what I presented to a raucous audience on April 17, 2024, at GMan Tavern, just north of Wrigley Field.
***
The other day I overheard a snatch of conversation, nothing much really. It was just a slurred voice declaring, “I’m gonna get clean, I swear.”
Instantly, my nether regions were electric in a way that was almost, but not quite, as surprising as accidentally washing one’s undercarriage with organic peppermint oil soap.
“Clean,” I whispered hoarsely. “Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time.”
I stared into the middle distance for a full ten minutes before the drunk in the neighboring booth at the hot dog restaurant asked if I were okay.
“Oh yes,” I said, meeting his red-rimmed, cloudy gaze. “I’m just remembering how good to felt to get…clean.”
***
I was young. Shit was wild. It was an era of protest music, sexual experimentation, youth revolution, an upending of social taboos, the complete reimagining of the American experiment. Up was down and what had been dry was wet with possibility. It was the summer of love: 2005.
I had been in Los Angeles for about a year. I’d gotten an elite gig waiting tables at the Chateau Marmont. I was strong, and flexible and happy thanks to Pilates and a vegan lifestyle. Cocaine is, of course, vegan.
There are a lot of things I don’t remember, like my age. In 2005 was I 18, 30, or 57? There is simply no way for us to know.
But there is one thing I remember — the way he looked when he sat in my section.
I knew who he was — of course I did. It was the Chateau! I’d served Keanu, Leo, women who asked if I could send the on-site asshole bleach technician to their bungalow. I was used to glamour.
But when this customer looked up at me, the low lighting glinting off his shiny dome and his kinda-gay earring, I knew he knew I knew who he was.
“Mr. Clean,” I said. “A pleasure to welcome you to the Chateau.”
He eyed me up and down, with a face that designed to make 10000 trad wives cum into their mop buckets. I’ll admit, my down-there-a was a lust swamp the moment we spoke.
“I don’t want any food,” Mr. Clean said. “I don’t want any booze. I just want you to come to my bungalow after you get off.”
“To, or in?” I said. I may have been young (or not, cannot be sure) but I’d read a book (cannot recall which one.)
And that’s how it began, the kind of messy yet pleasant-smelling affair with an A-list celeb that you can only have when you’re young or middle-aged and in Hollywood or the adjacent superior neighborhoods where rich people actually live.
Mr. Clean was a Los Feliz guy, like Brad Pitt — in fact, they were neighbors! They’d also coincidentally purchased neighboring homes out in Malibu, and in Tuscany, and in Switzerland, and, to their surprise, every single pair of homes had a secret tunnel running underground that linked both mansions, and they somehow had matching tattoos, and I once overheard a screaming fight where Jen Aniston said, “Is THAT who you’re FUCKING? Is that why you come home smelling like goddamn Pine Sol?” and Brad shouted back, “It’s not PINE SOL, don’t EVER say that, that’s DIFFERENT!” so I guess they were arguing about Angelina Jolie.
Me and my heterosexual boyfriend who was very in love with me, Mr. Clean, used to run into Brad all the time and they’d make the deepest eye contact. It’s so nice to know your neighbors!
Anyway, a few minutes after we started dating, Mr. Clean said, “Hey, babe?”
I said, “Yeah?”
He said, “I was wondering if you’re interested in polyamory? I really think you should read Sex at Dawn? Also, have you read The Ethical Slut? It’s got a deliberately provocative name, but I assure you it’s excellent.”
I said, “I’m sorry, what?”
He said, “Uh, I mean, monogamy is a trap enforced by white supremacist heteronormative cisgender patriarchy. Let’s fuck other people.”
Obviously I said, “Okay!”
And that’s when the parties started. Everybody was screened and selected by Mr. Clean and, for some reason, Brad. I guess he really cared about keeping the block safe.
The guest list was elite. Specific. Everybody signed an NDA. They were all in the industry.
I don’t know what you were doing on your birthday in 2005, but if you weren’t taking backshots from Toilet Duck while Mr. Clean and Mrs. Meyer sucked and fucked in front of somebody mysterious in a gorilla mask who was the exact height, weight and build of Brad Pitt, then I just can’t relate to you.
Mrs. Meyer was a trip. She was a giver. “Every day is a clean day!” she’d say as she buried her face in my ass. We had so much fun with her that we decided to become a throuple, until Mr. Clean felt like she and I were more into each other than him — which always happens — so Mrs. M and I said, “Baby, do not worry, the solution is to bring in some new fluid” and that’s how Liquid-Plumr joined our little quartet. Turned out he was way too intense and threw off the vibe, plus we were like, “Why is he deliberately spelling his name wrong? To be ‘different’? That’s such a first year at Bard type of move” so we replaced him with someone more nurturing: Scrub Mommy.
She was happily married, but her spouse was so supportive. Scrub Daddy was not only polyamorous himself, but actually asexual, and everything is a spectrum so that doesn’t mean he rejected all sexual interaction, but that he was highly specific and selective and didn’t NEED sex to love somebody, and you even expecting me to explain this is highly reductive so I suggest YOU read a book!
He was in love with all of us — hi, I said he was POLYAMOROUS — but only sexually attracted to the curiously omnipresent person in the gorilla mask who smelled and sounded exactly like Brad Pitt.
So that was our little polycule. Mr. Clean, Mrs. Meyer, Scrub Mommy and I would fuck, and we were all in love with each other, and also with Scrub Daddy, who was also in love with us but didn’t fuck us, because he simply preferred to do it with a masked individual with the exact gait and verbal cadence of the younger brother in the hit 1992 paen to fly-fishing “A River Runs Through It.”
We’d open it up sometimes and bring in Fabuloso, or Lemon Pledge, or Bar Keepers Friend, and when I really needed to refresh all my holes, I’d say “Better call Pine Sol!” and he’d show up immediately.
God, I miss you, Pine Solomon. You weren’t flashy, but you always got the job done. The rimjob, specifically, was your art form.
I really thought fucking around the world with my celebrity sex friends was going to be the focus of the rest of my life, but everything changes, doesn’t it? One day you’re taking turns getting absolutely rocked in a trailer at Coachella by 2005 festival sponsor Swiffer, and the next — well…
We were all macrodosing out in Joshua Tree, where Mr. Clean had just purchased a vast desert nature preserve immediately adjacent to an estate owned by, and you’ll never believe this, hand to God — Brad Pitt!
So me and Mr. Clean and Mrs. Meyer and Scrub Mommy are in the massive wood-fired hot tub jerking and fingerblasting while Scrub Daddy got lovingly spanked by a somebody in a very realistic full-body saguaro cactus suit whose grunts of pleasure made me randomly think of Tyler Durden for literally no reason at all.
That’s when I saw the man who changed everything for me. I looked over and saw the most enchanting, beautiful, incredible gentleman I’ve ever beheld.
Let me tell you, he was just…different. He seemed so…clean. Cleaner than any of us. Gentle. But strong.
“Who the fuck is that?” I asked Mr. Clean, who had just finished cumming in Mrs. Meyer’s mouth. She spit it back in his mouth (their patented move) and the guy in the cactus suit, “Now that’s what I call TRUE ROMANCE!” Then he laughed gently to himself for what felt like a really long time.
Mr Clean swallowed and looked over at our mystery guest and gave me that incredible grin. His teeth were as flawless as the most sparkling white tile grout.
“That guy?” he said. “Oh, I forgot to tell you I invited him. That’s Dr. Bronner.”
“A doctor?” I said, immediately charmed.
When God closes a door, he opens a window, which reminds me of the time Windex came over, licked each of our taints exactly once, and left. Call it what you want, I call that ART.
I got out of the tub, fully naked, and walked right up to Dr. Bronner. He smelled so inoffensive, but not quite great, you know? It was fantastic.
“Hi,” I said.
He looked at me with these gentle, kind eyes, and said, “GOD IS ALL ONE GOD IS LOVE THERE IS NO GOD BUT LOVE READ THE BIBLE READ THE KORAN READ THE KAMA SUTRA READ THE BHAGAVAD GITA READ THIS LABEL GOD IS TORAH GOD IS ORGANIC GOD JESUS WAS A RABBI SAINT ALL-ONE ALL-HAIL BUDDHA CLEAN THE FUTURE IS NOW DO NOT EAT THIS SOAP BUT YOU COULD BUT STILL DON’T BUT ALSO IT CAN BE TOOTHPASTE AND UNCLOG YOUR DRAINS I LOVE YOU!!!”
***
Back at the hot dog restaurant, the drunk man looked at me, horrified, and then blacked out face-down on a Chicago-style hot dog. I didn’t notice. I was still telling my sweet old love story.
“It’s been so long,” I said. “The polycule just kept getting bigger, and broke up when our shared Google fuck-calendars ran out of color-coded categories.”
I noticed the man was unconscious, and I gently picked his face up and wiped it off with the Burt’s Bees gentle antiseptic wipes I always keep in my purse. As ever, the sight of the brand label made my asshole vibrate with anticipation.
***
I never met Burt, but those bees! They buzzed me something good at the New York premiere party for Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which Brad’s new girlfriend had invited me to after we ran into each other in our partners’ shared organic tomato patch.
I’ve always been a big fan of bees, because they help us and our beautiful natural environment to survive and thrive. We all need to care about the health of bees.
So anyway, after I fucked every single one of Burt’s Bees in a bed at Bed, Angie waved me over for a chat by the bean dip.
Meanwhile, Brad took Mr. Clean into a back room I hadn’t noticed. When they came out fifteen minutes later, they both looked exhilarated. I asked Mr. Clean if they’d done a deal for him to be in Brad’s next picture.
“Y-yes?” he said, looking at Angie, who nodded solemnly and then winked at me. It was like we were in on a secret together that only she knew. That’s how charming these superstars can be! What a fun gal.
***
Anyway, my life is really different now. It’s slower, and quieter, and less abrasive to my mucous membranes. I’m happy in a different, more grown-up way. But every once in awhile, when I catch a certain scent on the breeze — some gloriously odiforous surfactant — I think of those days.
And when I really want to treat myself, I put on the soundtrack for my favorite gritty indie arthouse film, Salt, light a candle, regrout my shower tile, and flip the oscillating multitool so I can enjoy the vibrating handle. As I stand there, naked and tumescent, gazing at tile that gleams as beautifully as a certain bald-headed consensual home invader with affordable cleaning solutions, I whisper, “I’ll always love Clean.”
FIN
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After winning the trophy of Deathless Fucking Glory at Write Club, I published a draft on Patreon, then revised it for Medium. If you’d like to support my subtle and elegant artistry, I invite you to become a patron. I also publish a weekly newsletter, SARATONIN. Other professional info is here. Thank you for reading.
