Charlie Sheen: Charlie's Devils

I get the picture. Then what happened? "We go into the room. She was cool. She knew right away it was my maiden voyage. My knowledge was like, 'Do this and repeat if necessary,' like straight out of the sex manual. As brief as it was, it was crazily enjoyable. It was also immediately addicting. Right down my alley, man. Anyway, I wait in the bathroom while Joey goes to do his thing and then we go do the payment thing. The problem is, we don't have the $400. So, I went into my father's room and swiped his credit card. She sees my pop's name on it and says, 'Where is he? Can I get an autograph?' I say, 'He can't know about this.' Anyway, she was cool and she split. About two weeks later, Pop got his credit card bill and there's this $400 charge for 'Entertainment Plus' or something, so I had to confess."

What did Pop extract as penance? "He didn't make me go out and pick up dog shit for five years to pay him back. There was no back 40 to make me hoe. He was pretty cool about it, but Pop's famous for getting you in a car when he wants to talk to you because, like, where can you go? You're going to listen to him whether you like it or not. So, over the eight-track blaring Bob Dylan, he tried to explain sex versus love and how I had to understand where sex fits in and doesn't fit in. I said, 'Pop, it fit in pretty fucking good.'

"Love, lust--I mean, he talked about understanding the difference between the two," Sheen continues, his face turning serious. "And to this day, I'm not sure I know the difference. I think maybe I've been in love, but I don't know. Maybe I have been in love with the idea of being in love. Maybe I've been in love with the lust of love. But I've never really had my heart broken, you know." Sucking on a cigarette, he tells me how he and actress Meredith Salenger recently busted up, and about a poem, titled "Whatever Blues," he penned to commemorate the split. He tells me the poem "ends with a guy socking down spoonful after spoonful of cyanide-filled Jell-O. It's a metaphor for something, I don't know what."

I suggest that he might want to rethink dating other performers, making Sheen ask, "Do you date an actress because she understands what you do and what you go through, even though I have dealt with that 'actress' shit--hearing about her fucking auditions and callbacks and readings--and that's driven me absolutely fucking crazy? Or do you date a waitress or the telephone operator who doesn't know shit about what you do, can't relate to it? But at least [doing] that's cool because, when we get home, she's not gonna talk about a fucking audition or a photo shoot--all that shit you don't want to hear. I mean, sometimes you just want to go home, fuck, and watch baseball."

On the other hand, Sheen says, "Some things have really worked for me. I had a fucking crazy, really bitchin' relationship with Ginger Lynn." Ah, yes, Ms. Lynn, the body beautiful shown to spectacular effect in numerous movies in the "Adult" section of your local video store. Exactly how bitchin' was his relationship with Lynn, which, reportedly, did not sit well with his parents? "The physical, sexual aspects of it were completely insane, fucking phenomenal," he recalls. "To tell you the fucking truth, it was out of hand. Getting head? Beyond fucking thunderdome. The hang level? One-hundred percent. My friends fucking dug her because she was a great resource. If one of my friends was curious about something, they could say, 'Ginge, look, my girlfriend, the blow jobs just aren't there. What do I do to get her to improve the blow jobs?' And she'd just tell them. The sexual stuff was so fucking phenomenal, it fucked me up for anything after it. You know, you get accustomed to eating prime rib and if somebody starts throwing cheeseburgers your way, it's not gonna cut it, man."

Sheen throws back his head laughing, slapping the table. "There's now probably a couple of girls out there going, 'So, I'm a fucking cheeseburger, pal?' Sorry! But, hey, maybe compared to the prime rib they were used to, I'm a fucking cheeseburger to them, too." So, what made him give up his prime rib? "She had to figure some shit out on her own," he says of Lynn, with considerable tenderness. "I needed to give her some time to just let her get to know herself a little better. There was also a lot of judgment, a lot of pressure. From my family. From the press."

Speaking of the press, Sheen's gotten less ink lately about his earlier high living and carousing. "Nobody can tell you anything about the stuff that comes your way," he says, jamming out his cigarette. "You can batten down every fucking hatch, but, when you're at sea, the ocean is a motherfucker. I feel bad for Darryl Strawberry," he says about the ballplayer who's had drug troubles and got dropped by the Dodgers. "But man, you've got six months to fuck off and six to put people on the seats and play some good baseball. Having been through the whole deal, I understand that sometimes you just don't give a fuck. You've gotta feed that appetite, find that temporary satisfaction that feels like an absolute necessity at the time. I've been the guy at the bar until 5 a.m., picking up some girl, knowing I've got a photo shoot at 7, figuring, 'Fuck it, I'll wear shades.' But, with Strawberry or me, it's like, there are so many fucking guys that wanna do what you do, it's not fair not to be at the right place."

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