I had a gloriously brief conversation with April today on Instant Messenger which consisted of me wishing her a happy belated birthday (hers was three days ago), she asking who the hell I was (I was using a screen name she didn't know) and me identifying myself.
Her response: "oh, it's you," and immediately signing off.
I'm still struggling with why I don't feel especially guilty about what I did during the course of our relationship--the sex I had and the loves I developed, specifically--still asking myself the same questions even as I do the exact same thing with other people, albeit in slightly more noncommittal ways. It's not a stretch to say it's fairly obvious my handling of the Tiffany, Mackenzie, and Melanie situations are all directly related to my failures with April and, later, Allie (although I tend to not count the latter because our relationship only went past where it is now "off the record")--because I couldn't bring myself to end things with April before they got bad, I found myself all the more willing to simply stop communicating with Tiffany and Mackenzie when they made me feel uncomfortable, and because I couldn't keep Allie, I tried like hell to keep Melanie. And now, predictably, I have none of them, and unpredictably, I'm not crying in my soup.
When I was eighteen, I never thought I'd ever want to reach a point where I sought superficial connections with people; six years later, I find those connections are the purest I can ever have. The flirt is the easiest, especially when I know the desire is there, and I'm getting better at noticing it. It's the best, really, better than meaningless sex, because yeah, someone is always going to feel more strongly than the other ("love is never equal," as Jill Sobule once said), but if there is no contact, there is no foul, if I may lapse into basketball parlance.
This weekend was great for flirting--Saturday in particular. There was a bachelorette party at the bar, the tallest and the blondest girl (apologies to Leonard Cohen) wouldn't stop looking at me and, eventually, I had to say hello. Someone else was there too, I'd seen her before and she started talking to me. She ensnared me outside the bathroom and talked at length about literature--she was quite well-read--and gave me her phone number without me even asking. I appreciated her forwardness a lot more than I let on, preferring that she think me intimidated simply because it kept me from attempting to do what I, deep down inside, really wanted to do.
The last of the night was my favorite, though, the short Mexican woman with the Aztec name I never learned (instead receiving an Anglicism upon introduction months ago). I'd met her some brief forever ago and never really got the vibe that she was attracted to me, thus, freed from the tension that, sad to say, defines most of my relationships with women, I could be as candid as I wanted with her. She was having problems walking when I bounced over to her for the last time; I at first thought she was just having troubles navigating the crowd but, when she hit the open floor, I realized she was quite drunk. She asked me to dance with her for a song and I complied; seconds later, she asked me if I'd walk her to the bathroom because she was afraid she'd fall.
I showed her to the ladies' room and, after a few minutes' conversation, gestured for her to go in.
She didn't seem interested in evacuating. "You know what I like about you? I like the way you respect girls."
"You see," I said with the honesty I usually reserve for the extremely drunk, "I don't always, or at least I don't always act like it."
She shook her head; later, I would wonder if she actually thought about my situations with Tiffany and Melanie, both of which she knew about in detail. "Don't say that," she said, "I know you." She grabbed my hand and tried to pull me in with her and I dug in my heels.
"I can't go in there," I laughed.
"Oh, there's nobody in there," she said, "and even then, girls don't care." The nonsensicality of her speech suggested two things; first, that she was far more intoxicated than I initially thought and, second, that she probably only wanted me to stand outside the door of the stall while she urinated. I laughed at how funny the situation might have looked to any outsiders that might have been watching and slipped my hand from her grasp.
Minutes later, she emerged. Had I not been preoccupied with the tall blonde's offer for me to join them at the bachelorette party's suite at the Mark Spencer, I would have been amazed at how her smile looked as pleasant, friendly and sober as it normally did. At the time, I simply chuckled.
"I normally don't get this drunk," she said, leaning against the wall next to me.
"I know," I said.
Exhaustion and fatigue hide her exact next words from my memory, but the gist of the statement implied she wanted me to kiss her.
"I can't," I responded, thankfully managing at the last second to ungrit my teeth. "I can't."
"Why?" The drunkenness showed itself then, this time as a too-energetic inquiry.
"Because I know you," I said, "because I see you all the time."
"You don't want to kiss me?"
"I didn't say that; in fact, I very much do." It was, at the time, a lie; I had no desire to deal with any more potential baggage, nor add another inelegant red mark on my already vagabond reputation, regardless of how attractive I found her, but I figured my attraction to the sober her was worth mentioning.
"So, can we just have a friendly kiss?"
That, I thought, is probably the funniest thing I've heard all night. I leaned down quickly (she was five feet tall on in heels) and pecked her on the lips. I straightened up just as fast; a part of me, the internal part that grew to a startling position of influence during the Melanie situation was talking to me, telling me I needed to get her back into the main part of the bar before I did something outright stupid.
There was still enough of my libido that enjoyed the feel of her tiny hand in mine, enjoyed the softness of her shoulders and the drunken sway of her hips as they bumped into me as we walked, but it was the type of satisfaction that comes with knowing the ache won't ever be salved, that the want will always be there, and that trying to temporarily sate it, particularly with the drunk, would not, at least for now, be a smart decision.
As I turned her over to the care of her friend, exhaustion set in, four hours of sleep after work at the new job the night before pathetically inaccurate. My head had been throbbing and my larynx, overtaxed after not completely resting enough, only caught on every other rattle as I tested it. I sighed, partially regretting not joining the blonde at the bachelorette party or the well-read girl in whatever she did after she left, yet feeling relieved at having put off my inevitable collision course with drama for another night.
Her response: "oh, it's you," and immediately signing off.
I'm still struggling with why I don't feel especially guilty about what I did during the course of our relationship--the sex I had and the loves I developed, specifically--still asking myself the same questions even as I do the exact same thing with other people, albeit in slightly more noncommittal ways. It's not a stretch to say it's fairly obvious my handling of the Tiffany, Mackenzie, and Melanie situations are all directly related to my failures with April and, later, Allie (although I tend to not count the latter because our relationship only went past where it is now "off the record")--because I couldn't bring myself to end things with April before they got bad, I found myself all the more willing to simply stop communicating with Tiffany and Mackenzie when they made me feel uncomfortable, and because I couldn't keep Allie, I tried like hell to keep Melanie. And now, predictably, I have none of them, and unpredictably, I'm not crying in my soup.
When I was eighteen, I never thought I'd ever want to reach a point where I sought superficial connections with people; six years later, I find those connections are the purest I can ever have. The flirt is the easiest, especially when I know the desire is there, and I'm getting better at noticing it. It's the best, really, better than meaningless sex, because yeah, someone is always going to feel more strongly than the other ("love is never equal," as Jill Sobule once said), but if there is no contact, there is no foul, if I may lapse into basketball parlance.
This weekend was great for flirting--Saturday in particular. There was a bachelorette party at the bar, the tallest and the blondest girl (apologies to Leonard Cohen) wouldn't stop looking at me and, eventually, I had to say hello. Someone else was there too, I'd seen her before and she started talking to me. She ensnared me outside the bathroom and talked at length about literature--she was quite well-read--and gave me her phone number without me even asking. I appreciated her forwardness a lot more than I let on, preferring that she think me intimidated simply because it kept me from attempting to do what I, deep down inside, really wanted to do.
The last of the night was my favorite, though, the short Mexican woman with the Aztec name I never learned (instead receiving an Anglicism upon introduction months ago). I'd met her some brief forever ago and never really got the vibe that she was attracted to me, thus, freed from the tension that, sad to say, defines most of my relationships with women, I could be as candid as I wanted with her. She was having problems walking when I bounced over to her for the last time; I at first thought she was just having troubles navigating the crowd but, when she hit the open floor, I realized she was quite drunk. She asked me to dance with her for a song and I complied; seconds later, she asked me if I'd walk her to the bathroom because she was afraid she'd fall.
I showed her to the ladies' room and, after a few minutes' conversation, gestured for her to go in.
She didn't seem interested in evacuating. "You know what I like about you? I like the way you respect girls."
"You see," I said with the honesty I usually reserve for the extremely drunk, "I don't always, or at least I don't always act like it."
She shook her head; later, I would wonder if she actually thought about my situations with Tiffany and Melanie, both of which she knew about in detail. "Don't say that," she said, "I know you." She grabbed my hand and tried to pull me in with her and I dug in my heels.
"I can't go in there," I laughed.
"Oh, there's nobody in there," she said, "and even then, girls don't care." The nonsensicality of her speech suggested two things; first, that she was far more intoxicated than I initially thought and, second, that she probably only wanted me to stand outside the door of the stall while she urinated. I laughed at how funny the situation might have looked to any outsiders that might have been watching and slipped my hand from her grasp.
Minutes later, she emerged. Had I not been preoccupied with the tall blonde's offer for me to join them at the bachelorette party's suite at the Mark Spencer, I would have been amazed at how her smile looked as pleasant, friendly and sober as it normally did. At the time, I simply chuckled.
"I normally don't get this drunk," she said, leaning against the wall next to me.
"I know," I said.
Exhaustion and fatigue hide her exact next words from my memory, but the gist of the statement implied she wanted me to kiss her.
"I can't," I responded, thankfully managing at the last second to ungrit my teeth. "I can't."
"Why?" The drunkenness showed itself then, this time as a too-energetic inquiry.
"Because I know you," I said, "because I see you all the time."
"You don't want to kiss me?"
"I didn't say that; in fact, I very much do." It was, at the time, a lie; I had no desire to deal with any more potential baggage, nor add another inelegant red mark on my already vagabond reputation, regardless of how attractive I found her, but I figured my attraction to the sober her was worth mentioning.
"So, can we just have a friendly kiss?"
That, I thought, is probably the funniest thing I've heard all night. I leaned down quickly (she was five feet tall on in heels) and pecked her on the lips. I straightened up just as fast; a part of me, the internal part that grew to a startling position of influence during the Melanie situation was talking to me, telling me I needed to get her back into the main part of the bar before I did something outright stupid.
There was still enough of my libido that enjoyed the feel of her tiny hand in mine, enjoyed the softness of her shoulders and the drunken sway of her hips as they bumped into me as we walked, but it was the type of satisfaction that comes with knowing the ache won't ever be salved, that the want will always be there, and that trying to temporarily sate it, particularly with the drunk, would not, at least for now, be a smart decision.
As I turned her over to the care of her friend, exhaustion set in, four hours of sleep after work at the new job the night before pathetically inaccurate. My head had been throbbing and my larynx, overtaxed after not completely resting enough, only caught on every other rattle as I tested it. I sighed, partially regretting not joining the blonde at the bachelorette party or the well-read girl in whatever she did after she left, yet feeling relieved at having put off my inevitable collision course with drama for another night.