After
Dar handed me the small, thin cup of Turkish coffee and said "drink". I don't drink coffee, but she said she can glean my future, near and distant, from the coffee grounds left after I drink it. Fascinated, I drank and gave her the cup.
She studied the bottom of the cup, her small forehead winkled in concentration. "All I can see is your near future, tomorrow night to be exact". Such a narrow scope for soothsaying was a deliciously new concept for me: "Well? I'm curious. Look, I'm biting!!!"
She extracted her arm and said "Tomorrow you'll hook up with one of the most beautiful girls you've ever seen"
"Huh? Sex?"
"Sex! With a stunningly beautiful girl. It's very, very clear here. Also says you'll have one child but not tomorrow. Tomorrow night - sex f'r you you bloody pig. Better shave your sorry mug first; you give me strange urges of dialing 911".
The next night, I went to the drum-and-dance. I realized I needed sleep and was feeling a bit dizzy, but Dar said... So I went. I'm not in the mood for gratuitous sex, I thought, I'm not really looking to hook up after this long and complicated relationship. It ended well, but left me wanting something more than just casual sex. But I went and there I was, dancing around the room in ecstatic dancing, deliciously bouncing off fellow revelers, sweat starting to mist my naked torso, when I saw them: One small and dark haired with glasses, managing to radiate both a deep intellect and uncertainty, and the other...
Slim, lithe, supple, with deep pale skin and huge green eyes. She looked almost elfin, and radiated the easy, proud confidence of someone used to being stared at and wanted. She was easily one of the most stunning creatures that I have ever seen. Arrogant, conceited, ostentatious, patronizing... But beautiful. So impossibly beautiful. A haughty hottie, I thought. Your head held high, your body posturing its superiority every minute. Must be tiring. Look at the insolent way with which you scope the room, asserting your superiority. But Good Goddess you're so lovely...
Out of some pure impulse and feeling like I was in a predictable dream, I danced towards her and pulled her to the dancefloor. Her eyes went very wide but she went with me and pulled the other girl behind her. We danced, the three of us, her aloof and aware of her movement, me and her friend more with the spirit of the event, losing ourselves to the music and allowing our bodies to flow and sway to the beat.
Fast forward to the afterparty, and I realized that I'm a part of a nearly scripted play that has played before in different venues: Nicolette, that was her improbable name, She explained why it was "so cool", I don't remember. I just played my part. It was clear that I had a good connection with her more conventionally-named friend, what was her name? Susan? Holly? An old name, I can't remember... She had, Nicolette snorted in my ear, an uncharacteristic crush on me, Very Cute. It was suddenly clear that Nicolette had some cruel streak that compelled her to take me away. "It's time I give this thing a different ending" I thought, but then Nicolette was on me and in my arms and Dar said and Good Goddess she was lovely and the guys there were giving me withering envious looks and I was dizzy dizzy and her mouth was minty and the whole thing just wasn't real and...
The sex was a very predictable all nighter, I played my part. She made the right sounds and put on a great show, but her eyes were almost as dull as the conversation that lead to that point, and some part of me stepped aside with great disgust and was thinking about a Durrell book I just read.
=================
Susan or Holly or whatever your name is, I wanted to tell you that I picked the wrong girl. I want to go back and pull away from Nicolette and take you in my arms, tenderly, instead. I want to make you feel like the most beautiful girl in the world because I would have realized that if I wasn't caught up in my self-glorifying rut. I would have started to heal all these other times when guys didn't as much as glance at you but stared at her hungrily; I would have smoothed over the times where they only approached you to ask about "your friend". I want to know your name so I can whisper it to you and moan it at you and add various terms on endearments to it. I want to turn you over and massage you until you fall asleep. You quoted that line from The Dispossessed about not having to be a fish to know how to swim... How could I possibly have overlooked that?
Forgive me.
She studied the bottom of the cup, her small forehead winkled in concentration. "All I can see is your near future, tomorrow night to be exact". Such a narrow scope for soothsaying was a deliciously new concept for me: "Well? I'm curious. Look, I'm biting!!!"
She extracted her arm and said "Tomorrow you'll hook up with one of the most beautiful girls you've ever seen"
"Huh? Sex?"
"Sex! With a stunningly beautiful girl. It's very, very clear here. Also says you'll have one child but not tomorrow. Tomorrow night - sex f'r you you bloody pig. Better shave your sorry mug first; you give me strange urges of dialing 911".
The next night, I went to the drum-and-dance. I realized I needed sleep and was feeling a bit dizzy, but Dar said... So I went. I'm not in the mood for gratuitous sex, I thought, I'm not really looking to hook up after this long and complicated relationship. It ended well, but left me wanting something more than just casual sex. But I went and there I was, dancing around the room in ecstatic dancing, deliciously bouncing off fellow revelers, sweat starting to mist my naked torso, when I saw them: One small and dark haired with glasses, managing to radiate both a deep intellect and uncertainty, and the other...
Slim, lithe, supple, with deep pale skin and huge green eyes. She looked almost elfin, and radiated the easy, proud confidence of someone used to being stared at and wanted. She was easily one of the most stunning creatures that I have ever seen. Arrogant, conceited, ostentatious, patronizing... But beautiful. So impossibly beautiful. A haughty hottie, I thought. Your head held high, your body posturing its superiority every minute. Must be tiring. Look at the insolent way with which you scope the room, asserting your superiority. But Good Goddess you're so lovely...
Out of some pure impulse and feeling like I was in a predictable dream, I danced towards her and pulled her to the dancefloor. Her eyes went very wide but she went with me and pulled the other girl behind her. We danced, the three of us, her aloof and aware of her movement, me and her friend more with the spirit of the event, losing ourselves to the music and allowing our bodies to flow and sway to the beat.
Fast forward to the afterparty, and I realized that I'm a part of a nearly scripted play that has played before in different venues: Nicolette, that was her improbable name, She explained why it was "so cool", I don't remember. I just played my part. It was clear that I had a good connection with her more conventionally-named friend, what was her name? Susan? Holly? An old name, I can't remember... She had, Nicolette snorted in my ear, an uncharacteristic crush on me, Very Cute. It was suddenly clear that Nicolette had some cruel streak that compelled her to take me away. "It's time I give this thing a different ending" I thought, but then Nicolette was on me and in my arms and Dar said and Good Goddess she was lovely and the guys there were giving me withering envious looks and I was dizzy dizzy and her mouth was minty and the whole thing just wasn't real and...
The sex was a very predictable all nighter, I played my part. She made the right sounds and put on a great show, but her eyes were almost as dull as the conversation that lead to that point, and some part of me stepped aside with great disgust and was thinking about a Durrell book I just read.
=================
Susan or Holly or whatever your name is, I wanted to tell you that I picked the wrong girl. I want to go back and pull away from Nicolette and take you in my arms, tenderly, instead. I want to make you feel like the most beautiful girl in the world because I would have realized that if I wasn't caught up in my self-glorifying rut. I would have started to heal all these other times when guys didn't as much as glance at you but stared at her hungrily; I would have smoothed over the times where they only approached you to ask about "your friend". I want to know your name so I can whisper it to you and moan it at you and add various terms on endearments to it. I want to turn you over and massage you until you fall asleep. You quoted that line from The Dispossessed about not having to be a fish to know how to swim... How could I possibly have overlooked that?
Forgive me.