One-Night Fall

One-Night Fall

            I woke up this morning on the wrong side of the wrong bed. All I could smell was stale beer and cigarette smoke. Nauseated, I rolled away from the mildly attractive man I must have seen as a ten through beer goggles, and made my way toward his mildly disgusting bathroom he must have seen as sparkling through man goggles. Gagging on the taste of his leftover kisses, I pitifully brushed my teeth with my finger and his dollar store toothpaste. Looking down at his frayed, old boxers I was practically falling out of, I decided I had to make my escape, clothed or not. That’s when he knocked.

            “Good morning, sweetheart” flowed out of his mouth like he had said it a thousand times. Perhaps he had, but not to me. I wasn’t keen on pet names, anyway; and any man that was close to me would have known that.

            “Hi,” I responded, reluctant to admit that I had no recollection of his name or what had happened between the two of us to make him so comfortable calling me “sweetheart.”

Noticing that I seemed a bit uncomfortable and puzzled, he grabbed my hand and said “Please, tell me you remember last night.”

Stroking his callouses for a brief moment and wondering what the story was behind them, I replied, “No, I’m sorry. This is a tad embarrassing, but what is your name?”

I could tell he was disappointed and had not originally suspected that I was as drunk as I was the night prior by the look in his sunken eyes and the tone in his voice when he muttered “Jake,” beginning to pull away from me.

Feeling like no blame should belong to me, the helpless, blackout-drunk girl that awoke in a complete stranger’s bed, I unapologetically and sarcastically retorted, “well, I’m sure this was a very romantic experience, sweetheart.” Leaving him in the bathroom, I stomped into the bedroom to pack up the few belongings I had brought with me from the bar to his apartment. Fumbling around the various knick-knacks on his nightstand and the clothes strewn about the floor by his bed, I grabbed my ID, credit card, and favorite necklace, placing them in my handbag; then I changed back into familiar clothes and headed for the door to leave.

With the bathroom door wide open, I could both hear and see him from the other room. “I’m not sorry,” he said as he leaned against the sink, staring at the floor with a lifeless, drained gaze.

“You’re not sorry?!” I shouted, turning away from the door that I was about to storm out of and walking back toward him. The hollows of his deep brown eyes were like the cavities in my favorite apples, holding seeds that looked like baby cockroaches. They got under my skin.

“Yeah, I’m not sorry. I’m not sorry that I felt chemistry and potential between us; that I didn’t want to have a mere one-night stand with you, but I wanted to see you again; and again, and again. I’m not sorry that I wanted you to stay.” Just like that, he grabbed ahold of my heart and yanked me back into reality- a reality in which I couldn’t run from my feelings or pretend that I had none. Despite my attitude and complete disregard for his desire to drag out whatever spark he thought he had experienced the night before, he still looked at me with a hint of sweetness. He still wanted me to stay.

I tried to give him a quick goodbye hug, but suddenly, I forgot what goodbye meant. Though he looked like the type to leave you gasping for fresh air, like you were drowning in the cologne-bombed Hollister store, he had no particular smell. I loved that about him for some reason; but I didn’t want to love anything about him. I thought I had already learned that happiness never did come from happy hour, but when I looked at him, I was pretty sure I finally knew what happiness really was. It was something that I didn’t notice at first, just like I didn’t notice the firm, protective hug he wrapped around me that made me feel safer than I’d felt in eight years; but I noticed it now, just like I noticed that his calloused hands told the story of his passion for and commitment to playing guitar and working a labor-intensive job that paid him only $7.50 an hour. I even noticed the most beautiful part: that those calloused hands fit into mine like they were made to be a pair. But I didn’t want to notice anything about him. I didn’t want to be part of a pair. So, I found myself waging an internal war: head versus heart, and I knew this battleground well. It hadn’t usually looked like a dirty, cramped apartment bathroom belonging to an innocent man with his heart on his sleeve, but I had been in this general position many times before, and I could tell you that head always won. This morning, though, heart put up a good fight.

Once again, I found myself lying next to him in his queen-sized bed, sheets and blankets scattered in every direction. This time, I wasn’t a blackout-drunk girl opening my legs to a fellow bar-hopper, and I wasn’t a hung over wreck trying to escape that same stranger. No; this time, it was my choice to be there in that bed with him. This time, I wanted emotional intimacy over physical, and I was going to get it. So we scratched secrets into each other’s skin and giggled about our high school years, which now felt like such a distant memory. The stale beer aroma I woke up to had seemed to dissipate and as I fell into his embrace, I realized why I liked that he had no particular smell. With no distinct smell lingering on his clothes or in his hair, I would have nothing notable to remember him by. I would never be strolling down the road and suddenly get smacked in the face with a nostalgic scent that screamed “Jake.” I could make up my own idea of what he smelled like, who he was, and what he meant to me; and just as quickly, I could erase it. I could erase him. That’s what I’ve always been good at.

“I’m definitely not sorry,” he said softly in my ear with a grin on his face, rolling back out of bed and making his way to that sparkling bathroom of his. He hummed a giddy tune that seemed to harmonize with the water pulsating in the tub.

“But I am,” I whispered under my breath as I picked up my handbag and walked out the door, finally remembering what goodbye meant.