How Do You Like Your Eggs?

by Christine Williams

Soon after my birthday party, you sent me a Facebook message inviting me to your apartment on Saturday to celebrate the day after your own September birthday. You suggested we go for a motorcycle ride and return for a soak in your complex’s hot tub, casually mentioning your roommate would be out of town. Clearly an invitation for a sleepover. I’d gone two years without sleeping with anyone, and I was hesitant to accept. No doubt we had chemistry—enough to incinerate a small nation—but did I really want to light that fuse? To be gutted hormonally, temporarily insane, a dumpster fire of hyperglycemia? Martha, my best work-friend, reminded me, “You already are all of these things.” But if I slept with you, would the magic end? Perhaps withholding sex would save me from losing your affection. I told you (to ensure against a sleepover) I had plans later in the night to see a friend, but that a motorcycle ride and the hot tub sounded perfect.

By Friday I’d prepared a vague speech about boundaries. I’d decided that declaring my needs, which I’d never done, would be the key to either unlocking progress or dodging a bullet. If I thought about it too long, I didn’t actually know what “progress” or “a bullet” meant in this situation. Also I was unsure of the definition of “my needs.” But I knew I wanted to be sure of something. So I let years of unsolicited advice from friends and family step in—“Don’t ask, don’t get; A real woman knows what she wants and goes after it; Protect your heart.” Slogans I now clung to, despite not knowing what they meant either. Yes, I was ready to walk right out of your life if you “crossed my line” (speaking of slogans with a cliché)—one that I now decided I needed to draw. But I didn’t want to make it too strong. So I drew it in sand, which might change with the elements or the fickle waves of my mind.

On Saturday afternoon, I ransacked my closet. I shimmied into a pair of white jeans scattered with silver stars and a silky blue camisole. Stuffed a red tankini into my oversize black pleather purse emblazoned with a bold pair of red lips. I wanted the outfit to say “fun!” rather than “boundaries!” Hyped up on nerves, I floored my Toyota Celica from Alameda to your Walnut Creek apartment, thinking of you as I shot through the dark ravaged Caldecott tunnel.

I pulled up breathless to the entrance of your complex at 4:30 p.m. and inhaled deeply before trying the keypad at the gate. I rolled down my window and, with a shaking hand, three times punched in the four-digit code you’d texted me followed by the pound sign. Nothing. Someone behind me honked. I would have to call you. Doubtless you would hear panic in my voice, heightened by my inability to control the evil gate in front of me.

I dialed your number. You answered immediately.

“HELLO? I THINK I’M HERE!” my voice rang out like an alarm. I cleared my throat and tried again. “I mean I’m here at a big gate. I think it’s your gate? It won’t open and there’s someone behind me. I’ve tried the number like sixteen times. Should I get out of the car?”

Your line choked with bad connection, but the message was clear: “No, no!”

Seconds later the gate lurched open. I began winding through your complex at two miles an hour and squinted, scanning the buildings for numbers. But there were no numbers. No numbers! The apartments clustered together, a labyrinth of blocky beige fortresses conspiring against visitors looking for addresses. The car behind me honked again. Fucker. I pulled over, letting it pass. All this stucco. There went a garage entrance. And another. Follow the beige stucco road … were the numbers supposed to be hidden? For God’s sake, where was 601? My phone rang, and after picking it up, I heard a distorted, “Where are you?”

“I don’t know! Everything looks the same and I can’t see any numbers! I need help!”

Sounding like you were under water, you guided me to the right garage. I pulled into a cavern of neatly lined cars, and parked in spot 601 as directed. Sweaty pits and hyperglycemia notwithstanding, I’d done it.

My rearview mirror revealed you approaching in a gray t-shirt, black cotton shorts, and flip flops. I rehearsed my “boundaries” speech in my head, though I could already feel the sand shifting beneath me. When I shut my car door it banged loudly and made me nervous. You were not nervous. As you hugged me and kissed me on the forehead, you slipped my bag from my arm to yours and I relaxed. Swooned, actually. Not every man could pull off a large purse stamped with red lips, but you made it sexy.

I followed you up several flights of cement stairs, left out of the stairwell, right down a hallway. The complex had open-air corridors, and our footsteps echoed against the walls. When you opened your front door, I took everything in—five motorcycle helmets lined the wall to my left above a shoe rack full of giant shoes. To the right, your kitchen (messy), and straight ahead, your living room lit only by the outdoor balcony beyond sliding glass doors. Two bedrooms—one to the right of the living room, and the other to the right of the kitchen. There was a mountain bike suspended on the flat-white wall next to your helmets; a scuffed black leather couch in the living room; a large-screen television above a fireplace, along with several remote controls scattered over a black wooden coffee table; a Game of Thrones wall-hanging, its intended decorative effects nulled by the unkempt kitchen and electronic clutter. The whole place was dark despite the sliding glass doors. Gamer bachelor-pad vibes.

You set my purse down by the couch, and I stood by it while you headed for the refrigerator.

“Are you hungry?” Rummaging through your fridge, you began describing the food your roommate’s parents had made. Mostly I was nauseated with anxiety, so I declined. But you persisted, now heading to the living room where I stood sniffing the air like a cat. You pulled the lid off of a round, Costco-sized tub and gently dipped your head. “Please. At least try a cashew treat.” I peered inside. I didn’t know what this “cashew treat” would do to my blood sugar, but after a few millisecond calculations (mostly cashews, likely some sweetener in whatever substance bound them together, probably would have a negligible effect on my glucose given the circumstances), I fished one out and popped it into my mouth, failing to taste. Were you remembering what I’d said about my levels dropping during sex? Was this your insurance against crisis?

Your eyes wandered over my camisole, down my starry white pants, and over to the red tankini snaking its way out of my purse. “Red, white, and blue. And stars! So patriotic.”

Realizing I’d inadvertently dressed as an American flag, I winced. “Oh God. How embarrassing.”

“Why is it embarrassing? I love America!”

I wished for a coat to hide under. You gestured toward the couch—“Please, relax.”—and turned on your TV, which was hooked up to your music station, and began playing a Chopin étude. Just as I sat down, you changed your mind. “Actually, stand back up.” I obeyed as if we were playing Simon Says. In a great swoosh you collapsed down on the cushions, the length of your body taking up the entire couch. Reaching for my hand, and then my hips, you guided me on top of you. Rather than lay down, I straddled your abdomen, remaining rigidly upright. No, this wouldn’t do. You patted your chest to indicate I should lay down with you. I inched my lap toward your pelvis and laid my torso on top of yours, feeling like a marsupial clinging to a tree. Now I couldn’t disentangle the spiky citrus of your cologne from the plum-caramel notes of my own perfume. The clean-sweet scent floated on undertones of sweat and overwhelmed me. First time horizontal together—I worried about suffocating you. I lifted my head awkwardly from the hollow in your neck.

Your chest bobbed with laughter. “What are you doing?”

“Trying not to crush you.”

“You are not crushing me.”

“… I might be.”

You palmed the back of my head, which sank of its own accord back down to where it had been. “You are light. You fit nicely here.”

I lifted my head again and said to your collarbone, “Heads are the heaviest part of the body, and mine is on top of your neck. What if I choke you?”

You stroked my hair and waited. My neck strained from the weight of my head, and I finally gave in and nestled down into the hollow, where I did fit nicely, after all.

“You can slide your legs down too.”

A welcome rush of new blood flowed as I unfolded my lower half.

An Evanescence song followed Chopin and the vibration of your vocal chords tickled as you sang along to “My Immortal,” confidently garbling half of the lyrics. A song about dying didn’t exactly set the mood, but, I thought, at least I wasn’t the only one operating out of a place of not knowing what to do. You just put more gusto into the not-knowing whereas I clammed up. Perhaps you didn’t know what you didn’t know, and therefore were not turned off by your own cluelessness, and if that were the case, I envied this quality. But really, you sounded ridiculous serenading me with gibberish, and I pressed my lips together, restraining laughter.

Maybe you read my restraint for nervous energy because your thumbs began searching for tight spots in my neck and upper back, working into my knots like foam rollers. I knew I was in trouble when I felt release, my guard slipping away. Melting into your strokes along my shoulder blades that you now issued with calm precision, I exhaled and rolled my forehead against your chest. “What planet are you from? Why are you so good at this?” 

You whispered, “Ah. It’s a learned skill. When I was training for the Olympics my sports medicine doctor taught me how to do it.”  

Ah. Of course. Your sports medicine doctor. When you were training for the Olympics. My trickster boundaries cackled and flew away from me. Catching their tail wind, you unhooked my bra with a snap of your fingers. Off with the camisole. Another secret gone, a line in the sand subsumed by a wave. But it felt freeing and electric as a neon sunset, and your lips on my chest felt right. Right?

Wait.

I tried tuning into the alarm bell I’d set for myself that wasn’t going off. You registered the change.

“What’s wrong?” 

I sat up, folding my legs back into froggy-position. I gave several false starts of my “boundaries” speech, and you interjected, “Stop beating around the bush. Just say it.” 

And here is what I said, which came from me and no one else: “It’s not that I don’t want to sleep with you, but when I sleep with someone, I’m exclusive about it and I prefer that my partner feels the same way!”

You held my gaze, eyes inscrutable. “Oh.”

“And what do you think of that?”

You paused before answering. “I think it’s a strategy that works for some people.”

It took me a beat to process what you meant.

Probably it meant that it was not a strategy that worked for you …

Monogamy was not for you.

You did not want to be only with me in the way I wanted to be only with you.

My heart sank. I’d lost sight of shore, was cuddling a shark! I steadied myself to leave.

You sat up, sliding me off of your lap into the safety of the other side of the couch. I put my bra and camisole back on while you interjected, “Look, until my H1B status is verified at the end of October, I may be deported to India at any moment. I can’t make promises about anything to anyone.”

Though your argument against exclusivity was solid given the context, you’d delivered it like a form rejection. Who else had you used this line on?

You stood up, seeming to read my mind, and began to pace the living room. “Okay, I think I should give you more of an explanation.” 

I folded my arms, and retreated into myself, waiting. Your words came out in a tumble.

You launched into the story of your only serious girlfriend of two years. You were twenty-four, on full scholarship for grad school at Vanderbilt, and she was twenty, both dancing salsa in your spare time. You’d loved her, but the two of you fought constantly because you were new to the culture and “too judgmental.” On your first entry into the US, you’d condemned people who drank, and when once you saw her smoking weed, you’d panicked: “I thought she was a drug addict!” Yes, you’d fought badly and often, and once she had thrown a shoe at you—a dance stiletto—and in frustration, you’d banged your head against the wall, causing it to crack. (The wall, not your head.) After you broke up, you dated anyone who said yes. And when you moved to California, you fell in love with another dancer, who had ultimately broken your heart. Since then, you’d avoided commitment.

“When I moved to the US, I had to become a completely new person. Everything here, everything is different. And my relationships here have all been failures. Now I don’t believe in monogamy.”

“Not at all?”

Still pacing, you bit at your thumb nail. “For the moment, no. It traps people, causes them to become jealous and possessive.”

“Well, I don’t know about that.”

“Well, I do know. And I sensed this about you when we danced at the bachata festival a few months ago.”

“Sensed this what?”

“You had relationship eyes.”

Oh brother. While I did not believe polyamory to be the magic answer to the ups and downs of monogamy, I also didn’t believe relationships were the answer to anything.

“Relationship eyes?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not sure I agree. And I also don’t see how exclusivity necessarily leads to jealousy and possessiveness.”

“You would like it in India. People there date for marriage.”

I studied you. You weren’t hearing what I was saying, or maybe I wasn’t saying it well, but we were now in uncomfortable territory for you. Your earlier statement, My relationships here have all been failures seemed a bit extreme, maybe more fear-based than reflective of the facts. After all, the darkness of your dating history, at least as far as what you’d relayed to me, was relatively underwhelming. And if this was fear, I was glad you’d let it show. In any case, you were not the Lothario of my worst-case-scenario thinking. Stubborn and myopic (at least on the topic of romantic love), yes, and pretty annoying right now, but not toxic. You were honest, which counted for a lot. Plus, when it came down to it, you were hot. I felt the seconds slipping by, our scents separating. Now would be the time to gather my purse, put on my shoes, and walk out of your door. But that seemed like an even more dangerous thing than staying, like missed opportunities and running away. A life unlived, or, at least an important moment in the scheme of things.

Boundaries be damned: I would risk it.

Like the minuscule blood sugar calculations I’d done earlier, I arrived at my decision within seconds. Still, while I couldn’t cover all my bases, I wanted to cover a few more.

You had stopped pacing and were watching me from the doorway to your room. Waiting, probably, for me to leave. Instead, I ground myself down into the cushions and leaned forward to face you, elbows on my splayed knees. “Do you consider yourself a player?

Upon realizing you still had a chance, your tone lightened. “No. I used to be, a few years ago. But not anymore. It’s too exhausting.”

I continued like an investigator. “Do other people consider you a player?”

“Maybe several years ago when I was dating all those random people.” You waved your hand. “But it wasn’t that many people.”

“Do you get bored after sleeping with someone for a while?”

“No. If the sex is good, why would you stop?”

That gave me pause. A good answer, but still not quite what I was after. “Do you care for me?”

“Yes, of course! I don’t have casual relationships, no matter who the relationship is with. And one day, I know I’ll want a serious relationship. It’s how I was raised. But not until my H1B comes and I find a job I can continue with. And people are so easily influenced … you never know.”

“What does that mean?”

“Let’s say we agree to enter into a serious relationship. But then who knows whether you would get another job offer in DC or elsewhere, and then one person would have to sacrifice. Right now I’m just grateful for every day I can genuinely connect with people.” You stretched your arms skyward. “I’m enjoying experiences as they come, one day at a time.” Then you dropped your arms and looked at me point blank. “Sex is also extremely important to me. Regardless, I could not commit to anything without knowing what the sexual chemistry is like.”

I was briefly, painfully, reminded of James the Yoga Instructor. He had given me a copy of Siddhartha on our second date, insisting he was a patient man, but that “deep connection” was important to him. He had bowed out of our romance shortly after we’d sealed the deal a month later.

You continued, “But, even not knowing what our sexual chemistry would be like, I know I want to keep you in my life. In some capacity. Forever.”

Forever!—that jarred me back to the present. “How can you possibly know that?”

“Because.” You sat back down on the couch next to me. “I can tell you’re a good person.”

I maintained your eye contact while I tried to process this, but wished for more time to respond. “I think most people are good people when it comes down to it.”

You shook your head. “Your thinking is flawed.”

Shifting in my seat, I tried to strengthen my argument. “Look, I’m not trying to trap you.” I assumed entrapment was your unspoken underlying concern? “But sex changes things for me in terms of hormones being activated, brains going haywire, blood sugars going off the charts.”

You nodded, you knew this. “It’s different for women.”

“Yes. It’s also different for diabetics. I haven’t been with anyone in two years, not because I haven’t had offers, but because every part of me is tired of duds.”

“I understand. Thank you for your honesty.”

Were you giving up so soon? “What would happen if, assuming the H1B goes through, the job happens, and the sexual chemistry between us is there?”

“Ah! If all of that is in place, then we get married!”

From zero commitments to marriage in fifteen minutes, and with such confidence. But were you being serious or silly?

You concluded, “Well, I know what page you are on, and I know what page I am on.”

I chose my words. “I think I do too (I didn’t really), but to confirm … do you think it’s possible that someday those pages could merge?”

You nodded. “Yes.”

It was then your turn to interrogate me. You wanted to know my dating history, what had gone wrong with all the duds. I recounted: they got bored, or scared, or mean, and left. You wanted details. I gave as few as possible. And you were surprised (disappointed?) that they’d all been younger. Had you forgotten that you too were younger?

You ran your hands through your curls. “You have dated some immature men.” And frowned. “You must know that you are the prize.”

Resentment simmered and boiled into angry thought-spew: Were you suggesting I had low self-esteem? Could you not see how I could be both secure in my own skin and disappointed in these men I’d cared about? And why was I being talked about in terms of a game where I wasn’t a player, but a trophy?

I summoned patience. I knew my interpretation of your words hadn’t matched your intent. “Yes, I do know I’m the prize.”

You remained on your soapbox. “Well, you need a man who will appreciate you beyond the pursuit.”

Why exactly did you think we were having this conversation? I didn’t ask.

You asked if I had any relationship regrets. What to say? I was weary of presenting details you might dissect like a pseudo archeologist, proclaiming them significant artifacts when really they were just fossilized shit. Or the reverse. I did tell you I regretted breaking my last boyfriend’s heart.

“Why did you break his heart?”

“Because even though he loved me, he wasn’t an alpha, had no fire. It was like dating my mother.”

Guilt and shame rippled through me as I explained how I’d dumped him for Matt (Matt was excellent in bed). Your couch morphed into a therapist’s chaise lounge. As I described Matt, you came closer—as close as possible without touching me—until we were face-to-face and your lips hovered above mine. I stopped talking and you pulled back an inch, teasing me. “Continue.” But I didn’t because then you were kissing me, massaging my shoulders, brushing your lips against my neck. If this was therapy, I was ready to sign up.

“Continue. Tell me more about …” You slowly swept your knuckles along my décolletage, over my camisole, and down my breastbone, winding your hand around my ribs, and palming my back securely so our torsos matched. “Matt.”

Who was Matt? You’d placed my hand in your lap, making him vanish—conversation over.

Leaning into me, you whispered, “How do you like your eggs?”

I wanted to maintain the sexy vibe, but didn’t know how to respond. Surely my first instinct—Unfertilized?—would not do. So I gave you a coy look and whispered, “What?”

“Well, I was thinking either I could make good use of my tongue and taste you more deeply.” I felt you trace the inseam of my jeans. You looked down, following your fingers’ trail. “Or I could make you an omelet and we could eat together.” 

Silently I weighed my options. “Can’t we do both?”

In a trance, I let you lead me into your room, where thick crimson curtains muted the waning summer sun and your bed lie unmade on the floor. Off came the camisole, off came your shirt and shorts. Pants were removed in a flurry, as was underwear and my bra, until all I was left with was my insulin pump. I found my way into your sheets and felt shy, unsure of where to let my eyes land. I picked your shoulders. And as you lowered yourself over me, I thought, Will this be the end of us? I closed my eyes against the idea.

“Am I hurting you?”

“Nnnn … no. It’s okay!”

Drawing sharply away from me, something like anger caught in your throat. “No. It is not okay.”

You walked over to your plastic storage bins and rooted around. After enough time to wonder if I’d ruined the moment, you rose like a deep sea diver who had discovered lost treasure: lube.

“Found it!”

Slowing down now, you engaged me in light banter with your eyes. More connection, paying attention—you were good at that. You seemed to tell me things about myself that, somewhere inside, I already knew. I felt the ease and urgency come back to my body. This was how we could be when we relaxed into each other, glowing and alive, a bright red bonfire in the middle of nowhere.

Time bent around the next hour. My “boundaries” were no match for your bare shoulders and smooth chest. Finally, after so much talking and so little understanding, under the delicious weight of your body, I screamed. That you understood. You put your forehead to mine, drawing me out. There was no “too much” here, and I screamed at the top of my lungs, knowing it wouldn’t gross you out, turn you off, or scare you away. I saw stars. I screamed past them.

And then I was free.

When you knew this, you let yourself go, too.

Afterward, when I turned slightly away from you, you spooned me, stroking my forearms, and in my hand I cradled my newfound freedom like the yolk of the egg you’d promised.

“Wow. Two years. Well, how do you feel now that it’s only been two minutes?”

There was something teasing in your voice. Was that it? I don’t know, but just like that, the fears crept back and pierced my sunny bauble. A sticky mess: the feeling of freedom sliding through my fingers. I must have tensed, because you propped yourself on your elbow and looked down at me. “What?”

“What what?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Why do you think something is wrong?”

“Christine, I am so relaxed and you are on high alert.”

I didn’t respond. Your attention unnerved me, but also made me hopeful. Now that the lovemaking was over, given the circumstances, I guess I didn’t really know how to be present.

You sighed and sat up. “Madame, shall we make our way to the kitchen? I think you have earned your omelet!”

After we dressed, I plopped with my popped yolk on your couch, where I watched you gather ingredients behind the counter. I imagined the counter growing taller, helping me hide the disappointment I felt in myself for abandoning my boundaries, and my fear. But of course, the counter did not grow taller—you remained in full view. And after dancing toward the fridge, you retrieved mushrooms, onion, garlic, and eggs. As you chopped the vegetables and scrambled six eggs (Six! How many people did you think you were feeding?) with a pinch of salt in a bowl, you kept glancing at me as if I were about to flee.

So I asked, “What? Why do you keep looking over at me?”

“Why did you change your mind?”

I tried to clear my head. “About what?”

Adding oil to the pan, you sprinkled in garam masala. “Why did you sleep with me … knowing I can’t give you a relationship?”

Hope was such a dangerous thing. “Look, I don’t do friends with benefits. If that’s what this is going to be. I can’t do this if that’s what it is. Do you think of me as just a friend?”

You shook your head. “You are not a friend.” A quick shrug and you added the vegetables, stirring vigorously. “Anyway it doesn’t matter. I was just curious.”

“I mean … I am attracted to you.”

You nodded, onions sizzling away. “That part is clear.” You dropped the eggs from a ceramic bowl into the pan.

“And two years is a long time” (only a partial truth, but how to tell someone like you that I could love?—No, it was just hormones. Juvenile!).

“Two years is a long time.”

“And so I didn’t want to settle for anything less than great. And I had a feeling, with you, it would be great.”

This sent your smile into overdrive, and you shimmied your butt along with the omelet pan. “And was it?”

“Obviously. But look. Don’t get cocky. I wasn’t always sure it would be.”

“What? Why? What do you mean?”

“Well, I thought you were a predator before I knew you.”

You threw your arm holding the spatula up into the air and bits of scrambled egg flew off. “Why does everyone think that?”

“That you’re a predator?”

“Yes, so many people have said something like this to me!”

I wondered if all of these people were women. “I don’t know, you’re really tall and have good posture and intense eye contact.”

“But why did you think that?”

“I don’t know, something about you sent up red flags.” You were examining this more closely than I would have liked. “But don’t worry, I didn’t tell anyone or anything.”

“That’s not the point!”

I sat on your couch brooding, plotting my escape and yet not wanting to leave, while I looked for music on your internet television. From the kitchen, as you portioned our omelet, you watched me fumbling with the remote.

“What are you doing? That’s not how you search.”

I had never had an internet television, didn’t even know the name of the device I was trying to operate. And I resented navigating this foreign system for the first time under your heavy surveillance. It reminded me of being with my father, trying desperately to solve a puzzle even though I hadn’t the first clue of how to go about it. But with you, in addition to feeling inept, I felt old, and the pressure I imposed on myself to find a song you might like put me further on edge. I set the remote down, looked over at your Game of Thrones wall hanging, and decided it was dumb.

You strolled over with our plates, set them on the coffee table, and sat down next to me, both of us facing your impossible internet-television-music-machine. Briefly you showed me how to work the remote. I avoided eye contact, but glanced down to watch how you pushed the buttons. This setup of yours would not defeat me again. Then you reached for one of my hands, both of which I’d clamped between my thighs, and moved it—it was my right one—to rest lightly on your own thigh. I kept a cagey distance. You picked a plate up from the coffee table and delivered it to my lap. But I wasn’t hungry.

I watched you devour your omelet as I pushed mine around on the plate. By the time you had finished, I’d barely taken two bites and while I took another small mouthful, I felt you observing me. “You eat so little. Why? Do you not like it? You don’t like it. Are you unwell?” 

“I mean, really, who is ‘well’?” I snapped my head over to you on “well,” emphasizing it like a bad word.

You considered this. “I am well!” and briefly, your gaze turned inward. “Well … not really—” Then you widened your eyes, remembering your guest, recanting with, “We rushed out of bed too soon. We should have cuddled more.”

But we hadn’t. It was a missed opportunity.

I sighed. “Anyway. I think I have to leave soon.”

You nodded. “I’m going to go out dancing with my friend LySaundra. Do you know her?”

My stomach dropped. I set the plate on your coffee table with a clatter and shook my head—no.

“She’s on my team! I will have to introduce you to her, you would like her.” You polished off the rest of your omelet.

I didn’t know what to say. “So what’s next?”

“Next?”

“Yeah like … Are we dating or not?”

“Oh! Yes! We are. And we still have to do the hot tub. And I really want to take you to this cafe that reminds me of you. It’s small. Intimate. It’s kind of far, but we can take the motorcycle.”

You began rattling off things you would like to do with me “in the future.” I didn’t want to brighten inside. Or maybe I wanted to, a little. Well, I did anyway. Brighten. At least we had a future, even if it wasn’t clear to me what it was.

You danced our plates to the sink. “I didn’t think we would have sex tonight, but I’m glad we did because my housemate’s parents are here visiting for the next two months, and if I hadn’t been able to have sex with you I would have gone insane.” 

I stared back at you.

You registered my non-expression. “Do you feel that sleeping with me was a mistake?”

I rubbed my temples. “I have no idea. Ask me in two weeks.”

Then I walked myself to your door and you followed close behind. “Wait, wait! Let me get my dance clothing on. We will leave together.”

I sat back down on your couch and flipped through the channels as you’d shown me to do. Just as I’d found my groove, you emerged in black jeans and a dark blue button-up scattered with tiny white polka dots.

“What do you think of this shirt? Do you like it?”

I nodded. It reminded me of my star pants.

We walked to the door and you said this as we got into our shoes: “I think it will be best if we both let our thoughts settle for a few days and then get back in touch.”

Frankly I wasn’t sure whether I would hear from you again, so I tugged my left heel on, steeled myself, and said. “I will not be reaching out. But you can feel free to contact me.”

“I will contact you.”

You opened the door and waited for me to walk through it. “After you, my lady.”

It made me want to throw something at you.

You walked me to my car where you kissed me three times. Very sweet, but I wouldn’t look too closely at you. Who knew if these were pity kisses or goodbye kisses—protocol you had for all the women you’d probably “genuinely connected” with. In any case, night had settled, lifting the evil spell of the beige labyrinth. Despite the twisting roads and lack of signs, I made it out of your complex without needing to consult my GPS. Somehow, I knew the way.

ψ

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