On The Road Back To My Place

Things got really watery at this point.  I was roaring drunk, but used some Adderall to stay controlled since I am notorious for being sloppy.  Not being able to walk, to talk, to stop drinking.  Even though I was barely stumbling and I was conversing with people, the inability to stop drinking was still alive.  But it didn't matter, nothing could wreck that night for me.  It was what I dreamt of every day while sober.  Dancing on tables and just smiling and laughing the entire time.  And feeling good--so good.  I remember wondering why anyone would live any other way.

Back to him.  Back to the problem.  Well, he wasn't a problem at first because there it was merely sexual attraction.  A lot of it, yeah.  But, no need to ward anything off.  Not yet, at least.

He asked me if I wanted to go to the basement.  I nodded.  Followed him down there.  Normally there was dancing and a huge crowd, but that night there were only a few people drinking and talking.  It was a big basement, too, and the foregoing people were at the other end of it.  We got behind the DJ platform and stayed there for hours.  Playing music, fooling around.  It was weird because it felt like a trivial, drunk hook-up, but it didn't at the same time.  Maybe I say that now because I know what happens at the end.

We go to a decently small university so I already knew things about him, and he knew things about me.  That I was a crazy, but in an awesome way.  That I was trouble.  That I was unapproachable.  He liked my tattoos and he traced one above my left breast with his fingernails.

"Are ya sleeping over or what?" I asked him.

He laughed and looked away, surely thinking of something.

"We just met.  I don't want to do that, I want to be respectful."

I never imagined that I would ever hear that sentence while I was hammered at a party.

I told him to bag that attitude and come home with me.  I started kissing him and playing with his jeans.

Pause... I'm going to fill you in on something right now, and you may not believe me, but it's extremely true.

Before this night I had NEVER had sex with a guy the same night that I met him.  EVER.  Because I always wanted to make them chase, and then I would just let them down.  I don't know if that was on purpose or not.  Still haven't figured that out.

I was at number 4, and he was about to be number 5.  Low right?  For the kind of girl I act like I am.

All 4 of those guys waited and waited, and I pretended like I didn't give a damn about them the entire time.  And it kept them around.  Eventually, after I made sure that they knew they didn't have power over me like men usually do over women, I would sleep with them.  It would be great sex, too, because there was so much tension.  Then, I would push away.  They would run to me and tell me that they were in love and I would just smile wittingly, because love isn't real, it's a weapon.

I may seem evil, but I didn't act this outwardly.  This is all in my mind.

And up there, when I said that I "pretended like I didn't give a damn about them.." What I meant by that was that unfortunately, I'm a human being.  I hate to own that, and I try to conceal it as much as I can.  I never want to be vulnerable, never want to feel afraid.  I think that those are horrible feelings.  So, with those 4 guys from my past--sure I probably started to like a few of them.  But, I was so determined on never letting myself get attached to anyone, that I convinced myself that I didn't like any of them.  My friends would say (like girls do) "Aw you guys are cute!!"  And I would say, "woah we're just friends."  They would badger me and laugh and say "You know you guys are more! You talk every day!" But I made sure that I didn't know that we were more.  And I made sure that I didn't act like I knew that, either.

Back to this party, back to this boy.  I convinced him to come home with me.  We got into a car and rode back to campus.  Stares the whole way home.

Seven Steps Forward, Seven Steps Back

It was a night of drinking unlike others, because it was a night I remember.  It's second semester, sophomore year.  I had seven months sober at this point, but I couldn't go another breath.  Being in college made it easy to go back out and drink, too.  Ask anyone--what's up tonight? House party four blocks away.  My close friends who experienced what I was seven months prior were absolutely infuriated that I was starting up again.  It was an easy decision though, because nothing mattered to me, remember?  Ya see, even though I got sober, I didn't change my ideas about how to live.  That was a big issue and a big mistake.  I was numb and, sure I felt a little bad that my friends were so against my actions.  Only because I wanted to drink with them like old times.  But, they refused to enable me.

Skinny jeans, rosy crop top, leather jacket.  Plenty of eyeliner, and an insatiable thirst.  I showed up with my own booze because I remembered some old anxieties--1) I never wanted to share 2) I never wanted to run out.  Two Liters of rum in my bag, 3 shots of that in my cup.  Stars.  My eyes were stars.

I stayed outside smoking cigarettes with old buddies for about 10 minutes before even opening the door.  They said the parties really missed me first semester, and I confirmed that I missed the parties.  More than they knew.  But it would have been awkward to explain my love affair with drinking.  It also would have been impossible without seeming like a lush.

 As soon as I walked into the house I locked eyes with a guy sitting on the couch adjacent to the doorway.  A very familiar face to my stare.  All first semester I eyed this guy at the cafeterias, at the gym.  He was a freshman but he certainly didn't look like one.  And you could cut diamonds with that jawline.

We kept exchanging glances.  I went outside to have another cigarette after taking shots to a chant 'SHE'S BACK, SHE'S BACK.'  Moments after I shut the door behind me, it opened again.  It was him and he wanted a hit.  Still only glances between us.  I figured he wanted to take me home later.  I sure wanted to take him home.  I watched him like a flirt and when I went back inside, he followed....

Began As A Prizefighter

I was undefeated.  Nineteen and 1/2 years and I was literally unbeaten.  Never once did love knock me out.  It didn't even touch me, actually.  I parried every advance at me, every warmth of feeling.

Nine years old with AWOL parents, already too much fight-dog in me, already too guarded.  I didn't believe in anything and I didn't trust anything.  I learned that I had to be tough, made of metal.  Because I was the only one who could do that for myself.  I couldn't rely on anyone to do me any favors.

So it was nineteen and 1/2 spun out years of this internal anger, external pride, ostensible indifference, this roughneck attitude.  And isolation--always alone.  Most of those years were charged with alcohol and drug addiction, too.  The wonder of the party life that I thought was my passage to happiness.

I said I didn't believe in anything earlier.  Well, I take that back.  I believed that I was smart.  A genius.  Everybody that fell in love was an absolute numbskull.  Life was meant to be lived solo, by hedonists, by anarchists.  Start trouble, ride the wave with surface friends, eat the breeze hanging out of a convertible.

I believed that with every rocky gulp of air I took out of a Marlboro red.  Until something awful happened to me.  I got knocked out.