Control Yourself

I looked over at him and quickly looked away. It was difficult to hold his gaze. We were two bodies in space, and I was very aware of his physical presence in relation to mine.

We grabbed our respective weapons of choice from my closet. He set off to the bathroom with the shower, and I entered the adjoining bathroom. As I rubbed moisturizer on my skin, I thought how striking and odd it was to go on this, dare I say, "date," - the idea of getting ready in the same bedroom with a stranger. Not that he was a stranger. He was, two weeks ago when he unceremoniously agreed to crash on my couch until he could get back on his feet in California. We haggled over who would drive. As he watched, I frowned into the mirror at my figure for a prolonged amount of time, so he quickly gave up; because I won, he drove.

We took 19th past Geary, driving the road that would turn into the Golden Gate Bridge. He was self-conscious about what we should hear. We talked about cars and sound systems. I talked about future trips, as if they were certain. He played along. He parked, and before entering the club, he grabbed a bite to eat. I sat across the table from him, looking into his green eyes and asking questions - whatever came into my head, and was just so curious as to whether anything would flicker behind the undisturbed green when I waited for the answers. He noticed, and asked me questions in complementary conversation. Whenever he did, I gazed away and tried to affix my eyes on action at a distance. I watched a trio of overfed dirty boggarts cavorting on the sidewalk, but couldn't focus when I talked about my mother, my past.

The game continued until he finished his late night dinner. We briskly walked to the club. He paid for my cover, and I leaned over the bar to ask for our first round of drinks. The club looked scattered, and the DJ wasn't very good. So he bought our second round. And leaning against the bar, I flirted with a skinny bartender, and after tipping her fairly, got another round. With each round, he was only tasting his drink as I polished off mine. When he finished his third drink, he invited me outside, and we stood in the cold, smoking. He held me as I shivered; and when the man at the door joined us, he told the man that I was a fond conversation that would make him smile should I was sought out. I laughed, and the man agreed that my smile was worth the time. When we entered the club again, we danced. Uncertain, I let the alcohol and the nicotine feel its way through my body and there, connected to the music. That was when he held me close, and we danced, our bodies adjoining. I'd whisper in his ear and my lips, on more than one occassion, brushed his face. My breathing came heavy and he peered down at me, always focusing on me - was he curious, was he interested? When the music came to a stop, we stumbled out again, and smoked some more, his arms around me. The fever and the fire drifted into the cold that pushed us together.

We got into the car, and then I stopped feeling again. He played some of the music that I responded to in the club. As we rounded the slopes of Twin Peaks, I looked back to the city. It's covered in fog. No, he said. We're covered.