by Lola West
Once he got his breathing tamed, he looked down at me looking up. His pupils were dark and flared, perfect round orbs in a sea of green. I desperately wanted to shift my hips, press against him like he pressed against me at Bonnaroo, but I didn’t move. That’s not who we were to each other. With a gentle sigh, he smiled and then created a space between us by loosening his grip from my waist.
Warmly, with jest in his voice, he said, “I trust you. I do, but maybe it’s best to hold on.”
I reached up for the bar and the space between us grew. I ached to close it again, to feel the rise and fall of his chest against mine, but instead, I just thanked him for the rescue. And then we were quiet again until Union Square.
The walk to the theater from the subway station took like five minutes. I was completely right about taking the subway. It was definitely more efficient than a cab, and we got to the ticket window just minutes before the show started. The Daryl Roth theater was honestly a sight to behold in its own right, a stately Grecian-inspired building with four Corinthian columns out front and a cartoon bank feeling all around, but I didn’t really get a chance to take a good look because Drew rushed me through the front door of the theater, not wanting to miss a minute of the show.
In the lobby, there was a bar, but most of the patrons were funneling through the doors into the theater. Drew and I joined the crowd piling through the doors and once we were through, I was surprised to find that there were no seats. The entire audience stood in a square space that looked like a club with the lights dimmed. Basically, it was a black room, all four walls, the floor, and the ceiling were painted black, and we were surrounded by a few hundred people that I didn’t know. Signaling the start of the show, the lights went out. Instinctually, I moved closer to Drew and then hoped he didn’t notice. I didn’t love clubs or concerts because crowds of mainstreamers made me nervous, and this space felt like that kind of environment.
Repetitive contemporary tribal music surrounded us, and the whole audience seemed to sway in the direction of a bright light coming from one corner of the room. A man appeared drifting through the light and it was clear that he was walking on a large treadmill. The treadmill moved, floated out into the middle of the room and the man, who was wearing a white suit, kept walking. The music sped up. The man sped up. Whispers filtered through the crowd. Bright racing light started to flash around us. Suddenly, the man was running, and the music was running, and my heart was running in my chest. I couldn’t take my eyes off the man in the white suit. It was like he was connected to my pulse, the blood moving through my veins, like we—everyone in the audience—were connected to him, breathing with him as he ran. The intensity of the music increased, and then there was a loud bang. I jumped back, colliding with Drew’s chest, still watching the man in the white suit. Blood seeped across his chest and he fell forward, as though he’d been shot. People in the audience gasped; a few even screamed. I covered my mouth with my hand and the lights went out and everything was quiet. Emptiness pooled beneath my breastbone in the dark. I let it sit. Felt it. The hollow pull of loss.
Gradually, in the dark, the music started again. Again, the music was slow but more festive this time, still tribal with an upbeat Moroccan techno vibe. I spun my head around the space, looking for movement. A warm pink glow drifted across what I thought was a wall to my right, but the wall I knew to be there now looked like a billowing sheet of Mylar and two women, shrouded in shadow, seemed to be running and leaping through its folds. The pink light started to grow, pulsing to blue and then back to pink, tied to the rhythm of the languid music. The women’s hair hung free, floating behind them. It was subtle, but over time the music started to race and with it the women. The lights shifted, growing warmer, gold and orange, and the women somersaulted, defying gravity. They were glamorous and cosmic, like pixies. I can’t possibly explain the feeling of watching them run. They were freedom incarnate, something that almost doesn’t exist in the modern world, and then as quickly as they exploded into life, they vanished, and we were in the dark again.
Without touching his body to mine, Drew leaned forward so that his lips were a millimeter from my ear.
“Makes you want to run, right? Like to breathe that, be it.”
I nodded as the music picked up again. The middle of the show was wild, celebratory, and ferocious. The golden spotlight focused on a stage in the middle of the room and dancers, who moved without boundary, gyrating and bouncing in exaltation, appeared. As the dancers' movements exploded, it was like they outgrew the stage. So, they moved through the crowd, inciting everyone to dance and covering the audience in confetti. It occurred to me that I was in a room with unfamiliar faces, but I had no fear because this performance had bound us. We were all alive and chasing joy.
The dancers were followed by another huge Mylar sheet. This silver-colored sheet descended over the crowd and we all had to crouch down. I found myself reaching up above my head with both arms to touch the sheet like it was magical, like if I could run my fingers against it, I would know bliss. Next to me, Drew reached for it as well. Again, the lights burned pink, and I watched him, his skin reflecting the pink glow. His expression was the most relaxed I’d ever seen it. He turned to glance at me and he was smiling, a big toothy grin. I was overwhelmed by the fact that I was having this experience with him, that we were sharing this moment, that no one but Drew would understand this flash of my life. All around us people were emanating joy. The sheet rose, and we followed it. As I stood, I took Drew’s hand. At first, I held tight and his hand floated limply in mine, but I didn’t let go.
The lights around us turned blue, and the music shifted from a fast pulsing tribal techno beat to the soft melodic sway of piano or maybe an organ. The sounds played were reminiscent of whale songs, only they were made by some instrument. I couldn’t quite place it. I sensed that high above me there was movement. I turned my chin skyward and fifty feet in the air I could just make out the flow of water. The lights got brighter and suddenly it became clear that water was pouring and slipping across a piece of plastic above my head. Two dancers crawled and rolled through the water’s flow; they were wearing panties and t-shirts, and they tossed about like mermaids playing. Again, the space got closer, and the plastic descended toward our heads. My chin tilted up further, stretching in the direction of the plastic. The water rushed from side to side and even with the music you could hear it crash, like waves. Feet and palms and hips punched and slipped against the plastic, creating a thumping rhythm of their own.
When the plastic was at a reachable distance, Drew’s fingers suddenly closed around mine, gripping my fingers like they were the safety bar from earlier on the subway. I let my other hand float up and touch the plastic and the female performer spun on her back above our heads, her panties soaked and sticking to her skin. He reached up with his hand at the same time, but he was looking at me. It was intimate. It was so intimate and yet so communal. It was maybe the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
I was overwhelmed by it. I closed my eyes and let the beauty of it all ache under my skin. I smelled humanity all around me and felt Drew next to me, and I wanted to crash into him like I did in the subway car. I wanted to sway with my back pressed against his chest and his arms around me, but I couldn’t so I let go of his hand and stepped forward so I was in front of him with both my hands pressed against the plastic above my head. From behind me, he leaned in again and this time the nearness of his lips to my ear sent a shudder down my spine.
“You good?” he asked.
I leaned back into him under the guise of bringing my lips to his ear. His hands drifted to my hips, but the movement didn’t seem sweet or affection-filled; it was perfunctory. I had the urge to run my tongue along the edge of his ear rather than talk, but I didn’t.
Instead, I just said, “So. Good.” The words came out hot, all sultry and humid, dripping with the pull I felt toward him. I might have imagined it because there was noise all around us, but I thought he gro
aned. Then he dropped his hands from my hips and backed away.
13
Drew
As we exited the theater, I asked if she liked gelato. She nodded and threw me a little half smile. Since I had dropped my hands from her hips in the theater, the spell that had come over us both was broken. Watching her in those lights, free and spilling emotion, was like seeing her at Bonnaroo all over again. When she looked at me and grabbed my hand, like she wanted to connect to me, like she wanted to share everything that was happening, flooding all around us, I nearly choked. I was already so hot and bothered. I was turned on just by being in her airspace, but watching her let go like that, watching her experience the rush of all that commotion, that was what thrilled me about Lua, the way she lived, the way she breathed life.
For a few moments, I felt it with her. I let it all pour over us. I felt like I was glowing, like there was lightness flowing from my skin. And then she seemed to freeze, like she was going to cry or something, and when I leaned in to check on her, she shuddered, and I heard her suck in a quick breath. That little pull of air was so incredibly sexy. When she started to lean back to reply, I instinctually grabbed her hips to keep her from pressing against my cock. Because honestly, I thought that collision would have just been embarrassing. And then, to my surprise, her voice was all dirty and deep and I literally had to let go and step back so that I didn’t shove myself against her and hump her clothes like a fucking dog.
So yeah, after that it was weird.
I wasn't sure who was weirder, her or me. I felt awkward, that’s for sure. But I didn’t want it to end like that. I wanted her to remember that night. I wanted to keep her from misplacing the memory. I wanted it to be one of those crazy nights, when you connected to someone in a way that was more than you thought possible. I wanted her one night with me to be a spark, something that she would carry in her life and long after college when she saw my father or some other douche-y politician on television, I wanted her to think of me, to think of that one night, the night when we defied our limitations and had fun. So, logically, I thought ice cream. Ice cream was fun. Ice cream was innocent kid fun. I needed that kind of fun. I needed to cool down and go back to having friendly fun.
I knew a cute gelato store on University Place, so we walked and talked. At first the conversation was mundane. We talked about siblings and pets, things like that, and then she surprised me by asking, “Do you have a girlfriend?”
I was quick to answer, too quick. “Nope.”
She let out a little laugh at my response, and I was torn between feeling relief that we were back in a place where her laughter was possible or stress that she was once again finding humor in my simplest answers.
“What?” I queried tensely.
“Nothing, it’s just you answered so quickly, like you were six and girls were gross.”
That was not why I answered quickly, and although I couldn't have her, I didn’t want her to think I was some immature commitment phobe. “I’ve had girlfriends. I just don’t have one now. Us mainstreamers are not so lucky as you thrivers; our partners aren’t homegrown. We have to hunt for them.”
She stopped walking, turned to me, and quirked her head sideways like a dog looks at a human when it’s trying to decipher words. For some reason she was confused, followed by a quick flash of comprehension, and then anger flooded her face and the apples of her cheeks flushed red. When she opened her mouth and started speaking, she was almost screaming at me. “Oh. My. God. Or Goddess. Or whatever the hell you pray to, Drew. Do you honestly think that just because I was raised on a commune that I like sleep with all the guys I grew up with or that I’m like promised to someone or something?”
Immediately, I thought, Whoa, a definite misunderstanding happening. People passing us on the street were staring, and I was working hard to keep from feeling uncomfortable. Her anger was palpable, fuming off her skin in waves. I definitely didn’t want her thinking what she thought I was thinking, and I made a mental note that twisting and perverting the reality of what her home was like was a firestarter for Lua.
I jumped to correct her. “What? No. What are you talking about and why are you yelling at me?”
“You just insinuated that I’m like marrying someone I grew up with.”
I laughed. She didn’t. She stood there with her hands on her hips, tapping her foot like schoolmarms on television sitcoms do.
“I promise. I don’t think that. I was just making a joke about your boyfriend.”
Again, she quirked her head like a sweet, loyal pup. “My boyfriend?”
“The guy you’re always with on television.”
Suddenly, she was laughing, and I was confused. “What? What’s so funny?”
“Do you mean Joe?”
Yes, I meant Joe, but she had no idea I’d ever seen Joe in person, so I said, “Yeah, I guess. The guy who is always standing behind you.”
Giggling, she turned and started walking again. “Did you ever hear that expression ‘assume makes an ass out of u and me’? It’s not really funny, but you and I are on a roll with assumptions tonight.” She smiled. We kept walking. “I can't wait to tell Joe you thought he was my boyfriend. I think he’ll barf.”
Panic seared inside my chest. “He’s not your boyfriend?” I croaked out.
“No.” She snickered again. “He’s like my brother. I wouldn’t bed him if he was the last man on earth.”
I meant to be fucking freaked out. I did, but when she said, ‘bed him,’ I broke into some kind of nervous, delighted laughter. She stopped again and stared at me. In between these strange high-pitched guffaws, I asked, “Did you just use the word ‘bed’ as a verb, as in to bed, as in to have sex with?”
“I did,” she said smartly. “I think it’s a perfectly good verb.”
We walked on, quiet for a minute, and then I couldn’t help myself. I asked her again, “So, Joe is not your boyfriend?” It was sort of a rhetorical question. I said it more to the city street than to her, and I shook my head in bewilderment.
“Having a hard time with that one, huh?”
“Um… I guess I just… I pictured you with him. I thought you were with him, that’s all.”
As we approached the door to the ice cream place, she said, “Yeah, well, I’m not.”
I watched her walk up to the case to examine the flavors, and the full brunt of the situation hit me. All night I had myself believing that Lua wasn’t free, that the looks she gave me sometimes and the way she spoke to me during Fuerza Bruta was just her vibe, something sexy that rolled off her, an irresistibility, a sexuality that was just part of her, part of how she existed in the world, but certainly not something directed at me because there was Joe. Joe from the cheesesteak line, Joe from the newsreels. Joe was supposed to be her rock. The steadfast moat that kept me safely trapped outside the castle. And of course, there was a Joe, but the love I saw between them wasn’t the love of lovers; it was the love of a brother and a sister. Meaning, I was fucked because Lua wanted me. I knew it. I felt it that first night when she rested her face against my chest.
And I wanted her. Bad.
Fucked. Fuckity, fuck, fuck, fucked.
A few feet in front of me, Lua was running her hand along the glass case, leaving a smudge in her wake and quietly reading the names of the flavors to herself. The gelato place was Italian and the names she was whispering were in Italian, things like stracciatella and nocciola. My breathing quickened, watching her shape her lips around the foreign words. She turned back, and smiling, she looked at me and asked, “What are you going to get?”
I was stymied, but not by her question. I was taken aback by the intensity of my feelings. She wasn’t doing anything special right then. She was just standing there, not quite facing me so that she had to look over her shoulder to ask the question. Thick brown waves of soft curls glided along the bare skin of her shoulder as she turned to me. Her expression was relaxed, just a pleasant little grin. And why not? What wasn’t simple abo
ut gelato? But somehow her desire to know my gelato choice delighted me. She was interested in me. She was with me and I was happy about it.
There was a little piece of me that knew everything was spinning out of control, that her single status completely obliterated my justifications for spending the night hanging out with her, and that because of that I should have ended it. Pretended to get a call. Made an excuse about having to go. But I didn’t want to. I knew I was slipping into this selfish place that would leave her wide open and unprotected. I wanted to be stronger. I did.
From where I was standing, I said, “Chocolate and passion fruit.”
“You don’t even need to look?” she asked.
I shrugged my shoulders. “Nope.”
“I know you’ve been here before, but they have seasonal flavors. You sure you don’t want to look?”
“Yep.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “Will you share?”
“Yep.”
Silly and smirk-y, she turned back to the case, held her fingers in front of her, and danced the tips together like a plotting villain. “Excellent.”
I couldn’t stop smiling.
Gelato was a bad idea. There was nothing innocent about ice cream. I have no idea how I ever thought that ice cream was friendly. Watching a woman you desperately want to devour circle her tongue through sweet sticky cream is fucking torturous. I almost couldn't talk the entire time we were eating. She circled. She licked. She stuck her tongue out and salivated, leaning toward my cone. She sighed and groaned. At one point she got gelato on her index finger and rather than wipe it on a napkin, she sucked it into her mouth and made one of those little delectable sounds. I was dying. My balls were crying, sobbing like little fucking helpless babies.