Not Fade Away

A life spent lonely isn't a life at all, I've been told. Yeah, I can base that on empherical evidence in my life.

I've had one good friend in the span of twenty-nine years on this planet, and he's very happy right now, sitting in a corner swapping spit with Eddie Gurerro.

Me? I don't know if I get what happy is...dunno if I've ever known happy. I press an icy cola-brown bottle to my lips and take a heady swig.

Sometimes I like to go drinking in full RTC drag; tie, shirt and pants. They usually mistake me for a business executive, which is what I could have been if I didn't have this aching, gaping hole of need within me.

It's long past happy hour; most of the rest of the boys have departed upstairs with a plate of Rat D' Jour. I've decided not to even touch the stuff. My soul has suffered enough.

Vauge streaks of winter light pierce the artifical, cold atmosphere of the room as she walks in. Instantly, I'm drawn to her, a woman I've seen so many times, but known to me only by way of having her shout in my ear, 'Go home now, asshole!"

She's diminutive, moreso when loosely wrapped in the early morning. As she's seated in a booth steps from my body and the waitress hands her a menu, I realize that it's breakfast. Shifting my weight onto the balls of my feet I realize how drunk I am. The room sways a bit, and my eyes focus on the violet blouse she wore.

It draped over her shoulders, hanging open loosely at her collarbone. The swell of her breast peeked at me, flirting with each breath she took. An amber heart hung around her neck, kissing the base of her throat.

I must be drunk. Oh to be the necklace at that throat!

Why did it take forever to reach her? Little shocks of pain hit me as I smack into a table, and I look down.

There she sits, her face a sophisticate mask of non-plussed cool. Her hair is loose around her shoulders, floating in a lovely chestnut cloud about her face.

I'm frozen in fear of the litany in my heartbeat.

I want her, I want her, I want her.

"Lisa?" I want you

"Would you like to sit down, Michael?" She asks me.

I move like a wooden soldier, artificial movement as I plant myself before her. She holds up a silver carafe and pours a brown stream into an upturned cup before me. Coffee; the rich scent envelops my nostrils and mothered my brain. She doesn't chastise me for drinking my weight in beer.

Silence weaves a net between us, finally torn when she deftly leans over the centerpiece, climbing onto her knees. Her fingertips, so lightly, carefully, stroking my cheek from the corner of my mouth to my left ear. Her middle fingertip comes away with a rusty streak of blood.

"Did you fall last night?" Her expression is mothering, worrysome.
I try to focus on the past, but all I can remember are a haze of cigarettes and beer. "Dunno." I mutter.

She smiles up at the waitress when she interrupts Lisa's touch with a basket of rolls, "Could you tell the chef to have my order sent upstairs?" She asks.

The waitress' haggard eyes regards us both with contempt; her fists ball up in the bright pink apron she wore. Within a second, she turns and walks away. Some hardness in her eyes disturbed me.

Lisa ignores the woman, choosing to lead me away from the table and up the back stairs to her room.

***
I snarl when an alchol swab is pressed to my forehead. She sighs and pats the scratch marring my left temple. Eventually her hands lift away and I feel her presence abate.

She stands, her back to the dressers adjacent to the window and air conditioner. She watches me with her solumn, lovely eyes for a moment. I feel ashamed at my own loutish drunkenness, and before I can stop myself I say, "I'm sorry that I'm so wasted, Lisa. I felt so...I was just..."

"Lonely." She said. The words sounded like God's truth, "You felt lonely like I feel lonely. It happens all the time."

She turns away from me and, driven beyond reservation, I fill the space between us with my body and wrap my arms about her. For a moment she limpens, then allows herself to be coddled by me.

"I don't want to be lonely anymore." I said.
"Neither do I."
Clarity hit me, "We don't have to be lonely. We could have each other."
Her eyes focused on my face, hopelessness mussing her features, "We barely know each other."
"We could learn; Lisa, we could try. It's better than being alone."
She lowered her chin, then captured me again with her rich eyes, "It's better than being alone," She confirmed, "If we agree to some terms."
I nodded, "Tell me."
"There may be a possibility this won't work out..and I don't want any bitterness if it happens. If things become sexual between us..." She shook her head, "I don't expect you to love me, Michael."

I cupped her chin, as I had in a promo months before. The gesture now held more true meaning than anything I'd done yet. "I only expect something real." I said.

Fear touched me. Now, of course, I would love her, because she was utterly unlike anything I'd ever experienced before. No woman had displayed such sweet affection for me at even this young level of a relationship.

"OK." She said, And for that moment, it was. My head was clearing, the sun was coming up, and I had someone to lean on. What the rest of the day would bring, that's what I dreaded.

your flirt finds me out
teases the crack in me
smittens me with hope

probably maybe probably love



Go On