What the what?

I couldn’t put my finger on what I wanted to say when I asked her to meet me, but I needed to see her.  I assumed as in most things, my thoughts would solidify with the pressure of time and procrastination. I did kind of practice what I wanted to say, reciting the talking points in my head: friendship, blah blah, don’t want to ruin anything, blah blah, incredibly attractive, blah blah, desire, blah. But mostly there was just the brief thought of a conversation, followed by images of what I really wanted: passionate kisses, hands on bodies, and warm, wet access to her secret parts. 

Although I had asked her the day before to meet me, to which she agreed, an hour before we were scheduled  to meet we had a sting of confusing and frustrating text messages back and forth.  The texting was so … fucked … that I told her I would be at the coffee shop taking care of some work if she wanted to stop by. Complete pretense, but whatever. She eventually arrived 40 minutes late, a few mins before closing, and somewhat high on narcotics from a recent back injury.  While I sat sipping my black, hot coffee, she turned up at the table with a drink that was some sticky-sweet pink liquid and a few strawberry slices. 

After a few minutes of idle chatter and a full recitation of her back injury. I took a breath and tried to get to the real reason we were there.  Despite my mental preparation, all forms of articulate dialogue left my head.  What actually came out was “So, are we good?”

“Yeah!” She said with exaggerated enthusiasm and slapped me a ringing high five.

What the actual fuck?

I knew she had difficulty engaging in mature, adult conversations about relationships. I knew this from conversations we had about her relationships with other people while she was in them. I had previously counseled her to try expressing to them what she was saying to me. But as far as I can tell, she never did.

And so I sat there trying to figure out how I could steer this conversation away from exuberant high fives, into something more appropriate.

“What I mean is, I realize we were both in a compromised position, but from my perspective I had a really good time. I’m just wondering what you thought about it.”

“I’m not mad about it,” she said taking a drag from her socially acceptable kool aid.

Again, what the actual fuck?

I could feel my brow furrow. I looked down and fidgeted with some of my work, still spread out in front of me. She laughed and asked what was wrong. I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t find my way through her  obscurity, or her laugh.  I can accept that maybe I had a better time than she, that maybe she had regrets due to timing or location or intoxication. I can accept that maybe she’s disappointed in herself for breaking some unstated rule or in me because of my performance.  But I cannot accept what I am not allowed to know. 

We left the coffee shop a few minutes later and wandered down the street to an all-night diner. And while I did my best to shake off the disappointment and confusion I couldn’t entirely.  We joked, we laughed, we judged the other people, and speculated on whether the golden bubble perched on top of the waitress’s head was a bath pouf or a amazing bundle of highly teased and hair-sprayed hair. But the magic of possibilities had drained from the night and mostly I was going through the motions. 

As we sat there, waiting for food, she often picked up her phone for one reason or another. I was annoyed. While I stared at her, waiting for her to finish and turn her attention back to me, there was a moment as she stared down at the screen, when her eyes looked half closed and downcast, face resting, that my breath caught.  I could have sat content in that moment for a while. Finally she found the disgusting video or inappropriate meme she was searching for, and the moment was over.

She had steak tips and potatoes and devoured the entire plate. I had blueberry hot cakes. I picked the blueberries out of the pancakes and left much of the latter otherwise untouched.  In the parking lot as we stood between our respective cars, she hugged me more times than necessary.  I was tired. Physically tired from a long day and emotionally tired from alternatively trying to figure out her mixed signals and pretending like I enjoyed the ambiguity. 

We got into our cars. She pulled away without hesitation or a glance back.

I sat there for a while, trying to figure out what any of it meant, what she might have told me about the evening if it had been out with someone else, and what kind of jokes she might make about it to someone else, as she liked to do. None of it made me feel better. 

Anticipation

I leaned over and gave her a kiss. We had both been thinking of this moment during months of awkward flirting/not flirting.  Both waiting for me to swim through the muddy waters from married to divorced.

She was ready, but wouldn’t make the move.  I wasn’t sure if I was ready.

Actually, that’s a lie.

I was ready but I didn’t know how to get there, or what there meant.  The alcohol sure helped gloss over those naggy questions Sober Me would need to handle at a later date.  She was drunk, drunker than I was, but that wasn’t readily apparent.

We kissed, lightly at first, harder and more full as the hesitancy and awkwardness melted away.

“Nine and a half months I’ve waited for that,” she whispered as we parted to breathe.  It gave me the impression that somewhere in her head was a mental calendar that could have also provided the number of days, hours, and minutes of anticipation.

We came together again, with more surety this time, wondering what the gestation of these many months would produce. My hand wandered from her face to her neck and into the wilds of her sea colored hair.  Involuntarily, as our lips and our tongues continued their dance, with my hand entwined in her hair I gave a small squeeze, tugging firmly but gently. She inhaled sharply.  I did it again, a little less gently, and was rewarded with a moan and her mouth pressing harder into mine.

I was freed from the sad caricature I had drawn of myself captioned:  "Almost 40. Divorced, with kids.” Uninhibited by a few beers, and fully drunk on pent-up passion, I found my swagger.  In those few long moments in a dark car, on a dark street, sitting in front of a house we could never enter together, my skin came alive when her fingertips found my bare collarbone, and later my breast. I hadn’t had anyone touch me with desire in more than a decade. And I hadn’t had anyone touch me with any feeling in about half as long, at the very least. 

I wanted her.  God, yes.  I wanted all of her unencumbered by the confines of a car seat, or clothes.  But I was glad for the safety of our limitations, too.  I wanted her, but wasn't reckless enough to actually do it.  Instead, I relished teasing her, bringing my lips within a whisper of hers, breathing, grazing, pulling back, coming in again, breathing, lightly kissing but pulling back again before she can engage my lips. 

"I can't take you inside." I apologized in between lips on flesh.

"Let's go to my place." She offered. 

"No, not tonight. Not like this," I said since my problem was less a matter of geography.

"Why not?"

"Because … " Shit.  Why the actual fuck not?  "Because I want to make sure it happens for the right reasons."  I couldn't tell if that was the truth or not.

"Isn't it enough that you want to? Isn't desire a good enough reason?" she breathed as she continued to touch, to kiss.

She made a really fucking valid point. 

"No."  Even Drunk Me couldn’t ignore some of the problems here that wouldn't be resolved when we were both in varying stages of inebriation. 

But while Drunk Me wasn't going to cross ALL of the lines, she was happy to cross SOME of them.  There were mouths on breasts and hands sliding across bellies that longed to travel further south in that quick, practiced move under the waistband.  A few teasing fingers fondled the waistband, but went no further.

"I have to go.  I have to be up in the morning.  My neighbors will be up soon, they're old."  All sickeningly true statements.  All excuses.

"Fuck 'em. Let them watch" she said as she pulled off her shirt. 

When I was on the verge of caving, I took her hand and placed it between my legs, over the pants but otherwise right where we both wanted it.  She began to move her hand, trying to find the small button through the bunched denim and an alcohol fog.

"I want to gently kiss you here" she said, grabbing the entire area with her hand. 

"I'm not a big fan of gentle kisses," I replied.  

She ground her hand harder and kissed my mouth more voraciously.  Yes, yes, let's do this.  I want you. I want us, entwined.

"I have to go." Resolute this time.  I took a last breath of her body, a last teasing kiss, and pulled away.  She didn't fight me or protest.  "Stop drinking and call me," I directed, fully aware that neither of those would actually happen.  "We'll finish this later." 

I got out of the car and walked up the drive toward the dark, empty house.  My head reeled from the dissipating alcohol and adrenaline.

As I laid in the dark, alone, a short time later, my body rocked and throbbed, unsatisfied.  But I could still feel her hands on my body and the warmth of her mouth.  I imagined with a smile what might have happened. What might still happen.