So there I am, drunk and losing ground. Quickly. While making fun of a near-perfect (in both ways) stranger’s chosen hobbies and best friend, I did a boisterous Irish jig all over common ettiquitte. My drunk self (that bitch!) still thought the whole thing was hilarious while the real me (I hope) recoiled into the depths of my psyche. Ah yes, and the bizarro spinning cosmos had not yet had their fill.. I would yet be redeemed…
While Smell-Nice-Stan was fuming outside on the sidewalk, I gathered my frayed nerves about me, and prayed for the booze to start wearing off so I could get myself home. Owing to my irresistibly charming state of mind, I began to prepare for an awkward and abrupt goodbye. As it turns out, he wouldn’t have time to rid himself of me. As soon as I hit the cold air, my nausea struck again, and the wine boiled in my veins. It’s been a while since I last vomited from an actual physical condition (if wasted is a condition), and it actually isn’t all that different from a psychologically-induced bout of illness. As annoyed as he certainly was, Smell-Nice-Stan took pity on me and in one form or another, dragged me, moaning, to his apartment. I vaguely remember him laughing about something (maybe, maybe…I hoped it was the cat-pack), and I was dimly reassured of his good-natured, albeit excessively patient personality.
The worst of my ookieness had subsided by the time we got back to his place, but not enough to protect me from an unidentifiable odor permeating his entire apartment. There is a certain glee that one gets from the state fair in winning a really big stuffed animal, but it’s also a well-known fact that it really takes very little more than the walk from the front gate to the car to start wondering what exactly you’re going to do with this cumbersome cotton ball in a tailored bag. Smell-Nice-Stan (now a kind of ironic moniker) apparently never felt that way. Populating his bedroom were maybe ten oversized cuddly things. Stripping off his clothes (I had kind of stopped existing on the cab ride home. He wasn’t rude to me, but I think that my drunkenness had caused him to zone out. Like I wouldn’t care either way.), he took a running leap into the pile of animals. I was absolutely stopped in my tracks. He reminded me of my childhood dog, the way he wiggled and scratched his back on the obliging laps of the muppet-esque purples and greens. He grinned and softly giggled in pleasure, apparently unaware of the chin-to-floor action happening in the doorway. I turned on my heel and walked all too soberly into the kitchen to occupy myself with the task of drinking water. Or opening and closing cabinets. Or mashing my hands together and talking to myself in the microwave reflection. Was he fucking with me? Was he a performer taking his art to the extreme, all Andy Kaufman style? Despite this commentary flowing through my head, he seemed to be acting with no recognition of the other person in the room. I crept slowly back in the direction of his room and peered around the corner. Still writhing about, he suddenly flopped over and started vigorously humping a sorry-looking hippo with orange-ish spots. It had long-since been faded and stained (the odor? yes maybe), and seemed frayed at the edges.
The dawning took a long time coming, but the realization was a bolt. My eyes flew open, and the demon-girl leapt to the surface. With gurgling laughter barely corked, I escaped into the hallway, and slumped against the wall, shrieking. Again with my head in my hands, I shook in bewilderment. I have learned the value of the across-the-room desire, and the use of booze in dating. Some crushes are best left untouched, and some dates are best executed under the influence. Drink up! You never know what you’ll have to look at by the end of tonight!