(NOTE: This story is something that actually happened to me during the brief period that I lived in the States with my Father and brother. You guys that complain about girls being prudish here…you've just gotta get them in the right situation, I guess. Anyway, I hope you like it.)
* * * * *
"They always make them too watery," she said to me, poking at her "grits" with a heavily-spotted fork. The Waffle House was thick with cheap cigar smoke and NASCAR talk. I fucking hate NASCAR. On top of it, our waitress was ugly and mean. A restaurant full of redneck idiots, and my waitress, their queen. I could almost see her leaving after her 27 hour shift and hitting the sack with her brother and dog in the same, twin-sized bed. ((WHAT!?!?! That was totally harsh)) My friend's complaining words snapped me back into reality. "There's never enough salt, either." Her slight southern drawl accented the inanity of her complaints.
"Is that a big deal?" I asked. Even after all that had gone down, I was still acted like a damn nervous kid around her. Like a damn nervous kid about to ask his parents for something he knows he shouldn't be getting. Unbelievable.
"Well, yeah, I mean, you can't just have some watery, saltless grits, can you?"
"I don't eat grits…so yeah, I could." Something clever, finally…something clever.
She looked up at me with her big green eyes and smiled. "You know, I kinda wish I'd have been a dork in high school." She began to shake her head and laugh. "You're so much more fun."
This bares some explanation. I'd ask the cliché' "Why don't we start from the beginning," but I won't, because it's OBVIOUS THAT WE SHOULD START FROM THE BEGINNING!!! I fucking hate that pseudo-clever questioning shit! Imagine if we were NOT to start from the beginning. Imagine if it were like "No way, dude, I'm not gonna do that!" DO WHAT? What the fuck!?! I swear…
why don't we start from the beginning
…Jesus Christ.
Anyway, here's the beginning…
It was too tight. So tight, in fact, that I could barely breath with it clamped around me like that…er, my tie. My tie was too tight. See, the senior prom was that night (both participants of the following story ARE and WERE at the time, although in high-school, over EIGHTEEN…so shut up) and I was having a little trouble getting myself together. To make an EXTREMELY long and complicated story short, my rental tux and accessories were…let's say…
borrowed
from my car without my knowledge the night before, and I had to make some last minute, annoyingly make-shift adjustments. I fiddled around in front of my rear-view mirror for a few more minutes and, to my moderate satisfaction, was able to fidget this golden-rod bow-tie loose enough to where it didn't put me in a sleeper hold.
I sighed to myself one of those 'take it like a man' sighs and hopped out of my Oldsmobile. Being heavily a part of the slacker/grungy crowd, I felt more than a little out of place at this gala event, but it was just a necessary evil. My mission was extremely clear. See, as our slacker senior prank, my buddies and I (or, actually, just my buddies…I don't remember being in on the brain-storming of this one) had crafted a masterpiece. A real KILLER gag. Actually, it was kinda minor-league, but I think everything in life is like that. Like, the funniest thing you've ever done would probably only evoke slight chuckles from an audience were it re-played in a movie. So maybe you had to be there. Anyway, it was hilarious in conception to us. The long and short is that I was to finagle my way to the deejay booth during prom-king/queen announcements and start this tape we had of the chick about to become prom queen saying something to the effect of how she hated all the kids at our school. It was taken way out of context, as she was actually referring to the faculty acting like kids, and how they bickered and bossed and bitched. Regardless, it sounded mean on her part, and we wanted to embarrass her. After all, she stood for everything we stood against. Popularity, beauty, fun…
COME ON, WE WERE FRIENDLESS GEEKS!!! HAULDEN CAUFIELD!!! READ A BOOK!!!
I stood cross-armed in the doorway of the hotel ball-room for a few minutes deciding whether or not to go in. Maybe it was dumb idea I thought - a couple passed by and walked in. Maybe I shouldn't go through with it - a couple passed by and walked in. Maybe this whole thing was actually a plot by my friends against me and they had switched the tapes of her voice to one of me, like, singing "My Hero" in the shower or something and everybody would laugh at me more than they already did and - a couple passed by a walked in. "What the hell," I thought to myself. "Stop being paranoid."
I darted my hand out bravely and grabbed the door handle, opening it with a fling and marching triumphantly into the dance. Until I bumped into someone three steps in and ended up looking like a clumsy jerk. I made my dorky apologies and proceeded over to the empty chairs, only sparsely occupied by fellow nerds and rejects. I eyed across the dance-floor until I caught my victim. Her head was bowed down and she was playing with her accessory purse. I imagined she was perfecting a bow or something, making sure she was the best looking female in the joint, but that's not what she was doing at all. When she looked up, actually, she was crying. A tall football player-type walked up and put his hand on her lower-back, saying something that I'm sure was rooted in an attempt to get layed…then he grabbed his face and stumbled back after the impact of being bitch-slapped.
I swallowed hard and realized that there was no way I could go through with this. After all, I'm not a monster or anything…plus, I didn't really want to receive one of those open-hands either. So, I kinda ducked my head and scurried towards the door.
Half-way out of the lobby, I was bumped from behind. I turned around to see who it was (not that I was gonna do anything…that would take courage) and was met with those same teary green eyes. Tatum (that's the girl's name, by the way, Tay-tum) looked up at me and smiled (as if she were programmed to be the polite) and said "excuse me," in a soft, sadness-hiding voice. I dumbly and mutely stepped out of the way and she ran past, muttering her thanks.
What I did next is still a mystery to me. Maybe I did it out of straight curiosity, or maybe it was that I realized that I, myself, was about to try and evoke the same reaction out of her, but, in any event, whatever the reason, I decided to follow her.
Now, one must understand the chemistry here. This was Tatum McGrath, homecoming queen and cheerleading star. Blonde hair, green eyes, perfect teeth, big tits, nice ass, yadda yadda yadda, and I was Nigel, the slack-ass, greasy haired, listened to too much NIRVANA, watched too much porn wastoid. We had never spoken more than three words to one-another (excuse, me, and thanks were those exact three), and could not have been (at least we thought) from further ends of the social spectrum. But here I was, walking towards the sobbing girl, formulating my line of questioning and comforting.
"Hi." That was my big opener. Hi. I'm a natural at this, I tell ya'. A pro.
"Hi," she sniffled back to me. These smiles she was donning were nuts. She obviously wasn't in a smiling mood, but she did anyway. Like she'd been taught this. I assumed in her "My First Ms. USA" pageants or something of the sort.
"What's wrong," I asked. I'm tellin' ya', a pro.
"Oh, it's nothing, I'm fine," she forcedly giggled, wiping her eyes.
"You don't look fine," I said, beginning to calm down after realizing that she wasn't gonna be all 'who the hell are you' about it.
"It's…I don't know…don't worry about it," she shrugged. I started to mouth something else before she cut me off. "Guys are such assholes," she said, harshly. I was surprised by her communication. "They just…have you ever had sex with a girl?"
What a question! Two seconds in and we're discussing sexual past. Cool.
"Uh, yeah, of course…lots…why?" I could barely keep a straight face. For the first time, I realized that my anger towards Tatum was not based in some principles or ethics, but out of the fact that she was EXTREMELY hot and was NEVER going to fuck me. Note that I added in the "of course" and "lots," emphasizing my vast sexual experience.
"Did you tell everybody?" There it was, the age-old problem. Girl is perfect, does something HARDCORE sexual with a dude, he tells everyone he knows, and girl is now uber-slut.
"I don't have any friends, who would I tell," I joked back.
She smiled and laughed, wiping the remaining tears from her eyes. I reached my hand down to help her up off of the asphalt parking lot where she had been sitting. She reached up and grabbed it, her skin being unbelievably smooth.
"Come on, I'll take you home," I offered.
"Can't. I'm staying with a friend cause my parents are out of town." She patted some gravel off of her yellow dress. "She's still inside and I don't want to ruin this for her."
"You can come to my place and hang-out if you'd like," I said, as nervously as I had ever said anything in my life.
"Are you sure?" You could tell she was hesitant. She didn't even know me and this had been a pretty dramatic night for her. "I don't know…I think I'll hang-out out here until this thing is over."
"No…don't," I blurted. "You'll have more fun at my house. I have Playstation." Playstation? Whatadork…
She looked at me for a second, then laughed, rubbed her hands together. "Sure."
SURE!?! SURE!?! It was at this moment that I realized that I had just invited this girl to my house! Dumbass…dumbass…dumbass.
(I think I could tell you more about our drive to my house, or whatever, but there was nothing that interesting. She told me she listened to Nirvana, too, and that she didn't really like being popular all that much. She asked who was home, and I told her that nobody was, that about covers it. Instead, let's fast-forward to when we're coming in.)
We walked into the front door and I turned on the hall light. "Nice place," she said, removing her high-healed shoes and kicking them into the closet.
"It's pretty alright, I guess."
"Where's your bathroom," she asked.