I wake up in a deep fog. My stomach feels queasy and my whole body aches. I have no idea where I am or who this man is sleeping beside me.
"What the hell happened last night?" I mumble to myself, seeing my clothes scattered haphazardly all across the room.
I slowly slide out of the bed looking around at what looks like a college dorm room but the guy sprawled out naked on the futon looks more like a professor than a college student. Silently, I gather my clothes from off the floor and head into the bathroom.
Seeing myself in the mirror makes me want to vomit. My makeup is smeared and smudged all over my face and my long blond hair is sticking straight out in all directions on my head. A crusty white film is caked to my face, my breasts and my belly confirming what I already assumed my night entailed.
How did I end up here? Why would Jenni let me leave the club with this old man? Why would I leave the night club with this old man? I'm fucking losing it.
Still buck naked, the man walks right into the bathroom and starts peeing in the toilet right in front of me.
"How are you feeling this morning, love?" He says, looking over at me as I try to hide my face from his audacity, "No offense, but you look like death."
"Well, that's pretty much how I feel." I say stepping as of his way as he washes his hands in the sink.
"Why don't you grab a shower and then we can figure out how to get you home."
I run the shower as hot as I can stand it trying to wash my guilt away along with all his filth, all the while trying to remember any shred of detail into how I ended up here with this man doing what we did.
"That's much better." he says when I walk out of the bathroom wearing my black dress, fresh-faced with my hair wrapped up in a towel. I sit in the chair nervously tapping my fingers on my knees watching him toss the dirty sheets on the table as he folds the futon back into a couch.
"So about last night..." I say sounding completely clichΓ©, "...what...I mean...how did we..."
"How did we end up together? You don't remember?" he says sounding cautiously surprised.
"I'm sorry. I must have had way too much to drink I don't remember anything."
"Hmm. Well, I guess we'll have to start over then. Hello Jenna, I'm Jackson, we met at the club last night." He says sitting on the arm of my chair in only his boxers. The hair on his chest is the same brown with hints of salt and pepper tips that is on his head.
"Hi Jackson." I say awkwardly shaking his hand.
"So, a little recap of last night, we danced together at the club, you went to find your friends but they were already gone. You ran into some guy and you two started arguing. By the time I go to you, you were on the floor crying your eyes out so offered to bring you home. You told me you were upset with you friends for leaving you and asked me to bring you here. I knew you were drunk but I thought after you puked your guts out in my car that you had sobered up. You seemed perfectly coherent when we were...you know...doing the nasty."
I throw up a little in my mouth at the thought.
Using his computer, I log into my Facebook account and track down Jenni. She IM's me in a panic. "Where are you?!!?"
After a couple of posts back and forth I get her address and Jackson overs to take me to her place. I respectfully decline but he insists. Finally after much debate he finally settles for getting me a cab which I accept. I would have just had Jenni pick me up but I didn't want her to meet this guy nor did I want her to see conditions in which he lives. When the cab comes to pick me up he walks me out to the curb.
"It was really nice to meet you, Jenna. I hope to see you again sometime soon." He says, kissing me gently on the cheek. The smile on his face makes me feel a little uneasy. I climb into the cab and he shuts the door waving at me as the cabbie pulls off into the street. I am relieved that I didn't have Jenni pick me up; this is definitely not a nice part of town.
"Are you completely insane? Why did you leave the club?" Jenni says, barreling me over when I step out of the cab. She grabs my face in her hands, "You had us scared to death."
"Me? Jenni, you guys left me."
"No, I came out of the bathroom with Allie and Chloe and Tara said you took off with that hottie you were dancing with."
"She's fucking lying, I was looking for you and that old man told me you guys left without me. I don't remember anything except somehow I ended up at his apartment. I fucking ended up at his fucking apartment, Jen!"
"What old man?"
"Some guy I was dancing with, apparently."
"I didn't see you with an old man, Jenna."
"Ladies, let's talk about this inside." Damon says herding us toward the apartment as my panicky tirade starts to cause a scene.
Jenni sits beside me, rubbing my back as I curl up into a ball on the soft, comfortable mattress of the guestroom bed which is vastly different than that thing I slept on last night.
"I'm really sorry everything got screwed up last night. Do you want to talk about it?" Jenni says, sliding her arm around my shoulder to lie beside me.
"No."
"Do you hate me?"
"Of course not. I could never hate you." I say, pulling her arm tighter around me.
"How are you ladies doing in here?" Damon says, poking his head inside the door, "I don't mean to rush you but you realize the rehearsal starts in two hours."