It's usually not hard for me to pick out who I'll be hooking up with. Sometimes it's a look, a silly line of dialogue, an article of clothing--always a single detail that tells me, "Yes. S/he's The One For Tonight."
Occasionally, I get thrown off--like at my cousin's wedding this weekend. I was constantly scanning the crowd for Potentials: would it be the bartender with his horn-rimmed glasses? One of the groom's shy n' slender cousins in his late 20s? Or the foul-mouthed, interracial couple in their 40s? I looked for a Tell at every conversation, but nothing jumped out at me. My parents watching any move I made didn't help either.
As usual, I didn't know who the lucky person was until the last-minute afterparty at night. I had to talked to him briefly during the cocktail reception after the vows, but easily brushed him off. This time, I found him leaning against the wall of the bar our young group had migrated to, his sunglasses finally stored in his pocket. He had been looking at me all night. I approached him with a smile.
I have never understood the point of all those questions you ask someone at a bar: where are you from? what do you do? What are your hobbies? The more relevant ones would be: do you mainly kiss with tongue? are you considerate enough to make me come first? are you a giver? Unfortunately, I trudged through an hour of conversation with exactly the former queries. Some of the volunteered information was interesting enough. He was an Asian engineering student who also played soccer and table tennis. He attended college an hour from the current location. I returned similar answers out of courtesy.
Just really, what is the point? At least he surprised me by asking if I wanted to find someplace more private. Asian men aren't normally that forward. I was sufficiently impressed to agree so we left the noisy bar with his hand between my shoulder blades. I was wearing a backless dress.
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The groom had given me the key to a vacant hotel room above the bar. The warm wood paneling and creamy white carpet nicely set off the glow from the dimly-lit lamp in the corner as I circled the bed, twisting small bunches of my dress in my hands. What happened next came as a flood after months of drought; though I suspect his sentence was longer from the hungry way he clutched at my waist, how his mouth couldn't stay still on my neck. I ran my fingers over his black vest, relishing the feel of his broad back and barrel-chest: stocky where I was slim, solid where I was not.
The territory felt blissfully familiar. His lips were soft. My foot dangled over the edge of the bed. Our clothes didn't even come all the way off. As my life slowly becomes more and more uncertain, this was a place where I knew all the steps. Messy kisses, awkward laughter, rumpled sheets--the hour we had to ourselves was nowhere near long enough. At one point, he whispered, "You're beautiful" in my ear. I'm not so naive that I believe every word a man tells me while in the throes of lust, but it was nice to hear all the same. Those sorts of things tend to be.
What surprised me most was his mouth sliding down my stomach to the waistband of my underwear. His breaths ghosted over the wispy fabric, and I could feel the echoes of it on my thighs. He grabbed my arms to keep me from squirming. Tipping my head back, I let him drag it from my legs. When he finally bent further down, I closed my eyes.
He wasn't the best, nor the most memorable, nor the worst. He was exactly what I needed at the moment. Loud and boisterous, his enthusiasm infected me too. The hour we stole made our hands restless, our laughs frequent, our legs tangled. Sometimes the door would jiggle for a few seconds before stopping abruptly, which only intensified the thrill running up my spine. It had been seven months since I had a tongue swirling wetly on my breasts, fingers teasingly spreading me open, knuckles clenched bone-white on the sheets. My sighs mingled with his, and out of the corner of my eye, I watched cityscape lights blink back at me through the window.
But the phone rang eventually; it always does. We quickly dressed, shushing each other's snickers. I kissed him one more time before unlocking the door. We exited the hotel together, but gently split ways as I greeted my ride. My flight was leaving in 4 hours.
