The Very Last Night

THE VERY LAST NIGHT

I could hear the faint sounds of some strange progressive rock band blaring through the walls in her dorm. I proceeded with extreme caution towards her room, not due to the loud music, but because of the reaction my being there might elicit.
She had no idea I was coming, and would’ve never allowed it to happen had I told her in advance. It had been weeks since we last saw each other, and it’s safe to say that things didn’t go well. It’s what happens when you’re in a vicious fight. When things are thrown and awful things are said that won’t be taken back later, it’s always safe to say that it didn’t go well.
I stood outside her room for a little while. I couldn’t decide if going in was the right thing. I came there with the intention of settling things, hopefully working things out, but I was already second guessing myself. I wanted to go in, but I kept thinking that nothing would come of it, that we would just continue with the yelling and screaming and hating; this would only be interrupted by periods of prolonged silence, and then the eventual send off where I would leave with pride no longer intact and an overwhelming sense of guilt and pain.
So I knocked. What else could I really do?
I prayed and prayed for her roommate to answer, which she did. Her roommate was this girl completely caught up in herself and the college scene. She knew all the bars to hang around and her social circle kept growing and growing. She was much more than I would ever be able to deal with for prolonged periods, but Lauren didn’t seem to mind, seeing as how Tan provided the perfect counter to her generally reclusive behavior.
“Dave? What the fuck are you doing here?” Tan said in her usual confrontational way.
“I’m here to talk to Lauren.”
“Didn’t you already do that?” Tan still hadn’t let me in the room.
“Yeah, well, I’m here for round two.” I smiled and played her fucking game. I could safely say that I’m sure that Tan never liked me. She could always pretend in the pinch, but I was certain that it bothered her to see me there, maybe even more than it did Lauren.
“Come in.” Tan walked away and plopped herself back on the bed. She sat now disinterested, filing through her purse making sure she had everything she needed. It was one of those big purses with the long straps that dangled to her mid thigh when she stood and it was made of some non-conformist material with eyesore flower patterns stitched into the side.
Lauren sat huddled in the far corner of her bed. I stood staring at her as she worked to avoid eye contact with me. I loved her forever in that moment. She hated me and I just wanted to take her home. She had these warm brown eyes that could break my heart, and had on many occasions. She was dressed in sweats and no make up and I liked her when she looked like that, better than any other time.
“Hello?” I was careful to say anything. I even had trouble getting out a simple greeting.
“Hi.” It was short and very cold. I thought my being there would’ve at least startled her, or maybe enrage her, but it didn’t draw her out, it made her retreat.
We sat in prolonged silence, music still deafening. Tan gathered her things and made a quick exit. She dropped the names of a few bars they would be at, and shot me a look, ordering me to drop dead.
“Do you mind if I turn the stereo down?” I was practically sweating bullets. Lauren just shook her head.
I reached out and lowered the volume and placed my eyes back on her. The room was silent again except for a slow, off tempo guitar solo in the background. I waited for her to speak, but realized that she was planning it out. I started to speak.
“So, I, ah”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” She looked me dead in eye, and I couldn’t help but wonder how long she sat thinking about that question.
“I came to see you.”
“Why?”
“Because you weren’t returning any of my phone calls.”
“Did you think that maybe I just thought that there was nothing left to say?” I was caught off balance by the fury in her voice.
“But I thought I had something to say.”
“Well do you?” She said as lit her cigarette.
Lauren was a notorious chain smoker. She smoked so much that half that time she didn’t even realize she was doing it.
“I wanted to say that I’m sorry.”
“Well, you made a long fucking trip for nothing, because I heard that before.”
“I know, but I was hoping you’d respond differently this time.” My heart was breaking all over again. She wasn’t mine anymore, but I still felt like I was losing her all over again.
“Well, this time is it under the pretense that you didn’t cheat on me?”
It’s true, I guess. I did cheat. It had been a couple of months ago. It was some girl. I didn’t care for her at all. I had convinced myself that I did, or that I should at least explore that possibility, but I took all the wrong steps to find out. By the time I realized that she wasn’t for me, I couldn’t find my way out.
“No, I did cheat on you, and I’m still sorry.”
I did it, and I knew I had fucked everything up after the fact. Fuck, I knew I had fucked everything up right from the start.
“Well, then, your apology is not accepted. I don’t know why you thought that coming here would change that at all.”
“It was a mistake.” I was so close to pleading at this moment, but my foolish pride was holding me back.
“Yeah, it was, but it’s not the kind of mistake that’s easily forgiven.” She was no longer cold, I could see that hurt come bleeding through.
“It was a mistake, and I’m so sorry, but it’s you I wanna be with. I know this, and I don’t know what else to say.”
“What a revelation! So then tell me, why? Why did you fuck her?”
“I don’t know. I did, but I don’t know why.”
The truth was that I did know why, but it wouldn’t make sense to her. It wouldn’t have made any sense to tell her that I didn’t feel comfortable in my own skin. That at that time in our relationship I felt as lonely as I had ever felt. I couldn’t be that forthcoming, but I knew I should tell her something.
“I was fucked up baby, I didn’t know why I was doing it. Things weren’t great between us. That distance had made things tough.”
“What distance? I know that we’ve had to do the whole away at school relationship, but this wasn’t our first crack at it, we had been through this for a year before. I wasn’t away at school when this happened either, I was home. And I know that we were having problems, but I didn’t feel like that was a reason for me to go out and sleep with another guy, and believe me, I had my chances.”
“I know. I know it doesn’t make it right, but I was so fucking lost.”
I was a mess. She had come back and things were a little strange. We had been forming a habit of loving each other once every couple of months, but then she was back for an entire summer. I was ecstatic, but nervous. Things were weird. She had been changing and I had stayed the same. I was creeping through life as she was forging all these new roads. She was experiencing, meeting interesting people. I was still haunting the same old dives with the same sad faces. I was feeling inferior, but she couldn’t see that, and I didn’t want her to.
As the summer progressed we both grew more distant. She was concerned about us, and I was closing myself off so as to shield the blow when she dropped the bomb on me, but I never had a chance to brace myself. We fought more, and over things that didn’t matter. It wasn’t about why we couldn’t feel comfortable with each other. The fights were about not calling on time and other things too sad to discuss publicly. I slept with someone else and beat her to the punch that I thought was coming.
Our conversation was growing tense. I watched her avoid eye contact. She would nervously fumbling for her cigarettes. I just stood by the door waiting for her to throw me out.
“Baby, I wanna work things out. I wouldn’t have driven all this way if I didn’t think that was possible.” I was pleading my case. I was hoping some something would ignite a spark within her, that she would remember how much she did and does love me and that that would be enough.
“Every time I look at you, I don’t see you; I see what you did. I think about that night and it makes me sick to my stomach.” She was trying desperately to hold back tears. I watched her jaw quiver and her speech become stuttered. “You know what? I can’t do this. I can’t stand being here right now. I need to get the fuck out of here. I’m gonna walk.”
“Can I come with you?”
“Do whatever you want. I just…I just...I can’t be here.”
So she grabbed her jacket and headed out. I followed. For a moment when we stepped outside I thought about turning the other way and heading back home, but I figured that I had come this far, so I might as well destroy everything.
So we walked. She walked quickly but with no particular destination. I followed trying to think of things to say. I would make small talk to which she would just nod and passively agree with. I would attempt to make jokes about the frat houses filled with asshole frat guys and dozens of losers who really wanted to be a frat asshole. She barely cracked a smile. I was burying myself pretty deep but I kept on.
We reached a bar about seven or eight blocks from her dorm. Out of nowhere she came to a dead halt.
“Hey, they don’t card at this bar, you wanna go in?” She dead panned the question but I figured she silently hoped my response would be no and that I would just bow out and head home.
“Yeah, sure, I’ll go.” At that point I knew I wasn’t in any position to tell her what I wanted to do.
We entered the bar and found a couple of seats at the very corner of the bar. Lauren explained that those seats were normally empty because the waitresses never serve in that section. The bar was a good size. People were crammed in wall to wall. It had all the standard bar equipment. It had a pool table, dart board, juke box, and three or four foul mouthed drunken assholes to give the bar that extra reason to leave (or reason to stay, depending on the type of person you are).
I walked to the bar after minutes of waiting and no service. As I stood at the bar and ordered, I watched her. She had never looked more sad or beautiful in any moment I had ever known her. Everytime that night that I had been able to step away from her or step outside myself, I could see her for what she truly was: a girl I had hurt. I didn’t know too many of them in my life. My whole life I had been burdened with the curse of always being the one to get hurt. The girl only felt hurt by association. Now I was the one to deliver the punch I consistently fought so hard to avoid. This whole time I had been spending trying to get her back, I had forgot to focus on the one thing that truly mattered. I should’ve been spending that time on telling her why and how I hurt her, and that I wouldn’t ever want to do that again.
So I came back to the table with a new purpose. I slid the beer slowly across the table to her. “I’m sorry Lauren, you don’t know how sorry I am.” I had run out of small talk and little quips and anecdotes. I went back to basics. I tried the truth.
I rambled for quite some time. She sat and looked disinterested at first, but soon she could hear the sincerity in my voice and the honesty of everything I was saying. It was no bullshit. Just me apologizing for being the person I hate. So she sat and listened, letting me apologize.
After I was done she reached out her hand and touched mine. She looked me square in the eye and then turned away as if she couldn’t stand looking that deeply any longer. We sat in silence for only a few seconds but then eventually she started the small talk. From there we started talking for hours. It had only been a few weeks since we had last seen one another, but it had been a summer of shit and distance that forced us to keep quiet about everything in our lives. We talked about everything and nothing in particular. She spoke for the first time in months with a real interest in talking to me. And for me it was so great to hear her voice. I felt like I hadn’t heard it all night.
The bar eventually closed and we walked back to her dorm. I suggested, wanting to play my hand right, that I go home. She figured it was late, I was drunk, and the drive was long. She insisted I stay on her floor. Though Tan wasn’t coming home that night, she figured Tan wouldn’t appreciate it to know that I was sleeping in her bed.
We stumbled into her room. She threw me a blanket and pointed to a place right below her bed. We both stumbled to our areas. As I laid on the floor I could hear her tossing and turning above me.
“Are you comfortable?” She asked the same way she used to ask.
“I’m alright I guess, but I could be better.” I tried to let the statement flow as smoothly as I could.
“Would you sleep in bed with me?” Her voice softened as she asked.
Without hesitation I proceeded to climb into bed with her. We assumed the spooning position. I, for one, am not a big fan of the spooning position, but given the fact that her bed was the size of a shoe box, it was our most comfortable alternative.
As we laid, she tried to fall asleep. I stayed up and relished the moment. Her breathing changed as she became frustrated with not being able to sleep, she began to feel me watch her. Suddenly she stopped wanting to go to bed, and just wanted to be there. As I lay smelling her scent, she turned and kissed me. It wasn’t short or sweet, it felt long and passionate. I responded without hesitation.
It’s needless to say that things went further. To stop with just a kiss wasn’t an option. And it felt so good to be there at that moment. When she asked me to climb into bed with her, I was happy. And although the prospect of sex was wonderful, the prospect of just being in that bed with her was worth it. And while we were having sex, it was that level of just feeling comfortable touching her, it’s just not something you can fake. I felt good again to be with her. I had missed it for so long.
We had sex only once that night, not that I needed to have it any more than that. After it was over it was a couple quick kisses and then an almost instant pass out. The next morning I woke to an empty bed. I laid and watched Lauren from across the room. She was smoking and blow drying her hair. My head was pounding from the night before and I was tired enough to lay there all day. From the mirror she noticed I was awake.
“What time are you leaving today?” she said in a very matter of fact tone.
“I don’t know exactly, but soon. I’ve got work later.”
“Ok, because I’ve got to go, too, so you’ll need to be leaving within the next half hour or forty five minutes.”
“Ok.” I just wanted to lie there and try to pass the pounding in my head.
“Well, go get dressed.” She blurted, motioning to my clothes on the floor.
“Are you trying to rush me out or something?” I got up and sat on the edge of the bed searching through my jeans for cigarettes.
“No, I just have a lot to do today, and you have a long drive ahead of you and I don’t want either one of us to be late for anything.”
I started getting dressed as she lit another smoke and sat on Tan’s bed.
“So do you want me to call you tonight or should I just wait till tomorrow?”
“You know what? I’m gonna be pretty busy today and tomorrow. Give me a call sometime though, definitely.” She stated it so matter of factly. Their was such a confidence in her voice.
“Sometime?” I hated it when she was vague, and she was almost always vague.
“Yeah, it means sometime.” She was hesitant to get it out, but I could still tell that she was saying exactly what she wanted to say.
“And last night?” The more I talked, the worse my head got. I could feel it pulsating.
“Look, last night was good, it was, but it doesn’t mean that anything has changed.”
“Nothing has changed?” Two weeks ago you hated my guts and then last night we’re having sex, I would consider that a change.
“Last night was a mistake, maybe my mistake, but regardless of what happened last night, I still can’t forgive you. You cheated on me.” It wasn’t what she was saying that made me listen now, it was the way she said everything at this point. I could tell she had been thinking about this. Maybe she had only been thinking about it for the past few hours, but she had thought about it.
“So what? That’s it?” Now I go home and wallow in my shit. And then what? An occasional fuck when she comes home to visit? I was angry but trying to reserve myself from saying anything too rash.
“No more of last night. I told you that I thought it was a mistake. I want us to be friends, and I just think that we should ease into it slowly.” She was steady. Her answers were delivered as if she had practiced this long before the questioning started.
I couldn’t believe she was doing this. To me it seemed completely fucking twisted. After all the shit we had been through. After everything that had happened, was there nothing we could do in her mind to fix this?
“I’ve thought and thought about this, and I cannot simply forget.”
I wanted to take her and strangle her. Maybe just shake her, hoping it would somehow clear her vision. I hated that she wanted this, or that she didn’t want me, or that she wanted me but that I had fucked it all up for us.
“Look, don’t make this any harder then it has to be. I don’t wanna get hurt again and I can’t trust that you’ll protect me from that.”
“Baby”-
“I think it might be best if you just went home now. We can go forever about this, but nothing will change. Just go home and we’ll talk about this some other time.”
I said nothing and just sat there looking at the floor beneath me trying to figure out at what point everything went so wrong. I racked my brain, but found no one moment. When a relationship turns to shit, it’s often not any particular instance. It’s just a collection of small heartbreaking things that eventually leave a relationship doomed.
“Go. Just go. Please.”
We could’ve sat and went all day about it, but I decided to leave and save myself the prolonged embarrassment. I grabbed my coat and headed out. I couldn’t even stand to say goodbye. I was feeling suffocated at that moment. I headed out to my car, and wanted so badly to run back in and begin telling her how wrong she was and how right we were, but I knew it wouldn’t do any good anyway. What made it worse was feeling that I couldn’t blame her. After all, I started things by delivering the first blow; she just delivered the knockout.