I have to admit that I wasn’t super thrilled to meet you. You were cute, but too old for me, funny, but a bit obsessed with baseball and not too interested in photography or music, two of my greatest passions. I wouldn’t have gotten together with you at all if my date for that night hadn’t canceled. Chalking it up to ego, I said yes. You said you’d pick me up at 7.
You were late. I wasn’t impressed. I figured we’d grab a drink, talk a bit and I’d be home in two hours. I told my sister to call me in 2 ½ hours so we could talk about the date and laugh. I was so wrong. Five hours later I looked at my watch for the first time. And I was still in your arms.
We went to a bar in my neighborhood where I’d never been before. You promised me there would be a good dinner and blues – my favorite kind of music. A cover band was playing when we got to the bar and you felt awful – we can leave, you insisted. I laughed. No worries. The owner of the bar came over and apologized that the blues band on the schedule had canceled. She gave us free drinks and frozen pizza. We asked for a menu but she said no other food was available. I laughed and you turned red, embarrassed again. I pulled you to the pool tables. This is great, pointing to the drunks at the bar and the scratched up pool tables with racing car lamps, the hostess slurring as she promised us all the pizza and spiked cider we could drink. This is perfect.
You beat me in three out of four games, but all I remember is laughing and drinking, and the way you pushed my hair out of my face as I leaned down to shoot the ball. My heart skipped. The ball jumped.
After pool we went downstairs to the basement of the bar to watch old men throw bocce balls on red dirt and I kissed you. We held each other then, and cracked jokes about the bocce game, and sang along with the music the band was playing upstairs, humming when we forgot the words, and kissing softly – beard and nose and lips and neck and heart.
Back upstairs again and we were almost out the door but the music tempted, and so we danced, cautious first, then free and wild, catching onto the table when our hearts spun and our limbs left us. Our bodies fit. Our voices met and danced too, a tango of light and darkness, softness and strength.
You drove me home and I couldn’t sleep. Restless, my mind swimming, I just lay there. Drowning in the memory of your touch.
(Photo: williac)
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