This weekend sported party night and normally I'd be totally cool with anything that involved alcohol and shaking my booty, you know me. But I don't think I could handle it every weekend. I'm exhausted.
My friends and I went to this sorta popular club in the city. They, who had partied last when MC Hammer was all the rage, complained and grumbled, while the bass line crushed pancakes of my already-frail serenity levels. So I was happy when my ex, surprisingly, took me up on the offer of joining us at the club (which by this point, meeting up with him were fairly rare events).
I slipped back into the warm place I had left on the couch and watched as he danced on the floor.
Filled with unsure well-being, I was up to the usual: drinking a long island iced tea, boring the fingers off a friend on my mobile, and checking out the local talent. Glancing up from my cell phone I caught someone staring at me. That someone was a young woman of 5’4, who wore a long shirt over leggings kinda reminding of the young Joan Jett. Her happy pretty face opened into the biggest smile I think I've ever seen. I told Runa then that I was in love with a girl, and I meant it for like five minutes. Busy chatting with my companions instead of keeping tabs on what was happening, I missed her leaving the lounge and for fifteen minutes I literally prayed to God for her return. My ex wouldn’t speak to me properly and I realized this night was going all wrong. So I took his hand and went onto the middle of the dance floor. His eyes said that he had missed me. Everything that every girl wants to hear. Except for this girl. I moped a bit until I downed my drink, danced with my back to him and blacked out everything. Seconds later he startled me out of my trance by holding me. His breath sounded very loud and heavy next to my ear. For once, this was not a turn-on. I tried to say something, but my own voice, by contrast, sounded heavy and slurred. I might be drunk, I realized.
While dancing with him, I felt someone coming really close to me so I turned to face the enemy who had invaded my dance space and then saw her. She was holding out her hand towards me, I took it and smiled so big that I needed chapstick after. We danced together for ten minutes until my ex grabbed me back. I kept looking at her, dancing close and going away. The music stopped and when I turned around she was leaving. My distress was needlessly profound for how little I had done to hold her attention. I made my best frownie face and waved goodbye. She waved back and was gone. I broke away from his arms and packed up to leave the lounge. Outside we stand and it’s awkward.
"So you’re leaving?" he asked.
"Yeah,” I replied. There was no admission of guilt or rationalization. Just open-eyed honesty, which was tough to be, at that moment.
I let myself be hugged, and perhaps hugged him back a little, taking pleasure in the feeling of being wanted without being had. I wondered what kept me from doing something that I wouldn't be at error in doing. In short what stops me from consuming forbidden fruit when the fruit is essentially hopping out of its skin, pleading to be had?
I could have been another kind of woman. But the woman I am, moved his hand away and walked towards my ride. Went to her room alone. And fell back in hate with her city.
So on that note this post is for the girl who stole the night away and who reminds of a very bollywood-ish version of Joan Jett. And thinking about Joan Jett, got me watching all her videos this morning, when I had this sudden realization: I will never love another musician quite the same way I loved Joan Jett. And that made me kinda sad. I have quite a few favourite bands right now, but I couldn't tell you what all their names are, nor could I name five songs off their current album by title. But with Joan Jett, I knew every song and video, I knew so much about her and...I knew (and, frighteningly, still do) every frame of every video by heart. The videos instantly transported me back the days when my best friend was a Sherrie and a Shane and I would sit there watching 'Crimson & Clover' over, and over, and over again, all of us drooling over Miss Jett. And I miss that. I definitely don't miss being a teenager and fighting with my parents or hating high school, but I miss being that dutiful to a band and feeling like I knew them.
Oh, doesn’t Katherine Moennig look painfully similar to Miss Jett?
