Читать книгу Can't Think Straight: - Kiri Blakeley - Страница 17

That night, I go out with Lily, Sahana, and Julie. We hit Union Bar and sit near a group of men ranging in age from the twenties to the sixties: three young guys, their father, and their uncle, out celebrating the uncle’s birthday.

One of the young men is like a game show host. He sits in front of us and barks, “Where are you from?” and points at us one by one for an answer. Then he makes us each guess what he does for a living. I wonder when we get our year’s supply of car wax. After Aaron, who spoke every word with deliberate sincerity, I find myself drawn to the guys who take the conversation off my shoulders.

This game show host and I begin dancing. He’s actually quite good, twirling me around as I flop to and fro, always catching me firmly.

He sticks his tongue in my mouth. It’s stationary and bulbous, like a plug. He tells me, “You’re as good a kisser as you are a dancer.” The line is laughable considering how little I’d reciprocated. But having all of my emotional nerve endings suddenly sliced off is freeing in a way: I’m much less irritated by people I would’ve normally dismissed, more willing to dance, to mingle, to throw myself into the carnival of life and kiss its barker.

Monday night, as I make far too much tuna pasta salad because I’m accustomed to making it for two, and I futilely try to find something on TV, the Aaronless apartment gapes at me, cruel in its aberrant emptiness. I’m introduced to that heart-palpitating restlessness that attacks newly single people, the kind that makes you want to claw your skin off.

I’ve completely forgotten how to be alone.

The night before, Rahil had texted me, asking if I was “recovered” yet from the weekend. We’d emailed back and forth a couple of times that day. On the subway ride home, I angsted over how utterly disastrous it would be if I developed emotions for him—if I hadn’t already. I wondered whether women were even wired to have purely sexual relationships, and how lucky men were that they were capable of it—hadn’t Aaron said his hookups were just sex while I was love?

I thought about ending it with Rahil. Before I got attached. Before he hurt me.