Seconds

I think it's good to start things on a happy note, and so my tale begins with a kiss. No, on a bicycle.

Not to be confused, of course, with kissing on a bicycle. That is an adventure for another day.

But on a bicycle in Chicago is a grand way to be. The twists and turns of traffic, intermittent bicycle lanes, six-way intersections, foot-high curbs, the subterranian: these are the peppers on the polish of a cyclist's commute. It's honestly a bit much to mind, though, when you seek to get somewhere in a hurry. As I was, one Thursday evening, having just been reminded by my friend Package that I was to meet her, and some others, to see a picture at the cinema. Having recently made a great study by practice of how long it takes to ride from my apartment to the loop, I was able to predict my imminent arrival, and, by virtue of that same practice, to fulfill my prediction. It is on this bike ride, as I have already stated, that I wish my story to begin.

It was my first night out in a long time, a long enough time that it felt like a fresh start. The first real social outing of the summer, perhaps. I was excited, I was in a hurry, and I was looking forward to the company of that group of people who I affectionately think of as "not-my-roommate". Locking my bike to the no parking sign outside of the AMC River East, I was optimistic.

I have roughly three goals in my life. This is something I have had to devote some thought to, as I have no training, no role models, no guide at all for the daunting ordeal of being a young adult on my own. If I can say something like "I never...", I can say it about this. I never knew what I was going to do, what I was supposed to do, what I needed to do during the entire stage of my life between formal education and retirement. I think I can handle raising and maintaining a family, but everything else is, well, a big blank. And now I'm in that blank. And I know what I want, if I'm going to fill it in. I want to pay my rent. I want to do interesting and fun things. And I want make-outs.

Now the reader might think, "Isn't making out an interesting, or at least a fun, thing to do?" Well, yes. But in addition to such things generally, I specifically want to be making out. As an educated, cheerful, and handsome young man, I feel like I should be able to do all these things. Especially pay rent.

The movie was tolerably amusing, made really enjoyable by the company: one Toggle, one Lion, and of course, Package and myself. We afterwards made our way to the most disreputable bar I know of. Nestled in the loving arms of a typical upscale neighborhood, it has a very loud jukebox, long wooden tables with long wooden benches, and eight-dollar pitchers of Lion's drink-of-choice. That and the jukebox, as well as the convenient stumbling-home distance for many of the party, cemented our desire to carouse there. So off we went down Lakeshore Drive.

Now, riding in cars in Chicago is usually much less enjoyable than cycling, due to the overstimulation for the driver, and the understimulation for his passengers. This ride was different. A girl -probably a young woman, actually, but I can't honestly tell the difference- was making faces at us through the window of her taxi full of girlfriends at a stoplight. As I mentioned, I'm completely untutored in adulthood myself, so at first I attempted to retain my composure. As it was obvious she could see me, and was making the faces at me, and furthermore, was reasonably attractive in a modern sort of way, I soon came to reason and started making faces back. This was all the encouragement the girl needed to redouble her efforts, and I was hard pressed to keep up. Her taxi ran alongside ours for a number of blocks, affording the two of us much more time to grimace, scowl, and otherwise contort our faces at each other. She even waved a farewell as the taxi finally turned off Lakeshore Drive.

At the Bar, we hit upon a happy rotation of buying a pitcher apiece in turn, and splitting the fifth one amongst us. A similar arrangement ensured favorites on the jukebox, and the good times flowed. I'm afraid we all of us got a bit drunk. There was, of course, the enjoyable conversation of confidants that always seems to happen over a couple of pitchers, and I'm afraid I may have mentioned my three goals, generally agreed by that company to be reasonable and good. Lion was ridiculed for the peculiar habits of his devotion to his Lioness, Toggle expounded on history, and Package informed us that her longstanding relationship with her boyfriend was not exclusive. In fact, she almost seemed at pains to make it clear that she was interested in seeing other men. When beer began to be spilled, however, it was time for that stumbling-home bit.

I could've started this story earlier. I could've told you there was a girl -really, a young woman, I'm sure this time- who lived near the Bar, Strawberry. We're friends. She's cute. I'd already convinced her to do fun and interesting things with me on a number of other occasions, and, having drawn her into my second goal, was further hoping to draw her into my third as well. As she lived extremely close, and was of a disposition to still be awake, I decided to pay her a call. In fact, I stated out loud to my companions, "I'm going to seduce this girl."

All this, and we still haven't gotten to the kiss.

After we went our separate ways, I ended up returning to the Bar, this time with Strawberry and her roommate Pony. Strawberry had indeed still been awake, and carousing a bit herself in the company of her roommate. Pony is what I call a "nice girl". That is, there's something attractive about her, but there's also a good reason to steer clear. That would be the case even if I weren't going after her roommate, mind, and since I in fact was going after her roommate, she was certainly right out. This is a problem I've noticed. Attractive girls tend to group together, and if you've dated one, it usually rules out the others, more's the pity. Someone should really do something.

But it was Strawberry that I was after that night. You may recall that it had been a while since I had gone out, and so it had been a while since I'd seen the girl, and I was trying to recover ground lost to time. I was also getting less sober, due to being back in contact with things to drink. It's a problem I have. If something's in front of me, I will drink it. This mostly happens, rest assured, with water. I drink over a gallon a day, partly because I'm too cheap to buy food, so I drink water instead. If I'm really desperate, I walk to the corner bakery and buy some thirty-five cent bolillos. But it doesn't matter. Water. Beer. Mixed drinks. Unmixed drinks. Kool-Aid. Smoothies. Anything in my hand, in a bottle or glass, is doomed to a short life on this earth. Drinking through a straw slows me down, but not by much. Not even a crazy straw.

Then I started getting text messages from Package. She asked how the seduction was going, and related Toggle's attempts (prompted, no doubt, by her advertisements of availability) to seduce her. Silly Toggle, she said. Even as I attempted to chat up Strawberry, I began to text suggestively with Package. This sounds bad in retrospect. I was acting in innocence at the time; I really just wanted to make out with someone. Eventually, I was invited to crash on the couch in Pony and Strawberry's apartment, and then both went off, without another thought, to bed. I snuck out of the apartment, leaving the blankets I'd been given, still folded, on a chair. I was going to go on a walk with Package.

So we walked, and talked. I gave her my arm, she took it at the elbow, and we walked. We came to a park, and talked about talking with the trees. We talked with the trees. The trees, each and every one, told me that I should watch out, that this was a mistake. They also agreed that she was beautiful, and that was the only part I repeated to Package, who was beautiful, and moreso when I told her.

I'd like to say that I was wrong, and that this story ends with a kiss. But I was just wrong. I kissed her. For hours, I think, as the trees shrugged and wagged their fingers, I kissed her.

We walked again, eventually, her hand on my arm once more. We went to the apartment where she was staying with a friend. We unfolded the couch into a sheet-covered mattress, and we sat on it and recited each other poetry. We kissed again, and lay down together. She told me she'd never been held like that before, and I woke up alone.

I lay, pretending I was still asleep and she was still next to me. She never came back. I got up and folded up the bed, turned it back into a couch. Outside, the sunlight hit me like hammers, and I went to eat breakfast alone, the sunlight hammering into me with every step I took. I've been hit with hammers. I know how it feels, and that's exactly how that sunlight felt that morning, as I walked to the diner, to the bus, to my bike. As I rode home, we texted each other wishes of a good morning.

So the story doesn't end with a kiss. It ends on a bicycle.