“Hey there, mister.” After a few
drinks at a bar on Hollywood Blvd, texting those you’ve almost kissed seems
like a good idea. Especially when they’re geographically miles away and the
emotional stimulus is of the safe variety.
I take my vodka and tonic out onto the smoking patio. Eavesdropping on
slurred conversations and pick-up lines. Watching the tourists stumble and
stare at my hometown streets. My phone
vibrates and I trade my cigarette for my phone in my right hand.
“You in
L.A.?” it reads.
“I am…” I respond, wondering where
else I would be. I have been off tour and catching up on real life for a couple
of weeks now.
“Come to my
hotel.”
Hold up.
It’s one a.m. This seems like a cheap
thrill request: a stab at getting laid while he’s in town. Did he have to be in
town? My text was initially sent with the thought that he was off the road and
resting in his East Coast abode. But on
the other hand…why not have an adventure? My friends won’t be upset if I ditch
them for the last few hours of Sunday or the first few of Monday – however you
wish to see it.
“Where is
it?” I respond.
“Hollywood
and Highland.”
Not far at
all. A ten minute walk will do my head some good anyway: The cold air. The
quiet streets that will only be interrupted by a stumbling drunk or a couple sloppily
making out. I remember being in this same hotel on pit stops on tour before I
lived in Los Angeles. The cigarette
butts would pile up outside the door. The trash can would overflow with empty
bottles. Music would be written intermittently. Those stereotypical times when
the lifestyle becomes more important than the music. But this time is
different: this is not my space and this is not on my terms. I knock on the door. There’s no answer. My
phone rings and his name is on the caller ID. For a moment, I ponder turning
around and leaving but my feet stay planted and I answer the frantically
ringing phone.
“Hello?”
“You there?
I’m not.”
“I picked
up on that. I knocked.”
 |
| The entire album is amazing. |
“I’m
pulling up now. The guys are going to drop me off.”
“Okay. Do
you want me to meet you at the front or just…”
“Stay put.
I’ll see you shortly.”
There’s a
few awkward moments of me compulsively checking my phone for a
distraction. A nervous tick I have
picked up when alone. Look out over the railing. Look at my phone screen. It
didn’t vibrate. It didn’t make any sound. And yet I look at it. Look out. Look
at my phone screen.
“Hey you.”
I turn
around to his smiling face and his open arms. We hug. And I realize that I do
not know this man aside from dancing at after parties and him carrying fruit
around in his pockets. A kiwi? A lime? A conversation starter. We walk into the hotel room and I sit on the
bed: a queen size with a squeaky polyester comforter. The kind that makes you
wonder how many times it has (or hasn’t) been washed and how many times it’s
been sat upon by two strangers. He
quickly ventures into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face.
We engage in some light
conversation. I can never tell if he’s
drunk or using some sort of substance or if perhaps his brain just doesn’t fire
at the pace that we have come to accept as normal. Eventually he walks closer
to me and sits next to me. Our thighs side by side, almost touching, almost
making that physical connection, but not quite. This night isn’t what I
expected. And that’s a good thing for I don’t really have the emotional
capacity for a one-night stand with an acquaintance. It’s never really been a part of my make-up
to take part in the shallow and anonymous. I prefer to over-think the details
for days after, picture the ending before it’s even close to happening, and
second-guess every interaction in the days that follow.
He wants to quit his band. Even
though they are the headliners of a major US festival tour. Even though they
are selling large numbers of their album. Even though they have a dedicated and
large fan base. It’s not what makes him happy and he says that he’s never even
liked the band. But it is what is familiar now. Familiar and expected. Letting
down one person is easy. How would it feel to let down thousands? He shows me
baby pictures and tells me about the last time he remembers being happy. At
this point our conversation has gotten more personal and our bodies are leaning
in towards each other. This is when I
start to shake. The adrenaline from being so close to another person becomes
overwhelming and my body can’t control it. So I shiver. As most do, he assumes
I am cold. We move from on top to under the comforter. I still shiver.
“I’m not cold. I’m actually sweating
a little bit.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“Whenever I’m close to another
person. A guy. I shake. It’s nerves and adrenaline.”
“What helps it?”
“I suppose eventually it stops.”
“I’ll hold you ‘til you are
comfortable enough to stop shaking.”
We nestle further into the covers
and his scrawny but comforting arm is around my side. I feel him reach over to the bedside table,
but am too content to look up and see what he is trying to grab. He shows it to me. A pencil. The one that was
in the drawer by the prerequisite Bible. He throws the pencil across the room.
“There!”
“What?”
“Wherever that pencil landed is the
happy medium.”
“The happy medium of what?”
“I love too many people and you
love too few. Wherever that pencil landed is the happy medium. But we will never
know where it landed. Still lost.”
With that I smile and drift off to
sleep quietly and motionless. The
shivering has stopped. And I am comfortable. Not in love. But in a state of
caring and of being cared for. It’s four a.m. and my phone is dead. I’m not
worried about getting home. I’m not worried about any of it. I am simply
content with his grasp, with the hotel room, with the vulnerability of the
night.
The digital numbers flash six a.m.
I sneak out from under his arm. Thinking I have successfully left without
waking him. He stirs. And gets up to open the door for me and say goodbye.
“It’s nice to meet you, Lauren,” he
says as he hugs me goodbye.
Six am and the city is asleep. The
only people present on the boulevard are those cleaning the marbled stars. The
city is mine. And I belong to the city.
And, for once, I feel a bit of accountability to another person without the
sense of weight that usually accompanies it.
Another text message a couple weeks
later. This time he initiates. “In my dream last night I was you and there was
a mirror I was looking into that made everything black and white and pretty.”
Since that
night, I have tried to stray from my normal path and boundaries: to let people
in and learn to trust them. I have learned to be open to adventures and to
people. But I have also learned that
living in the city, it is much safer to keep people at arm’s length in order to
protect yourself and not be broken. It’s not easy and it’s usually the lonelier
path. But one has to do what one has to do to survive in a city of strangers.
