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He took a long, slow swig of his beer, his head tilted sideways, his eyes never leaving hers. Lexie decided to up the ante. She took a French fry without taking her eyes off him. Luckily locating it on her first try, she dipped it somewhere in the vicinity of the ketchup then made a show of licking it really clean before popping it into her mouth and chewing ever so slowly. He broke eye contact first, his gaze transferring to her mouth, hypnotized, riveted.
To Lexie’s utter chagrin, she felt moisture pooling between legs. She squirmed, and the action broke the stranger’s fascination with her lips. He smiled again and lifted his beer bottle in a cheerful salute to concede her victory.
Oh my God! Did they just have eye sex? Lexie turned away from the handsome stranger abruptly, dismissing his presence. She couldn’t deal with bucket list number two when she wasn’t even done with number one. Not yet. Later. If she was still in control of her faculties. If the stranger stayed.
But these concerns were secondary compared to one imperative that had just decided to make its presence known. Again. Oh, God. She needed to pee, as Blair would say. Her trained-to-hold-it-‘til-the-parade-was-over bladder was no match for the vodkas she had consumed.
Blair had disappeared to the back of the room, playing beer pong with some college-age students. She made her way to the ladies’ room and to her dismay saw a rather long queue. The third singer, a girl in her twenties, was now busy twerking on stage to music she didn’t recognize.
Hurry up, hurry up, she thought, spotting Mavis second in line. In an odd kind of way, now that she had been working on her courage all night, she didn’t want to miss her chance on that karaoke stage due to a bladder that started acting up. Lexie had horrifying visions of her mid-song on stage and having an “accident”. Twerking girl was now bowing to vigorous applause and some feet stomping, and there were still five girls ahead of her.
By the time Lexie had finished doing her thing in the horrendously cramped, smelly toilet made even more claustrophobic with all the grafitti lining every inch of the wall, she heard DJ Twist announcing the next song in the line-up − her song.
* * *
Inside, the place was jam-packed. Loud Abba music reverberated from the speakers. There was a motley gathering of hipster types, roughnecks, skankily-dressed women, some with mullets, executive types, and biker dudes. Nic grabbed a place by the bar as a couple stood up and left, probably to go find a better place than this kitschy dive. Nobody gave him a second glance. All the attention was seemingly at the front end of the bar, where a small platform had been set up. He was surprised to see an old woman singing and dancing on stage. Nic groaned, realizing that he had landed smack dab in the middle of karaoke night. That was it. He was leaving. He wasn’t enough of a masochist to torture his eardrums just for a couple of drinks. He was about to stand up, and then he saw her.
She was a couple of seats away from him on the long end of the L-curved side bar. Nic was positioned on the short arm, affording him a nice view of her without him being in her direct vision or in the “line of the ball” in polo speak. She was wearing a ridiculous red wig, the kind of red that couldn’t possibly grow on any human head. She was taking big gulps of her drink and alternately biting with determination on an enormous burger. Nic thought she wasn’t enjoying herself much. She appeared to be alone. From the dim lighting, he couldn’t make out most of her facial features, only that she appeared young, was slender, and had full, rounded breasts showcased by her bustier dress. What he could make out though were full, plump lips glistening with grease from the burger and chips she was bent on finishing. Nic had a sudden vision of those lips around his cock and quickly tried to quell the image. He wasn’t into one-night stands anymore. Been there, done that.
As if sensing his discomfort, the woman looked up just as she was about to take another bite of her food. And just like in that sappy chick flick he had only seen once so he could bang the girl he had been dating at the time, their eyes met across the crowded bar. They both froze. Her mouth was still partly open, her tilted cat eyes startled at the encounter. Nic’s heart stopped beating for a second and then slammed right into his chest cage. He knew her. Or rather, he thought with out-of-character drama, his soul recognized her. In that brief instant when their gazes met, Nic felt it. A connection.
