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Almost.
Anyway, here we are. The venue is nearly ready. Everything is going smoothly, and the decorations are finally in place. It only took all night.
“This is the problem, Lissie,” I said, turning to her. Lissie had been My Girl Friday for this event. I don’t know what I would have done without her. “I’ve got my ass on too many seats. Right now I've got my ass on like ten different seats. It's not working. I only have two butt cheeks. Really, I should only be sitting on one seat, two tops, but somehow I've spread myself to ten. My ass can't handle that, Lissie!”
I glanced at my clipboard, glaring at the unmarked “to-do” boxes. I shook my head, trying to get focus. I love how when you get out of control, shaking your head somehow (magically) brings you back to the real world. If only for a few minutes.
“Never mind,” I said, my voice level. “Can you go check on the first caterer? Please tell me that they've arrived.” Lissie nodded with enthusiasm and wandered off to go put out some fires for me. I watched her walk away, before expanding my gaze to the venue.
The caterers are setting up and the DJ is making sure the cables are wired correctly and that there is no feedback over the speakers. All that's left are the final touches. It's only minor problems now, things that I'd already planned for. I even planned for the early birds, guests who arrive more than three hours early.
Yeah, there are people who do that—arrive three whole hours early. Why on earth they do that, I don't know. Let me tell you right now, there is no secret party before the party. All that's going on is a million different small fires that everyone is putting out.
When you show up early, you officially make yourself one of those fires. Luckily I anticipated that, so I set aside a small room with hors d'oeuvres and ambient music. The room was already full. What the fuck is wrong with people? The card said 7:30 p.m., not 4:30 p.m.
As we rolled closer to 7:30 p.m., the crowds started piling up. I moved the people from the early-bird room back outside. They were not happy about that. They assumed arriving early meant that they got to be a VIP. No, sorry. Being a very important person makes you VIP, not arriving early.
We were ready by 7:15, so the party doors opened early. The band was scheduled to start at 8:00 p.m., so until then, it would be up to the crowd to choose how they wanted to be entertained—there were a lot of choices.
For example, in one room, I had fortune tellers replete with crystal balls, and beeswax candles.
Another room was pitch black; it was a sensory deprivation room—I thought the Regal guests would like it. I had it stocked with a large selection of gourmet food strategically placed throughout, and piped in experimental music that used only organic sounds. I was hoping that everyone was mature enough to use the room in the way it was supposed to be used, rather than having sex in it.
As the people rolled in, there faces a mix of excitement and apathy, I held my breath. This was it.
I could come right here; the party was going so well. It wasn't just that it was doing well, but that I had had only three weeks to pull it off and it was doing better than any party I'd ever thrown. I love challenges, and this challenge I had taken, claimed, and made my own. That feeling of accomplishment was really orgasmic.
The black room was a hit. People were leaving the room looking like they'd had a spiritual experience.
The live band was also very popular. It was an indie band that played a mix of old school rock and Romani music. Their sound had a sexual, ghostly quality, which was why I'd picked them. They were going places far beyond my venue.
The Regal crowd loved the music and attractions. It was all very indie and hipster, but with just the right amount of opulence.
I hadn't had a minute to actually enjoy myself. When I glanced at the clock and saw it was nearly 10:30 p.m., I almost passed out. The party had lasted three hours without any problems. At exactly 10:45 p.m., I took a break (considering I hadn't eaten since I started planning the damn party). Everything was going smoothly, so I knew no one was going to miss me. I wanted to see the party for myself. Starting with the black room.
It wasn't as crowded as earlier in the evening. Most of the party-goers had gravitated away from the sideshows toward the bar or dance floor. So when I went in I wasn't bumping into other people (which I'd heard was a problem before). You couldn't actually see how crowded it was in the black room since it was, you know, black, but you could feel everyone. By the time I got there, however, it was pretty empty. Eerily, so.
I gravitated toward the chocolate-covered fruit. The food was placed on lighted pedestals giving the appearance that the food was floating amidst the dark room. I took a big bite of a strawberry, letting the juices hit the back of my throat. I understood how people compared this to a spiritual experience. There was something transcendental about standing in complete darkness with only your thoughts to guide you.
Two hands placed themselves on the sides of my waist. I tried to jump away, ready to give the pervert a piece of my mind.
“Who the hell—” I was shocked into silence as the hands seized my sides and pulled me toward a body. My sense of smell was heightened, and through smell alone I recognized the culprit immediately. Dark, earthy, and sexual.
“Vic?” I asked the darkness. I was breaking one of the rules in the black room: no talking.
I recognized those hands. I recognized the smell. I recognized that energy. It was like when I stuck my hand on a Van de Graaff generator at the science museum and my whole body tingled. My breathing labored and my heart palpitated.
Dehydrated. Starving. My body missed him like he was an essential life-force. Fuck the party, fuck the rules, fuck whatever I was doing before I felt his hands. I needed him like an alcoholic needed a drink. No. I needed him like a dying woman needed water. I had said no to Vic. I was a dying woman who had said no to water.
Vic didn't respond to my question. I felt his hands slide inside the back opening of my dress and circle around to my exposed breasts. I heard his breath hitch when he realized I wasn't wearing a bra. The dress didn't allow for one—it had an entirely open back. All my thoughts flew out the window when he thumbed my right nipple. I leaned back into his chest and his arms wrapped entirely around me, as if I might run away. I wouldn't run away, I never wanted to leave. I wanted time to stop and for us to always be like this, together in this black room where all realities seemed possible.
Time stopped for us. He held me and I let him. I forgot about the rules I had put in place to protect myself, and I forgot about the thick fog he’d put around his heart. All we did was breathe in each other during those perfect minutes we were together in the black room. Nothing was tugging and pulling, it was simple.
Then he pulled away, slowly, as if he were savoring every second. I let him pull away. I let him take pieces of my heart with him. The black room won’t change anything, just like dreams at night don’t change the day’s realities. Just because I didn't stop him, though, doesn't mean I didn't feel utterly and bone-crushingly hollow when he was gone. A figment of the black.
I left the black room feeling a strange dichotomy of invigoration and sluggishness. It was like walking through mud after having your heart shocked with an AED. Everything in my body screamed to turn around and run after Vic. He was a drug; I couldn't quit him. My body told me I needed him, and my mind told me it wasn't a good idea. Just when I thought I was getting over my Vic addiction, he showed up to remind me how much in my system he was. It was never going to be a quick fix with Vic. Vic was the kind of drug that you tried once and sent you spiraling for years.
I stopped dead in my tracks.
