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One drink, twenty minutes, that’s all I’m asking of you.
You sigh, looking at your phone and knowing you’re going to cave even as you type your response. I don’t know, dude, I’m just not feeling it. But of course when you set the phone down, you turn on your hair straightener.
The text back from your best friend reads just the way you know it’s going to. Bitch you are never feeling it! I know you’re still sad but y’all broke up six months ago and he sucked anyway and I’m leaving town for two weeks tomorrow and I MISS YOU and I want to hang out with you come on pleeaaaseeee. You can’t help but smile. She’s right and you know it. It has been six months since you called it quits with your freeloading shitty ex and it’s about time you got out there and at least flirted with someone. “One drink, twenty minutes,” you say to your reflection before putting on your favorite lipstick.
Alright I’m coming. DON’T BE LATE.
YAAAAAAAAAS GIRL I won’t I’ll see you there!
She’s late.
But you knew this was going to happen and it’s fine. It actually does feel nice to get out of the house for a little bit. Besides, some kinda cute dude in the corner has smiled at you a couple of times, so there’s that. Even if he is wearing his cap down over his eyebrows, gross. You only wish you’d had more time to charge your phone before you left because the piece of shit cannot hold a charge for more than eight hours at a time and you let it run down before going out. If you stay for the twenty minutes you promised [which, does that start when your friend shows up or when you showed up because if it’s the latter you’ve only got ten minutes left] then the solid 30% you’re rocking will hold up just fine and give you enough to get a Lyft home. If you stay for longer… well. At least there is a charger in your purse and you can probably find an outlet somewhere. “God, get your shit together,” you say out loud.
“Sorry?” someone says to you, and you look up into… kind eyes. Blue eyes. Soft bottomless oceans. Woof.
“Hi, no, not you, I’m so sorry. I was talking to myself because I’m a crazy person.” You flash him a self-deprecating smile.
The owner of the eyes is smiling at you, but you know he agrees and is likely regretting striking up this conversation. “Oh no worries,” he says. “I do it all the time. Sorry to interrupt if the conversation was getting really good,” he says with a grin. Okay, maybe not. Immediately he’s gained points by not saying that stupid thing everyone says. As long as you don’t start answering yourself ha ha ha.
“Unfortunately no, I was just giving myself life advice that will go largely ignored while I wait for my friend who is late even though she promised not to be.” Cool, can we stop rambling at the gorgeous stranger please? Nope, gonna keep going. “I figure she’s got five more minutes before I bail. Or to the end of this drink, whichever comes first.”
“Hey, that sounds fair to me. College rules, if the professor is more than fifteen minutes late you’re legally allowed to leave. Mind if I stand here for a minute? My friends are also late, and this bartender is apparently ignoring me.”
You nod, reminding yourself not to chew on your straw while you’re talking to him. “Yeah it’s cuz you’re a cute dude. He’s bad about that, hang on.” As you turn your head toward the bartender in question, you wonder where this boldness is coming from. The bourbon and coke you're drinking is strong, but this strong? Maybe it’s just because you haven’t had anything to drink in at least a year. Yeah, let’s both give up drinking, that will fix our relationship. Still… The bartender catches your eye and you flash him a dazzling smile, which he returns as he heads toward you.
“What can I get for ya?”
“Oh my friend here just wanted to order something,” you say, turning back toward the handsome dude with the dimples and the eyes you could go snorkeling in and holding up a flat hand to indicate toward him like a Price is Right prize. As he orders his drink, you do your best not to look back at Baseball Cap in the corner who… might have been scowling at you? Whatever man, get over yourself. There is a lot happening right now and that’s suddenly the least of your concerns. For one, your drink is empty. For two, your friend is texting you I’m two minutes away I S2G my Uber driver got lost but I’m nearly there I’m sorryyyyy! which means you’re stuck at this bar for at least twenty more minutes. For three, this guy next to you smells so good it’s making your head spin. Did he mean to coordinate his breezy seaside cologne with his eyes or was that just a coincidence?
“Here you go,” the human beach vacation says, setting a drink in front of you. “Figured it was the least I could do for flagging him down for me.” Well damn, now you’re double stuck. But also…
“I’m… that’s… uh, thank you, I mean… it’s just…” How do you politely decline a drink you didn’t get to see being poured? You’ve taken so many self defense classes and number one is don’t ever leave your drink or accept one from someone you don’t know. Well, shit, honesty is the best policy, right? “You seem super nice but I don’t know you and it’s…”
The realization takes him a minute, but it does come, and hits him like a ton of bricks. You’re mentally prepared for him to go on the defensive but he surprises you. “Holy shit, no, you’re right, I can totally see where you’re coming from. You absolutely don’t have to drink it. Shit, I didn’t even think about it, I’m so sorry.”
“I mean no it’s really nice of you to get one for me I just, didn’t get to like, see it, you know--”
“Hey, I get it. Listen I can just keep it. Or, I could take a drink of it first, if you want? Totally up to you. I won’t be offended.” His eyes are crinkling at the corners and you’re not sure if he’s joking or not but…
Hell… you’re stuck here for at least twenty more minutes, and he really does seem like he’s just trying to be nice. And like, free drinks. And since he’s offering… “Is that annoying? Like is that too much trouble?”
He laughs, giving the drink a stir with a fresh cocktail straw and taking a swallow. “There. Now all you have to worry about is cooties.” He passes it to you, and you smile at him, giving it another stir. You’re still not going to drink it, at least not right away, but you’re feeling a lot better about the whole situation. And hell, if he does roofie himself, well… he’s possibly the dumbest person you’ve ever met, and it’ll be a good laugh later. “It sucks that that’s something you have to think about,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s literally never crossed my mind. Not to sound like a douchebag or anything but… that’s fucked up.”
You laugh, glancing down at your phone as it lights up. I’m here! Who IS THAT?!
You look back up at him and raise your glass to touch his. At least now if something happens you’ve got backup. “It is fucked up. Thank you for noticing. Cheers,” you say, taking a drink.
You have to let the stranger introduce himself to your friend because you realise you don’t know his name. He stays and talks with you and your friend for a minute before his friends show up and he goes to join them, not before turning and giving you a sweet smile.
“What the fuck!” your friend says, smacking you on the arm. “And you didn’t want to come out!”
“I’ve never been more grateful for your perpetual tardiness, I can honestly tell you that.”
It’s two hours later before your friend says she should think about heading out.
“Are you joking? You’re trying to leave before I do? After you dragged me out here?”
She shrugs, glancing over at the bartender to try and get his attention so she can close her tab. He gives her a one second finger and she turns back to you. “I know! Honestly I really did think you’d only stay for the one drink so while I’m really happy you came out I do have a flight to catch in the morning so I have to go home!” She turns away from you again, closing her tab and signing her receipt, then swivels in her barstool again to face you as she finishes her drink. “What about you, I’m sure you’re ready to head home. I’d offer to share an Uber with you but we’re going in opposite directions.”
“I know, it’s fine. I’m gonna… I’m gonna finish this one and maybe, I mean I’ll probably go home.”
She eyes you for a second, suspiciously, then glances over your shoulder. “Ohhh, he’s still here, huh? Good for you, hell yeah!” You roll your eyes at her, but you’re grinning the whole time, too. Yes, the cute dude with the ocean eyes has been smiling at you occasionally when you make eye contact with him, and yes you would like to maybe get his number before you head out. Or at least thank him for the drink.
“Yeah yeah,” you say, still grinning. “Thank you for making me come out, seriously. It has been too long and I need to at least try to get over that dick. So yes I will probably sit here for a few minutes more and see if maybe he comes over to talk to me again and if not, well… I might have already written my phone number on a napkin while you were in the bathroom.”
“Fuck yeah dude, get it, I am so proud of you. Alright well, I’m going to head out, my ride's here, text me when you get home tonight. Or tomorrow morning,” she says, wiggling her eyebrows at you. “Love you, be good, be safe!”
“You too, have a safe flight! Love you!” You turn back to the bar for a minute, wondering how long you’ll sit there hoping Ocean Eyes will come talk to you before you march over there and give him your number. You’ve got half a drink left so, probably at least that long. But no sooner has your friend vacated her seat, someone’s taken it. You’re happy to ignore them and just dick around on your phone for a minute except… nope. It’s dead. And suddenly the someone is talking to you.
“How’s your night going?” you hear him say, and you look over. Oh, it’s Baseball Cap. You’d forgotten all about that guy. He is not nearly as cute up close. And he definitely gives off a very intense vibe. Neat.
“Uh, good! It’s good, got to hang out with my friend for a little bit before she had to hit the road, that was nice.” Oh rad did you just tell him you were alone in the bar? Smart. “What about you?” What’s the minimum time frame before you can ditch this weirdo and head home? Thirty seconds? If only you had a reason to get up from this stool… You glance around real quick, but the only person you even remotely know in this bar is Ocean Eyes. He’s deep in some apparently hilarious conversation with his friends, and your telepathy skills aren’t quite up to getting his attention with only your mind. You look back at your new neighbor, he’s saying something about… something, but you definitely aren’t listening. You give the bar another slower scan, this time looking to see if there’s anywhere you can plug your phone in. There’s a jukebox by itself against the far wall… maybe it’s only taking up the one outlet. Worth investigating. Now if you could just politely shake this creep.
“Totally,” you say, smiling the best you can manage as you turn back to him, just catching the last of whatever he was saying and hoping it’s a fitting response.
“You come out here much?” he asks, pushing his free hand into his pocket. Your straw is spinning a little in your drink but you’re too rattled and, to be totally honest, too drunk to notice.
“No, not often, no. I am not usually one for the bar scene. I prefer to drink at home normally, if I drink at all, which is super rare.”
“Hey that sounds good to me, we could definitely go drink at your place if you wanted.”
Ew. Is he serious? C’mon, just be rude! But even under these circumstances it’s hard to be anything but cordial and polite. “Ha ha!” you manage to bark out. “What about you though, where do you like to hang out?”
He rattles off a couple of bars, name dropping some club his buddy owns and devolving into a tiny rant about a pub you’ve never heard of because the bartenders were rude or some other complaint. You’re just thankful he accepted you brushing him off so easily. Though in hindsight maybe it should have been a tiny red flag. You run through all of your best ‘wow that’s crazy’ faces and phrases as he’s going on about the pub, and pick your drink up and down half of it in one go. You set it down, frowning a little. There’s… something is off about it. You can’t put your finger on it but it’s… salt? Is it salty? You glance over at the dude but he’s still ranting. Shit. For all your precautions earlier with the handsome guy, you’ve let your guard down with this skeeze. Though you can’t think of when… but of course, it’s when you were trying to find an outlet for your stupid shitty cell phone, and you turned away. And while you can’t prove that he’s just slipped something into your drink, you’d rather err on the side of caution and get away from him while you can. But how, and to where? Your phone’s dead, the bartender is busy as fuck, and even with your safety on the line the idea of making a huge scene sounds so mortifying. What if you’re wrong?
Still, you’re starting to feel super weird. Maybe a scene is in order. You look over at him as a dizziness starts to take hold. You’ve only got a short amount of time and you know that, but still you can’t bring yourself to scream. Maybe… oh wait, is Ocean Eyes still there? You look over, and yeah, sure enough. He and his friends are still occupying a table in the corner, and he’s looking up at you and smiling a tiny smile. Please let this work out, you think, grabbing your bag and sliding off your bar stool. “Could you just give me one second? I think I… know…” You stop halfway through your half-assed excuse. He knows you don’t know that guy, he watched you meet earlier. Besides, what do you care what he thinks of your reasoning? You feel his hand on your upper arm but it slips against the fabric of your shirt, and you squeeze between two people before he can catch up to you, making your way toward the corner table. Yeah, you’re definitely getting dizzier, and it’s not just normal drunk dizzy either.
“Hi, gentlemen, hi, sorry to interrupt,” you manage, the words getting a little more difficult as your sentence progresses, “but I’m pretty sure that guy at the bar just put something in my drink and I um…” You barely register that one of his friends has already stood up and headed in that direction as you put a hand on the boy with the blue eyes’ shoulder, giving it a squeeze in a feeble attempt to get the room to stop spinning. You look down at him and are floored, even in your current state, by the expression on his face, the look of anger and concern that’s twisted up his forehead as he’s standing. “Please help,” you manage, before your legs give out.
When you wake up in the morning, it’s with a headache so egregious that you know instantly what’s happened, even if you can’t remember it so well. This is not a normal hangover headache, even despite how long it’d been since you had a drink. This is a drug-induced headache, a screamer so terrible you’re convinced your head is going to split in half. After a minute your eyes have adjusted to the light, making the headache turn down the volume a decibel or two. Enough for you to take stock of your surroundings anyway. You’re in a king sized bed, and although a cursory glance out the window doesn’t tell you where you are in the city, it does tell you you’re pretty high up. Okay, so some sort of apartment building. And a pretty nice one, given the size of this room and the bathroom you can see leading off to one side. If your brain weren’t actively trying to escape your skull you might be able to appreciate the size of the bathtub. You sit up a little, afraid to see who’s next to you, afraid to fully piece together the night that’s downright refusing to come back to you. But you do it, because it has to be done, and because maybe you can sneak out before whoever it is notices you’re awake. And it’s… empty. The bed is empty. That’s weird.
You get up, slowly, noticing there’s an unopened bottle of water and a single serving aspirin next to the bed, on a nightstand that also holds your purse and your phone, which is plugged in but off. It’s not your charger, either, but what appears to be a brand new one, still half wrapped in the plastic it came in. You drink the water, swallow the aspirin, and take a deep breath, looking down to realize you’re fully clothed. Like, shoes and all. Which might not mean anything but makes you feel better, anyway. The water does, too, and after a minute you’re feeling up to heading out from this bedroom and into the rest of the apartment beyond.
It’s huge. And really nice. And… also empty? The layout is pretty open, but you don’t see anyone on any of the living room furniture, or in the kitchen, or what appears to be an office/game room behind the one door that’s closed. The rest is just, closets and bathrooms, and they’re all empty. Who just leaves a stranger in their apartment? And whose apartment is it?
You sit down on the couch for a minute, but only long enough to finish the water. There’s clearly no one here, and all you want to do is go home and get in bed. Maybe stop by a police station first, but… in all honesty, you don’t feel that bad. Just the headache. The bits and pieces that are coming back to you aren’t sending up any red flags, either, so you decide to head home and take a nap, and make a more concrete decision once you wake up from that. So you head for the front door of the apartment, pull it open, and nearly step on a human being.
“Uh,” you manage, taking a step back and looking down. There’s a dude fully sprawled out in front of the door, one leg sticking out from under a quilt that only a grandma could have made, a cell phone laying next to the pillow under his head. It’s Ocean Eyes, you’re somewhat relieved to find, though why you’re here, and why he’s out here, is still a mystery to you.
“Hey,” you say, a little louder, nudging him gently in the ribs with your toe. You consider stepping over him for a second and just going home, but… it does seem super rude to just leave him out here in the hallway. “Hey get up.”
He stirs, then sits up, looking surprised to find you standing over him. “Hey, you’re awake, hi.” He gathers his blanket and pillow before standing up, checking his cell phone before slipping it into the pocket of his basketball shorts. “I’m so sorry, how are you feeling?”
“Terrible, yeah. Really bad,” you say, nodding. “Uhm… what the fuck?” You consider elaborating but then decide that pretty much encompasses everything.
“Yeah, do you want to come inside? I’ll explain.”
“Technically you’re the one who needs to come in, but… yes, that would be nice. Thank you.”
He follows you inside, then steps around you and heads into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee. You sit down on one of the barstools, holding your purse in your lap. It’s only then you notice the note addressed to you on the whiteboard on the fridge saying CALL ME WHEN YOU WAKE UP and his phone number. Whoops.
“So as you already know that guy definitely did something to your drink,” he says, leaning against the kitchen counter. “He got a black eye from one of my boys and a trip to the county jail for his troubles. Would’ve been worse for the guy if the bartender hadn’t stepped in, but he was feeling pretty bad about the whole situation too, so I’m thinking he could have stopped it a little sooner if he’d really wanted to. Uh, I am really sorry I brought you here. I took you to a hospital first, but they said since you noticed beforehand there was nothing they could do but put you in a bed for a night, and I figured yours was as good as one of theirs and a whole lot cheaper. So I took you to your place, sorry, I did go through your wallet to find your address, but you apparently don’t have a key, and I couldn’t get the door code out of you. So uh, I just brought you back here. I’m really sorry for all of it.”
You stare at him, processing all of it as best as you can. Maybe it’s just the suggestion of his words, but that all seems to match up with the hazy memories you’ve got filtering through the mostly inky blackness of the night before. Really, you only have one question left. “Why… uhm. Why were you in the hallway?”
“I locked myself out.”
“With a blanket and pillow?” you say, not believing him. But then another option comes to mind. “Like, on purpose?” You can’t help but smile at him.
He laughs. “Yeah, I just… I just wanted you to feel as safe as possible? So I figured if you knew I was outside, you’d feel better. I don’t know, I don’t know what to do in this situation, but you asked for my help so I really didn’t want to let you down. I’m an idiot, I know, but I did my best.”
God. What a nightmare. But you’re pretty sure this is the best case scenario you could have hoped for. “Did you buy a phone charger?”
He laughs again, shaking his head. “I have a spare one of every type just in case someone needs it while they’re here.” He shifts his weight a little. “Listen, are you okay? I mean, all things considered…I’m making coffee, obviously, do you want some?”
“I think… I think I’m just going to go home. But uhm, I just want to say thank you, so much. I guess that’s what I get for going out by myself,” you say, but you don’t really mean it. Still, he’s frowning like you’ve said something really upsetting.
“Absolutely not. This is absolutely not your fault and you didn’t do anything wrong. This is a hundred percent on that asshole. Which, by the way, I’m happy to be a witness if you want to press charges or anything. Me and all my friends.”
You smile at him, nodding. “I’ll keep it in mind.” You stand up, walking yourself to the door, but of course he follows. He opens it for you, and you turn and smile at him again. “Thank you, again, for everything. I know I didn’t do anything wrong but it means a lot that you would help me out in that scenario. I know I put a lot on you and I really appreciate you helping me.”
He shrugs, running a hand across the back of his head. Is it stupid that you’re noticing the way his biceps flex when he does that? “It’s what any decent person would do. I’m sorry that there are people out there who are less than decent. Uh, I know this is a really awful start to anything, but…” he stops himself, shaking his head. “Never mind. Nah, I just--I hope you have a good day.”
You smile warmly at him. “You’re right, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to thank you. Uh, here. I was going to give you this last night, so you might as well have it,” you say, fishing into the pockets of your jeans before finally coming up with the napkin you’d written your phone number on the night before. “Tha… thanks. Yeah, last time. For now.”
You take off down the hallway before you can thank him fifty more times, and hear the door close behind you. The idea of going home had sounded good when you first woke up, but now… now it just sounds lonely. Your apartment sounds so cold and empty and dark compared to the place full of light and the smells of coffee and those warm blue eyes you just left behind. Your finger hovers over the button to the elevator, but you don’t press it. Go home and do what? Sit around feeling terrible? Watch TV? You take a deep breath, nod once to yourself, then turn back around, not even pausing before you knock on his front door. He opens it, looking surprised to see you, and you smile at him. “Actually on second thought… coffee sounds really good.”