Before we got a washer, I had to use the apartment complex’s
common laundry area. In the movies, Laundromats look cool, hip, and
inviting. Someone is always writing
poetry, playing the guitar, or making flirtatious banner about separating lights
from darks.
The only guy I ever saw in mine looked like the kind of guy
who would steal panties, so I put my laundry in, and sat to wait. I had just
switched my stuff to the dryer when a guy about my age walked in.
He was a nice looking guy, if unremarkable. He was about 5’10”, short brown hair, clean
cut, in shape.
“Hey,” the future-young-Republican or
stereotypical-white-male-serial-killer-suspect said.
WTF? No witty banter? No cliché opening line? This blew.
“Hey,” I said, in response.
If he wasn’t going to put in the effort for a
screenplay-worthy dialogue, neither was I.
“So, uh, you live here?”
Wow, someone nominate this guy for an Emmy.
“No, I just really like the smell of Tide with Detergent,” I
responded.
“Haha, OK. Stupid
question. Well, my name is Skip, and I
just moved in building C,” he said, indicating a building that looked
remarkably similar to my humble abode in K.
“I’m Zoe,” I said, shaking his hand. “Nice to meet you.”
“How long have you lived here?”
“About a month.”
“You like it?”
“Yes, I’ve always dreamed about living in an overpriced
generic apartment complex with three other girls. Who needs a penthouse with hardwood
floors? We don’t even have to clean our
floors, our air mattresses, blankets, and various womanly shrouds cover our
carpet. And furniture? Buying an antique dresser from Sotheby’s on
auction? Please,” I scoffed, waving my
hand in the air as I dismissed such a frivolous idea. “I like having my worldly goods in a
Tupperware container.”
Before I could continue to explain the diet plan that
involved eating cereal every night because our shoes filled the microwave and
oven, he cut me off.
“So I don’t know anyone here. Do you want to go to dinner tonight?”
“Sure,” I responded.
“Where did you have in mind?”
“I’m not from here, what’s good?”
I rattled off the names of various local restaurants, until
we finally decided on a well-known pizza place.
In rom-coms they always go for sushi or coffee, but I’m
allergic to shellfish and hate coffee, so I guess pizza and beer it was.
“Cool, I’ll come over at 7:30 to get you.”
“See you then.”
I was kind of disappointed in his lack of creativity. In 40
Days and 40 Nights, Josh Harnett takes his date on a bus ride around the
city. Not that I wanted to really spend
three hours seeing various Dollar Trees, Quicken Cash and Loans, and welfare
offices, nor was I accustomed to bringing Lysol wipes on my romantic outings,
but still, the gesture would have been nice.
We got to dinner, and the first ten minutes were
unremarkable. Then, it started to
steadily go downhill.
The waitress came to get our beer order and asked for our
ID’s.
“How old are you?” Skip asked.
“I’ll be 22 in a few months, why?” I responded.
“Uh-oh, only three years until your expiration date.”
“My what?” I
responded. You see, in our lady-cave,
expiration dates were a foreign concept.
If it had mold on it, you cut off the moldy part. If it still smelled fine, you ate it. Unless there was an organism actively moving
on it, food was pretty much fair game as far as we were concerned.
“You know, the time past which no one wants to marry you.”
“Um, 25? That’s a
little steep, don’t you think?” I asked, taking my beer from the waitress and
sipping it.
“Well, it’s all downhill after 22, and at 25, those tight
triceps become bat wings and you could start a fire from the friction of
rubbing your thighs together.”
I stared. Strikes one
and two.
“How old are you?” I asked.
“Oh I’m 24.”
I almost spit my beer back through my nose. “You’re going to expire before I do! You’re going to have like botulism and I’ll
still be within my sell-by date.”
“It doesn’t work the same for men. I am not getting married until I am 35.”
“OK,” I said, trying to follow his logic. “But even if you marry a 18-year-old, which
won’t be creepy at all (lie), in seven years, you’ll be 42 and probably still
alive. What are you going to do
then? Divorce her?”
“Probably,” he said, with no sarcasm in his voice at
all. “I’ll just keep them for seven
years and then send them on their way. I
mean, if I have kids with them, I’ll still let them live in my guesthouse so I
can take care of the kids, but they won’t be in the starting line-up, ya know
what I’m saying?”
“Well, I personally, no,
don’t know what you’re saying, but I think Warren Jeffs and others who live in
‘compounds’ might. You do realize you’ll
still have to pay for all these women and kids, right?” I asked, about to throw
down some Kanye West-type logic on him.
“Of course. But I’ll
be rich by then.”
Well, that all makes sense then.
Our food arrived and we started eating. I ate my first slice of pizza, then about
five minutes later moved on to the second.
“Wow, you like to eat,” he commented, as he removed his
fifth piece from the pan.
“I haven’t eaten anything since lunch,” I protested. “Plus, I ran like seven miles today. People tell me I eat like a bird.”
“Yeah,” he snorted, “like a pterodactyl.”
Strikes three and four.
We finally finished up and went back home. We got out of his car and he started walking
me towards my building. We arrived at my
door, and I heard voices inside.
“Well, looks like the roommates are here. I’m gonna go crash out. Thanks for dinner,” I said, groping in my
purse for my keys in an effort to avoid the awkward ass-out goodbye hug.
“It’s only ten thirty,” he announced.
Yes, three hours
out of my life had been spent with this ass-hat. That’s three hours I could have spent
learning Spanish, watching a Stephen Hawking documentary, or at the very least,
painting my toenails.
“Well, I mean, I’d invite you in, but our place is a mess,
and my roommates are busy.”
“No we’re not!” announced Katie, flinging the door open.
They let us in and then retreated to the bedroom. I thought, ‘I’ll just text them and have them help get
him out of here.’
There was one problem with my grand plan. Skip was suddenly right next to me, despite
me being 1,127 days away from spinster-hood.
“So wanna watch some TV?” he asked, as seductively as if he
had asked me to pour hot oil and chocolate on his body in a bathtub filled with
rose petals.
“Fine,” I mumbled, sitting on the couch, flipping on the
television.
Skip started scooting closer to me. I started scooting further away to my
right. He raised his right arm and put
it on the back of the couch. Oh great, I
knew where this was going.
I looked at him with a flat expression that I thought
bespoke of mocking and annoyance, but he interpreted as seduction.
“So, Zoe, you’re really pretty.”
“Thanks,” I responded.
He looked at me, his face only a foot from mine, gazed in my
eyes, and said, “You know I don’t like skinny girls.”
Um, OK.
He continued, “I like girls like you- big shoulders, big
ribs, big hips. Big, sturdy girls.”
I sat there shocked.
Even a blind man should have been able to sense my
disbelief.
“What?” I repeated,
sure I had misheard him.
Not a chance. “Yep,
big sturdy girls. That’s what I like,”
he smiled, moving even closer to me. I
couldn’t even move back.
“Do you want to know why
I like me some big, sturdy, girls?” he asked.
By this point, the momentum of my self-confidence’s nosedive
acted as a G-force pinning me to the leather seat. Morbid curiosity had taken
over and all I could do was slightly nod.
I noticed that the peanut gallery in the bedroom had fallen silent, so I
knew they were as riveted in anticipation as I was.
“Because I’m real well endowed if you know what I’m sayin’,” he continued, pointing towards his
crotch as if no, I didn’t know what he was insinuating here. “And like when I’m doing this-“
Then it happened.
In one fell swoop of grace and athleticism, in a time that
would rival Edward Cullen; he was on my right side at the arm of my leather
couch, hands grabbing the innocent, virgin material, as he simulated violating
it in the worst way possible.
“-I could break a skinny girl,” he grunted, getting more and
more into it as he went along.
OH MY GOD. He was
humping my couch. Copy that. He was
HUMPING. MY. COUCH.
“Then I’m like-“ he announced as he slowed his pace to porn
star levels of sexual activity, and rubbed the poor, poor, innocent upholstery.
“But when I’m ya know-“
Know what? Of course I knew
exactly what he meant! He was going to
town like a prisoner on his last conjugal visit before the chair. He actually slapped my couch.
This had to stop, because if it ended the way I thought it
might, even with his pants still on, I didn’t have Lysol wipes
“Stop humping my couch!” I screamed, probably loud enough for
the whole complex to hear. I get it, OK?
I needed to get this freak show out of my apartment before
he shoved a lamp up his ass or something, but I needed a plan. My roommates were of no help. This was the best entertainment they’d had
all month. This was a shitshow and
suddenly I was the star.
I stared directly at the TV.
Douches are like rashes. If you
ignore them, they go away on their own.
(A douche told me that, so I’m assuming there’s some logic). I didn’t blink. I didn’t acknowledge him. I turned on C-SPAN and pretended to be very
interested in Bernanke’s speech about inflation.
He was undeterred.
“Hey Zoe,” he said, tapping my arm, in case I had lapsed
into a catatonic shock after witnessing the most horrible of atrocities
inflicted upon my furniture.
I turned, scowling at him, only to find him pointing to the
couch, where
before him lay three Magnum XL condoms.
“You wanna hit this or what?”
