Dating : Carrying This Torch

He doesn’t know how I burn for him.

My perfume has soured in the suffocating heat. Instead of “passion with a touch of dark musk,” I smell vaguely like black pepper and freshly mowed grass with an undercurrent of desperation. I pound the still hot pavement heading for the neon lights of the bar. I stumble on the broken pavement and curse myself for choosing high heels. It isn’t as if he’ll notice my new stilettos or the way my calves curve from a month of squats. He might not even notice me at all.

I hate what I’ve chosen to wear. Sweat pools in the small of my back. I’d changed two dozen times before leaving the house and yet never felt attractive enough to catch his eye, much less hold his attention. My skin aches in every spot the barbed fabric touches me. I am bound physically in spandex but held spellbound by him. The entire night feels like a fool’s errand. It’s me, I’m the fool. My mood is quickly becoming as sour as my perfume.

The skin under my eyes feels as if a herd of elephants has trampled it and my head balances precariously on my neck like a thousand-pound weight. Awakening repeatedly last night, and an entire string of long nights before it, my thin t-shirt clinging to fever-tender skin, has taken its toll. Sleep has eluded me for weeks and my body has begun its mutiny against me. The bottle of red wine didn’t help me sleep last night, nor did it calm my nerves tonight. I blame him.

It’s always him. Though in daylight I smile and laugh and touch his shoulder tentatively, I usually beat a fast retreat lest he sees the truth in my eyes. In truth, I want to run to him, not away. I want to fling myself into his arms and have him return my undying devotion. In my dreams, I do… and he does. But sleep and dreams are few and far between. Instead, I hide in plain sight and he keeps me restless, yearning, haunted.

My hair is wild and untamed, curling about my cheeks and forehead like Medusa’s snakes as I enter the smoky bar and lock onto him. My shadow limps along beside me like some sort of wanton gypsy begging for change. My heart beats faster in the cage of my chest as our eyes meet and hold for a second, two seconds, then longer. He sees me. Finally, he sees me.

His boots echo across the concrete as he crosses the expanse of the club towards me. I feel a wave of panicked heat wash over me and even the breath in my chest feels hot as I try to ready myself to speak. His lips curve into a smile and I try to catch my breath long enough to return it, but I feel vulnerable, naked, melting into the bar to which I clutch. My insides ache from need and the words burn unsaid on painted lips. I’m sure he can hear the jackhammer in my chest and read the feelings written so plainly on my face, but he’s completely unaware of my hunger. Why shouldn’t he be? He belongs to someone else.

He kisses my cheek and smiles that smile that leaves me quivering inside. He tells me I smell like summer. He says that I remind him of a gypsy and waggles his eyebrows at me, “and that’s a very good thing.” Still clutching the bar for support, he cups my elbow and pushes me gently onto a stool.

Taking my lust as a different kind of thirst, he sets his beer before me. “Drink,” he orders.

I let him control me. I drink the cold ale and will my thoughts to slow down. When his hands find my tired shoulders, I stiffen but stay silent, all the while wishing he would let them slide down and down and down until the rest of the bar has faded away.

“You’re tense,” he says, interrupting my thoughts. “Your arms must be tired.”

I drain his beer. Of course, I’m tired, I think. I’ve been carrying this torch a very long time.