Now he’s just standing there. I thought he said he was leaving.
“Leila?”
“Yeah?” I ask, popping my lips for some absolutely unknown reason.
“I work outside my room.”
“You’re kind of a weird guy,” I respond.
“Yeah,” he says. “You’re standing in my doorway.”
“Oh,” I say, and move with all the grace and majesty of a giraffe on a tilt-a-whirl.
To further embarrass myself, as I seem to be incapable of doing anything else in the world right now, I give him the “You may pass” gesture, or whatever it’s called, and he can’t possibly get out of the room quick enough.
“Yeah, well, you have a good night, Leila,” he says. “Maybe dial it back a little on the sauce.”
“You betcha!”
Who am I right now?
He doesn’t say anything else on his way out.
Maybe that should have been my strategy: silence.
The door to the apartment opens and closes, and I’m smacking my forehead with both palms. The action doesn’t last more than a couple of seconds, as my hangover rises from its grave to punch me right in the prefrontal cortex. So, now I’ve gone from smacking my forehead to cradling it.
“Are you okay?”
The sound that comes out of me is some kind of mix between a scream, a squeak, and a sneeze.
“I thought you were gone,” I say.
Good move. You’re really making it better now.
“I forgot my keys,” he says.
He’d opened the door, remembered to grab his keys, and closed it.
Great detective work, Leila. You’re an inspiration.
“Ah,” I say. “I do that all the time.”
“Really?” he asks. “I don’t think I’ve ever known you to forget your keys.”
“Will you just grab your keys and get the hell out of here?” I ask.
Shock adequately describes the look on his face.
“I mean, you’ve got to be running late,” I say.
“Right,” he says.
With that, I just give up and turn toward my own door. I open it and close it with myself on the other side, imagining a utopian scenario when I’d just done that after spending a much more reasonable amount of time in the bathroom, not bothering to say a word or even look at him once.
Ah, the joy of fantasy.
* * *