Should Have Known Better

“Dawn!” he yelled like I wasn’t supposed to be walking into my own bedroom. He jumped right out of the bed.

“What are you doing?” I asked in a haze. I stepped in to see the television. It was another taped episode of Sasha’s show. She smiled brightly into my bedroom with a purple halter top that showed a line to her cleavage.

“Just watching the news,” Reginald offered.

“Sasha’s show?” I said. “We never watch that.” I made my way to the bed and just tossed my whole self onto it without digging into the covers.

Reginald was still standing where he’d landed. His gym shorts were hanging low at his knees.

“What? Why are you looking at me?” he asked.

“What? I always look at you.”

“You’re drunk.”

“No,” I said and even in that one syllable I managed a slur. My head on the pillow, I watched as Reginald straightened his shorts and sat back down on the bed. “Why did you get up if you were going to sit back down?”

“Why do you keep asking me questions?” He sounded highly annoyed.

“I was just wondering—”

“You’re drunk.” He clicked the television off and in the darkness my mind began to spin.

I reached out for him.

“Why did you turn off the television?” I asked.

“Dawn, you’re drunk,” he repeated.

I reached farther and then moved my body toward his. “You wanna do something nasty?”

Reginald turned to me. After my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw his eyes.

I slid my hand into his pants and he pulled it out quickly.

“Dawn, I’m tired and you’re drunk,” he said. He dropped my hand, as if it were diseased, back onto my side of the bed.

I groaned and tried to settle into the idea of sleep. Flashes of red silk and candles and wine spilling from a bottle swam in my head.

“Be nice to Sasha,” I said with the last light breath I had in me.

“I said I’d try,” Reginald said. “That’s all I can promise.”

When someone hasn’t had more than one or two alcoholic beverages at a time in three years, it’s usually best to take it easy when stepping back into the league of libation. Had I considered this logical concept, I wouldn’t have had the four extra glasses of wine I’d shared with Sasha before returning to bed with Reginald. But the jokes and old memories and sex talk was flying and, well, who was counting? Who? Eight hours later, and I was. My head had an invisible ax in it and it was still spinning after I’d lifted it enough from the pillows to see that the sun was bright in the sky outside of my bedroom window. The room was quiet.

“Reg—” I tried calling Reginald but it came out as a little spurt. I lifted my head a little more and it felt like a television. “Owwww.” My face fell back into the pillows.

I heard the bedroom door open and I turned, sure it was Reginald.

“Honey, my head is—” I looked and Sasha was standing in the doorway fully dressed and in heels. She quickened toward the bed dramatically.

“You OK?” she asked. “We heard you scream or something.”

“Oh, my head . . .” I complained, but really my senses were now divided between my headache and Sasha’s perfect appearance. She sat down beside me on the bed and I saw that she was wearing eyelashes.

“Hangover? Oh no, girl. That’s too bad!” she purred before giggling.

Her blond wig was back in place. I looked for glue or a stitch of thread. Nothing. It looked like that hair was growing right out of her head. She was wearing blush and diamond earrings again. Different ones.