Grip - Downpour (chapter 4) by Kelsey Schur

Kassandra

I really, really hate bars. Dark, sticky, cramped caves full of men. Specifically, men like my boss. But tonight, I am on a bar crawl.
I was in a relatively good mood today. It's Saturday, so I didn't have to go to the lab, which meant an Al-less day. Even better, the sun came out around lunch time. I brought a novel, the latest good piece of fiction doomed to become a terrible movie next month, to the park and spread a blanket on the grass. By some act of God, no one hit on me, and I passed a peaceful, warm afternoon in the sunlight.
However, this did not last, as good things never do. Upon returning home, I discovered that my roommates, two useless, testosterone-sweating college males, were planning an XBooze party for tonight, which I was informed was to be a video game, alcohol, and marijuana extravaganza with eight of their closest comrades. By the way, I was welcome to join in, my roommate told me while eying my chest. I had to disappoint them, and wondered for the hundredth time why I hadn't tried harder to find better roommates. Having no other plans, I'm desperately trying to get trashed enough to justify Mia letting my drunk ass crash on her nearby couch at the end of the night instead of going home to a bunch of stoned kids. Mia, a friend from the calligraphy class I foolishly tried my hand at last semester, is giggling over her Long Island iced tea and sizing up every man seated at the bar.
“Ugh, that one, he really shouldn't have a beard, and his friend really should. And, that guy with the martini, he's totally gay...”
I wonder why I hang out with Mia. Years ago, I could act like her, but no more, and thank God for that. At least I don't feel ashamed getting drunk around her because she makes me look sober by comparison.

It's the fourth bar of the night. Mia is lying on some grease-ball at the other end of the room. I'm drunk, not that drunk, but my upper lip is numb, so I guess I should only have one more. Some guy is trying to talk to me.
“What're you doin' ova here all by yoursel'v?”
I'm too tired to try to actively get rid of him, so I don't say anything. I'll just keep watching Mia.
“Ay sed-”
“Hey, what're you doing talking to my girlfriend?”
Huh? Who the hell-? I look over my shoulder. You have got to be kidding me.
“Awh, shit man, I di'n' know. Sawry.” The stool scratches across the floor, and I assume the drunk has left, though I don't look over.
“Thanks for the rescue, but you're not my boyfriend.”
“I know.” Al concedes, taking the vacated seat. He's not as drunk as me. Wonder if he knows that. “But you reject me often enough that I know what it looks like when you don't like a guy.”
I snort. So he's not entirely naïve. That's interesting news. His face isn't as wretched as usual. Wretched. Good word for him. And his hair is brushed and dry – it's actually sort of wavy and makes him look more like a harmless hippie than his usual slimy appearance. He shaved too. All in all, he's not so ugly.
“Hah, you can laugh. I'd offer to buy you a drink but uh, looks like you've had enough.”
Now I'm laughing at the absurdity of the situation. Al, of all people, is telling me that I drank too much. Hah! “Screw you, I have a man's liver.” He's still laughing at me. Jerk! I'll show him. “Yeah, you keep laughing, I challenge you!”
“Challenge me?” He asks incredulously when he stops laughing. “To what?”
“Shots, idiot.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Well, okay, but uh, I we'd better declare a five shot handicap on my end.”

I lost. My phone buzzes on the bar. Text message. Mia: “Oh, sexy. Didn't know you were into hippies, but cool. You good? Gonna go if you're good.” I text back, “Good.” Al looks at me questioningly. His arm is around my shoulders, that's fine, I'd probably fall off this stool without it.
“'S my friend. She's leavin' to go get laid,” I explain.
“Ah. What're you goin' to do?”
“Dunno. M' roomies took over my apartment.”
“It's 2 AM, better come up with something. I have a couch, y' know,” he suggests.
I look up at him; his face is an amorphous flesh-colored human shape. He won't try anything, now, if he hasn't yet... Although... I haven't gotten any in months. Agh! Ew. Terrible thought. I can't even think that. “Sounds good.”
“A'ight. I'll call a cab. You gonna fall off that stool if I leave you here so I can step out and call?”
“Maybe. Ah'll go with you.” I follow Al out of the bar, and suddenly there's a curtain of rainwater in front of me. It's running off the roof. The weather didn't hold. I lean against Al under the overhang. He's calling a taxi.
“You gonna make it?” He asks, putting an arm around my shoulders to hold me up, against his chest, broad, warm, shirt smells vaguely like dog.
“Mmhmm...” Wish the world would stop tilting. I'll put my head here; his shoulder is stable. He's rubbing my shoulders. I look up at him. He's looking out at the rain. He looks back, smiles at me, his face is so close to mine, his lips are on mine, my tongue is in his mouth that tastes like vodka, his hand is on my ass. Somewhere, I think I should be furious, but I'm not, this is nice, this makes me happy right now.
At some point, we get into the taxi, but it's all just a blur of touching. We pass streetlights, a rhythm as they pass. I see nothing, I see his large hand on my leg in orange street lamp light, I see nothing, I see his wrist, his hand in my skirt, I see nothing... We get out at his home, an apartment building, brick, not sure what part of town.
“Have fun, kids,” the cabbie snickers as we stumble through the rain to the front door.
Inside. His apartment is on an upper floor; he nearly carries me up the last of the stairs. A bark announces our entrance into his apartment. Hound, the enormous, black, shaggy behemoth is snuffling my ass until we're in the bedroom and shut the door. Now he's above me, a dark shape in the dim room illuminated by the streetlights pouring through the windows. He, he's my professor, my professor again. Professor Lawrence, Ian, Professor, he was never as rough as this but his hands were large too; they could swallow one breast in his palm. It was like this, with no lights but from outside, though not ever in his own bed. The rain is pounding on the glass; the wet streaks of rainwater are cast on my naked body, on his where I can see it. I can't see much, just hands; he must look like Ian; he does in my mind. Back in that office again, I'm on the desk, I am having sex with Professor Ian Lawrence, married with kids, and brilliant. Ah! He's not gentle; I wasn't ready.
“Shhh, Melody, Shhh... You know I never mean it...” He murmurs.
Melody? I know he's said that name before, once. When was it? Why? Sad. Sad for both of us.

My head hurts. My mouth is dry, and my stomach has turned inside out. God damn it, I know better than to drink so much... Did I drink so much? I roll over to look at my clock, and am confronted with a naked back.
“Jesus Christ!” I shoot out of the covers and lean against a wall, covering myself with a sheet. Oh God, I remember now; I remember enough anyway. He's awake now, looking at me through half-closed eyes, then suddenly realizing this is real he also sits up, his long brown hair a wild mess.
“Kassie, Kassie calm down-” I don't hear the rest because I've run out of the room; I don't even know where I'm going. Thank God, there's a bathroom on my right. I dive in, lock the door, and draw my knees up to my chest, sitting on the lid of the toilet. My head is throbbing. I never throw up when I'm hung over, but I want to now. A few moments of silence torment me, then I hear a knock.
“Kassie?” Al's voice is muffled by the door. “Look, I brought you your clothes, just open the door so I can give them to you.”
How can I answer him? This isn't happening; this can't have happened.
“Kassie...? Alright, I'll leave them outside the door and walk away. ...I'm going now.”
I open the door the tiniest crack, and after determining there really is no one nearby, I quickly snatch my clothes and relock the door. Now that I've dressed, what do I do? My brain spins its wheels when I think of last night, except for a few disgustingly clear moments. I have no idea where I am in the city. Reluctantly, I open the bathroom door and step into the hall. I hear someone moving around, and I follow the noise into the living room. The room is so typical of him that I almost laugh. Like every other space he inhabits, it's piled with books and loose office debris, with a china cabinet in the corner stocked with every color of alcohol I've ever seen. Al is dressed in gym shorts and a t-shirt, making coffee at the counter in the kitchenette on the other side of the room. What the hell do I do?
He turns to me and offers a mug. “Peace offering?”
I just want to get out of here, but coffee would help, and I still have no idea where I am. Wordlessly, I take the coffee mug and stare out the window as if the brick wall of the neighboring apartment building were a lovely view. Al sits down at the small table. It occurs to me that this apartment is small enough that he must not have roommates. I can't look at him, and I know he's not looking at me, but the room is growing more stifling the longer I refuse to sit with him. I give in and take the only other chair at the table, directly across from him.
“Kassie...”
The wood grain of the veneer on the table is very interesting.
“Kassie...”
Hound puts his huge black head in my lap. I've always liked Hound when Al brings him around the office, but right now, I don't feel like humoring his attention-whoring.
“Kassandra.”
I finally look up at Al, and we lock eyes. They're green. I've never noticed, probably because I can never look him in the face. His head is in his hands, a lock of tangled brown hair wrapped between his fingers.
“Professor Greye.”
He winces and leans back from the table. “Ouch.”
“Same to you.”
His face pinks a little, and he looks off to the side. “Sorry. For being rough, anyway.”
“What, only that part of it?”
The green eyes flick back to me, a little irritated now. “Oh come on, we're both adults.”
“And that makes it okay?” I'm trying to not to get pissed, or at least, not show it.
“It takes two.”
“You asshole, I was drunk!”
“Yeah, so was I.”
Hound barks as I stand up quickly from the table. “Enough, I'm getting out of here. Where are we?”
“Hillside.”
Al doesn't follow me when I retrieve my bag from his room. I feel disgusting, standing on the sidewalk for all to see while I wait for a cab, hair a rumpled mess, makeup smeared, my entire body sticky with his sweat. My bag vibrates, and I reach in for my phone. One of my roommates is calling. Wonderful, that's really a voice I want to hear right now.
“What?” I snap at the phone.
“It's totally not my fault,” my roommate stammers immediately. Oh, this just gets better.
“What isn't? I swear to God, Matt, if your friends fucked up my room, I will murder you.”
“Uh, shit, Kassandra, uh, look, we woke up, and everything was soaked. We didn't do anything!”
“Soaked?!”
“Yeah, the pipes burst, or some shit. I dunno, the landlord is on his way over.”
Pipes burst? In the summer? “Great. Just great. Okay. You and Andy better not bolt and pin this on me. I know where you sleep.”