glancing back at him and Blake, “and I hate it when you two fight, especially when I’m stuck with you for the night and have to listen to you both go back and forth about stupid shit that happened a year ago.”
Natalie’s confused expression turns into a devious smile. “Well, I think you’re paranoid and maybe trying to distract me from saying anything about you and Blake.” She’s getting that playful look now and I hate it.
I roll my eyes. “There is no ‘me and Blake’, we’re just talking.”
“Talking is the first step. Smiling at him—” her grin deepens, “which I totally saw you doing when I walked up—is the next step.” She crosses her arms and pops out her hip. “I bet you’ve already had a conversation with him without him having to pry the answers out of you—Hell, you already know his name.”
“For someone who wants me to have a good time and meet a guy, you don’t know when to shut up when things already appear to be going your way.”
Natalie lets the music dictate her movement again, raising her hands up a little above her and moving her hips around seductively. I just stand here.
“Nothing’s going to happen,” I say sternly. “You got what you wanted and I’m talking to someone and have no intention in telling him I have Chlamydia, so please, don’t make a scene.”
She gives in with a long, deep sigh and stops dancing long enough to say, “I guess you’re right. I’ll leave you to him, but if he takes you up to Rob’s Floor, I want details.” She points her finger at me firmly, one eye slanted and her lips pursed.
“Fine,” I say, just to get her off my back, “but don’t hold your breath because it’s not gonna happen.”
An hour and two drinks later, I’m on ‘Rob’s Floor’ of the building with Blake. I’m just a little buzzed, walking and seeing perfectly straight, so I know I’m not drunk. But I’m a little too happy and that bothers me a bit. When Blake suggested we ‘get away from the noise for a while’, my warning sirens were going off like crazy inside my head: Don’t you go off by yourself at a nightclub after a couple of drinks with this guy you don’t know. Don’t do it, Cam. You’re not a stupid girl, so don’t let the alcohol make you stupid.
All of these things screamed at me. And I listened until at some point, Blake’s infectious smile and the way he made me feel completely at ease calmed the voices and the sirens down so much that I couldn’t hear them anymore.
“This is what they call Rob’s Floor?” I ask, looking out over the cityscape from the roof of the warehouse. All of the buildings in the city are lit up brilliantly with glowing blue and white and green lights. The streets appear bathed in an orangish hue pouring down from the hundreds of street lamps.
“What did you expect?” he says, taking my hand and I inwardly flinch at the gesture but accept it. “A posh sex room with mirrors on the ceiling?”
Wait a second … that’s exactly what I thought—well, in a roundabout way—but then why in the hell did I come up here with him?
OK, now I’m panicking a little.
I think maybe I am slightly drunk after all, otherwise my judgment would not be this far off. And it freaks me out and almost completely sobers me up to think that I would ever be up for any kind of ‘sex room’ even in a drunken state. Is the alcohol really just making me stupid, or is it bringing out something inside me that I don’t want to believe is there?
I glance over at the metal door set in the brick wall and notice a light shining through it and the doorjamb. He left it open; that’s a good sign.
He walks with me to a wooden picnic table and nervously I sit down next to him on top of it. The wind brushes through my hair, pulling a few strands into my mouth. I reach up and tuck my finger behind them and pull the strands away.
“Good thing it was me,” he says, looking out at the city with his hands draped between his knees; his feet are propped on the bench seat below.
I pull my legs up and sit Indian-style, folding my hands in my lap. I look over at him questioningly.
He smiles. “Good thing it was me who brought you up here,” he clarifies. “A beautiful girl like you down there with all of those guys.” He turns his head to look right at me; his brown eyes appear faintly luminescent in the dark. “If I had been someone else, you might’ve been the rape victim of your very own Lifetime movie.”
I’m completely sober now. Just like that, in two seconds flat, it’s as though I never drank a thing. My back shoots straight up rigidly and I suck in a deep, nervous breath.
What the fuck was I thinking?!
“It’s alright,” he says, smiling softly and putting up both hands, palms facing outward in front of him, “I would never do anything to a girl that she didn’t want, or anything to one who’s had a few drinks and just thinks it’s what she wants.”
I think I just dodged a very deadly bullet.
My shoulders relax somewhat and I feel like I can breathe again. I mean sure, he could just be filling my head full of more bullshit to make me trust him, but my instincts are telling me that he’s perfectly harmless. Keep my guard up and be careful while I’m alone up here with him, but at least I can relax. I think if he intended to take advantage of me, he wouldn’t have announced the danger of the possibility like that.
I laugh a little under my breath, thinking about something he said.
“What’s so funny?” He looks across at me, smiling and waiting.
“Your Lifetime movie reference,” I say, feeling my lips shape in a faint, embarrassed smile. “You watch that stuff?”
He looks away, sharing my embarrassment for him. “Nah,” he says, “I think it’s just common knowledge comparison.”
“Really?” I taunt him. “I don’t know; you’re the first guy I’ve ever heard use ‘Lifetime movie’ in a sentence.”
He’s blushing now and I’m kicking myself for being so happy to see it.
“Well, just don’t tell anybody, alright?” He gives me his best pouty face.
I smile back at him and then look out at the city lights, hoping to deter any hopeful expectations he might have developed over the course of our brief, playful exchange. I don’t care how nice or charming or sexy he is, I’m not caving to him. I’m just not ready for anything other than what we’re doing right now: having an innocent, friendly conversation with no sexual or relationship strings attached. It’s so damn hard to have that with any guy because they always seem to think that a simple smile means something more than it is.
“So tell me,” he says, “why are you here alone?”
“Oh, no …” I shake my smiling head and my finger at him, “… let’s not go there.”
“Come on, throw me a bone
