We all have that person that’s somehow accumulated an impressive amount of lore and become a celebrity within the friend group. Mine was this guy who I had no romantic feelings for, and who I invited to my birthday party – entirely as a joke.
By some miracle, he showed up. Right on time, if not a little on the early side. Everyone knows that you don’t show up at 7pm on the dot unless you’re a close personal friend of the host, and definitely not if you’re… whatever he was to me. Luckily, I was the birthday girl, so I was adequately smashed when he arrived. Most of what happened that night is a total blur, but I’ve pieced it together in the months that followed through photos, videos, and hangxiety-inducing conversations.
He came straight upstairs to look for me, and found me cutting lines on my bedroom floor with my student ID (what can I say, it was my birthday). The bag I was sampling had been found on the ground at a festival, lovingly referred to as ‘mystery bag’ by my flat. Determined to buy this guys silence, and not offend some of my more conservative houseguests, I offered him some. Whatever mystery bag was, he did not like it.
He proceeded to follow me around the house, and we began making out in every corner. I honestly don’t know if I was physically dragging him around or if it was more of a lost puppy kinda vibe. As the party began to wind down, we ended up on the couches with my flatmates. He seemed to have no intention of leaving, so I took the opportunity to slide into a bad habit – nail biting. Not my nails, mind you. His nails. And he let me do it… for a really long time.
Finally, we ended up back upstairs, and I was determined to go to town. Lying flat on my back, I made this poor man put my shoes on for me, then fell down the stairs. We made it about a block down the road before I decided I wanted a battered sausage and took a sharp turn into the greatest oasis for any poor drunk soul – Night ‘n Day. I’m pretty sure I ended up underneath the drinks fridge. I am absolutely sure I got my battered sausage.
He half-carried and half-corralled me back up the street into my bedroom. We made out for a while longer, and he (honestly, understandably) thought we were going to have sex, but I rolled over and promptly went to sleep. I should admit, I left him to sleep on the side of the bed that had a towel laid out under the sheets. A towel that was working hard to soak up certain liquids from the night before.
We woke up at the restful hour of 2pm, and when he saw the time he bolted straight out the door, yelling that he had no phone, no wallet, no ID, and no-one knew where he was, because he’d lied to his friends about coming to my birthday party in the first place. He did not text me again, so maybe he never found his phone. I did see him in town a few months later, so he did find his ID in the end, and he did in fact come home with me again. We never had sex.
