Let's Dance To Joy Division
Sitting on the fire escape looking down at Broadway and 85th , envying the better-looking and exponentially cooler kids my age having fun, or their equivalent of it.
How I could have such a platitudinous life is beyond me.
My mom is out to dinner for the umpteenth time.
Once more, I am left alone. A faint and constant buzzing catches my attention. It is only the fridge.
I sigh, one of those really elongated adolescent ones when you're just begging for someone to notice your boredom and fix it. The bass line of the Gorillaz song playing on my boom box reverberates through my lungs, and I close my eyes. I think I can survive here, alone, with the music and the familiar scent of weed and ginger root.
"I can see up your skirt." A distinctly male voice says, smashing my peace into a gazillion pieces. Oh-fucking-no. It's that kid from downstairs. I looked down at him, sitting in my exact position on the fire escape, looking up at me.
"You're a sick horndog, Malcolm Hoyt." I smirk and go back to nodding my head softly to the music.
"I can see up your skirt," he repeats, "And I like what I see." I laugh scornfully. Is he seriously attempting to get into my pants (or skirt, in this case) tonight, of all nights? I'm only fourteen, first of all, and no matter how attractive he is, I am not in the mood to break any of my mom's rules tonight.
"Please stop." I say, poking fun at him. The song changes. Joy Division, my mother's favorite band.
"Can I climb up?" Malcolm asks. His voice is so distant. I nod offhandedly. Sighing as I stand up, "Where are you going?" he asks. I stare at him for a minute. Sonic Youth T-shirt, dark jeans, converse, and a plaid shirt. It looks exactly like the one I'm wearing, except his is a bluish color; mine is mauve.
I have to use all of my willpower to both avoid attacking him with kisses and pushing him off the fire escape down in front of the falafel shop downstairs. Why is he so irresistible yet equally detestable? I want to strangle him and fuck him all at the same time. Good lord, I'm hormonal.
"So, um, Joy Division, huh?" Malcolm says, attempting to make small talk. I don't respond. Instead, I shakily ask him if he wants something to drink. No? Alright then.
"It's good dancing music..." I hear him say. I splutter and choke and snort and laugh, in that order. Dancing?
"Yes, because we all just love dancing like this," I imitate a zombie walking, in time to the music, and Malcolm laughs.
"I was thinking more of a, 'let's dance to Joy Division to celebrate the irony'," and before I can tell him to let go of me or I will fucking rip his head off, he grabs my hands and swings me around, chuckling in that charming way of his. I'm yelling and attempting to pry myself away from his viselike grip on my hands till I realize I'm holding hands with Malcolm the Sex God and I can't help but grin stupidly as my legs turn to jelly.
We spin, spin, spin, and he's smiling and looking into my eyes with a comic intensity and oh god. How can something making me so pathetically useless exist? Oh, lordlordlordlord please save me from melting right here in my living room.
He took off his plaid shirt. He's flung it somewhere, and he's whooping as we dance and jump and spin around.
Yum.
And we stop as the song winds down to an end. I'm excellently close to Malcolm now. Holy mother of Jesus on toast.
Piano notes begin to tinkle out of the boom box, (Note to self: never underestimate the power of a boom box) and Malcolm finds this a good excuse to grab my waist and begin dancing like one would at some dorky school dance. I must be the color of Ukrainian beet soup by now and my face is probably all blotchy and adolescent, like it usually is on nights like these, sans makeup.
"Hi." He whispers, bringing his face close to mine.
"Sup." I whisper back, smiling awkwardly.
Nico's voice creaks out of the speakers. "My fuhn-ee fah-len-tine..."
"I'm really close to your face," I murmur.
Malcolm edges closer, "Now you're closer."
Nico again, the third person in the room, overseeing everything, "Is your figure, less than Gweek, is jour mouff a little weak?"
"And closer,"
The piano, in between each pause.
"Mal--" I begin.
"Your looks are laff-uble, un-fotogwaff-uble,"
And then he kissed me.
"...Eech day is fah-len-tine's day..."
I don't know how long we stood there, in the middle of the room, with the April evening breeze wafting in and the music playing the vintage night music my mother loved. Perhaps it was three seconds. Perhaps three hours. All I cared about was the fact that I was kissing a Sex God and one of my favorite songs was playing and for once my breath didn't smell like garlic and pizza.
Now all I had to worry about was how tongue got into the picture.
FIN. :)
