The Waitress

The breaking storm

He woke hard.

Embarrassingly so.

Her body wrapped around him.

Cocooning him from the world, from life, like a hard shell around the soft yolk of an egg, coddled, safe. He had needed that last night, something and someone to anchor him, protect him, but now he had to escape. Now he had to change and run, get as far away as fast as he could.

He hadn't meant to drop all his fears, all his insecurities on her. And yet he had, he couldn't stop himself. The information bubbled up to the surface and out of his mouth like a fissure had opened up in his soul.

Did he feel better?

He wasn't sure.

All he knew was that he had to get away, his body had betrayed him at a time when I thought that was totally impossible, there was no lust, nothing sexual about the situation last night. No, he could tell you why hadn't really experienced anything like this before. But here he was.

She had offered him solace and his body had taken it to the next step like it was meant to. He wondered if a penis had muscle memory if his body instinctively remembered the last time they had shared a bed? The things that they'd done. But he didn't want the next step, it had been the last thing on his conscious mind. He just wanted to feel safe, whole, he wanted solace, he wanted to turn back the clock.

He tried to wriggle away.

She held firm.

"It's okay, I'm surprised and flattered, but that's going to happen when you sleep so close to someone like this," she murmured and he wondered if she was talking in her sleep or she was really talking to him.

"It's okay," she said again still drowsy with sleep.

"But if you need to take care of it and then go for a run or a cold shower, I'll let you go."

"I didn't mean, too, I didn't think it would, I didn't think my mind was anywhere near that, was clear enough for that," he said looking embarrassed and she hugged him again before loosening her arms and straightening up next to him on the bed, her eyes finally drifting open, a soft, sad smile on her face.

"I'm a woman, you're a man and last time we shared a bed we did things, things your mind remembers, your body remembers, these things happen," she answered yawning, echoing his own thoughts as she often did.

"It is flattering but it's not going to happen and we both know that. I'm your friend and if you really want it to dissipate fast I could tell you all about my day at uni yesterday if you like that would make anyone go flaccid believe me! But hey and if it doesn't I am thinking of making some doughnuts this morning you can punch the holes in them for me with that thing."

He laughed then.

Not long or loud but it was a laugh.

Something.

And it felt good.

It felt weird.

He wondered how long since he'd had a little moment like that. Since he'd really laughed.

Since he'd had a little moment of light in what felt like a world of suffocating, all-encompassing black.

She was treating him as she always did though, giving him a hard time, it was normal, anyone who knew him at the moment seemed prone to molly-coddled him. Anyone who didn't know him seemed to treat him with some sort of disdain. He wasn't use to that. Not in this iteration, not since he'd left uni, not since he'd become cool. But now had been a reminder that he wasn't really – cool that was – that he was just a nerd boy pretending to be cool, hanging out with the cool kids but not really belonging there.