Another Flash Fiction Friday: One Night Stand

Prompt: STARTER SENTENCE: “I slowly peeled back my eyelids and immediately wished I was still out for the count”
Genre: Open
Word Count: 1500 words
Deadline: Thursday, July 28, 2011, 8:30 pm EST

          I slowly peeled back my eyelids and immediately wished I was still out for the count. My eyes felt like they had had sand thrown in them, my throat burned, and my head throbbed with a dull thunder. A ceiling came into focus. White, wide decorative cornices, a wicker bladed ceiling fan rotated overhead.  I turned my head and red numbers shone: 2:34. Morning or afternoon? I didn’t know.  I felt coarse sheets against my body. I was naked, or “nekkid” as my grandmother used to say.  I wiggled my toes. I still had my calf length stockings on.  A grunt startled me.  The top portion of a head peeked out from under the sheets beside me. The previous night started coming into bleary focus.

          A night out with the girls. A packed nightclub, pulsating strobe lights, throbbing music, a dance floor packed with sweating gyrating bodies, one too many shots of tequila, dancing on a  table. A table? Crap.  Okay, calm, down.  What happened next? Where was I? Who was this person beside me?  Okay, think. I closed my eyes willing the memories to form. Last thing I remembered was pulling off my black strapped high heel and throwing it into the street while I giggled and leaned against.. who? . My Jimmy Choo heel! Dammit! I loved those shoes. Think harder. My mouth tasted like an ashtray. What the hell? I didn’t smoke. I was beginning to feel like a character in a Twilight Zone episode.

          The person beside me moaned. Please, please, please don’t let him wake up. It was a “him” wasn’t it? I sniffed. Yeah. Man sweat. It was a man. Plus the form under the sheets was too bulky to be a girl.  Next problem: how to get home. Nettie had driven and I had no idea where I was, much less where Nettie was.  My cell phone was on the table next to the bed. I slowly reached for it, flicked it opened and started scrolling through missed calls. There were two: both from Rob. No voice messages waiting. I had put the phone on silent for some reason. Why? Only time I ever did that was when Rob and I could find precious time, between his working and me taking care of three kids under the age of six, to make love.

           I had picked up a stranger in a bar.  I was a slut. Oh my God, I thought. I’m a slut.  Me. Go-to-church-every-Sunday, volunteer-for-snacks-at-the-pre-school, take-the kids-to-ballet-and-baseball, scrub-the-grime-off-the-baseboards, bake-cupcakes-on-Sundays me. Now, here I am naked in bed, in God knows where, with God knows who. Did we use a condom? I leaned over the bed and looked around on the light blue carpet. No sign of a disposed condom. I’m sure we weren’t in any condition to be neat and throw it in the bath trash can. I might have gonorrhea or syphilis or AIDS. Don’t think about it.

          I had to get up. Had to get home. I started edging towards the edge of the bed, cell phone clutched tight. The person next to me shifted. I stopped and held my breath. I really didn’t want any stilted, we-just-fucked-but-I-don’t-remember-a-thing conversation. I just wanted to get the hell out and pretend this never happened. The room looked like a hotel. Stark, impersonal. If I could find my clothes and get dressed I could sneak downstairs and call a cab. I waited a minute, two minutes. The person next to me relaxed. His breathing evened out. I slithered out of bed like a snake until I was crouched on the floor beside the bed. I peeked over the edge. He hadn’t moved. I crawled on my hands and knees and found my bra under the bed. I slipped it on while still crouching. My panties? Where were they? I couldn’t find them. Screw it. My pants? Where were my pants? I inched around the bed and spotted them and my blouse on the floor at the end of the bed. I grabbed them, lay on the floor and wriggled into them, zipping slowly and carefully. Damn, who knew a zipper could be so loud? I threw the blouse on and buttoned it wrong. No time to do it over.

          My purse.  I crawled over to the night stand. There it was. I slowly reached up, grabbed it and lay back on the floor trying not to breathe.  Now, to get the hell out of here.

          A noise. He shifted, the bed squeaked. He turned over, sheet still wrapped tight over his head. He sighed. Please, I am so close. Don’t let him wake up.  I waited for him to settle back into sleep. When he quieted down and I was sure he was sleeping again, I flipped open my phone and texted Nettie.

           “Where r you?” I waited.

           In a few seconds a message buzzed through, “Home. Fun last nite, wild grl? lol”

          Great. Now I was “wild grl” .

          I texted back, “Call u in a few. We nd 2 talk!”.

          Nettie texted back almost immediately, “I HAVE 2 hear this!”.

          I slipped the phone into the side pocket of my purse.  I peeked over the bed. The body under the sheet was still and breathing evenly. I looked around. The door was about 25 feet away. My lone Jimmy Choo halfway between me and freedom. I crawled on my hands and knees slowly towards the shoe, picked it up and traced my finger lovingly over the polished black leather. Holding the shoe and my purse, I made it to the door and studied the door mechanisms. There was a flip lock under the handle and a chain lock at the top. I looked back. He was still snoozing, facing away from me. I might get lucky. I stood and slowly, so slowly unlatched the chain lock, careful to not let it tap against the door. I flipped the bolt lock under the handle. It made a loud "click". I bit my lip and waited. I slid back to the floor on my haunches, clutching my purse tight to my chest.

          Now the handle.. I reached up and pulled down. Now to get the door open enough so I could crawl out into the hallway.  I glanced back. Still sleeping; he hadn’t moved. I opened the door an inch at a time. My heart thumped staccato beat in my chest.  There was enough room to slip my body out now. I poked my head into the hallway. Dark red carpet ran in both directions down a long hallway. No one in sight. Good. I crawled until I almost had my shoulders out the door

          A laugh from behind. Damn, he woke up.  “What in the hell are you doing?”

          I stopped, turned my head around, the door slid open wider. “Rob?” 

          Rob threw his legs over the bed. “Well, yeah, but what the hell are you doing on the floor?”

          I couldn’t say anything. My vocal chords didn’t work. Rob laughed again, got out of bed. He crossed the room; his hair standing up in spikes, the freckle on his thigh, the scar on his stomach.

          He laughed again and his eyes crinkled in that way that drives me crazy.

 “I call you last night,” he said, “you tell me to drop the kids at my mom’s, meet you at the club. I arrange a cheap hotel room, we have amazing grown up monkey sex, and now you try to ditch me. Was it that bad, baby?”

          I’m still on my hands and knees on the floor with one Jimmy Choo and no panties.