An Affair To Rememblur

-or-

One Night At The Nugget

They were smoking menthol cigarettes at a sports bar in a dive Nevada casino. They were laughing, loud, and swaying, having spent their entire evening commiserating over cocktails. She wore a snug skirt and blazer combo, her black hair pulled tight and assembled into a long ponytail. He, with sandy brown and receding hair, wore a snap-button collared plaid shirt and tan slacks. They were both drunk. They found themselves together in this low-light casino bar after a trade convention, both of them brought here on business.

Their conversation was boisterous, drowning out the noise that surrounded them. Their focus on each other eradicated everything else. The bartender had thankfully stopped putting booze in their drinks somewhere around the fifth or sixth cocktail, doing his part to keep them from barfing at the bar.

Despite all this liquid encouragement, their flirting remained hesitant and nervous. They were close enough to talk and joke at an intimate level; it was as if they were showing off to the rest of the convention. It was like they were playing this Will They/Won’t They game with each other and they were exceptionally good at it.

Their night of intense conversation wore on well past midnight. They flirted and talked for hours until the bartender finally issued them a forlorn last call. They giggled about splitting the tab, and she commented dramatically that she was in no state to drive home and that it would be a tragedy for her to sleep alone in her car.

Even with this obvious suggestion to continue their encounter somewhere else, he still felt too much apprehension to reach out and actually touch her. Somewhere in him was the desire to pull her in by the waist and start making out right there. Instead, he put his arm around the back of her chair. She called him out on this awkwardness. He pouted and tried to pull her closer, and now she definitely wanted to leave the bar, with or without him. They glared at each other through some aggressive eye contact. The world around them went still as they quietly dared each other to make the next move.

He playfully suggested they find somewhere private, she coyly evaded it. He then more threateningly offered they’d either fight or fuck before the night was out. The sweetness from before transformed into palpable tension growing between them. It was clear, after hours of this banter at the bar, that he was growing frustrated with their game. He knew he traveled to this event as a pretense to see her. She thought it would be fun to meet up, but did she really want anything more than that? She seemed to keep that to herself.

The trip to Nevada was out of his way, but in the end he knew why he was here. From his back pocket, he produced two room keys in a slip of fancy cardstock. He took one for himself and folded the cardstock closed, slapping it down against the bar directly in front of her.

He said, “See ya in the East Tower,” and left.

She fiddled with the thin gold ring on her left ring finger.

“You act like you’re married?” The bartender asked.

“Ah, no.” She said.

...

He made his way to the men’s room, far away from the bar. He stumbled through the labyrinthine casino floor, navigating rows and rows of glowing, screeching slot machines, each occupied by obese figures mechanically poking buttons as the consoles flashed. A miserable existence, he thought, to feed money into these machines while they playfully blink and make sounds at you.

He had a moment here to collect his thoughts and try to sober up.

Beneath his jeans and winter long johns, he wore a thin pink thong. He seemed to know before this whole thing started that he would find himself in this very scenario. It seemed that everything was falling in line with a self-fulfilling prophecy: putting on sexy underwear and going to work with every intention to fuck this flirty woman from the bar. This was his red-letter moment to spend a night with this unavailable dream girl. He felt safe—like he was strapped into an amusement park ride.

He left the men’s room and snaked back through the maze of the casino floor, exiting the building. He wanted fresh air and to give her time to reach the room and relax. He got to his car to retrieve his overnight bag, and as suddenly as a thunderstorm can drench a desert, he cried. He wanted this, but he didn’t want it like this. He knew it was going to happen, but he didn’t want to stop it. The agency to do so was absent. He glanced at the dash clock, and the blinking colon between the pale green digital numbers gave him a flash of clear-headed sobriety. He could blast out of the parking garage and be home and in an empty bed by 3:30 am. He could have driven away then and there.

But he didn’t.

He walked back into the casino with an overnight bag slung over his shoulder and a girly thong up his ass.

...

Near the elevators in the hotel lobby, he saw a woman—tall black heels and a white fuzzy peacoat, with long black hair that stretched down to her hips—leaned against an awkwardly large, pink, hard shell suitcase. The length of her coat made it look like she was not wearing any underwear at all. She seemed frustrated, or flustered, and flagged him down the moment she saw him. “I need you to help me find my phone,” she said. He obliged. They left their bags with the front desk and linked arms, swaying gayly as they made their way outside. Large flakes of wet snow fell on them as they wove through the maze of cars in the surface lot. The walk to the car was long, so they had more time to be with each other, to talk, to joke, to be flirty and frisky. After a brief search and without finding the phone, she decided she was ready to go up to the room. She was no longer concerned with anyone trying to reach her, and this relieved her. And, perhaps because she felt so soothed underneath the softly falling snow, she finally relaxed her shoulders. She heaved a huge puffing sigh, “I like doing this with you.”

Perhaps she really did like how he could match her stride, or how they navigated swerving around corners without colliding. She couldn’t deny that there was some wild spark between them.

Instead of going straight to the room, however, she wanted to stop at the front desk for a toothbrush. The tired girl in the houndstooth coat looked up from the tedium of her graveyard shift and told her no, they don’t have toothbrushes at the front desk. “But, I want my mouth to be clean,” she said. The houndstooth girl was firm in her denial.

 They retrieved their bags together and left the front desk, still buzzing and linked arm-in-arm, their blood thinned with alcohol. The booze had certainly worked them both over the brink; their flirtations more fluid, and the brisk walk in the cold snow had melted the previous tensions away. They playfully shoved each other—he tousled her hair, she grinned brightly at him—as they strutted toward the elevators.

...

The elevator lobby was empty save for the approaching clip-clop echo of black stiletto heels. A cold, metallic ding announced a door sliding open to absolutely no one. A convention-goer, emerging from the late-night casino floor romp, his nametag lanyard still dangling from his neck, politely held the elevator door open as he heard them approach. He stood outside the elevator car with a smile on his face until he got a better look at the two approaching. They gripped each other tightly, tripping over their bags—laughing stupidly and carefree. The rhythm of the heels was erratic as they struggled with the weight of walking with each other while carrying their own luggage. The conventioner, once he saw this, removed his hand from the door, lowered his head, averted his eyes, and stepped back. He’d wait for the next one, he wordlessly indicated to them. They drunkenly thanked him, “Thaaaannk yooouuuuuuu,” as the doors slid closed. They kissed the moment they had the privacy and security to do so.

During the 15-story elevator ride, they kissed, groped, and hugged—the most physical contact they had ever shared together. Blushing, they stumbled down the long anonymous hall—a boring, plainly wallpapered path past endless rooms—until they reached their door. She opened it with her card. She asked what had taken them so long to get here.

As soon as the door closed behind them, she dropped her peacoat to the floor to reveal the two remaining unseen articles of clothing on her body: a black spaghetti-strap tank top and a black thong. Nearly naked, she strutted to the room’s mirror to check herself out. Her ass, as she saw it, was like a horse’s ass. He watched her twist and flex and could see the firm definition of her muscle under a thin layer of newly acquired fat.

As he examined her full form, he remained fully clothed, weighed down by his hesitation. Despite her undressing in front of him, he felt no arousal. Many layers of damp winter clothing separated him from nudity. He zoned out, enthralled and frozen, like he was watching a recording of himself. She pounced on the bed. He joined her, slowly. He finally started to take off his clothes—shirt first. He had another chance to stop here, play the game a little longer before revealing the embarrassing pink-and-black-lace underwear he was wearing. So they stayed hidden underneath the long johns as he took off his jeans first. She cooed, rapt. She pawed at his crotch. He felt satisfaction in being wanted, and she wanted him. And he wanted her because she wanted him; the feedback loop was complete.

After twice teasing a reveal of his genitals, he ripped off the rest of his clothes, all at once. He wadded everything up into a ball and tossed it into a chair. He was naked; the self-imposed degeneracy belt, gone. They lay down together. The initial contact of skin-on-skin was cold; they debated stopping together. They discussed how they can’t do this, and how it would be a dumb idea, and how maybe they should just stop here. But they were too close, too aroused, and too naked to stop. Sharing the same bed intensified the foreplay from earlier, and now without any barriers or onlookers, she climbed on top of him.

They fit together well. He grabbed her hips. Though she was on top, he felt in control while holding her; their rhythm was in-sync. They smashed each other. They fucked like they were trying to hurt each other. Their pace quickened; she climaxed first, collapsing onto his chest. Her slumped body folded nicely against his, and with her naked breast pressed against his, she hugged him with a blushing sigh.

He wanted to live up to that fantasy they had created together down at the bar. Despite their sexual appetite and the moment’s potential, the copious drinking and smoking—along with his own sense of guilt—delayed his climax until much later. He could feel his nerves and apprehension keep him in check the whole time. He was nowhere near reaching an orgasm; he wanted to be finished, but it felt so hauntingly far away.

After a long and exhausting time of their bodies writhing together, he reached his edge, and his entire being tensed and stretched out, thrashing, knocking the headboard off its moorings. She yelped and quickened her movements, seemingly instinctively. He squirmed and quivered, and the seed of life left him in a drunken outburst.

Finally finished with all they had set out to accomplish, they could disengage and lay next to each other. It was a quiet, still moment as they both quieted their breathing and thoughts rushed in to fill the space.

For him, a deep desire to bond and spoon, along with a blinding fear of becoming too attached. A worry that all her availability would dry up, and all the fun they have together would be over forever. That thought sickened him.

For there was no joy in the afterglow. No victory between their silky, warm bodies. He knew from that point on she would be gone entirely from his life. Without any words, she left quietly in the early morning, just before daybreak, leaving $150 in cash on the dresser.