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She was a girl across the room and that was enough.
He walked to the bar downstairs and asked for a beer. That this was a party in a derelict basement – with illicit drugs running rampant, plastic handles of liquor strewn everywhere, and a guy behind a makeshift bar whose personal job description was “mixologist” – was of no surprise to anyone in attendance.
This was a party not unlike one you would see at a state college, except the average age of an attendee hovered around 25. Our main character had just walked eight blocks in ten degree weather with a girl wrapped around his arm who, before this night, he had only said hello to a few times in passing. They lagged behind the group they were supposed to be with, as two people tend to do when they want to be left alone.
Their groups ran in the same circles, but why the two of them had decided to lock arms and effortlessly flirt for the entirety of the walk to this very average house party was anyone’s guess.
For the time being, it was fine that he couldn’t find her in this dingy, unkempt basement. He needed that beer he had asked the mixologist for before he could make a move.
There were people mingling in the kitchen, but he was visiting for the weekend and wasn’t interested in small talk. That’s where his friends were, whom he was supposed to be staying with for the duration of the weekend, and they were either uninterested or unaware that himself and this girl had walked to the party together.
Up until that moment when he had been handed a beer from across the makeshift barrier between bartender and patron, he had lost sight of her. With drink in hand, his primary focus became finding her. Propped up against “the bar,” he turned around, cup full of either Bud Light or Coors Banquet (he couldn’t tell), and spotted her.
She was a girl across the room and that was enough.
They locked eyes just slightly longer than is socially acceptable for two people who aren’t having casual sex together. She was walking towards him now. She had a boyfriend, as most attractive 26-year-olds do, but the guy holding that cup of beer knew that this boyfriend didn’t live in this city. He felt bad only in that he had met him once before and actually enjoyed his company. Not bad enough to decline a potential advance, but bad enough that he thought twice about it.
“Can we share that beer? I don’t feel like getting my own drink.” She said it in almost a whisper, and before he had time to answer her she kissed him. It was a peck on the cheek, but before she drew her head away from his he had returned serve, kissing her on the mouth and in essence, signaling that the game was indeed “on.” The cup full of beer? It got set down on a counter in that basement, and the two of them left about five minutes later.
He didn’t know it at the time, but she would eventually ruin him. Not in a physical manner, of course, but more so in a way that can only come from having an on-again, off-again relationship for the better part of five years. This was the beginning. Our protagonist had been seduced. The brunette across the way would cause him more grief than any human being had ever inflicted upon him, but hindsight is 20/20 and in this moment he had no idea what was in store for him.
In the moment – in this seedy, disease-riddled basement – he was certain he had just found the love of his life. This was who he had been searching for.
She was a girl across the room and that was enough.
“This is a story of boy meets girl. But you should know upfront, that this is not a love story.” .
Image via Youtube
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jduda@grandex.co
This might be some of your best writing Duda
Is this Duda’s origin story?
I think yes
Duda if we don’t get a follow up to this fictional column, I’m personally coming for your neck
0% expected something like this from Duda.
100% urge him to continue.
I’ve never been more excited to mix and mingle on a Friday than after reading this. Bravo Duda, this type of shit is your calling.
Hit me hard on a Friday. We all have that person who’s responsible for that chip on your shoulder that makes you more cautious next time around. Good stuff Johnny.
Love the 500 Days of Summer reference. Definitely see this as a series with great potential.
Whoa… Duda, props. Hits me right in the feels.
Bravo Johnny
If this was a Johnny Bravo pun you deserve more upvotes
Did you just prelude TGDAG?
She met Todd on Tinder. Read the early installments for me one time.
Thought it was Hinge.
Will getting got on his knowledge on his own capstone series. SAD!
Huh. Could have sworn is was JDate or FarmersOnly.
I actually read them a few weeks ago, Will, but it’s fun to pretend
but is it girl in san fransisco
I think so and I don’t know if I’m (we’re) ready for it