Cold Sweat

A Story by Alyssa

This guy that next to me is slobbering on me and drunkenly asking me what my major is and for some reason I tell him its some type of science even though there’s a million other majors that would have been more realistic, but he’s too far gone to notice my fake. He says he’s an engineering major which I highly doubt, but I lied too so I don’t comment. And I’m looking away at the guy on the other side the room. The type who’d never give me the time of day. The type who’s beautiful and knows it. They type who can f**k you up.

This place is gross. There's a Penguins hockey jersey half hanging from the wall and a throw up colored and covered carpet. The couple next to me is on second base and I’m bad at sports so I move farther away, closer to slobbery boy. He makes me feel gross. His arm is dripping in the heat and I see steam rising on the windows, closed to conceal the disgusting rap music I’d never listen to outside of here, now, this context.

He asks me to lick his neck and I say no thank you and he laughs like I’m Will Ferrell. He’s the type to follow a fake Will Ferrell twitter account and wear a snapback he found at a different party. He’s the type to use emojis because he knows girls like them, but might not text back. He’s the type who would cheat, but this wouldn’t surprise you. He’s the type I hate. He’s the only type I can get tonight. He’s not the type I’d like, the beautiful boys who line the walls and laugh with the beautiful girls. Those are the goals I suppose, and we are the filler. Me and the sweaty hands are just bodies around them.

Sweat is cold. I never noticed that before but Sweaty is cold, and his hands are ice as he reaches around my back. When you think of sweat, this public declaration of dehydration and overheat, you are drenched in the cold. It’s a million degrees in this hell hole but I’m so cold with his arm on my shoulder, with his mouth near my ear, with my eyes looking at the puke covered carpet and my arms covered in goosebumps, probably because its so cold.

If I am the manic pixie dream girl, he is the relaxed ogre nightmare boy. He is sweaty and large and his hands touch my back like he wants something more than a casual conversation. If only my skin was as burning as his hand was cold, then maybe he would snap his arm away without a second thought, move onto the next girl in the next room.

He asks me to dance and I say okay because the couple beside us just hit third base and I fear a home run. He takes my palm and rubs it between his fingers and puts his hand on my stomach which I feel is weird. I can’t move it because I can barely move at all. I am dancing on him but I think I’m dancing on someone else, we are sardines packed in a microwave. His hand rubs my stomach as if I am expecting a child and his groin gets unusually close to me. I push backwards into someone else, a girl stumbles a little, but she assumes this is a happy drunk state of being and giggles. I kind of wish I was her, unaware of the nasty room and nasty boy I was with.

My brothers friend gave me this address. He told me it was the college experience of it all, life is short and parties are too. Freshman year was the best time of his life and now he’s a sophomore washout with alcoholism and a girlfriend, live it up now. I wonder if this was the memory he had. I wonder if he was the beautiful boy or the sweaty hands.

It dawns on me how much I don’t care. Not at all. I feel empty

So I turn to the slobbering boy and I tell him I love him. I tell him that he’s amazing. I tell him everything he came to hear and he grins too wide and sticks his sweaty tongue down my throat and I don’t care. I don’t care and I hope the beautiful boy sees me. I hope the beautiful boy looks at me and wishes he was the sweaty blackout, draping his arms all over me and forcing his hands up my shirt.

I come up for air and the beautiful boy is gone. I came up for air and I am gone. All I have is the sweaty boy and the words I told him. I don’t care.