Waking up with hair in your face is always a positive way to start the day. When the hair is blonde, the bed is huge, the house is old and creaky and the sun is shining through the windows, it’s downright sublime.

Sarah was once my boss when I had started working at a convenience store on campus. When I first met her, she was blasting obscure rap while acting quite surly towards the customers, which I soon learned was warranted as our clientele were mostly pompous history and philosophy professors. She also didn’t mind if I drank at work and always looked the other way when I used coffee cups to smoke out the Frito-Lay delivery man. She is pretty, is the only girl I’ve known with the same taste in music as me, and can talk a lot of shit. I spent most of my time at work hitting on her.

Sarah was a serious hipster when I first met her, and correspondingly dressed like an idiot. The first time I ever got her to hang out outside of work was for a party at the house I was sharing with ten other young men. She showed up wearing what amounted to a burnt orange bag. I distinctly remember loudly asking what the fuck she was wearing, which should have chased her off. She stayed.

At some later date, she called me up quite late and wanted to come over. It was our first time having sex and I did not give a particularly phenomenal performance. I was quite drunk. She left at 5:30 the next morning, which seemed ludicrous. She seemed far more awkward than normal as I walked her out, but I figured it was because I had given her the soft serve.

I woke up hours later to her calling. She was crying hysterically on the other line. I started to freak out.

“Oh my god! OHMYGOD!” Sarah went on like this for a minute, and then slowed down just enough to shout “I can’t believe I cheated on JAMES!”

Feeling relived that I hadn’t broken her vagina or something, I politely asked her who the fuck James was and set the phone down without waiting for an answer or hanging up.

Three years and I had been her occasional man on the side for three boyfriends straight. It wasn’t that I was purposely trying to wreck her relationships. At least not at first. I just never heard from her when she was single, if she ever was.

With this in mind, I found myself drinking Pabst in her kitchen in San Francisco. As usual she had invited me to something that no other woman would; this time it was a ‘90s hip-hop and Miami/booty bass night at a bar known for having root beer on tap. Simply amazing.

After dancing to music that I actually was stoked on – a rarity – and some serious injections of root beer and whisky, we ended back at her place along with a mutual friend Brian who lived on the other side of the city and had missed the last train back.

I was fumbling with my bag in her room when she came in with her hands on her hips and a jaunty cock of the head.

“Well I don’t know where you’re going to sleep. You’re sure not sleeping in my bed.”

“Sarah, you gotta be shitting me. I drove eight hours up here to see you. There’s no way I’m sleeping on the hardwood.”

“Why don’t you snuggle up with Brian on the futon? It’s probably pretty comfortable and I bet that’s right up your alley.” Coming from anyone else, her smirk would have pissed me off. In this case I pulled up the mental image of finger banging her on a similar futon in years past and laughed it off.

“Brian definitely deserves to get beat off for coming out tonight when he’s probably going to miss work tomorrow, but that’s not my job.” I had inexplicably lost my voice in favor of a cracking, squeaking rasp. Sarah looked at me with wide eyes like I was a fully pubertal young boy asking her for hand job. I pointed at her, through the wall at Brian in the living room, and gave a furious whack-off motion. Her scowl finally disappeared. I figured I was in.

“Okay, now that’s settled, I’m going to go ahead and get in bed and pass the fuck out,” I said. “Brian probably needs servicing, but feel free to sleep in here. I’ll leave you the edge. Just don’t touch me, I’m not interested in any funny business and I know how much you want to jump my bones.”

Her facial expression went from incredulous to angry and finally to amused. A very good sign. She let loose with the gorgeous smile that had got me talking to her in the first place and left the room. She soon burst back in wearing phenomenally small shorts. I promptly fell out of the chair I was sitting in.

“Damn momma, what the hell you trying to do sashaying about the room in those things? Give me a heart attack?”

She laughed. “Do you want a pair?”

“No way in hell. I don’t want to outdo you or anything. I’ll tell you what though, there’s no chance of me sleeping in these damn pants.” Whenever I’ve been drinking and with a girl, it always seems like it’s a good idea to remove as much of what I’m wearing as possible, as if I’m attractive enough in the buff to get them to burst out of their clothes.

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly expect you to do that.” With that, I ripped off my jeans like a stripper and dove headfirst into bed. She was a bit more tentative. I gave her a half-hearted attempt at a kiss, and she turned away. Somehow I figured that was going to happen, but oh well.

Still, I had to ask. “So, is it because you’re currently single?”

“Well… no.” I raised an eyebrow at her. “Okay, yeah. Kinda.”

I turned over and passed out.