Dear Girls Above Me: Inspired by a True Story (21 page)

Let’s be honest, right before having unprotected sex, most members of my tortured gender don’t voluntarily say, “Wait, hold on. Before I venture into a place of incredible warmth and happiness, let me roll into a slimy suffocating balloon that smells like a hospital.” Guys can’t help but live in the moment. We use our heads, but not the smart ones. If I wasn’t going to get condoms, I needed a plan B. Wait, Plan B! Could I convince her to take—no, on second thought, let’s not go down that dark road.

It was judgment-call time. I was pulling up to her block and had to make a quick decision. Condom or no condom? A Shakespearean conundrum if ever there was one. I decided to go with condom. I mean, what was I doing here, right?

Luckily, there was a liquor store, as well as a CVS, right in her neighborhood. I knew both places were sure to sell condoms. For me, picking which store was a clear no-brainer. As dirty and presumptuous as buying condoms before a first date was, I thought the
least I could do was procure them from a drugstore. Purchasing condoms from a pharmacy, as opposed to a liquor store that sells
Barely Legal MILF Magazine
(what does that even mean?), would somehow classy the whole thing up. See, I was thinking of Katie.

I think I’ve mentioned before how reliable I am when it comes to showing up to a place on time. For this reason I wasn’t too stressed about my CVS detour making me cut things close. I had plenty of time to spare. Confident in my choice to go with condoms, I strolled through the CVS trying to find the condom section. I can never find the section I’m looking for in a grocery store. Typically I have no problem asking an employee, but when it comes to condoms, not gonna happen. Even at the expense of being late, I’d prefer to hopelessly roam the vast CVS wasteland like Moses before asking someone to point me in the direction of condoms.

Ten minutes later (I’m lying; it was fifteen) I found the section. Needless to say, I had about seventeen different kinds of strokes trying to figure out the type of condom to buy. If I were a girl, I’d surely notice what type of condom my sexual partner decided on, and then I’d judge him accordingly.

With me, it’s not so much you are what you eat. It’s more you are what brand of condom you decide to wear when having sex. Okay, I’ll admit the latter doesn’t quite roll off the tongue like the former, but I’m not trying to design a new bumper sticker here.

MY CONDOM OPTIONS

Twisted for Her Pleasure: I actually do care about her pleasure. I’m a pleaser by nature. I’m the kid at his own birthday party who can’t have a good time unless he knows that all the guests are also having fun. But as far as twisted condoms go, if I was a girl, I’d think that a guy who was so desperate to please me that he needed the extra help of a bent, curled piece of latex to do what he couldn’t was at best a loser. Also, the lime-green wrapping ain’t putting anybody in the mood. That alone was enough for me to veto.

Lambskin: Do I even have to explain?

Magnum: Makes me think of Tom Selleck. Which, believe it or not, isn’t someone I like to think about during sex, awesome mustache notwithstanding. (And that’s the
only
reason I’m not going with Magnum.
Only. Reason
. You think I’m lying, don’t you? Well, I’m not. There’s no other reason why I wouldn’t go with Magnum. You believe me, right?)

Ultra-Thin for Extra Sensitivity: All I’ll say is, it’s been a little while.… Good night, Charlie. Next.

Thick-Ribbed for Longer-Lasting Excitement: Why not just call them “You Feel Nothing” condoms? If I didn’t want to enjoy it, I would’ve just stayed home and listened to Cathy and Chad have sex. Also, who wants to last so long anyway? It’s like, sometimes enough is enough and Letterman has a cool guest booked.

I didn’t know which brand or type to get. I’ll be the first to admit how little I understand of marketing, but Trojan seems to me to be the most poorly named condom brand one could possibly come up with. Named after the Trojan Horse, a huge wooden horse given to the Trojans as a surrender gift by the Greeks to end a war. Hidden
inside the wooden horse was a fighting force of Greek soldiers who broke through the wood and destroyed the entire city in a surprise massacre sneak attack. Yeah, I want to think of little soldiers breaking through wood, sneaking their way into enemy territory, claiming it as their own, while I’m trying to have protected sex with a girl I haven’t seen since Justin Timberlake was a member of ’NSync.

Fuck it, I thought, and went with Durex.

On my way to the cashier I was pretty calm due to the fact that I still had ten minutes to pick Katie up and I was already on her block. Using the soothing technique of positive visualization I learned from my mom, I envisioned an evening that was smooth sailing from here on out. Only thing was, though, thinking about my mom reminded me that I’d forgotten to call her back that day. My mom views forgetting to call her back as my actively deciding to not call her back because I hate her and I’m waiting out her death. I could see her standing by the phone waiting for me to call her back just so she could yell at me for forgetting to call her back.

“You never called me back.”

“Mom, this is me calling you back.”

“No. This is you calling me back because you forgot to call me back.”

“But, I’m calling you back
right now
, so what’s the difference what my intention is?”

“Someone’s beeping in on the other line. I have to call you back.”

The mind games. I knew what she wanted to talk to me about anyway; she was planning our annual family reunion and she wanted to get everybody’s availability to better plan the … to better plan the … Oh. Shit.

I was at the register, cursing the guilt I would inevitably face after
returning my mom’s phone call to apologize for not returning my mom’s phone call, when Katie walked right in. What kind of moron architect would design a CVS checkout aisle that ends right at the main entrance?! There was no mistaking it. When she walked in, I was the first thing she saw. More specifically, I, buying condoms for our first date, was the first thing she saw. I grabbed as many bags of chips as possible, hoping to conceal my rubbers.
Mayday
. Brace for impact.

I saw that she saw. She saw that I saw that she saw. I was stunned. I couldn’t speak. Unfortunately, she was able to.

“Charlie?”

She had the same voice. A more mature version, but almost exactly as I had remembered it. And, of course, she looked stunning. I was pretty much in heaven, but the little sealed items in my hands were trying to drag me down into the underworld. “Yes,” I replied.

“Oh my God, this is so crazy!”

“Yes.”

“I’m so embarrassed to be bumping into you right before our date.”

“Yes.” Wait, did she just say
date
? At least we cleared that up.

“I ran out of mascara and—well, ya know, typical girl stuff.”

“Yes.” That
yes
was genuine. I knew from Cathy and Claire that mascara to a woman is as necessary as maximum-hold hair spray is to Donald Trump.

Then the inevitable happened. She looked down at my arms full of cornstarch and latex. “Are you buying condoms … and chips.” That’s not a typo. Yes, she technically asked a question, but to hear her say it, it was a statement.

I guess it was time to come up with something other than
yes.
“These …? Oh. Yeah. They’re not for—oh, you must think … No. That’s so embarrassing. These aren’t for, like, tonight.” I left things open; maybe I was talking about the chips?

“They’re not?”

“God no!”

“Well, what are they for, then?” She was onto me.

“… I’m going out of town soon.… I’m taking a trip.… I have a family reunion to attend and—”

“You’re buying condoms for a family reunion?”

“Umm … you like Cool Ranch Doritos?”

The good news
was that I found out my meet-up with Katie was undoubtedly a date; the bad news was it only lasted a few seconds longer than my first hand job. No Doritos were had that night. It was a muggy, humid drive back home. Traffic was heavy; the windows were up, smog was in the air, and I was behind the wheel riding the brakes as the sounds of car horns and nighttime construction crews drilling into the cement of the 405 penetrated my car. No doubt the only kind of penetrating that would happen that evening. There was no Ace of Base to be played. No joy to be had. Right then, if my penis could have talked, it would have said, “Coach, I’m seriously considering switching teams, you’re not ready for me to play.”

As I delicately slid my key into the front door, I was praying to the Man above me that Pat wasn’t home. He knew of my date and was excited for me to get back out there, as any close friend would be. This wasn’t a story I was ready to laugh about, and the thought of having to relive it through explanation was something that made me physically ill. I didn’t want to face Pat or anybody else who knew me.

As the door opened, I remembered that Pat and his crew were catching a fireworks show at Downtown Disney, so I was safe for a
few hours. I never thought I’d ever be so grateful for the existence of Disney. I went into my room, barricaded the door, and hoped for an earthquake. Well, pretty soon, the walls were shaking, but it was no earthquake.

“If it’s called pre-drinking before you go out, what’s it called when you continue drinking after you get home?” Claire belted to Cathy over an upbeat Drake song.

“It’s called Lindsay Lohan,” I responded without even thinking, almost like a reflex.

The music continued to blare with no end in sight. The girls were hosting a pre-drinking party before going out. I knew I was in for trouble, because the last three pre-drinking gatherings they held had resulted in everybody getting so trashed that they decided not to go to the club they were pre-drinking for in the first place—sort of like tailgating before a football game and then not going to the football game.

I know I said I didn’t want to face anybody who knew who I was, but that didn’t mean I wanted to face two girls who
didn’t
know who I was, especially these girls and their pre-drinking friends. (I’m looking at you specifically, Becca.) I mean, the disaster of tonight’s non-date with Katie was a direct result of their voices bouncing around in my head, causing me to get flustered. In my normal daily life, I have enough trouble constantly second-guessing myself, but tonight I was triple- and quadruple-guessed by these girls above.

How on Earth did I allow them to infiltrate my neurotic brain so easily? I tried to shake their conversations from my mind, but the louder the walls thumped from Drake, the louder they managed to talk over it all. My apartment ceiling continued to pulsate.

Shake, shake, shake
.

“I need to know right now if we’re sunbathing on Sunday Funday
so I can get rid of any peek-a-boo pubes.” Nice way to start the workweek, I thought, cringing.

Shake, shake, shake
.

“I hope that guy Kieran meets us out tonight. I’m talking about ‘strong cheekbones but needs to lose the Harry Potter haircut’ Kieran.” “Is there any other kind of Kieran?!” I wanted to sarcastically shout up to the heavens.

Shake. Shake. Shake
.

“Anyway, I wasn’t into Kieran at all until he called me outside of booty-call hours just to tell me that he’s into me.… Also, he texted me a pic; he lost the Potter haircut, now it’s more in the style of Ryan Gosling circa
Drive
.” Congratulations on using
circa
correctly.

Shake. Shake. Shake
.

The night crawled on at a tortured pace. I couldn’t sleep. And it wasn’t the girls above. I kept thinking about how that guy fumbling for condoms at CVS wasn’t me. I had gotten myself all worked up for a date that I’d kept thinking I wasn’t prepared for. It became a self-fulfilling prophecy. I knew I could’ve done better. It may have been too late to salvage things with Katie, but I at least could attempt to salvage some dignity. I wanted to apologize.

I stood in the center of my room and took in the many options I had to connect with her. Did I continue to communicate with her via Facebook message thread? How about straight-up e-mail? Would a text be inappropriate after an impromptu CVS condom splurge? I could apologize @her. Should I write her a handwritten letter and send it off by way of the Pony Express? I was wasting time. In my gut, I already knew the answer.

It was like Cathy said that one time: Drinks are text-approved, but dinner deserves a phone call. (Using that logic, with the way events
unfolded at CVS, I should have sent her a singing telegram.) As her phone rang, I wondered what odds a Vegas sports book would give somebody gambling on whether or not Katie would take my call.

“Yes, Charlie?” Can’t believe she answered.

“Can’t believe you answered.”

“Me either.”

“I wanted to apologize.”

“You apologized at CVS. Then we both went our separate ways, which I think was for the best.”

“I know I apologized, but I didn’t explain. I want to be honest with you. Please. Just give me two minutes and I’ll never bother you again.”

For the next two minutes I tried something I hadn’t attempted since my breakup: total honesty. I was done pretending that I was something other than myself. I explained to Katie how devastated and insecure my breakup had left me. I told her how my absence from the dating game caused me to make poor choices. I even admitted to eavesdropping on the girls above me. Sharing a few specific tidbits didn’t hurt either. Girls like to feel more superior and smarter than other girls, and Cathy and Claire gave that to Katie.

After it all poured out of me, there was a long silence on the phone. Not as long as the one that followed her catching me buying condoms before our date, but it was a silence nonetheless.