About four-ish years ago, when I first started going to karaoke shows after my divorce, I frequented a pub that I still go to on a regular basis. The guy who runs the karaoke there is responsible for all of the friends that I have right now. S has been the catalyst of so many friendships and has brought an island of misfit toys together. I really feel like he is our glue. There's a lot that can be discussed in the short amount of time it takes to pick your song and put it in the queue. I've had conversations that have ranged from serious relationship advice to let's-guess-who's-not-wearing-underwear-tonight. I really don't know how he tolerates us sometimes.
One Tuesday night my group of best friends were sitting at our table. I guess kind of like in school in the cafeteria. We had our area and people knew it was/is ours. I go to karaoke because I like to sing and I happen to have a kick-ass group of friends who can all really sing. Yeah, there may be a few random clinkers here and there where someone would get up and sound like a dying cat, but who cares? It's supposed to be fun, and that it has been. A lot of times if people are talking and I want to listen to who's singing, I'll get up and stand by myself. As I'm standing there, another group comes in. People know them but I'm thinking, "Who just came into my bar?" Not in a bitchy way...ok, maybe a little bitchy. I'm territorial. There's a couple that walk up to S and it's obvious he knows them. The girl, when she is talking, is beautiful. She radiates a glow. Is she the typical societal glow...no...she's got wild black curls and a smile that made you want to be near her. The guy she's with seems much more reserved. Quiet. He smiles with his eyes behind dark-rimmed glasses and looks like he's going to picture day at school with his collared shirt and sweater. I've soon learned that I'm about to hear some crazy singing from the girl so I should hold onto my hat. The music starts,
"So 1, 2, 3, take my hand and come with me because you look so fine and i really wanna make you mine."
She smiles when she sings and looks like she's having so much fun, she's so at ease, and wow, she sounded like an angel. I had a new girl-crush for sure. It's time for the quiet one to sing. By this time I've walked back over to my table and started talking to R talking about how good my new crush was. I wish I could remember the song he sang. I want to say it was, "Oh Darling," maybe by the Beatles, but I'm not sure. What I remember is Shy-guy starts to sing, I looked at him, I looked at my table of friends, I looked back at him, I turn to my friends and in the loudest voice I say,
"ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?"
How do I describe this without sounding trite? Imagine a singer who's not looking at anyone in the audience because he is staring at the words on the screen while holding the microphone stand with both hands. Now imagine the seemingly nervous looking singer opens his mouth and his soul is bared to everyone. If you can imagine when you hear a song on the radio, or even in person, that touches you. Almost like the music floats down from the sky and wraps around you like a soft blanket. That's what it felt like to me on my skin. His voice has just a touch of grittiness to it that makes you pay attention rather than talking to your friends at the table and looking at the Cubs score on the tv. I couldn't believe it and just kept saying, "You've got to be kidding me," as I've been known to do when I think something is that good.Time passes. Years in fact, since that night. I would see both of them out, but they weren't together anymore. I would ask ( LL) if he would let me pick a song for him to sing and he would always say yes to me. Did I have a crush? Of course I did. Did I ever think anything would ever happen? Fuck no. I'm a hundred years older than he is, and my usual type is tattooed, loud and obnoxious, bikers who may or may not have a drinking problem. If there were a polar opposite, LL was it. I would still flirt with him and tell him he could sing me the phone book and I'd listen over and over. (Start over at the A's again...) He'd still hold the mic like it was trying to escape his grip, he'd still maintain eye contact with the screen or sometimes even close his eyes completely. But his voice...
"...Free me, leave me
Watch me as I'm going down
Free me, see me
Look at me, I'm falling and I'm falling..."
Is it weird that I can't remember what I had for breakfast today, but I can remember this song he sang two years ago at a place in Mount Prospect?
While all this is happening, in my parallel universe I'm dealing with a man who would break my heart constantly. I became so broken and triggered easily by choices made that I'll probably talk about later. I don't want him to taint my writing here.
About two months ago R and I go to a different venue for karaoke. It's not S doing it and I am pretty spoiled by his sound system and him so I'm a bit of a snob...hard to believe, I know. R's kids are with their mother for a vacation and he needed to get out. I was happy to meet him.We see some friends who are in our social circle and although the music was making my ears bleed, it was possible to scream your conversation. LL walks in. Oh yay! His eyes aren't smiling. He doesn't look himself.
"HEY! How are you? What's wrong?" I scream into his face.
"It's nothing. My girlfriend and I just broke up..." (more talk about what had happened)
"Oh, Honey, I'm so sorry." Screaming this just didn't have the soothing effect I normally would have wanted.
LL sings a song that I'm pretty sure had meaning behind it it. It's pained and has this dubstep-y part to it that makes the audience wooooohooo. He looks different to me now. His dark hair has grown so long that the curls are more relaxed and the loose curls that fall around his face are perfectly imperfect. He can put it up now and I really like it. I'm a big fan of longer hair. Not a big fan of body hair, though. There's something about a man taking off a sweater, but looking like he's still wearing a sweater. (shudder)
LL is fun to flirt with. He's quiet, but assertive. Funny as all hell, too. Although he looks sad, distracted, his eyes show me who he is. He's free. He's...free. This word just keeps coming to my mind.
After a few weeks pass, my kids leave for camp and I am feeling incredibly blue. I go out on a Thursday to one of S's shows and I get to see the crew that I only get to hang with in the summer. I'm chatting with the girls, having drinks, meeting new people who have come into the fold, laughing a lot. LL walks in. The same shy boy I saw 4 years ago, (now, I don't mean boy like he's a kid. He's definitely a man, but I saw him differently back then) walks in to [bar] and our friends are rushing up to say hello to him. People are genuinely happy to see him and that makes me feel good. I can't think of one person who has ever said, "Oh, fuck. LL is here. What an asshole." Nobody. What is it like to be held so high and yet maintain this humbleness? He comes over and says hi and something snaps in my brain. God, he's sexy. How is it I'm just noticing this? I walk over to S at the dj booth and I look at one of my girlfriends who is sitting up by S and I say, "I totally want to make out with LL tonight." Now, this is not something I would normally just come out and say about LL. Never has that even been in my mind. Without missing a beat, Rh says to me, "Ok, take this cigarette. See if he wants to go smoke."
"But I don't smoke."
"Who cares! Do you want to get some alone time with him?" As she's saying this to me and handing me a smoke, LL walks by with cigarette in hand and asks me, "Are you going outside to smoke?"
"Yes...yes, I am." How did I sound like a game show host just now? I turn and get the ok-eyes from Rh and out the door we go.
flirt...flirt...flirt...eyelashes...smile...(I'm talking about me here, not him.) We talk about everything and nothing. It's raining on us.Not hard. It's so hot, I welcomed it. He's adorable. Soft voice. Easy. We've both have had a few cocktails. I'm skinning my hair back over my head out of my face.
"Do you want to go in?"
"I ain't made of sugar, Honey."
"Do you want me to light that now?" He motions to my cigarette.
"Um, LL, I have to be honest with you...I...don't smoke."
"Really? So?..."
"This was a plan so I could be alone with you for a bit. Rh helped me."
"Wait...there was a plan? Nobody's ever made a...plan. That's awesome."
I move towards him and now we are standing talking uncomfortably close. I look up at him and smirk. More talking about nothing...
BLAM!
The door swings open, "Hey, LL! You wanna go smoke?!" LL says ok, asks if I'm staying, then off he went.ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? NO! COCKBLOCKED!!! No, really. If he would've turned around and saw my face, it was like the commercials you see where Sarah Mclaughlan is singing and you have the dogs with the sad eyes looking through the holes of the fence, shaking. "...In the arms of the angel..." I swear I should've just thrown one of the tables at her and knocked her out cold so he would've stayed. Some time goes by but it seems like three hours. I am not leaving here without kissing that man. Let me tell you something about me. I've been skinny, I've been fluffy, it's never made a difference in going for what I want. When I taught at the pole studio, I was the heaviest girl there for a while. Then I got a divorce and the weight fell off...and now back on again. When I would dance, never did anyone say, "Look how big she is." I've never let my weight deter me from anything. I don't know why I felt compelled to say that. It's weird...more men seem to approach me when I'm heavier. Hmm, don't know. Ok, back to LL. My mind is made up. Pucker up, Sir, because, oh, it's SO going to happen. But then more time passed...(another three pseudo-hours went by). So I decided I'd get in the car and just go. It's not meant to happen. Get a grip, Robyn. Why would he want to be with you like that? Rh comes out to leave, visibly upset about something happening in a show she's in. She sees me and starts to talk. LL moseys up and looks at me like, "You're leaving?"
"Well the least you can do is get out of the car while we smoke," Rh tells me.
I get out. I go back to the hair flipping and eye-making at LL. His smile is beautiful. Rh leaves and it's me and LL alone again. More close talking. More of me giggling like a schoolgirl. I come to terms with either I am going to have to make this happen or I may be waiting until the Messiah comes.
I stare at him with my head cocked to the side, my eyes squinting, "I am so going to put my face on your face right now." Wait...What? that's what you say to him? I couldn't help but laugh at what I'd said. Through his laughter he says, "Ok."
Oh fuck! He said ok? I realize now I have to do it. He called my bluff.
"Uhhhh...you ready?" Oh my God. Have I lost all of my cool? Have I forgotten all of my tools? Did I just become an instant asshole?
"Yep." Was he answering my inside or outside voice?
In front of [bar] I reach up on my toes, lower my eyes to look at his lips, I'm holding my breath and he starts to lean in to me. It took forever to finally feel his kiss...and...believe when I tell you, it was the softest, most sensuous kiss I have EVER had. Now...this princess has kissed a lot of frogs in her day. So, I really feel like I have a baseline to go off of. I come back down from my tiptoes and exhale. What the fuck just happened? Before I can answer my own question, I pop back up and kiss him again. This time it's so much more. His hands press into my back. My hands are in his hair with my fingers threaded in his black curls and I'm pulling him into me. His hand touches my cheek and his thumb grazes over my lips as he kisses me slowly. Deliberately. I love the taste in his mouth. I'm inhaling him as we are full-on making out in the parking lot next to the door and I don't have a fuck to give. I am so oblivious to everything except what LL is doing with his tongue, you could've set my hair on fire and I would've said, "What's that smell? Is something burning?"
I'm taking a pause here for a minute
I should've stayed. I should've gone back in and taken up more time with him. I had no reason to leave, but I did. I went home...awestruck and still saying to myself, Did that really just happen? LL did that? Why am I surprised? He was a total ninja about his singing. I had no idea how personable and funny he was. He has now proved that he is very sensual and extremely sexy...wait...doesn't do him justice...oozes. He oozes sex and sensuality. (I know you're reading this now, LL, and want to shake your head, but it's true.) So of course he'd be the best kiss I've ever had?Should I tell you now about the next time we kissed? Or the first time we were alone? It's going to have to be in another post because each time I'm with him it's better than the last. But I will tell you this...that man does things to my mind, my body, my soul, that I can only guess what it would be like if I were in heaven. Where could this possibly be going? Who knows. LL is my lesson on patience and mindfulness. To stay in the moment with him right now. Not thinking about when I'll get to see him again, but to just be. This morning I told him that. I ran my hands along his body and smelled his skin. My head was asking when would the next time be? But instead I focused on now. I have conjured a great man, my Darlings. I have sucked in the perfect soul healer and I'm a genius, lol. As always, I am ever grateful for the space that you hold for me to write about happy things, sad things...whatever. Just thank you.
Hmmmm, the songs I would pick for this post...
Falling Slowly by Glen Hansard
Kiss by Prince
I am grateful for:
summer rain
conjuring the perfect moment
songs that make me forget where I am
karaoke
slow kisses
perfect timing
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