Hen’s Night
Charlize
When Francis tells me to come to Angela’s hen’s night, it takes some convincing on her part. None of us has talked since I moved to Australia—we wrote a couple of letters back and forth for maybe a year, and Angela would often send mixtapes of songs she enjoyed at the time, but after a while, the letters slowly stopped—from both sides.
Life has a way of making people drift apart—it takes work to maintain a quality connection, and it was a different time back then. E-mail was as high-tech as it got.
We’re at a bar called Willie’s that completely goes with my vibe; it’s chill, low-key, and not too clean.
I watch Angie and Francis talk rapidly, a little surprised their friendship circle hasn’t really grown, but it’s good to see them laughing like this—I didn’t realize until now how much I’ve missed the two, somewhat unhinged human beings sitting before me.
I observe them carefully—they haven’t changed much at all. It’s almost as if time stands still in this town, and they’re both just as insane and loopy as they once were.
On their own, as individuals, they’re relatively fine to be around, but put Angela and Francis together, and they bring out the goofy in one another.
I never really understood what they saw in me as a friend; I’m the broody cloud that tags along and dissipates into the wind once I get drained by the high-energy people around me.
They both seem to sit in the exact same areas of the innie/outie scale I placed them in all those years ago—my scale usually determines how much time I can spend with a certain individual. Some don’t even make the scale—these mostly include people with inflexible, extremist opinions, ideals, or beliefs that cannot be challenged, discussed, or moved because they’re stubborn individuals who can’t comprehend a world in which they might be wrong. Those people are not for me.
Francis has always been an extreme extrovert; her company I could only ever tolerate in short bursts, but I’ve gotten a lot tougher since then; I might manage to be around her longer than before. Francis thrives from social interactions, while I myself am completely on the other end of that spectrum. Way over. As in, I may not even be on the spectrum at all.
Simon Sinek said it best when he said extroverts start off with no coins at the beginning of each day and gain them with each social interaction. Meanwhile, introverts start out with coins at the beginning of the day and spend them on each social interaction they have. I must get shortchanged every morning, or the people in my dreams count as social interactions because I wake up with empty pockets each day, and by the end of it, I’m always in the red.
For as long as I remember, it’s always been this way—people are exhausting; that’s why I work a job that requires minimal to zero social interaction; wood doesn’t talk back. And, I’m very particular about whom I spend my time with personally. People are, however, interesting to watch. So here I am, at the bar, aka a people zoo, watching them in their natural habitat.
Angie, who now goes by the nickname Bobbie for whatever reason, has always been able to read me—and it’s nice to see she’s still reading me. I feel seen by her, truly seen, understood, and accepted, which makes her significantly less exhausting to be around than Francis—also, because Bobbie teeters somewhere between introvert and extrovert depending on the day, her empathy is intermingled with her experience of both areas.
As I watch her sipping my beer, Angie’s brain gets struck by lightning. She jolts in her stool, and her hand wraps around my wrist. “Wait, Charlie, you play bass, right?”
I feel one of my brows twitch. Shit, I must be losing my touch.
That’s all the confirmation Angie needs to drag me off my stool, earning her a cat-like hiss from me, which she completely ignores as she leads me toward the stage where the band plays. They seem to play a mix of new and old alternative rock, digestible by most crowds without being too niche.
They’re decent, and so is their drummer. Yummy.
I don’t know why drummers are sexy as hell; maybe it’s because they have an impeccable sense of rhythm and can maintain a steady pace as they give you a good drumming between the sheets. That escalated fast. I’ll have to work that frustration out later when I get home.
Angela is on friendly terms with everyone on stage because they all acknowledge her with a friendly smile as she approaches them. It’s always been so easy for her to make friends and find a connection with people—a quality I was envious of long ago, but now I don’t really care as much. I am what I am; I accept myself, flaws and all.
The second the band finishes their rendition of “Zombie” by The Cranberries, the lead singer approaches Angie, “What’s up, Bob? You wanna play?”
“Yes! Charlie here plays bass; I wanna jam with her,” Angie exclaims.
I eye the drummer whose chocolate eyes dart up to my forehead to the masking tape still stuck across it. He smiles as he reads the word written on the tape and hands Angela his drumsticks without a second’s hesitation.
Angie finally lets go of my wrist, and the bassist hands me his bass. It’s covered with band stickers: Slipknot, Metallica, Slayer, and Iron Maiden. They all earn my approval, and I take the bass, lifting the strap over my head. One bad sticker, and I wouldn’t touch the thing except with petrol and a box of Redheads.
As we play, that’s when the coins start pouring in. Playing the bass was a bit of a cop-out—it’s relatively easy compared to the guitar—fewer and fatter strings—but deeper vibrations always resonated better with me. High-pitched noises make my skin crawl.
The second song we play, “By The Way” by The Red Hot Chili Peppers, has a badass bass solo that takes me into my own little world. I barely notice the pub’s patrons going nuts until I look around.
I should have been a musician, but it would mean performing, and I don’t pretend to be anyone else but me, which isn’t exactly in vogue nowadays.
Toward the end of the solo, I see Angela’s brother, Atticus, and her fiancé, Mason, walking through the crowd. Being giants amongst men, they have always stood out, even in high school. I barely recognize Oliver, who talks with Mason as they weave their way through the crowded bar—Olly used to go to our school, but he sure as hell did not look like that. Holy smokes.
The last guy that follows them, I don’t recognize. My eyes linger on the stranger longer than I intended, his long golden hair tied in a man bun. He’s in a very well-tailored suit that does things to my insides I’d never admit, not even to myself. It’s a strange look; he almost looks like a steampunk pirate dressed in a navy shirt and brown vest, and…are those leather suspenders? Interesting.
When he looks over at me, and our eyes meet, I feel my soul catch fire and my vagina heels to attention. Down girl. He’s a suit, we don’t do suits.
I keep trying to remind her about the strict No Suit Policy we have in place, but the entire time it takes to wrap up this song, Mr. Suit has her wagging her tail like a bitch in heat. Turncoat.
The golden-haired Adonis follows Atticus, Mason, and Olly to their table, where they make themselves comfortable.
When we finish up, I hand the bass back to the bassist whose name I learned to be Jack, and the hot drummer’s name is Theo. Hello Theo, maybe we can get together sometime, and you can play my bongos?
I swear, if I said half the shit I thought, I would get myself into some very interesting but sticky situations. It’s a good thing my brain-to-mouth filter is top-notch and has never failed.
I notice Mr. Suit looking my way, and I start to feel the tingling again. I don’t usually shy away from eye contact; in fact, I enjoy using it in combination with the occasional glare to make people uncomfortable, but right now, I think I’m the only one feeling uncomfortable. This is highly irregular and will not be tolerated.
“I need to use the restroom,” I tell Angela as we leave the stage.
“Do you want me to come with you?” She asks a little too excitedly for my liking.
I raise a quizzical brow. “You want to chaperone me to the bathroom?”
“Nope, got it, you’re a big girl now,” she patronizingly pats my head a couple of times before quickly making herself scarce.
I’ll allow it—it’s been a while since anyone’s touched me, and my quota for physical contact is filled for the next few days, at least.
As I pass the bucks’ party on my way to the bathrooms, I unconsciously sneak a peek at the Suit that caught my eye earlier. He smirks as he recounts a story to Mason, who visibly hangs on every word. The way his mouth moves is delightful, and for a split second, my mind takes a one-way trip to the gutter, and I imagine what those lips would feel like kissing my inner thigh—it’s a bit of a weak spot for me.
Mr. Suit’s eyes dart to meet mine as if he knew where I am with every step I take. He keeps talking, not missing a beat, but how his lips curl at the corners as he speaks inspires me to believe that he hears my mind calling those lips to do inexplicable things to me.
He must be defective—a person who looks so polished and pristine doesn’t normally look at someone like me in such a sultry manner.
In the bathroom, I look at myself in the mirror, taking a moment to examine my appearance. I know what I look like; my shell is a well-crafted armor designed to keep people like Mr. Suit at bay. My arms are completely covered in art, and my hair is dyed navy—not exactly a look shiny citizens go for. My clothing, mostly ripped shirts and torn black jeans, isn’t in style either—they’re torn because the hands-on nature of my work tears them right up, and I don’t care enough to go shopping. Shopping is hell incarnate—I’d rather inject mercury into my eyeballs. Plus, everything ends up ripped and covered in sawdust anyway.
The cherry on top of my look is my naturally unapproachable demeanor. In early 2000, they gave this look a name, “resting bitch face.”
Clearly, I wasn’t the only person who “suffered” from this affliction, and they deemed us worthy of a label to apply to ourselves in order to make others around us feel more comfortable.
If it has a label, we can be forgiven for it, right? For not fitting in and being visually different.
“Forgive me for my resting bitch face, I really am a nice person,” they say, making excuses for their own faces.
Nah, fuck that—fuck you and your labels. My face matches my insides. I’m not a “nice” person, and you know what, I feel absolutely fine about it.
