I Left My Conscience

Lacey lay awake in the dark hotel room as Jeph slept soundly beside her. She knew he was sleeping because of the soft snores that could be heard coming from behind her. She was lying on her side, her back facing Jeph as she stared at the wall next to the bed.

Lacey wasn’t even sure why she wasn’t sleeping. As far as she could tell, she didn’t regret what had happened. In fact, she had enjoyed it more than she had expected she would. Just the memory of Jeph’s hands touching her, feeling every inch of her body made her shiver with pleasure.

But Lacey knew—she knew that it was loss of control that was keeping her awake now. She had never lost control like that before. If she ever found herself in a situation like she was in now, she always stopped it before it went any further. This was the first time in a long time that she had slept with someone within only hours of meeting them.

When she used to just let things flow and didn’t try and control everything, she would lie awake like she was now—and there would always be this feeling of emptiness that she could feel straight to her core. Meaningless sex. That was all she used to know.

But somehow, what she had shared with Jeph didn’t feel like what she had shared with all of the other guys of her past. She didn’t feel empty. She felt like what had happened between her and Jeph wasn’t just meaningless sex. Maybe it didn’t mean the same thing to each of them, but it meant something. At least, she hoped it had meant something to Jeph.

Lacey was trying to hold onto this hope, but the fact that she had lost control made her feel like her hope was slipping away. Who was she to just hope that someone like Jeph would find meaning in sex with someone he had just met?

As she lay there, thinking over all of these things as she listened to Jeph’s snores, she could start to feel that familiar empty feeling starting to move its way through her. The coldness of that feeling made goose bumps form on her skin and her breathing picked up a bit. She felt as if the walls of the room were starting to close on her and as the last remnants of hope started to disappear, she realized she still had some control left. She could stay right here, feeling that empty feeling, maybe getting a few hours of sleep before waking up to have an awkward good bye with Jeph. A good bye where he would tell her that he’d give her a call sometime, but he never would. Or he would tell her that he had a good time with her, that they’d have to meet up sometime, but they never would.

It was with the bit of control that Lacey believed she still had that she decided to leave. To get up now and just leave. And that’s what she did.

When she had pulled on her clothes, she left the hotel room quietly before heading to the elevator. But as she waited for the elevator, she wasn’t sure if this was actually what she wanted to do. There was still that lingering thought, wondering if the recent events of her life had meant something to Jeph—but she couldn’t bring herself to just go back to her room. She looked around her before spotting an ‘Exit’ sign pointing to the stairs. She headed that way and went through the door. Instead of going down the stairs to leave, she went up.