In Over My Head

I stumbled out of my hotel room thirty-five minutes later, showered and as put together as I could manage, given the time restrictions. Tango was waiting for me in the lobby.

“Let’s go, let’s go. Everyone else is already down there.” He ushered me out the automatic lobby doors and out onto the street.

“Where are we going?”

“Some bar.”

“Really?” I said, hesitating for a moment. “They’re going to film us drinking?”

“I don’t know, Hale. We’re late, though. Do you think you could move it along?” He stuffed his hands in his pockets and I looped my arm through one of his.

It was cold outside. I flipped the collar of my blazer up and tucked my chin down in an effort to conserve heat. It didn’t do much, and I was glad when Tango pointed to a dimly lit pub at the end of the next block. I would’ve picked up my pace, but I couldn’t feel my legs. I hoped I wouldn’t have to sniff back a runny nose while filming. Not only would I be known as the childish bitch who runs from ghosts, I’d be known as the childish bitch who runs from ghosts and has snot running down her face. Fucking fabulous.

Tango and I crowded into the coat room of the pub, stomping our feet and breathing heavily like people always do when they’re cold. It was busy for a Thursday (or maybe Thursdays were always busy there. I don’t know). I could hear men cheering over some sort of sports game, games of pool being played, and music playing from an old jukebox I could see just through the empty doorway. I hung my blazer on a wooden peg and stepped into the main room.

Not two seconds later, I froze, arm flung out to prevent Tango walking past me.

“Where are the camera crews?” I said in a low voice, staring around the room with wary eyes. I spotted Jay and Grant at a table in the corner with Steve. They raised their arms in greeting, Steve stared into his beer.

“What camera crews?” Tango grinned.

“Fuck you, Dave Tango.” I punched him hard in the shoulder, then grabbed the collar of his shirt and dragged him back into the coat room. “I’m going to kill you.” I hissed, crossing my arms over my chest.

“Look, I had to tell you something, or you wouldn’t have come.”

“Tango, there’s a reason I wouldn’t have come.”

“Oh, okay, what? What, maybe like, I don’t know, you would’ve had a good time?” He threw his hands up and rolled his eyes. “Oh, shit, Carling Hale’s having a good time and isn’t sitting in her hotel room feeling sorry for herself.”

“I am not feeling sorry for myself.”

“Bull shit.” He narrowed his eyes.

“Bull shit, yourself. Tango, I don’t know if you’d noticed, but there happens to be a little tension going on right now. You know, like, I’m pretty sure Steve wants to strangle me with some extension cords and toss my lifeless corpse down a flight of stairs? Come on, man, you were there last night.”

“It’s a big bar,” He held his arms out and grinned, “It’s not like you have to talk to him. It’ll do you good to forget everything for a while, you know?”

“I forgot everything when I was asleep.” I grumbled.

“What’s the worst that could happen?” He said. I raised my eyebrows at him. “What the hell, Hale? You’re this crazy paranormal investigator who hangs out in dark basements with violent ghosts, and you’re afraid of a little beer and mixed company? You’re unbelievable.”

“Not afraid,” I held up a correctional finger, “Apprehensive.”

“Come on. I’ll keep an eye on you.”

“Who are you kidding? You can’t hold your liquor.”

“Fine, you’ll keep an eye on yourself.”

“I hate you, Dave Tango.” I rolled my eyes.

He grinned and reached behind my ear. “No you don’t.” He said, and came away with a quarter between his thumb and pointer finger. He pressed it into my palm and, in the same motion, took hold of my hand and dragged me through the doorway.

To be fair, the pub was kind of nice. Without the cameras rolling, I didn’t have to keep up a pretense or a fake smile. I could just sit at the end of the bar and chat it up with the bartender who was at least ten years older than me but still had something going for him. He asked me what I did for a living, and I explained my career in the paranormal, careful to leave out the show and everything. He was still interested, as were several people sitting near me and, before long, I was holding court there with five or so men of varying levels of attractiveness practically killing each other to buy my beers for me. I tossed my hair a little and kept talking because it was nice to be noticed. I secretly hoped Steve was watching and drowning in jealousy. Or maybe drowning in his desire to protect me from “panty-bandits”. I chuckled aloud and, before I could stop myself, glanced around for him.

He was no longer at the bar table with Jay and Grant, but standing near the juke box with a brunette who was much, much prettier than me. My mood darkened a little, but I reminded myself that I was doing the exact same thing (if not on a grander scale), and that everything was fair game. Especially given the fact that we weren’t speaking.

The bartender asked me something about EVP sessions, and I tore my eyes away from Steve to answer. A guy with a Corona hat and a sweaty face bought me another Bud Light, and I accepted it with a polite smile.

It wasn’t often that I was the center of attention, but, man, a girl who sits alone at a bar does not go unnoticed. I sort of wished Tango was with me so that I wouldn’t look like such a strumpet. Then I remembered that Tango was, in fact, a guy and therefore would be no help.
Corona Hat Guy let out a loud laugh at something I didn’t catch and put a heavy hand on my thigh. I raised my eyebrows in shock and looked at it pointedly, but he didn’t move it. I tried shifting my weight, crossing and uncrossing my legs, but he seemed to take the movement as a invitation to move his hand from my leg to my waist.

“Um, excuse me.” I said, slipping off the barstool and out of his grasp.

“Come on, sweetheart, don’t be like that.” He reached toward me with a lopsided grin. I took a step back.

“Back off.” Said someone else, taking the words right out of my mouth and sounding a lot more menacing than I would have. I glanced at the newcomer with mixed relief and apprehension. It was great that he was stepping in to assist the - dare I say it - damsel in distress (puke), but it wouldn’t do me any good to have another stranger wanting to have his hand on my knee.

It was Steve.

“Hey, sorry, man. She yours?” Corona Hat Guy held his hands up submissively.

“Yeah.” Steve said shortly, with a sidelong glance at me that had to be super obvious to everyone else.

I guess it wasn’t, because no one questioned him. They all returned to their beers like I hadn’t been there at all, which was fine. I looked up at Steve with mixed confusion and relief.

Before I could open my mouth to thank him, he said “You should be more careful”, reminding me that , oh yeah, we weren’t friends anymore. I snapped my mouth shut and crossed my arms over my chest.

“Well, you know, I was going to thank you.” I huffed. He walked away without saying anything and leaned against the bar, out of sight of the, for lack of a better term, “panty bandits”. I followed, and leaned against it, myself, if only just to piss him off.

“Well, are you?” Steve said after a few minutes of silence.

“Am I what?”

“Are you going to thank me?” He looked at me directly without a glare on his face for what had to be the first time in weeks. I was too taken aback to think up a witty retort.

“Thank you.” I said quickly.

“You’re welcome.” He said, and looked away.

Three and a half seconds of eye contact. Progress.

“So, ah,” I stuttered, then thought better of it and instead took a pull on my beer and pretended to be engrossed in a display of sports paraphernalia hung on the wall directly in front of me.

“Yeah.” Steve said.

It occurred to me that this might be my only chance to apologize for the way I’d been acting, but I couldn’t bring myself to tear my eyes away from the brown stains in the armpits of the signed baseball jersey on the wall. My beer was almost empty, and Steve kept shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Without looking at him, I opened my mouth, figuring I would do some improvisation and ease myself into an apology.

“Right, so…” Was all I could manage. Steve didn’t even bother with a response, just scratched at his three days’ worth of stubble and glanced out at me from under his TAPS hat.

I absolutely despised myself for being a monosyllabic asshole. He was probably two seconds from saying “Yeah, you know what? I knew there was a reason I stopped talking to you”, and then abandoning me for his brunette. I’d get sloshed all by myself and be set upon by rabid, single men with no one to save me because, the last time I’d seen Tango, he’d been pursuing another blonde, and he was the only one who’d care.

And you know what’s the absolute worst? I’d be upset about it. I’d be completely bummed out and jealous of Steve’s brunette and wishing that I’d said something wittier than ‘Right, so’. Let me just take my foot out of my mouth.

“So, listen,” He said suddenly, unknowingly rescuing me from my wallowing. I tore my eyes from the wall and saw that he was staring at the display of liquor bottles in the center of the bar. “What the hell happened? To you and me, I mean.”

“I was going to ask you.” I said honestly, surprising myself with a full sentence.

“I’m asking you.” He said. I sucked my teeth and thought for a minute.

“Well, you woke up in my hotel room and then stopped talking to me. I don’t know, Steve. What do you want me to say?”

“Really?” He said, ignoring my question. “Because, I don’t know, I sort of thought it was the other way around. You stopped talking to me and started telling anyone who would listen that there was nothing going on between us.”

“There wasn’t, though.” I said.

“Fine, but did you have to make such a big fucking deal about it? Seriously, Hale, you made it sound like nothing could’ve been worse.” He threw his hands out in front of him and turned his head to look at me.

I didn’t really know what to say. My brain was sprinting and I was swimming through cement trying to catch up. Was he really asking me why I’d so fervently denied claims of anything between us? Hadn’t Tango said something along the lines of “maybe he didn’t think it was nothing” in reference to the hotel incident? What did that mean, exactly? Was he simply insulted, or was it something else? I hesitated to think past the ‘insulted’ part.

“Steve, I didn’t mean to offend you, or anything, but you did kind of throw me under the bus.”

“How did I…?”

“Well, when rumors started circulating, you didn’t exactly do anything to stop them. Maybe I got a little over zealous in my denials, but, Christ, I wouldn’t have had to if you’d have just helped me out a little.”

He stared down at the bar and nodded his head. Neither of us said anything for a little while, and I wondered if that meant our conversation was over, if I should walk away and go on not being friends with him but be a little nicer about it because he had at least tried to figure some shit out.

“So…”

“So,” I said slowly, because, whether I wanted to admit it or not, I wasn’t ready to stop talking to him, yet. “I guess we just made some mistakes.”

“I couldn’t help but notice that ‘mistakes’ was plural.” He said.

“Well, we probably should’ve killed Tango. And we probably shouldn’t’ve spent the night together in the first place.”

“Really?” He said. He was frowning out at me from the depths of his hat.

“Yeah. We both know he can’t keep his mouth shut.” I said. Steve shook his head.

“No, I’m saying ‘Really, we shouldn’t’ve spent the night together’?” he said. I almost choked on nothing in my shock. He was still frowning.

“Well, no. I mean, we were drunk. Or, I guess I was, anyway. And there was nothing going on between us, right? So technically there was no point.”

“Technically.” He agreed. “But, I don’t know. I was kind of thinking it wasn’t so bad.”

I studied him for a minute, unsure of how to proceed. The first thing that jumped to my head was how I’d realized that morning all those weeks ago that I hadn’t exactly minded the feeling of being all huddled up against him. The second thing, though, was how terrible it had been since then. What if, hypothetically, of course, I told him that no, sleeping together hadn’t been bad at all, really. What if our relationship progressed past trips to Boston and cups of coffee, onto possibly waking up next to each other every morning (clothing optional)? And, finally, what if it all fell through in the end and we stopped talking again? What if, God forbid, things got so bad, one of us had to leave TAPS? Could I deal with that? Did I care?

Maybe we should give it a go…

“I’m having an epiphany here, Steve.” I said and, before I could think about my actions enough to stop me from actually doing them, I stood on my toes and crushed my lips to his. He didn’t respond for a minute, and I almost pulled away, afraid he’d be disgusted with me and we’d be back in square one. But, to my surprise and immense relief, he lifted a hand from the bar and wrapped an arm around my waist, then began kissing me back in a way that, admittedly, made my head spin. When he pulled away, I stood simply blinking for a minute, unsure of how to proceed.

“So, what was your epiphany?” He said, looking like his brains were a little scrambled.

“Oh, that was it.” I said simply. He nodded, and we seemingly simultaneously decided that it was time we joined the rest of the world, because, without talking about it first, we turned and moved toward the side of the bar that actually had people in it which was, coincidentally, back within eyeshot of Jay, Grant, and Tango, who were all sitting at that little corner table.
Tango caught sight of me and looked horrified until Steve dropped an arm around my waist in a way that suggested a little more than friendship. Jay and Grant started chuckling and I may have blushed a little, but it was alright, man. Things were good.