I'm Restless, Obsessed With Your Future

Jack, he hears. Jack, you little fuck, wake up. He unwillingly rolls over to his left and groans in despair. There’s no way he’s slept more than an hour or two. He opens his sleepy eyes and looks at the person calling his name. “Alex,” he grumbles. “What’s up?”
 
“Oh, nothing,” whispers Alex with a smile. Then he frowns.
 
Before Jack can even ask what’s wrong, Alex slaps him across the face. His right cheek stings in pain. “Dude, what the fuck!”
 
“You stole my girl, you ass wipe!”
 
“Wha—” Then he remembers. He turns around and sees Dessa, sound asleep. She’s closer to him than he remembered her being. “Okay,” says Jack, facing Alex again. “We didn’t do anything, I promise.”
 
Alex scoffs. “Yeah, that’s exactly what Danielle said.”
 
It takes a while, but slowly, the night is coming back to him. “I can explain that,” he begins.
 
“You don’t need to fucking explain it! You stole my fucking girl and you-”
 
“It was just to make Danielle jealous!” Jack says as loudly as he can without waking Dessa. “We were literally just talking the whole night.”
 
Alex hesitates for a second, trying to take Jack seriously. The idea of “talking” to a girl is a foreign concept that Alex can’t seem to understand. “Talking?” he asks mockingly. “Seriously, you expect me to think that you were sober enough to do anything less than fuck her?”
 
“Dude, her boyfriend cheated on her like, a week ago. They just broke up.”
 
Jack can see Alex’s face deflate. He hates losing arguments almost as much as he hates losing girls. “That makes a lot of sense, actually,” he finally makes out, regrettably taking defeat.
 
“Yeah,” says Jack, reveling in the moment. “You inconsiderate piece of shit, trying to take advantage of her. She told me about you.”
 
“How the fuck was I supposed to know she was cheated on?!”
 
It’s hard not to laugh when Alex gets so offended, but Jack is aware of the sleeping girl next to him, so he holds it in for her sake. “Calm down,” he says, keeping his amusement to himself.

Alex sighs. "You guys need to go, though."

Jack is taken aback. "You mean the room or the apartment?" he asks, expecting for a spot to be available on the couch in the living room.

"Well, I mean… you can sleep on the floor if you can find a spot."

Great, he thinks, annoyed by Alex's stupid revenge for hanging out with the girl that he wishes he could've fucked. He knows that even with sympathy, his best friend isn't going to budge. "What about Dessa?"

"She can deal."

He chuckles somewhat loudly, startling Alex a little. "Fuck you," he says. He rolls back to Dessa and shakes her shoulder back and forth. "Dessa," he says quietly. He watches her face go from a peaceful sleep to a surprised squint. "We have to leave."

"Hm?" She doesn't move.

"Alex is kicking us out."

At the sound of Alex's name, Dessa opens her eyes, confirming her fears of the man standing by the bedside with a smirk across his mouth. "Oh," she says, closing her eyes again and hoping he disappears. "God." She's thankful when he doesn't say anything back. After a few seconds, she forces herself to sit up, surprised by the lack of energy in her body. She stretches and yawns, almost unable to stay awake. When she feels like she has the will stand on her own two feet, she looks at Jack. "Let's go."


She stares at the subway map and can't translate its patterns. It's all a bunch of colorful lines and dots without a system, taunting her tired mind. Her eyes don't have the energy to move further than the star that indicates she is here. Somewhere in Brooklyn.

"You need help?"

She sighs, too tired to look over at Jack. "Yeah," she says in the middle of a yawn. "Washington Square."

Jack glances over and wrinkles his face out of curiosity. "Do you go to NYU?"

"Yep," she says as she wipes her eyes.

Jack nods, looks at the map, and tries to find a connection to the Washington Square Park station from here. It's a long way from Brooklyn, especially considering his final destination is only three stops away from this station. "So you're kind of far."

"Hm."

"I mean," he begins, even though he doesn't have much else to add. "You're all the way in the Village, and I'm basically right here."

Dessa's still slightly unaware of her surroundings, but tries to look at Jack so as to be polite when speaking to him. "I can just go by myself," she says while yawning again.

Immediately, he tenses up. "No way," he snaps. "You're a college student in her early twenties that clearly isn't awake enough to defend herself."

Despite her sleepiness, she understands the concern from her new friend. "So what should I do?" she asks.

He pauses and considers the possibilities of riding the subway or a taxi with her, only to proceed to his own apartment in solitude. Not ideal. Between the additional cost and time, along with losing Dessa for the night, he's not willing the accept his options. If only she were a girl that he could just take home and worry about in the morning.

"Wait," he says, realizing the brilliance of this plan. "You could stay at my place for the night."


"So you just stayed at his place?"

"Yes."

"And you didn't have sex."

"Well, no."

"So you did?!"

Talking to Morgan is essentially hopeless. "No, Morgan," she explains. "I did not have sex with him." Dessa glances at her French homework.

They pause.

"You would tell me if you had sex with him, right?" Morgan asks frantically.

"Sure," says Dessa, but only to amuse her roommate. "Sure." She stares outside her window from her desk and looks at Washington Square, the only green area on her campus. It's especially colorful today, maybe partly due to yesterday's rain, but also because of the college students lounging around the now-dry park. "So how was your night?" she asks, looking back down at the homework.

"It was good!" Morgan says. "I, uh…" She takes a breath. "I kind of hooked up with Alex." She speaks almost as if she's apologizing.

Dessa closes her eyes slowly, keeping every word she wants to say inside of her. The eyes open. She continues to face her French. "Hm," is all she says. She reads a question from her worksheet: Écrivez quatre phrases au sujet de votre musique préférée. Quel est votre groupe préféré? Pourquoi pensez-vous comme eux? Four sentences about her favorite band. She writes that blink-182 is her favorite music group because both she and her sisters like them. Mon groupe préféré est blink-182. Je les aime parce qu'ils sont le seul groupe que moi et mes sœurs en profiter.

"Look, I know it's stupid to you..."

Dessa glances up at the shelf on her desk and frowns. Though disappointed, she turns to her friend. "But?"

Morgan smiles a little. "I don't know. He was just really cool about everything. Like, he didn't force me to do shit. And he actually asked for my number this morning."

She faces her homework again in an attempt to keep her annoyance from showing. Remembering Jack, she writes that 'Josie' is her favorite song. La chanson 'Josie' est ma préférée. Cela me rappelle la maison. "Well, I'm happy for you," she says in the most unenthusiastic manner she possibly can.

Morgan's phone begins to vibrate constantly. "Hello?" Dessa hears. She tunes Morgan out and tries to focus, looking to the next prompt. She has to write another four sentences, but this time, it's about her opinion of art. What does that even mean? What kind of art? All art? No, all art is too broad. She could get really philosophical if she wanted, asking questions herself. What is art? Unfortunately, philosophy is difficult in French; she'll end up writing something pretty bland.

"Hey," says Morgan. "Did you leave a white t-shirt at Alex's?"