Congratulations

"Oh. OK. I just wanted to make sure you were all right. I don't want anything to be messed up between us."

"No way. We're good . . ." and her voice trailed off a little. "Congratulations on that job. You deserved it. We'll miss you around here for a while."

It might have been my imagination, but I thought I saw her get a little misty on me.

We both stared at each other with little half smiles, not knowing what to say next.

"Bye" she said, and she stood on her toes to plant a real, solid kiss on my mouth, with both hands on my face as I stood motionless.

Before I could say anything, she spun on her heels and walked the other way.

"Yeah . . . bye." I said awkwardly. I stood there, watching her walk away for a solid two minutes, oblivious to the people walking in and out of the bar nearby. I reveled in her smell that was all over me. As cars honked and I heard shouts in the distance, I slowly felt an anxiety creeping up on me, crowding out the ecstasy that I had experienced just moments before. I thought to myself: Was she headed home, thinking about me, or was she headed to the next place and whoever that was? In my mind I had to decide that she was headed home, like I was about to, and was going to daydream about that night for decades. It was too painful to think about it any other way, at least at the moment. In the moment, I wanted her to be all mine.

When I came back from my trip after six weeks, I went to the Barbary looking to re-establish my old network. In my absence, I had become something of a legend, apparently because a lot of other folks thought Em was a lesbian, too. However, being nicknamed "bathroom guy" was not the honor you might hope it would be, so I eventually found a new watering hole around the corner with the same kind of crowd - but different. I wanted so badly to re-capture that incredible feeling, but whenever I saw Em around in her workout clothes and fuzzy ponytail, she was as friendly as ever, but she acted like nothing had ever happened between us. Her old posse was preserved, and evidently they had made some kind of pact to not to speak of "the incident" again.

I never saw the "other" Em again. Some lucky bastard, someday, will see that sweet, fiery, passionate, loving Em, but I've lost hope that it will be me.