Arrhythmia (12 page)

With a sense of relief, I joined them and took my time studying the drink menu. Feeling halfway sober once more, a little tipsy at most, I summarily decided on a Long Island Iced Tea.

Connoisseurs know, of course, that this cocktail is not for sissies. It’s basically a mess of different types of alcohol to which a dash of Coke is added to lend the whole thing a little color.

Just the thing for my present state of mind.

Determined to get my hands on one immediately, I resolutely tried to squeeze by Frank to get to the counter.

“Hey, there’s no pushing allowed here!” he scolded good-naturedly and blocked my way.

“I’m dying of thirst; I don’t have time to be considerate,” I whined.

“I see. Where were you all this time anyway?”

“I looked for you guys but you disappeared!”

“You were the one who disappeared first. There were too many people back there, so we found ourselves a quieter spot.”

“Yeah, I get it,” I put him off. “Can I please order now?”

He laughed and made way. Sebastian said something to him, so he turned away from me. I leaned on the tall paneling of the bar and impatiently drummed my fingers on the counter. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that the guy next to me was eyeing me curiously. I turned slightly to him and carried out a brief check myself. A little taller than I, buzz cut, body type suggesting too much time spent at the gym and perhaps an affinity for steroids. On his neck, he flaunted a large tattoo of a snake. All in all, really not my type.

Still, I gave him a reasonably friendly smile before nabbing the overworked bartender and ordering my drink. As I was waiting, I continued to sense this character next to me. To prevent him from getting the notion of talking to me, I did everything I could to ignore him and continued to drum on the table. As soon as I had my drink in hand, I beat a hasty retreat and went to stand next to Vera.

“What’s that you’re drinking?” she wanted to know.

“Long Island,” I answered curtly and took the first sip.

Ew, disgusting . . . and somehow delicious.

Vera shook her head and grinned. “Are we going to have to carry you home again tonight or what?”

“Oh, I’m sure I can handle one little glass!”

“We shall see,” she giggled and raised her caipirinha.

We reminisced for a while about our worst drinking experiences. The infamous iced tea was indeed doing its worst and, after only half a glass, I found my tongue becoming a little heavy. But I was still within the acceptable range, so I continued sipping away through my straw.

When I noticed Vera looking over my shoulder with a mixture of surprise and delight, I knew that Desiderio must have found me.

And sure enough, next thing I knew, he was whispering in my ear. “Hello, beautiful. Buy you a drink?”

I held up my glass by way of explanation. “Already got one.”

“Oh, I can wait until you’re finished,” he declared airily. Then he pushed a suntanned arm past me and extended his hand to Vera. “Hi, I’m Desiderio.”

What the hell? Now he was putting the moves on my best friend?

“Vera,” she breathed and briefly shook his slender hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

I choked on my drink and coughed into the face of my
former
best friend.

What was that?
Had she lost her mind, saying something like that to him?

“Oh really?” Desiderio grinned next to me. “All good, I hope.”

“No!” I wheezed.

“Yes, of course,” Vera lied.

What the hell has gotten into Vera? Is she drunk?
I was ready to kill her.

I tried to convey this as well as other threats to Vera with my eyes. She, however, paid very little attention to my anger and continued to beam at Desiderio instead.

I was still coughing as she carried on with her insanity. “Yeah, Lena has mentioned you a bunch. You two seem to have a lot of fun together at work.”

“Oh yes,” Desiderio answered. “We get on splendidly, don’t we?”

Since I was approaching asphyxia, I was in no position to comment on this impertinence. With tears in my eyes, I fought for air until Desiderio finally took pity and slapped me on the back. Soon, the panic in my throat subsided, though I might have just been distracted by his hand, which lingered between my shoulder blades. I could feel its warmth through the thin fabric of my dress.

“Better now?” he asked.

I quickly slipped away from the strong hand and wiped my eyes while I gave Vera a look intended to make her understand that she was close to dying a violent death. But she just gave an innocent smile and winked at me conspiratorially.

Fucking traitor!

“What do you want, Desiderio?” I snapped once I was halfway able to breathe again.

“I want to have a conversation with you.”

“Don’t you have any friends?”

“Oh, I do. Plenty.”

“Then why don’t you just go have a conversation with them?” I asked angrily.

“Because they aren’t nearly as attractive as you,” he answered without hesitation.

Vera giggled and I grumbled. Irritated, I sucked down my drink in one chug.

Desiderio watched me with glistening eyes. At least he refrained from making a comment about the straw. “You see? Your glass is empty, and I can finally buy you a drink! Was that a Long Island?”

I made a face. “I’m not thirsty right now.”

“Hm . . . Perhaps you’d like to dance with me?”

“Dance, yes. With you, no.”

“Why not? I’m a good dancer.” He pretended to be a little hurt.

“Sure. Anyone can say that.”

“Don’t you believe me? I can prove it to you!”

“No, thanks.” I waved him away haughtily. “No need.”

He thought for a moment. “Could this have something to do with those dirty mental images you mentioned earlier?”

Vera giggled again. Desiderio grinned at me mischievously.

I put on my best bitch face and said nothing. It wouldn’t have done any good anyway.

He heaved an exaggerated sigh. “All right, then. You don’t want anything to drink, you don’t want to dance . . . so we’ll just stand around the way people do in any decent club.”

“You’re going to drive me insane,” I said without meaning to. “There are plenty of women here for you to seduce. All you have to do is choose one!”

He looked at me solemnly. “But I already have.”

His look overwhelmed me, and I was close to collapsing.

“Go find a different one, then!” I snapped angrily. I dragged a very surprised Vera toward the dance floor by her arm.

“Lena! Are you nuts? Why would you treat him like that?” she asked loudly.

Furious, I turned to her. “Excuse me? Who’s gone nuts here? I really ought to kick your ass for what you said back there.
‘I’ve heard sooo much about you!’
Are you out of your damn mind? I can’t get away from his come-ons, and you have to encourage him? What were you thinking?”

Now it was Vera’s turn to get angry. She put her hands on her hips and glared right back at me. “Come back to earth, OK? If you’d just open your eyes for once in your life. This Desiderio guy is Prince fucking Charming! He’s handsome, smart, sexy . . . and most of all, he’s crazy about you! Are you really too stupid to see that?”

“All that guy wants to do is get me into bed so I won’t mess up his stats.”

“Nonsense! What makes you so sure?”

“Just look at him!”

“Oh believe me, I have. And I’ll tell you one thing: he’s making a pretty insane amount of effort for a one-night stand.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That means I don’t agree with you at all.”

“You don’t even know him!”

“No, but neither do you. Just think about it.”

For a moment, we glared at each other silently.

“Fine, whatever,” I finally relented. “Let’s forget about it and go dance a little. It’s your birthday!”

Vera nodded, well aware of how stubborn we both were. “But you know my opinion on the matter,” she warned.

“Yeah, yeah, come on!”

We pushed our way through and joined the fray on the dance floor. Despite the late hour, Go was still packed. Using my elbows, I gracefully carved out just enough space for us to dance.

The music felt awesome. Just the thing for unwinding.

I closed my eyes and felt the bass vibrate in my abdomen. Almost automatically, I started moving my body to the rhythm. The flashing of the big spotlights, the loud music, and, not least, the Long Island Iced Tea temporarily transported me to another world. A world with no cares. At that moment, the only thing that mattered was the here and now, and that consisted of having fun!

I playfully threw my arms in the air and gyrated my hips to a mixture of techno and Latin American rhythms. Vera did the same and even uttered a cry of joy.

After a while, I came back to myself a little and ventured a glance back to our spot at the bar.

Unbelievable.

Desiderio was still there, watching—and even waving at me!

Time to find out who had greater endurance, me while dancing or him while standing around and being bored. Certain of victory, I turned away and devoted myself to the music.

At some point, I noticed that someone kept bumping into me. At first I was slightly peeved, but then I realized it was some kind of unsophisticated come-on. I looked over at the bar to make sure the dancer trying to rub up behind me wasn’t Desiderio.

But he hadn’t budged. The only change was that now he was talking to Sebastian and Frank.

What an SOB!
Now he was going after my friends.

And it looked like they were getting along famously.

I automatically clenched my fists as I considered going over there, grabbing him by the collar, and dragging him outside. Or would it be better to tell a bouncer that that slick character in the blue shirt had sexually harassed me? Ha! Those gorillas would take care of things before he even knew what hit him! I was strongly considering finding one when I felt the dancer bump up against me again.

I peeked behind me and recognized the guy with the snake tattoo. He wasn’t what you might call a gifted dancer, but he was doing his best to impress me. He tried to draw my attention to his jacked biceps, but the inflated muscles turned me more off than on.

Again I looked over to Desiderio, who was still watching. His face seemed tense, and there was no trace of his earlier lightheartedness.

Aha!

Prince Charming had noticed that Snake Tattoo was hitting on me, and he was not at all pleased.

Aw, too bad!

I turned to my admirer with a broad smile and danced with him.

Admittedly, it wasn’t very mature of me, but it just felt nice that for once it was Desiderio who was furious and not me.

And he was definitely furious!

Even from afar, I could see him grinding his teeth. If looks could kill, Snake Tattoo would have keeled over.

What fun!

Desiderio’s reaction stoked me so much that I even permitted the stranger to grab my hips from behind. He pressed me into his pelvis and forced me into gyrating movements that absolutely did not fit with the music.

I actually hated dancing like this. I wasn’t some kind of dance-floor slut. It was only Desiderio’s chalky-white face that made me let Snake Tattoo touch me like that.

At some point, Vera grabbed me by the arm and tore me away from the strange hands.

“What the hell are you trying to do?” she hissed.

“Huh? I’m dancing!”

“Wrong! That dude is trying to jack off on you. That shit has nothing to do with dancing.”

I immediately felt ashamed for my childish behavior.

“You’re right,” I admitted with my shoulders hanging. “Come on. Let’s go.”

I gave Snake Tattoo a hand signal to tell him I had to leave with my friend. He looked so disappointed that I almost felt sorry for him.

I quickly scampered behind Vera back to the bar. I was even more ashamed of my stupid behavior when I saw Desiderio. He was standing with his arms crossed, glowering at me. His eyes were so dark that I was almost frightened.

Since I was not in the mood for one of his stupid pronouncements, I turned right just before the bar. “I have to go to the restroom,” I quickly said to Vera before fleeing yet again. What a coward I was!

The club crowd was gradually tapering off, so there was no traffic jam in the ladies’ room. I found a stall right away, slammed the door shut, and rested my sweaty forehead against it.

Shit, that had really been a dumb move on my part. I regularly ridiculed women who felt they had to impress men by dancing like that, and now I had suddenly mutated into one myself.
Oh God, how embarrassing!

And once again, Desiderio was to blame . . .

Because for once I’d felt like I could get even with him. Man, I simply couldn’t think straight where this guy was concerned.

Shit!

The evening was turning, slowly but surely, into a catastrophe. My head pounded, and my feet were hurting from the high heels. In addition, I was feeling pretty woozy.

The best solution was for me to go home and bathe in self-pity.

I washed my hands and looked at myself. A radiant beauty? No. But it was good enough for the walk home.

“Did you have to change your panties?” someone asked as I stepped into the hallway. Of course, I immediately recognized his voice. It was only the hateful tone that was new to me.

“Pardon?”

“Well, after your porno performance just now, that guy is definitely cleaning himself off.”

Wow, that really was nasty.

My lower lip began to quiver. “My dancing doesn’t concern you.”

“But it does.”

“And you’re loitering around the ladies’ room to tell me that?”

“I have to, since you’re always running away from me.”

Without being asked, he walked alongside me. “You’re running away from me at this moment.”

Damn it.

I stopped.

“What else?” I asked. Because I was swaying a little, I leaned against the wall just to be safe.

Desiderio shook his head. “Why are you always angry at me?”