The Storm Ch. 02 of 03

Most people have noises they fall asleep best too.

Because sleep - good sleep - is important.

For the fortunate people, it is the absolute mental and physical rejuvenation that is only truly possible to have, keep and genuinely enjoy when childless and without truly great responsibility. Others, the regular people (the privileged and the medicated, mostly) fixate on a steady sound, rhythm, beat or song that best lulls them to the sweet, loving embrace of sleep.

Whether that sound was silence, rainfall, their breathing, waterfalls and running water, their heartbeat, jungle noises, the quieting rustle of their mattress and the blankets, animal noises, their partner's breathing or body, white noise or music or the sounds of the television - it's completely individual.

It's what works for them.

Imagine that's what they're used too.

Then there's you.

You're the person that never sleeps well. You toss and shift and turn and squirm and worm and open your eyes to focus in on the glowing numbers of your alarm clock (just in case you accidentally managed to fall asleep at some point between the last time you checked it) and fail to really hit your unconscious stride - because instead of sleeping - you prefer to worry and stress about just how little time you actually have left to sleep.

It's a vicious cycle.

You wake up feeling tired, lethargic, irritable, and it impacts the first few hours of your day - until you gobble down some caffeine and sugar and manage to hobble your way through another one before repeating the process all over again.

Sleep - good sleep - is a commodity.

Imagine then, the intense anger - the frustration - that might take you if somebody denied you your god given right to a few hours of sleep - how fucking furious you would be that those strange people you didn't know were selfishly having the best sex of their life just next door - or a few doors down - or across the street - or anywhere within sight or eyesight or earshot, really.

Imagine how the sounds of animalistic, lusty, purposeful passion (it sounds a little bit like bed springs, wet slapping noises and grunts and howls - in case you were curious) would draw your attention, like a moth to the flame, towards your anger; which is all the fuel the dwindling fire of your unwanted consciousness needs to reignite back to it's regular blazing glory.

You were criticizing their sex noises in your head. You'd never admit it, but you were.

Be honest.

Sex was not a noise most people fell asleep best too. You had to wonder about the ones that did.

It's too distracting. Too engaging. Too arousing.

Especially when it sounded that good.

Especially when you've never had it sound that good.

It made you angry.

Not because strangers were having the times of their lives, of course. Nothing inherently wrong with that.

You're angry because you can hear them. Hear the effort they're putting in to pleasure each other - and some part of you is jealous. Envious. Because you can't get to sleep; because your spouse isn't that passionate; because you aren't that passionate. Your sex life is tepid - irregular - lukewarm - comfortably uncomfortable - and theirs is aflame. Boiling. Fun.

You're angry because your mind, which controls your consciousness, comes to realize and internalize, at some point, on a very quiet and subconscious level - even if you're not quite aware of it - that there are certain things you don't get to have, or enjoy, because you never bothered to earn them.

Whether that's success, sex, money, or just a few hours of goddamned sleep.

You don't understand how to do it - or how others do it - how they simply close their eyes and just be comfortable. How they just let go; how they consciously choose to stop worrying and disconnect. How they shift the object, the focus, of their mind's eye to the regular, relaxed state of their breathing, or another sound - rather then the annoyingly vivid and emotionally taxing recall of the day's events.

The day's mistakes.

The day's problems.

You don't understand how other people shut out the exterior world; and change their focus to the interior one; nerves firing and vibrating; the fatigue and trauma of another long day ringing through your body and mind like liberty bells that are habitually ignored and overlooked; leading your subconscious - desperately needing time to recover from another long day of exertion and effort and failure and some small, minor accomplishments - seizes the reigns, takes control, and allows your conscious mind to soak into that dark, restful, silent oblivion while it repairs and reorganizes the tattered shambles you've made of everything.

For a few hours.

Before the whole thing starts all over again and it becomes your problem again.

Nobody ever talks about it.

What people living in an apartment buildings do choose to talk about is the new person who just moved in across the hall, or down the hall - or on the floors directly above and below the horrible, enthusiastic sex noises. Did you hear that last night? Yeah, I think everybody heard that, hurr hurr. Obligatory jokes and comments.

Yeah, I thought about calling the police too. How selfish of them.

Think of the children traumatized by the sounds of passion.

How dare they.

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You ever have one of those days when you just do not want to wake up?

When you're conscious of the dry, dehydrated, gross taste in your mouth long before you actually crack open your eyelids.

Those days when you just don't care enough to do something, anything, about the awful taste. You may have been snoring. Drool could be a bit of an issue. Dignity and unconsciousness are rarely on speaking terms.

You slept well. Deeply.

Despite yourself.

One of those.

As Sonya's dark lashes fluttered to life, wincing and recoiling a little from the sunlight streaming in through the window at an unfamiliar angle; it took her eyes and mind a moment to get it together and put a face on her new surroundings. She was experiencing that sensation you have when you're on vacation, or traveling, or visiting somebody.

Like your sleeping is right, but the where is wrong. It's hard to describe.

It's the same feeling people have after a good (or bad, depending on how you want to think about it) night of drinking. Or partying. Or clubbing.

Unfamiliarity.

You learn to get used to it - but it's always there. Home is where the heart is.

It always happens when you move somewhere new - at some point or another you find yourself painfully aware of the differences in your new furniture arrangement (in this case; unlabeled torn garbage bags packed full of clothing and a randomly placed drawer-less dresser laying haphazardly against the wall); your new ceiling (was that a stain? She'd have to talk to the landlord about that) and the big mess you know you're going to have to get around to dealing with.

It sucked.

Moving sucked.

She sighed, yawned and gave a wicked looking stretch before sinking back into the mattress with a small sigh.

You see, Sonya had just finished moving in to her new apartment last night - with the help of one of her classmates. She shifted position, caught the inglorious whiff of body odour and it all came flooding back - the call, her classmate, the move, the beers, the...

The sex.

Dear god, the sex.

Her eyes sprung open as her mind splashed her consciousness in the face with cold spring water.

Wakey, wakey.

She slammed her eyes back shut as adrenaline, stress and anxiety began to spread through her.

No, she couldn't think of that now. Not yet. She had absolutely no idea what she was going to do, how to proceed or even what to think. Her apartment was a tidy compared to the state of her personal life, right now. Her head was pounding a little as the beer she had last night took in the views, enjoyed the sights and left a distinct, unique trail composed entirely of garbage floating around her system.

She knew that to be true because she could taste it. Taste the garbage.

Mmm.

Morning breath. Another unpleasant reminder of last night.

That's why you brush your teeth, folks.

She closed her eyes and took a moment to consider the condition - the general feeling - of her body. A little sore. A little hungover.

Stage one tourists.

Canadians.

Not bad, considering.

Though she would never admit it socially, electronically or even to herself; Sonya had been on enough binges in her time that she had unintentionally developed a highly sophisticated four-tiered categorical system to roughly communicate the severity of them. Call it the alcoholic's morning after Richter scale.

Rosetta Stone, maybe?

Whatever. It worked.

SONYA'S FOUR LEVELS OF HANGOVER; 1.The Canadian drinking American beer. 2.The American drinking Canadian beer. 3.The American drinking with an Australian. 4.The Australian.

Sonya covered her face with her funny smelling sheets (sighing as she was enveloped by the smell - the incriminating, unmistakable odor of stale sex) in an age-old motion used the world over by the young and old alike to symbol and signal the outside world that the enclosed participant was not ready to deal with or acknowledge what lay outside the protective cocoon of the all-comfortable, all-powerful blanket for as long as was deemed necessary.

The butterfly would emerge when it was ready.

To piss.

She took a moment to consider whether she needed to cry as she folded herself into a ball under the covers, hugging her knees to chest. Eyes tight and breathing sharp. Vulnerable.

No - she didn't need to cry. Not really. Not about the sex, anyways. Not that. Combined with the massage the night before, she physically felt... vigorous, vibrant, vital - some other v-word that didn't do the feeling justice. Amazing, in other words. She felt amazing and she felt like calling somebody - one of her girlfriends, maybe - to brag, but she couldn't.

She certainly couldn't do that. Could she? She felt bad about wanting to brag, to tell the world - because she felt a little bit like she had just won a contest.

Some sort of strange, hard to define or explain sexual partner slot machine ...thing.

But Steve.

Her fiance.

She winced away from really visualizing his reaction to the news. The shame, the hurt, the disgust.

The pain. The recrimination.

The disappointment.

What the hell was she going to do?

She hated moving. Moving complicated everything. Sonya decided that the only reasonable solution would be to never change living locations for the rest of her life as she threw back the protective covers of her blankety cocoon, drinking in the fresh air.

Her bladder had decided that it was time to move.

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Emerging from the bathroom after a nearly spiritual shower (idly noting that she would have to change the curtain) Sonya paddled into the kitchen, absentmindedly tying the belt around her waist. Glancing at the living room couch as she emerged from the bathroom; she wasn't sure whether she was more relieved or disappointed to find her apartment empty.

Daylight illuminated the scene of the crime. She felt a like the carpet was an accomplice.

They would never again talk of what they had both been involved in- but it would forever alter their lives.

Their relationship.

Was that crazy?

Yes. Probably. Maybe. No.

Whatever.

Clad in her fuzziest bathrobe and wincing a little as she ran a comb through the knots in her hair (ow) she couldn't help but give a small, subvocal sigh as she approached her empty fridge.

Despite knowing on an intellectual level that having groceries in the fridge required that a person first buy them; she felt obligated on some level to go through the motions. Maybe positive thinking would be enough. The sight of an empty, desolate fridge would undoubtedly inspire and motivate her enough to go grocery shopping.

On an empty stomach.

Yeah, that would end well.

Her tummy groaned.

Just then, the buzzer to her apartment bleeted like an animal, while the exact the source eluded her. Where the hell? It took her a moment to orientate herself and locate it. The awful little machine by the door chirped a second time before she could locate it. There were two small buttons on the box - both of which she mashed while smothering the noise it with her hands; trying to make it stop.

It did.

"Hello?" she asked, somehow managing to convey the confusion of all her questions leading up to this particular morning in that simple query.

A voice issued forth from underneath her hands - muffled and tinny.

"Morning, sweetness. It's Steve".

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Crap. Oh,crapohcrap.

Sonya's imagination went to work like a commission-based outcall salesperson on an espresso-cocaine enema bender.

A long moment passed. He would kill her when he found out.

Would he?

No. Probably not.

Maybe. Yes.

Right?

"Steve? Babe? Just... just a minute. Give me a minute to get ready". No response.

Fuck.

He had to be heading up. Panic flooded her system as she strode back to her bedroom and tried to find something to wear.

She had about a minute to put herself together and come up with a game plan.

About a minute and a half later the knocking started; she had decided that "nude, in a warm bathrobe" was the outfit she would be wearing while dealing with the consequences of the biggest, most embarrassing mistake she had ever made.

Strolling towards the door, she put up her hair in a messy, carefree ponytail as the savaged plastic corpses of her unlabelled trash bags lay scattered around the floor of her room like the broken bodies of a mass-grave.

Their wrinkled, damp, cotton and denim insides exposed to the harsh light of day.

Rocking the floor-drobe.

Yeah, this would go well.

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He was on her before she had really finished opening the door. His hands, his mouth.

Oh.

Well, she did have that going for her.

Steve was a good guy. He had a decent job as an engineer and made decent money. He had nice parents and a nice family and a great car and an ambitious ten-year plan and actually had a plan of some sort that involved working for his dad's company. Something to do with computers. Or consulting. He had tried to explain it a few times, but she never really got it.

He was also an insatiable horndog.

Over the last two years she may or may not have been guilty of experimenting at times to see how far she could toe the line if she denied him. The results were shocking.

The packaged flat screen television in her living room stood testament to the ambition of her curiosity.

It was a problem.

Seriously. He had no willpower.

His roaming hands were already inside her bathrobe as she took this all in. He wasn't yelling, or angry, or disappointed, or pained. He was just acting the way he usually did, treating her like he usually did. Like they had had a minor fight and he wanted to get over it in the simplest way possible. Like she hadn't cuckolded him with a virtual stranger just a few hours ago. He had shaved, showered; he smelled good - he tasted fine.

It was... it was nice.

Really nice.

He lifted her up a little with an arm around her waist and she instinctively took the opportunity to wrap her long legs around him. She could already feel him, swelling against her.

As he did a bit of a duck-walk into her living room, attached as they were at the pelvis and mouth; the bath robe slipped off her shoulders.

He lifted her up a little and hungrily nibbled at the exposed skin of her breast. She winced as his cold hands made contact with her lower back and ran along her ass. She actually flinched a little when he began tugging on the knot of her bathrobe, his fingers brushing her belly button.

She detached herself and stood on her own again, readjusting her bathrobe.

On the carpet.

"Sorry," he apologized, wincing.

She pulled away for a moment and drank in the expression of his face. She had to tell him.

Right then.

Didn't she?

Her big brown eyes searched his green ones. Their eyes searched each other. Their exchange was silent. She was trying to force the words out, but they wouldn't come.

Steve, I cheated on you.

Steve, I got drunk and let another man fuck me.

Steve, I made a mistake.

His hands found hers and they stood there, together, facing one another at point blank range for a long moment. It really was a beautiful day. They were standing in the sunlight.

"I'm sorry, Sonya" he said, breaking the silence with his sincere apology; seeking out and holding her hands in his.

Fuck, they were cold. There's something about cold people - something about stealing somebody's warmth. That's probably how the vampire legends started, come to think of it - some guy with poor circulation and pointy eye-teeth shook the wrong hand. Imaginations run wild. Legends were born.

"I know I said I'd help you move - but I got called in for that important interview I was telling you about. Me and the guys decided to stay overnight instead of driving through the storm. Did you get my messages?"

She was staring at him, listening to the sound of his voice.

She removed her hands from his, folded her arms.

Eyes moist.

Lip aquiver.

God, she was sexy.

"I actually left early this morning to come see you. I brought us some breakfast. I'm sorry."

His eyes were searching her face. Looking for a reply. A response; a sign.

/Now/ she felt like crying.

That was fast.

Sonya could feel the pressure rising - the fear - the stress - the anxiety - threatening to spill precious moisture over her recently dried cheeks. That moment before actual crying occurs gives people a distinct look - a little bit like a lost puppy. Misty would probably be the best word to describe it.

She looked adorable.

The ridiculous bathrobe probably contributed to the effect.

She wanted to swear at him. She wanted to hit him and blame him for what she had done and demand that he forgive her.

Somehow that made sense. Last night wasn't her fault; he had cancelled on her - she had cheated on him.

It sounded reasonable when you put it that way.

Right?

Her trembling mouth refused to obey her mental commands to open, to speak - to confess to her fiance about what she had done; how she had betrayed his trust, betrayed him. Her mouth was refusing to hit the self-destruct button. It understood what it was supposed to do - what it needed to do - but refused to carry out its orders.

The spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak.

Now she knew how the Terminator felt.

With that ridiculous, incredibly nerdy thought, the levies broke and she started crying.

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Do you know what make-up sex is?

Make-up sex is a type of apology in relationships. Not every relationship, mind you - but some.

The good ones. Usually.

It's how couples communicate that they forgive each other on a more intimate level - with their bodies and minds; instead of with their sounds and mouths the way normal people do.

Imagine for a moment that the passion of the make-up sex is highly dependent on the degree of negativity involved in the fight that resulted in the sex. The intensity varies - small arguments and exchanges are a little slower, more tender. Gentler.

Big arguments - the really ugly ones - the ones that make people crazy; they're rough. Harder.