GOOD LOOKIN’ RIVERBOAT
In the hallways of this pseudo-luxury national chain, the carpet’s swooping pan-European patterns stand still long enough to consider the difference between hotel and motel, and whether it’s as serious a distinction as boat and ship. Then I see the Riverboat, his scalp glistening under chandeliers made of plexiglass.
I meet his gaze, brown on blue. The carpet patterns swirl again.
The Riverboat works somewhere, lives someplace. “Can’t complain, can’t complain,” he coos and leads me to a utility closet. His hands cup my breasts. Sooner than anticipated the Riverboat is inside of me. Ferocious pecks. He kisses with his eyes open. It’s unnerving, and, sooner than anticipated, I climax. The Riverboat smirks, how terrible is his ugliness beneath an exposed bulb! I wince and he winces because I am jerking him off, passing drunk breath back and forth. Suddenly I become very aware of how my biceps contract: I imagine this is what people mean when they say things like “be present.” I enjoy a peaceful absence of thought, a great field or empty parking lot.
The Riverboat tucks his navy shirt into his brown pants and leaves.
Some while later I am pissing in a toilet, thank God, my stream mixing with the nondescript jazz playing over an intercom. Frenzied sniffs come from the neighboring stall.
“Think it’s laced?”
“I’m sure they test it. The guy has like seven drivers. It’s a whole operation.”
“All the online talk has been making me nervous. Did you hear that Danny’s friend overdosed? The vigil is next week if you want to go together.”
“The gropey one?”
“I had totally forgotten about that! Nevermind, good riddance.”
I press my ear to the dirty wall, sing louder tweaking canaries! But this triggers the toilet’s auto-flush and the voices quiet. Not much else to do besides rejoin the meet-and-greet for young professionals. Haircuts and perfumes.
I see my friend at the bar and momentarily consider spilling my guts but think better of it. I’ve already decided how to feel about the Riverboat and needn’t risk a remark or glance ruining the afterglow. Martinis. Some half-hearted networking. I hold my gut and recall my clandestine fuck. One friend becomes three and they are gossiping, at last, about a man who crossed a line at so-and-so’s party. Too many drinks hinted at the wrong idea and ended with the offender ousted, from the party and the extended friend group, presumably left to wander the streets for eternity.
Then somebody gasps. The one who OD’d on fentanyl? No. Goody Mary with the devil! Which one? The balding fella in brown slacks. Oh. Everyone is looking. My hand is fastened over my mouth but it does bupkus as vomit begins to shoot through my fingers. The last thing I will remember are cokehead shrieks and bits of olive scattered across the bar, no longer melting ice caps but the final green vestiges of life after calamity.
Illustration by Ramona Rowan.