O. Henry

Friday night, Rolf and I headed out to buy some shoes, have dinner at Annie’s and go shopping at Lambda Rising. We were on I-395, after doing some serious damage to our shopping budget, heading into the city. As we passed our exit Rolf, said “Wait, we should have gotten off there.” I said “It’s ok, we can take the next exit and it will work out.” Before we knew it, we were lost somewhere near DuPont Circle, but we didn’t know exactly where. While I was confident we’d figure it out, we were attempting to go the wrong way on one-way roads, to read street signs obscured by tree limbs, and getting more lost and frustrated. I finally recognized that we were near the Studio Theatre, and I told Rolf where we were. He pulled into the intersection and prepared to turn left, and I hollered that he should turn right. He nearly screeched to a halt, and said to me:
“Where are we going?”
“Lambda Rising!”
“I thought we were going to Annie’s first because you have to pee!”
“I thought we were going to Lambda Rising first because you needed some books! You know, if I knew you were going to buy combs for my hair, I wouldn’t have sold it to buy a chain for your watch,” I said with a laugh.

No wonder we were lost. He’s so sweet. We found a great parking space near Annie’s on 17th Street, but far enough away that we had a nice walk amongst the boys. (It’s always nice to be among the boys. Woweee!) One thing I don’t like about Annie’s is that the best seats are in the smoking section. I am tired of sitting in that hall-way between the bar and the bathrooms. But neither of us likes to be around smoke when we eat (and I’m a smoker). But there are tables upstairs that I never get to sit at. That’s where I hoped we’d be. I really rushed past the hostess and the bar to get to the bathroom. I guess I had a few too many Vodkas before the shoe shopping, because I just left Rolf standing there at the front door.

He’d already been seated by the time I got back, or so I assumed. But he wasn’t in the coach section, as usual. Nor upstairs in Business Class. Nor in the First Class Smoking Section. Nor outside fuming at me for some supposed slight. I didn’t know where the fuck he was. This was beginning to feel like the “Short Black Man with Bricks” episode and I was becoming alarmed. I backtracked, this time checking the bathroom on my way to the business class section, tracking through the coach section 6 times total, and then imagining that first class was going to be the best place to have a melt-down, I walked into the middle of the room to find him tucked away in the far corner. I can not ever remember sitting there with him, but he wanted for me to sit in first class for a change. Even if there was smoke.
There really wasn’t any. Everything was great, even though we didn’t make it to the bookstore; we did make it from the romantic dinner to a romantic bedroom scene without hard words derailing our intimate plans. It was very hot.