In My Bed

By Stan Morris

Copyright 2014

It was midnight by the time I got all of them out of my apartment. The snowfall had increased, but Jason was a careful driver, and I wasn’t too worried. I spent five minutes cleaning and then stopped to appreciate her; asleep on a couch that had an uncomfortable hump in the middle. Her short skirt had hiked up during her sleep. I grabbed two acetaminophens and a glass of water, and then smacked her bottom lightly, rousing her. She sat up, bleary eyed, and looked around.

“Where is everyone?”

“They went home. It’s late. Come on.”

I handed her the acetaminophens and the glass of water. Obediently, she took the capsules and swallowed them. I laid the glass on the end table coaster, took her hand, and led her to my bedroom. She stood next to the bed, confusion in her face, as I retrieved a faded long t-shirt from my bottom drawer.

“You can sleep in this. I’ll be back in five minutes.”

“I want to go back to my dorm.”

“You can’t.”

Uncertainty crossed her face, so I pulled back the curtain.

“It’s snowing. I leant Jason my van, so he could take everyone home.”

“I can walk.”

“You’re not walking two miles in this stuff.”

My voice was firm, and that’s the way I meant it to be. I stepped out of the room to give her some privacy and found the remote. There was a late news show on television, and I hoped they had something local about the weather. Fifteen minutes later I gave up, powered down the LCD TV, and reentered the bedroom. She was standing fully clothed next to the drawer, wedged into a corner, as far from the bed as possible.

“I don’t want to stay here.”

“You should have thought of that before you downed those two shots of Jose Cuervo. I told you not to do that.”

But, really, her action was typical of a kid who had never drunk alcohol before college, and I had made the mistake of using the bathroom at the wrong time. Two beers, two shots of tequila, they were the same, right? Except that the beers were consumed over the course of an hour, and the tequila shots were consumed in five minutes. Twenty minutes after that, she was snoring on the couch, not caring one whit how uncomfortable it was.

She did not reply. I sighed, turned off the light, stripped off my clothes, and got into my bed. After a few minutes she accepted the inevitable, shed her clothing except for her underpants, and pulled on my t-shirt. She got into bed and lay on her back, arms at her sides, palms pressed to her thighs, waiting. She lay that way for ten minutes before speaking.

“Are we going to−”

“No, this is not high school. You’re still half drunk, and I’m tired.”

When she didn’t answer, I said, “Come here.”

After a few seconds, she rolled toward me, and I slid my arm under her shoulder.

“I have something to tell you. Something important.”

“What?”

“You’re safe. You’re in your boyfriend’s bed and in your boyfriend’s arms, and you’re safe. If the roads are not too icy, I’ll try to get you back to your room, tomorrow. Now go to sleep.”

“Okay.”

Ten minutes later she was snoring again. I slid my arm from under her shoulders and turned away. The bed was not wide, and it was pleasant to feel her bottom against mine. I wasn’t that tired, but I wasn’t a randy seventeen years old, either. We both knew where this relationship was headed. Those Trojans could wait.

Originally published at www.readwave.com.