mr. november, behind the van, with the awkward sweaty hug

A Thursday night or two ago I found myself at the HiTone for Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears, along with just about everyone else I'd ever met. It was basically a huge dance party (because, well, DAMN) and I was right up front, just a sweatin' it out and shaking my ass.

About three-fourths of the way through the set, I look to my right and I see a face leaning forward to peek out of the crowd at me. And it's Mr. November.

He waves, and I wave and smile, and get back to the very important task at hand: DANCIN. But I knew then that wouldn't be the last I'd see of him that evening, and sure enough we passed each other outside after the set ended and he told me that seeing me at this show was just "another testament to my unfailing good taste." I smiled, and laughed.

I assumed he was leaving then, and I actually went back inside to talk to some friends and then rejoined another group outside a few minutes later. Where I found Mr. November. He hung out for a minute, perhaps waiting on a break in the conversation so he could interject, but one never arrived. At this point Meredith and I were discussing all things transcontinental because apparently she, too, is an Anglophile and I never knew it until just that exact moment. We obviously had a lot of catching up to do. Asking me to talk about England is, I imagine, something like asking Stephen Hawking to recite pi to the millionth digit. Although at least when I'm rambling endlessly about the tube and scones and other shit you're just as uninterested in as a never-ending decimal, it's not through a vocoder.

Eventually he gave up and walked off in the direction of the cars and I assumed he'd actually left this time. Meredith and I wrapped up our conversation and I said goodnight to everyone and about 10 minutes later I started making my way in the same direction.

And y'all? There he was. Standing on the other side of a church van that was parked next to the building, doing something on his phone. And when I say "doing something on his phone," I really, really want to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he was actually texting someone or calling someone to come and meet him or even just calling the movie listing hotline, just to see what sounded good. But truthfully when someone pops out from behind a church van at you with a phone in hand, I have a hard time convincing myself he was actually doing anything on the phone other than scrolling through his phonebook aimlessly to seem busy until I happened to walk by.

I saw him, and of course pretended I didn't and kept walking toward my car. And then he called out my name. I turned back.

"I just wanted to say goodbye to you," he said. He reached his arms out to hug me.

"Oh, we're both really sweaty!" I said, hoping that the implied "so maybe we shouldn't touch each other" part was understood.

"Yeah, we're both gross!" He said, as if to say, no big deal! HUGS! "So it's okay."

"Is it?" I said. Too late. I was being descended upon.

Cue: sweaty squeezing in a gas station parking lot.

But none of this. NONE. Of. It. Could beat the text that I received an hour later, just as I was drifting off to sleep:

"I'm sure you don't wanna hear from me. But I had to let you know that I miss you and wish we could hang out sometime."

Apparently I'm even magic when I'm sweaty.


cheers,
elizabeth