I first saw Tegan in this very bedroom early in the school year at a party. It was the second weekend after my life as a college student had begun, and Riva had invited me to her party after meeting her at the coffee shop. She claimed to throw the best party and she was right. Riva can be very persuasive. Who am I to judge anyway? I had been away at college for three weeks and this was my first full-on party. “You’re a geek,” I could hear my sister Aimee telling me in my head.
Tegan seemed isolated, yet she must have been having the best time within the partygoers. She prowled the crowd seemingly alone in her own world. Not with a beer or red cup in her hand, but with a camera. Not in conversation, but rather an accosting thrust of lens in seemingly random directions with pleasant and mixed responses. I think that is what drew me to Tegan at first sight. She worked with amazing audacity and confidence without a word.
It was impressive, not the camera. She was impressive, wielding her wand of memory upon the rookie takers of booze and fake joy that you find at a freshman party like this. She worked the room like she had already documented all of it. Riva had a keen sense to elicit emotions and help set up shots. She played wingman.
Some freak was yakking my ear off about some story about spending some time in some lockup facility during some summer. In this moment, I was reminded that in general, I hate people . I tried to ignore him and I just followed Tegan around the bedroom with my twin-lens stereovision eyes.
“You know they got like Vo-Tech in there. Yeah, like job training and that kind of bullshit. So this guy took a No. 1 Phillips head from the shop. We was in the laundry room and he come at me with it. I went like this,” he moved his arm to protect his neck and face. He did this motion in three similar jerks then pointed with his other hand to the tattoo on his forearm. “He got me right there. Man, it fucked up my tattoo. Right there on the end,” pointing to the point of a flame shaped figure tattooed there. He waited until I inspected his arm, pointing patiently.
“Ooo, yeah,” I said without really seeing a puncture wound or a scar of any kind, but rather seeing a poorly done tattoo. My sharply focused twin-lenses saw the truth.
The inspection and my enthusiasm caused him to continue with the next bit, “They released me after that. Yeah, mom picked me up that same night all bandaged up. I seen this other dude a few weeks later at the store and he tells me that the guy that jumped me had his fucking face disfigured with boiling baby oil. Ya know on movie night the counselors bust out wit’ de popcorn. Well he put a cup of baby oil in the microwave behind de popcorn bag. He snuck the shit into the activity room because it looked like water. When the three minutes went beep , he pulled the popcorn out with one hand, baby oil cup in the other, and slung it across the couch and hit three motherfuckers with it. He melted ‘em.”
“No shit.”
“Fuck. One guy had his eyelid melted, another almost lost an ear and shit.”
“Where’s the beer?” I said as I was trying to run from his sight. He started to explain how he had been “holding the same fucking beer can all night” as I slashed into the living room where at least people seemed happy, at least the music was decent: Evangelicals: Hello Jenn , and onward to the patio by the pool to ditch him completely.
“Fucking lunatic,” I screamed passing through the music, noise and crowd in the living room. A girl grabbed my arm.
“Hey!” she said. I wouldn’t stop for her and she wouldn’t let go, so she let me drag her outside. “Lunatic? What are you talking about?” she said as we circled the pool together.
“Who are you?” reaching the far side of the pool and a place of solitude, I turned to face her. “What is your problem?” The freaks story had irritated me to one level but this chick was irritating me on a whole different level.
“I’m Jocelyn,” she drew near and pushed my bangs out of my eyes. “Are you alright?” she seemed genuinely concerned.
“Yeah, this guy in there was freaking me out. I’m better now,” she set me at ease. One look in her eyes and I felt fine. I smiled and she smiled back. Next thing I knew she was kissing me. Instinctively, I was reluctant and she sensed my pulling away. She kissed very carefully. On the third kiss, I gave in and kissed back. We wrapped our arms around each other and the freaky dude leapt from my memory all together, however, Tegan remained.
The kisses were nice, her lips were very soft. Her hand slid to the back of my head and she used the leverage to smash our lips together. A few moments later, I opened my eyes to the direction of a sound and I was startled to see Tegan stepping onto the diving board, and she was taking pictures of us as she circled our kiss. She must have followed me. My instinct was to pull up and run, but instead, being studied by Tegan’s lens was really quite a turn on.
She squeezed on the button in a rhythmic sequence and I felt that her moments of release were heightening my pleasure. I decided to help her make the best pictures possible. I closed my eyes and kissed Jocelyn with every ounce of passion I could conjure. She responded by probing with her tongue, I gave my tongue in return. Making out with a cute girl was one level of a good evening, but doing it for Tegan’s camera was beyond imagination.
Our lips separated, but our tongues continued to wrestle. Tegan released. Our tongues were silhouettes with a bright-blurry party beyond. You could tell who we were with just enough light falling across our faces, but only if you knew us. This release, the black and white ink jet plot hung on the corkboard in my dorm room, the black tones slowly turned blue over the course of the school year.
It was a great conversation piece, and every time it came up Tegan would again swear that she’d have a real print made for me. No big deal, really, it’s the memory that counts.
I was passed out on one of Riva’s extremely comfortable leather couches. I remember I had fallen asleep with Jocelyn in my arms, but I awoke to Tegan instead. Dreams do come true. Tegan’s blonde locks smelled of patchouli or marijuana, not sure which. I threw an arm around her and held her close. She stirred and cuddled back. Once her body was formed against mine, she became still again. I dare not wake her, this moment should last forever.
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