Fate

(a little creative writing)


This particular night I’m at a dance club with my friend Evan. We spend a lot of weekends here, sometimes not getting back to campus until sunrise. This is our favorite club, the one with the best music and the most colorful people. The dance floor is tiny. One wall is covered with mirrors to make it look larger. Most people can’t help checking themselves out as they dance. Most people here are very interested in themselves.

Evan is fun to be around. He has a lot of charm – he knows everyone and everyone loves him. People usually ignore me. I’m not sociable. I hate trying to make small talk in loud clubs. I am shy and tend to glower. But I like dancing. It doesn’t matter how you dance here. In fact, it’s best to be a bit extravagant and odd. And you don’t need a partner. There’s no couples dancing. If you want to get up close and personal, that’s what the bathrooms are for.

Evan catches sight of someone he knows. He smiles his potent smile and soon I’m half heartedly trying to follow a half-heard conversation with someone whose name I’ve already forgotten. Not that it matters. They’ve forgotten mine, too. I think it’s exhausting I’m a little jealous. I’d rather have Evan all to myself, not because I have romantic designs on him, but because that’s the way I feel about my friends. I’m possessive.

He says, “I want you to meet someone.” I’m looking at a girl with short black hair and dark eyes with dramatic black eye liner . She looks like Siouxie Sioux from Siouxie and the Banshees. She looks like Louise Brooks gone goth. She looks like…the only thing worth looking at. She has a friend with her that I don’t really notice. Someone inconsequential.

“Hey,” I say, “weren’t you at that party at Ella’s place? You tried to transfer an entry stamp on to the back of my hand so I could get into a club.”

“Oh yeah, I remember.” she says, then she smiles and I don’t catch what she says next. “What?” I say. I can barely hear anything. She leans in until I feel her hair against my cheek and whispers in my ear, “Fate.” She leans over the bar and says something to the bartender. He gives her a pen and a matchbook. She flips up the cover and scribbles. Then she takes my hand and gently closes my fingers around the matches. “Call me.”

It’s several days later, now. I’m sitting by the phone with this matchbook in one hand, and I’m considering. When fate deals you a card, you should walk away from the table. But I don’t.