Gravitational Forces

 The other day I was randomly thinking about a former Friend-with-Benefits situation I had.  This girl I met years ago online.  Match, I think?  It was a quick few messages and I ended up inviting her to play for my coed softball team, Surrender the Booty.  She came out for one game and her first plate appearance knocked a fly ball into shallow left field, just past the shortstop position.  I was coaching 3rd at the time and watched the ball drop neatly on the grass.  I was clapping for what was clearly a hit and I turned to look at first expecting her to be standing there...  No.  I looked back to the batter's box to see her picking herself up off the ground and dusting herself off. Seems she slipped running out of the box and never made it to first.  Womp-womp-waah...  

Anyway, that was the only game she made it out to and we went on a couple of dates a few times after that but it never really clicked between us, so we agreed we could just be friends, hang out, do stuff with.  She was originally from back east and had only been living in California for less than a year when we met.  She was cute, no doubt.  Otherwise I never would have asked her for a date to begin with.  Yes, I'm that shallow.  Redhead, like a thick, curly mane of red, blue eyes, turned up nose and almost as tall as me.  And besides that, she had a body.  I wouldn't go so far as to say she was full-figured but she definitely had curves in all the right places.  That was especially true of her booty.  That's where the title of this particular story comes from.  When we would sometimes be walking back from being out and about, and odds are neither of us were entirely sober especially her since she LOVED to celebrate 420!  OMG, this girl would so rarely be fully sober whenever we'd be hanging out.  I distinctly remember several times she would wake and bake.  Literally roll out of bed, go to her living room where her bong was, grind some herb and hit the pipe a few times before we'd go back to doing what we were doing before.  Yes, she was extra intimate when she was buzzed.  And seeing as how at the time, I was the recipient of this increased intimacy, I wasn't about to complain.  

Anyway, as I was saying the title of this post is because when we'd be walking back from wherever, neither of us keeping a straight line, we would occasionally bump into each other and she'd declare; "See, my ass is so big, it's got it's own gravity!" Sometimes I'd 'scream' helplessly as I was pulled into it again.  

It's weird thinking back now since it's been at least 15 years since this all first started.  We were like a sine wave in how we'd hook up, FWB for a few months then out on our own separate ways for a year or two then we'd randomly run into each other and do it all over again.  What's funny is that, in a short span of time when she was meeting and hanging out with the group of friends I made when I got to HB, she was totally hands off, keep our distance from one another when we were with the group.  But as soon as we were out of their sight, she'd be inviting me over to her place for some nookie.  

I think the only time anyone ever really suspected something was going on between us was during a beach party I organized for the group.  Everything was going great, I was talking up another girl who I was hoping to get together with when Red blew out her knee.  She mentioned an old injury before that if she planted her foot wrong, her knee would give out.  Sure enough, someone brought hula-hoops, she went to try one and the next thing you know, she's laying in the sand holding her leg.  Knee blown out sideways.  Looked brutal to be honest.  Lifeguards came over and put a cardboard cast on her but she refused to leave the party.  Only taking some really potent stuff another girl brought for pain relief.  800mg of something  Vicodin, I think.  
Red took the Vicodin and tried washing it down with a cup of red wine.  What??!  No, you can't wash that down with wine!  And she kept trying to sneak it past me.  But since she was hobbled up, it wasn't too hard to stop her.  Until another girl thought; "What's the harm?" and gave her the cup behind my back.  About 30-45 minutes later, we all got to see what the harm was in that as Red decided she was ready to go home.  And tried to stumble her way to her car.  No way, you're in no condition to drive.  Someone suggested she could follow her since they were both going back to the IE and that almost would have worked except Red's cognitive decline was accelerating.  She was loopy by the time we made it from the sand to the parking lot.  Nope, she's not driving.  No way she'd make it in her condition.  So the next logical step for me was to take her back to my place and let her sleep it off.   I was pissed because this pretty much blew my chances with Paola that night.  And now I was trying to pack up all my shit from the beach party, get some dude to drive her car to my place while I'm apologizing to everyone for having to bail out early.  The bonfires were just getting started, that's how early we were in the evening.  

I'll never forget having just buckled her into the passenger seat, going back to pick up my EZ-Up and when I got back, she wasn't there.  fuck...  I put the EZ-Up away and started looking up and down the beach for her when Steve shot back at me, she's right here.  I looked back and he was pointing into my car's passenger side.  What?  I went over and there was Red, somehow managed to squeeze herself into the footrest space of passenger side.  This tall, curvy girl with the banged up knee was someone able to fit herself into a space that, sober, there's now way in hell she could have done it.  Facepalm moment for sure.  

We get back to my place, Steve helps me with her up the stairs, I dump her unceremoniously on the couch and drive him back to the beach, thanking him the entire way and in the back of my mind praying Red doesn't do anything stupid or damaging to my place while I'm gone.  

By the time I got back to my place, Red had managed to move herself from the couch to my bed.  Fine, it's not like she's unfamiliar with the territory anyway.  Seeing she was ok for the time being, I unpacked what I could from my car, got in the shower to wash off the sand, sweat and sunscreen and set out some water, Tylenol and a barf bag/pail for Red figuring she was going to need some of them at some point, and settled in for sleep when she got up and had to go.  Like, go to the bathroom.  I helped her to the door and she partially closed the door for a little privacy.  Funny that even in that condition, she seemed modest.  At least until she finished, got back into bed and decided her clothes were uncomfortable.  She tossed and turned for a bit as she stripped off her shirt, shorts and pretty much everything else she had on.  After a few minutes struggle, she was laying naked, spread eagle face up wearing only the cardboard splint the lifeguards had put on her earlier that afternoon.  Considering how much she had bent the thing with all her walking around, tucking into the floorboard space in my car and flailing around she was doing on my bed, I was honestly surprised it was still holding on.  

When all was said and done and she seemed to finally drift off to sleep, I looked at the time.  9:30...  9:30 on a Saturday night with everyone else I knew still out on the beach enjoying the bonfire and here I was babysitting Red.  

We saw one another less and less and she eventually started dating a friend of a mutual friend.  Moved in with the guy when she lost her job and when they broke up less than a year later, she moved back to Jersey.  We briefly reconnected online a couple of years before the pandemic.  She was engaged to a guy, living together at her place.  She seemed happy.  Until she kicked him out the summer of 2019.  He wasn't driven enough for her.  She wanted him to have bigger goals in life.  We talked for a bit about her coming out to visit maybe late Spring 2020.  Then the world shut down.  And while that happened, she also reconnected with a dude she originally met on Match right around the time we first dated.  She called him: The One That Got Away.  Shit lady, if that dude still has your phone number after 13-14 years or so and waited until the world shut down before he reached out to you, I'd say that's some really weird(desperate) timing.  But if you're going to be spending time with him, I bow out.  Once I told her that, she fully blocked me on social media.  That happens often, oddly enough.  Not just unfriending but a full block.