The Rules of Attraction

She heard one of the guys throwing up in what she hoped was Lorna’s wastebasket. She passed out again and when she woke up, maybe thirty seconds later, maybe a half-hour, still being f**ked, still moaning in pain (they probably thought she was turned on, which was definitely not the case) she heard someone knocking on the door. She said, “Answer it, answer it,” or at least that’s what she thinks she said. They were still on the floor when she passed out again…. She woke up the next morning, early, on the bed for some reason, and the room was cold and reeked of vomit, the half-empty keg leaking onto the floor. Her head was throbbing, due partly to the hangover and partly because it had been banged against the wall for she didn’t even know how long. The film student from N.Y.U. was lying next to her on Lorna’s bed, which during the night had been relocated to the center of the room, and he looked a lot shorter and with longer hair than she remembered, his spiked cut wilted now. And in the light coming through the window she saw the other guy lying next to the film student—she wasn’t a virgin, she thought to herself—the boy lying next to the N.Y.U. guy opened his eyes and he still was drunk and she’d never seen him before. He was probably a townie. She had actually gone to bed with a townie. I’m not a virgin anymore, she thought again. The townie winked at her, didn’t bother to introduce himself, and then told her this joke he had heard last night about this elephant who was wandering through the jungle and who stepped on a thorn and it hurt a lot and the elephant was having trouble pulling it out so the elephant asked a rat who was passing by to “Please pull the thorn out from my foot” and the rat made a request: “Only if you let me f**k you.” Without hesitation the elephant said okay and the rat quickly pulled the thorn from the elephant’s foot and then scrambled up behind the elephant and began f**king. A hunter passed by and shot the elephant, who then started to moan in pain. The rat, oblivious to the elephant’s wounds, said, “Suffer baby, suffer,” and kept on f**king. The townie started laughing and it was a joke she wished she would forget, but it has stayed with her ever since. It was beginning to dawn on her then that she didn’t know which one she had (technically) lost her virginity to (though odds were good that it was the film student from N.Y.U. and not the townie), even though that seemed to be beside the point for some reason on this post-virginal morning. She was vaguely aware that she was bleeding, but only a little. The guy from N.Y.U. burped in his sleep. There was vomit (whose?) all over Lorna’s trashcan. The townie was still laughing, doubled up naked with laughter. Her bra was still on. And she said to no one, though she had wanted to say it to Daniel Miller, “I always knew it would be like this.”



SEAN The party is starting to end. I get to Windham House right when the last keg is being tapped. The deal in town went okay and I have some cash so I buy some weed from this Freshman who lives in the cardroom in Booth and get high before coming to Thirsty Thursday. There’s a Quarters game going on in the living room and Tony is filling a pitcher with beer.



I ask him, “What’s going on?”



“Hey Sean. Lost my I.D. Pub’s out,” he says. “Brigid’s got the hots for that guy from L.A. Wanna join in?”



“It’s okay,” I say. “Where’s the cups?”



“Over there,” he says and goes back to the table.



I get some beer and notice that this hot-looking Freshman girl with short blond hair, great body, that I f**ked a couple of weeks ago, is standing near the fireplace. I’m about to go over and talk to her, but Mitchell Allen’s already lighting her cigarette and I don’t want to deal with it. So I stand against the wall, listen to REM, finish the beer, get more, keep my eye on the Freshman girl. Then some other girl, Deidre I think her name is, black spiked hair that already looks dated and trendy, black lipstick, black fingernail polish, black kneesocks, black shoes, nice tits, okay body, Senior, comes over and she’s wearing a black halter top even though it’s like forty below in the room and she’s drunk and coughing like she has T.B., swigging Scotch. I’ve seen her stealing Dante in the bookstore. “Have we met?” she asks. If she’s joking, it’s just too dumb.



“No,” I say. “Hi.”



“What’s your name?” she asks, trying to keep her balance.



“It’s Peter,” I tell her.



“Oh, really?” she asks, looking confused. “Peter? Peter? That’s not your name.”



“Yeah it is.” I’ve still got my eye on the hot Freshman but she won’t look over here. Mitchell hands her another beer. It’s too late. I look back at Dede Dedire whatever her name is.