Mystique and Aura

Posted by Lex Konrad in Relationships | Oct 22, 2004

We took Layla out to dinner down on Houston and stuffed our faces with spicy rolls and Toro. It was a pre-birthday celebration of sorts. Lay and I traded barbs over baseball. I decided our relationship may not survive the postseason.

Off to a little hole-in-the wall to watch the game, a place overflowing with Yankees fans. On our way in a tall woman in a black t-shirt handed us a pack of cigarettes. Not her brand.

“I made a pact with God concerning this series,” I told Lay. The truth is I tried to make a deal with the Devil first but I’d already given away my soul.

The three of us found stools by a pool table in the back. Four televisions blared. Lay wrapped her arms around me and kissed my cheek. Les was quiet. I felt uneasy about Lay’s affection—I wanted the girls to talk. When they finally did start talking I went back to staring at the teevee and lost myself in the game.

Inning after inning melted away. At some point I went out for a smoke. The tall girl was there. She introduced herself and stood a little too close, all six feet and two intimidating inches of her.

It was just after midnight when I came back in. Leslie and Layla stood by the pool table in full-on lip lock. I strode up to them and pushed my tongue into the fray. We then drank birthday shots. At the other end of the room the tall girl stared dagger-eyed in our direction.

The game ended and I cheered a little too loud. I gave Lay my condolences. We quickly ducked out of there, limiting any potential for grievous bodily harm, and spilled onto the street.

Layla and Les sort of summarized their conversation for me; they both said they felt better about things. “I’m not trying to keep you on the sidelines,” Lay said.

In hindsight I should have kept my mouth shut. It was going to be an early night and it had been awhile since we’d had a proper date so I asked Layla when she’d be free. “Maybe Saturday,” came her response, and she then went on to explain the other guy would be coming back to town on that day and she was anxious to see him.

Cue the sound of a stylus being yanked off an LP.

It’s not exactly that I had a problem with Layla’s balancing act, just that I didn’t need to be reminded the scales were tipped in the other side’s favor. The heart may have a limitless capacity for affection but we humans are, for now, constrained by time and space. Choices must be made and only then do you know where you really stand. Just once, I thought, it would be nice if someone else were her contingency plan. Leslie gracefully bowed out, saying we’d do it another time.

The situation didn’t bother me much that night. Maybe it was the excitement of the series. Or perhaps after the stress of the prior seven days our little triad had—much like the Yankees—lost some of its mystique and aura.

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