The Shallow Man

By Eddy Taylor

How can a reflection be so lonely? A stranger’s bathroom probably isn’t the place to have thoughts like this and yet here I am. Stood, naked in a place so familiar and yet foreign to me. The sweat peels off my brow keeping rhythm with my breath and I can hear hers from outside. I turn the tap and splash the cold water over my head, hoping to snap myself out of the moment. It never works but it is a mechanical act, one I’ve repeated dozens of times before, I trace the cold water over my ears and nose, through my hair and blink. The stranger still stares back at me. The person has gone from my body, and I am left with the skin that does not fade; the animal is all that remains. I can note every imperfection from the broken nose, the cauliflower ears, the neck bent over years of looking down at people to the muscle and acne. It is a view I cannot enjoy, always looking half finished, slightly deformed by puberty and childish stupidity. It is a piece of meat left out so long in the sun the flies have taken over, a rough and grim thing to discard.

She hits the door and I’m brought back to myself. I clean myself up, making sure to leave the room the way I entered and open the door to see her outside. I think her name is Lara, she said it once a few hours ago, never thought to ask her again and now it feels too late. In my head she’ll stay Lara, but I won’t risk saying anything. She slips past me and locks the bathroom door behind her, and I am left to myself again. Without a care she has left me alone in her room and I find my hands wandering over the shelves. Aside from a washing basket and the few things she came in with, now dotted across the floor, her clothes are hidden neatly in her cupboard, the room has an emptiness to it, no furniture aside from what was provided for her, and the same crooked half naked posters stuck to the walls randomly. An industrial hair dryer almost twice the size of my head on her desk guarding her make up and mirrors, each accented by a light ocean blue. The same as the bra hanging off the corner of the bed. She has a few CDs and DVDs, but it is too dark to make out what each one is individually. Nothing to play them on though I notice. The only books are of that brutal hardback quality, tidy and pristine, course related. She told me she loved to read and rattled off a few favourites but now in here the reality makes it obvious. I can’t even remember what titles she came out with, but none are present in this space. A little lie to get me invested enough to come back with her.

I step over something and almost fall. The rush and dizziness come back. I can’t stand up. I search for her bed and finger my way down. My head drops and I barely catch it my hands. There is a long stillness where I feel like I am still falling even though I know I am not. My arms shake under the small pressure, and I drop back onto the bed. My head lands on her dress and the sequined fabric pricks at my neck but I don’t have the energy to move, I stay still and uncomfortable waiting for Lara to come back. My throat has dried up and I can hear my breath audibly cut across my tongue the same way it does after an intense game. The ceiling twists in that funny colourful way everything does when I’m drunk, I know it’s really my head swerving unconsciously while I struggle to find the strength to keep it straight but still the world feels like it is turning without me with terrifying disinterest. My heart rate rises loud enough for me to hear it punch against my chest. I need to calm down. I try to take back control of my breathing, but it is so hard. Why did I let Brandon pour the shots tonight? This must be his fault; I only had a couple drinks at the club and those were as miniature and overpriced as anyone could expect. Has he killed me?

“You alright?” Possibly Lara says. Her voice pierces the swirling ceiling like a pin through a wall and brings me that little bit closer to focus. She is delicate and deliberate in the way she talks. Flirting with her was easy, she knew what she wanted from the offset, and I have never been very good at hiding my intentions from girls, or anyone for that matter. I’ve never been much of a liar.

“No.” I manage to spit out, I can feel something rising in my stomach. Oh god not now. I know that if I am not careful, I will ruin this whole evening. I need to get up, but my legs are lost to me. They have turned into wobbling runaways the way legs like to be when you drink too much. It is at this moment I regret having ever met Brandon in the first place, and I despise him for making my drinks. He is one of those people who thinks everyone has the same tolerance as him, but Brandon’s liver is more like a horses than a persons. I can imagine him now, perfectly sober in the back of a taxi with one of those blonde mantis looking girls he’s so fond of, his lips and neck stained with blotches of glossy makeup. The image makes my hand curl into a fist.

“Okay, do you need to-“

“Yes-“

“Not on the bed! Can you get to the toilet?”

“Yes.” I have no idea if I’m telling the truth. I pull myself up and stagger desperately to her bathroom, looking down at the floor to avoid her eye. Where’s the door? “Where’s the door?”

“Here.” she says, startled, jumping past me and holding it open.

I turn inside and collapse. Catching myself from hitting the edge of the bowl with on outstretched hand. I lower my head down and wait. I gag, cough and eventually puke into the clean white porcelain and feel the sweat come back with renewed vigour. As I hold myself up, I can feel a long slivery drop pour its way around my ears, down to my chin and then descend to join my discharge below. Another wave comes over me and the process repeats itself. Not as large as the first time, this one is filled with a different kind of poison. The chain-smoked rollups Lara made for me are being rejected and each cough releases more of the dark tar from my throat. I try again to control my breathing but can only cough up larger traces of black sooty shite. I can feel my head getting lighter the longer I lean over the bowl. I want to pass out, to end the embarrassment and fall asleep on her bathroom floor and not have to control myself until the morning when I can slip away without fear of catching her eyes and figure out a different, better story to tell my mates. But the sleep doesn’t come. I’m trapped in this room with Lara looking down at me. I dread the moment when I’ll have to turn around. She hasn’t moved but I know she is still there, and I cannot bring myself to imagine what she thinks of me, a man she just met naked and sick over her toilet. I feel like I am falling with her stood there but I cannot bring myself to speak, the force of each successive puke and cough makes it impossible to focus on forming something to say.

“Better?” She speaks. I throw up again, but my stomach is finally empty.

I take a long deep breath and say, “I think so.” I have no way of knowing and cannot trust myself to give her a straight answer. “Can you just. Leave me here for a bit?”

She shuffles quietly behind me. “Fine. Just let me flush it.” I roll myself onto my back and sit up beside the toilet and watch as she carefully steps over my legs and takes hold of the flush, her thick curly hair covering her face as she does so. I’m grateful. I don’t think I could handle seeing her expression right now. I peer at her as she leans across me and watch, charmed by her. She is strong, tall and firm. What was it she did again? Something that meant going to the gym a lot I remember but the exact details escape me. I cannot place anything specific about her life outside of this stolen tableau. Her body leaning over mine with a tenderness and worry, my odour surrounding her. I want to hold her again, to have her wrapped around me like we were a moment ago, my head buried in her chest and her nails dug into my back, to kiss and taste her in that clumsy give and take.

I touch her leg with my own. She flinches, turns and I look away, still scared of that face that beautiful angry face staring back at me. I rub her ankle with my shin and whisper “Sorry.” Absurdly she laughs at that, an ugly snort she quickly snatches away, embarrassed.

“It’s okay” she says, “I’ve had worse.” I think she meant to comfort me, but I don’t feel any better. She arcs herself over and kisses my cheek. “I mean that.” I know now that I am blushing as she comes into full view. Two deep brown islands amid a sea of freckles take me in as I contort my neck in an attempt to focus. Visions of earlier torment me, I want to look further, to catch a sneaky glimpse at her breasts and stomach but I hold myself back, terrified. Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand I arch my head to the side, away from the temptation, the white tiled walls are much harder to get distracted by.

“Thanks.” I tell her, staring at the walls, taking in all the imperfections and chips made over the years.

“No trouble.” Lara steps back, covers herself in a towel and opens the plain shower curtain before setting herself down inside. She looks at me and there is a long stillness between us. I can’t think of anything else to say, I am too focused on my breathing and maintaining control over my stomach, and I can sense the awkward responsibility she feels for me. I can’t say I would do much differently were the roles reversed, but in a strange way I am happy it was me who got fucked up, it’s much easier to be taken care of than to take care of someone, especially a stranger. I summon up a smile. She returns it. A quick affirmation that she isn’t going anywhere, that I can stay and that I shouldn’t be worried. It helps a little, not much but it is better than a frown. I don’t imagine I could handle her discontent. “Marcus, do you do this a lot?”

What kind of question is that? Why? What? Now of all times she wants to know that. How am I supposed to answer her? Does she mean throwing up in a stranger’s toilet because though this isn’t a first its not exactly common. Does she mean the sex because though I do go out a lot I’m not much of an expert when it comes to getting into someone’s bed. What do I say to that? I stare back at her confused. She looks away. Have I embarrassed her?

“No.” I stutter.

She looks back at me. “Me neither.”

“I mean… I have done this but… not a lot no. I usually just go home and pass out on the sofa really.” The more I talk the more I don’t know what I am saying.

“You look like the type.”

“What?”

“The type who does. Do this I mean.”

“Really?” A strange sense of pride overcomes me, and I feel a grin take over my face.

“Yea.”

“How come?”

“It’s just, I don’t know the way you and your friends were made me think that maybe you all went out and did this sort of thing a lot.”

“Oh okay.” My heart sinks a little. My association with the other guys from the club, men I only know from charging at them for eighty minutes at a time is the source of my imagined confidence with women.

“I had fun though.”

“Good. So did I.”

“Good.”

I want to explain, about Brandon and the drinking but I could not bring myself to say much. So, we sat there in her bathroom for a long time, quietly glancing at one another with false familiarity. Sometimes she throws a smile at me, and I will do my best to return it, though I cannot be sure I am really smiling. Eventually the dizziness lifts and I find the strength to stand up. Lara, startled, jumps up to steady me but I hold her back. I tell her that “I’m fine” that she doesn’t need to worry. I clean my face and step out into her bedroom.

“I should go?” I ask, I don’t know what answer I hope for but all the same her reply does not help me much.

“Yes. Let me get your clothes. I’ll call you a taxi.”

I dress myself and we wait for the taxi to come, a cheap three-piece I bought from a charity shop, the blazer is a little tight and the tie is a struggle to knot so I leave it hanging around my neck. I must look like some ugly mockery of James Bond. The quiet of the room is louder now, I try to find something to say but the words slip by me as Lara shuffles herself into her pyjamas. She leads me outside, down the blocky stairs of her accommodation, thankfully she is only on the second floor which makes the journey somewhat less perilous, we pass through the glass doors and onto the street. I take note of the bus stop and think if the taxi is worth it, but she assures me that nothing is running for the next few hours; checking my watch in the streetlight I know she is right. If I could just disappear quickly that would be a blessing, I think. I can’t stand here with her without imagining what she must think of me; some drunken idiot she pulled away from his mates and into her bed only to stink out her toilet and look like death on a Friday night. The taxi takes its time, but Lara stays by my side, likely to make sure I do not collapse a second time and break my neck, I would like to think it is because she likes me but that cannot be right. If I was her, I would despise me right now. I do despise me right now. I feel dirty and my skin itches and sick shame leers over my shoulder for having taken her to bed. I wish this whole evening had not happened, that we stayed at Brandon’s house and just messed ourselves up in his kitchen instead of descending upon the town in search of a good time. Crowded into the tight clubs and hounded by the booming music only to rub ourselves against each other until we find someone worth paying attention to. For me that was Lara, much to her misfortune. Instead of a simple night out, she got me.

Finally, the taxi pulls up and I step inside and give the cabbie my address. He gives me a funny look, but Lara assures me I’m alright, that I just had “a bit too much fun” if only. Before he can leave, she comes round to my seat and kisses my cheek again and asks if I “remember her number?” I do not know what face I pull but based on her reaction I think it conveys my confusion. She hands me a folded piece of paper and leans into kiss my cheek again. I cannot explain why but I slide my head to the side and catch her lips with my own and hold her there. I begin to move my tongue, but she disengages and steps back. I blush and give her a toothy smile. She waves and the taxi drives away. Looking down I open the piece of paper, and there in red ink is written a number and her name: Clara.