Page 4 of Shame Me
Without Zack, though, I realized something else. I wanted someone.Neededsomeone. I wanted comfort and love and intimacy. I wanted to explore my sexuality, that part of myself that had been awakened by Zack.
As I drifted off to sleep, I came up with the perfect solution, one that I hoped would one day drive Zack straight into my arms. Maybe sooner rather than later.
CHAPTER 2
“Hey, Braden,” I asked my bassist friend the next morning over coffee. “What do guys think about slutty girls?”
After sleeping on it, I needed to gauge how bad an idea I’d come up with the night before. In the light of day, it didn’t seem as brilliant and as perfect as it had when I’d been entering dreamland.
Braden almost spat out his coffee. “What? Why are you even asking?”
I stirred the brown liquid in the mug in front of me, hoping I appeared nonchalant and uninvested in whatever answer he gave. “Just…asking for a friend.” Seeming to ignore my question, Braden got up and set his cup in the sink. “Well?”
“I’m thinking.”
“I didn’t realize it was such a difficult question.”
He sat back down, his chair at a diagonal from mine. “It’s a difficult question because I don’t know why you’re asking. Or, um, why yourfriend’sasking.”
Why the hell was he making this so damn painful? I just wanted a simple answer. Quiet Cy, though—he’d heard us talking from the living room where he was doing something onhis new laptop and felt the need to contribute his two cents’ worth. “Slutty girls are fucking awesome. I can’t get enough of ‘em.”
Of all the things I’d expected our guitarist to say,thatmost certainly hadn’t been one of them, and I immediately burst into laughter. “Thank you, Cy!” Lowering my voice and picking up my cup, I said, “See? That wasn’t so hard.”
“Okay, yeah, but that’s theeasyanswer.”
“That’s all I asked for.”
“But it doesn’t take everything into account.”
“Maybe you need to go back to bed, Braden.”
Running his hand through his light brown hair, he said, “Maybe. But…here’s the thing, okay? Different guys will give you different answers. You can’t just assume we’re all alike.”
Oh.“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“You didn’t. I just—” When he sighed, I began to wonder why this topic agonized him. Had I known, I might have considered asking Zack, the one guy I hadn’t wanted to. “I just want you to know that some of us—men, that is—feel bad for women who act that way. We—Ihave nothing against a woman enjoying, um, the act, you know, but if she’s sleeping with a different guy every night, it’s…like a cry for help.”
A cry for help?I would have asked him what that meant—except for the fact that his response hit way too close to home.
“Thank you, Braden. I appreciate your honest answer.” I swigged the rest of my coffee, wanting to avoid eye contact now.
From the other room, Cy said, “Don’t believe it, Dani. Slutty girls fuckingrule!”
Braden shook his head as he rose and made his way to the bathroom for a shower, reminding me that we all needed to enjoy the afternoon before our next show.
And I probably needed to begin another job search. After all, because I’d decided to stay, I needed to contribute and support myself.
I might as well not put it off.
This was my new life and I was going to live it the best way I could, even with a broken heart.
Three days later,we were playing at what would become one of my favorite venues, the Vertex Music Hall. It didn’t look like much on the outside. In fact, it looked like an abandoned movie theater, with its old-fashioned marquee sign and faded red bricks, but inside it felt like a real concert venue. We were all so stoked on our first night there when we peeked through a side curtain backstage to see all the seats, including a huge balcony.
There was no way we wouldn’t sound great or feel amazing playing at this place.
Oh, and the acoustics were better than any other place we’d played so far. This spot was designed for music, and something I didn’t realize until later was that they even had great laser lights, another thing that made our shows look a lot more professional.
Playing drums that night, I felt like we were a real band.
