Chapter 9 Meetings of a Human Kind of the Coed Persuasion

Nuala is facing the street, facing the others.

She asks of the others:

"Now what?"

They point behind her.

She turns.

They are at the door of the club Etain had given the name and address off, which turns out to be the QSINY Restaurant & Nightclub.

"Oh."

"Well, I guess that's what next…"

They wait for her.

She makes her way into the club.

They follow.

Once inside the club Nuala unerringly homes in on Etain.

She is perching on a stool placed in the midpoint of the bar.

Nuala sits besides her, stares hard into her eyes, then finds herself at a loss for words.

Meanwhile Pah and Selu sit at one end of the bar, order bourbon, and engage in a spirited conversation.

Delirium goes to the dance floor and starts dancing wildly.

"You came!"

Says Etain to Nuala.

"I promised."

"Yeah, but promises are empty things, everybody promises and nobody keeps, everybody says one thing and does another, and yet… and yet you came..."

"I promised!"

"Yes you came. You are here now, you came."

"I promised…"

And once again Nuala falters, at a loss for words.

Etain kisses Nuala.

Nuala makes a decision.

She stares hard into Etain's eyes, mesmerizing.

"You cannot come into my home tonight."

Delirium has drifted to their neighborhood.

Nuala hands a hand scribbled napkin to Etain.

"Here is my address."

"You cannot come into my house tonight, there is… stuff, going on tonight at my house."

Etain stares despairingly into Nuala's eyes, as if fearing she will never be able to go to her house, never see her again.

"But one night you will go to my house. You will go. You will."

Etain nods vigorously

Then chokes out.

"… When?"

"You will know."

"I need a cigarette. I am going to the patio for a smoke."

Etain nods confused.

Nuala dashes off.

The air has grown still and humid and cold.

Nuala is leaning with her backed pressed against the handrail.

She looks at the moon, disregards the city and the city lights and the headlights of the night traffic.

She is looking for stars, but she cannot find any, for they are lost in the city's light pollution.

She ends up smoking three cigarettes.

One very fast, in quick frantic inhalations, so hard and fast the cigarette burns.

The other more moderately, at a normal pace.

And the other very slowly, taking delight at each individual drag, as if making a sacrament of it.

Has she is stubbing the butt of the last one with her toe:

"I need to dance."

She darts back inside.

The cloud of smoke she exhaled does not disperse.

Nuala is hyper.

She darts to Etain.

She grabs her, drags her to the middle of the dance floor.

Delirium, sensing what is to come, follows both of them eagerly.

Nuala starts dancing with all she has, combining the hip movements of an Arabian belly dancer with the mudras of an Indian classical dancer. Then she seems to remember who she is, and starts interspacing a vigorous jig with bits of dancing coming from the Sun Dance ceremonial.

Delirium dances fervently, with manic abandon.

Etain at first is at a loss.

Then she attempts to keep up, with far less elegance and energy.

Dancers crowd around them, leaving them a circular clear space to dance, cheering them on.

Nuala dances on.

Something grows within her.

Something she hasn't experienced in a very long time.

Not since she was embraced.

It is a very incremental growth.

Suddenly a threshold is crossed.

Nuala stumbles, her hands flutter of their own accord to where her heart used to be.

Her lips form a soundless O.

She darts back to the patio.

She stands in the exact center of the patio, bathed in moonlight. She hugs herself, and occasionally her hands drift to her heart. She is circling slowly around herself.

Then she goes to lean again against the guardrail, this time on her elbows, taking in the lights of the city at night.

Then she turns back inwards, smokes a cigarette, in a contemplative mood.

Unbeknownst to her the smoke from this cigarette coalesces with the smoke from the previous three.

She heads back inside.

She has something to say to Etain.

For the first time in a very long time she knows what to say to someone, and she can't wait to say it.

When Nuala spots Etain she is being harassed by an obnoxious young man.

Nuala makes a beeline towards them. Yanks him by his forearm. Twirls him around so that they are both with their backs to the bar, taking in the rest of the club. She is squeezing his forearm hard.

Delirium comes to see what is going on.

"Have you noticed where you are?"

All around them, the majority are young women paired with young women. Sprinkled amongst them are couples of young men. And in a couple of tables pressed against the wall lining the dance floor some couples of young men and women, for the most part engaged in each other's company.

"What could possibly lead you to believe she had any interest in you?"

She waits for an answer.

With a look that betrays the pain she is inflicting on him through her squeezing his arm, he stares defiantly at her.

"Could you possibly be trying to save her?"

Her voice rises until her last word is cried out.

She lets go of his forearm forcibly.

"You disgust me."

With his arm released he starts to walk away.

He hand snakes to his chin, jerks his head until their noses touch.

"You might love women. You might even have a sick fantasy about seeing two women together. No matter. Your manhood is shriveled. Forever more your manhood will shrivel at the sight of women. Forever more your manhood will only swell in pride in the presence of men. And always in the most embarrassing awkward moments, with your friends in the locker after gym practice, in bars with your friends bantering, even when wrestling or in fisticuffs with a foe."

She stares a while longer into his eyes for effect.

Then releases his chin in disgust.

Terrified he flies the club.

Delirium blinks owlishly at her.

"Wow. That was rather… extreme…"

Etain is staring at her in a fight or flight posture, unsure whether to run to her or run away from her, delighted that she protected her honor or appalled at her overreaction.

Nuala thinks once again about what she had to say to Etain.

And darts away to the patio once again.

She only makes it out the door. She falls upwards leaning her back against it. Out of some sense of she knows not what, she inches to the side until she is leaning against the wall, and then falls squatting.

She raises her knees, hugs her legs, and rests her left cheek in her knees.

She just squats there for a very long time.

Eventually, tremulously, she lights up another cigarette.

The smoke of that cigarette combines with the cloud of smoke from all her previous cigarettes.

The cigarette smoke cloud coalesces into a person.