Once Upon a Dream

Chapter Two: My Not-So-Exciting Life

Even though my dreams are pretty weird, my life was very normal. Now, when I say normal, what I really mean is dull. I’d get up, I’d go to class, I’d go to work, I’d do my homework, and I’d go to bed. End of story. But once in a while I would make an attempt to lead an exciting life, and be an exciting person. These attempts were not met with much success.

Case in point: One day last year I decided to become sexy. I went shopping and bought a hot new top to wear to class the next day. My bra didn’t work with the shirt when I tried it on, but I thought that I had one back at the dorm that would, so I shelled out forty bucks for the teal silk confection.

I went home. I went to bed. I got up Friday morning, and discovered that the bra I was so sure would work didn’t. So, you know, I decided that I was far too exciting and sexy to feel uncomfortable without a bra. I went to class bold and braless. I really did feel confident. Wow, I thought. This braless thing kinda works for me. I feel hot. I must look hot, because that guy walking ahead of me just flashed me a grin that could only be described as wicked. And there was another suggestive glance. Woohoo! I looked so good that a whole group of frat girls just looked at me in open-mouthed admiration. I have to say, the attention felt good.

So I was a little shocked when my good friend Iacopo tackled me with his leather jacket.

“What are you doing?” I asked indignantly, struggling to get my arms loose of the jacket he had wrapped tightly around me.

“Making you decent, moron,” he replied. I gave him a look that said, “You’re crazy.” He gave me a look that said, “You’re naked.” I peeked inside the jacket, and saw the mole. The mole that was just beneath my left nipple.

Well. Wasn’t that exciting?

So, needless to say, I tended to be a little cautious in situations that put me at a high risk for making a fool of myself. Which was why I wanted off the hook that night.

“No way, ‘Donia. Are you crazy? This is going to be a great party,” Carmen insisted at lunch that day in the union grill. “And besides, it’s Parker’s birthday. You know she’ll feel bad if you don’t show.”

“Not that she needs any excuse.” Iacopo said around a mouthful of bacon cheeseburger.

I laughed. It was a well-known fact that Parker, our resident pessimist, was a softy deep down. If you looked closely enough. With a high-powered telescope. “But Cobb,” I protested. (Iacopo is a little bit of a mouthful. I don’t know what his parents were thinking. He hadn’t been called anything but Cobb since he turned six, when his parents realized he still couldn’t say his own name. And neither could anyone else. But I digress.) “But Cobb,” I protested. “All that fun and excitement. And me. In the same room. It’s dangerous.”

“Maybe for you. But the rest of us will so enjoy laughing at you,” Parker said, pulling out a chair and plopping down.

“Geez, Park. You haven’t been here five seconds and you’re already letting loose the zingers,” I grumbled.

She just shrugged. “You do what you’re good at.”

“Wench.” Parker smiled and nodded her agreement with my assessment of her character.

“Please, ‘Donia. I put so much time and effort into this party. You just have to come.” Letting her blond hair fall lightly over her eyes, Carmen pouted prettily.

Parker snorted. “Carmen, you are the only person I know who would make my birthday party revolve around you.”

Carmen stuck her tongue out. “I tried telling her she should come for your sake. But geez, that would be more likely to scare her away, wouldn’t it?” Oh, boy, I thought. Now the glove had been thrown down and they would argue at least until we were done eating. And that\'s bad for digestion.

Cobb chuckled at the banter. “You know what would make them stop?” he asked me.

“I have no idea.”

“You could agree to come to the party,” he cajoled.

“Oh, all right,” I huffed.

“I’ll watch out for you,” Cobb assured me. “Make sure you don’t get it into your head to do anything exciting. Like last time, when you decided that you could gain your fifteen minutes of fame by reciting Hamlet’s entire ‘to be’ soliloquy in pig latin on the roof of your car.”

“Cobb,” I warned.

“Hey, I think those cops really were enlightened during the hour and a half it took to get you down.”

“I hate you.”

I went to the party. I double-checked everything—I had my keys, my cell phone, and a tampon just in case in my purse. I had undergarments on. My tennis shoes were double-knotted. (I had long since given up wearing heels. Those things were deadly. I almost got sued after Tim Cullens groped me and I kicked him in the groin and fractured his penis.)

After checking everything for a third time, I walked to Parker’s house. Cobb was waiting for me in the foyer.

“You look good tonight, ‘Donia,” he said as he pocketed my keys and cell phone for safekeeping.

“Dude. Cobb. You have got to lay off the crack,” I joked. I was wearing exactly what I had been wearing to lunch—jeans and button-down shirt. Even though I had taken the time to put my hair up in a ponytail and swipe on some mascara, it was hardly worth a comment. But whatever. Cobb was just nice like that.

In Parker’s living room, people were already dancing. It helped that Carmen had hired some latin dancers from a club downtown to get things going. Those men—whew. All three of them were wearing white shirts that were almost completely unbuttoned and black jeans, and I couldn\'t wait to get my hands on them.

“Down girl,” Cobb whispered, laughter in his voice. I looked up at him and smiled.

“I might just have fun at this party after all.”


And I did have fun. As usual, I only had one drink. (Ha. You thought that incident on the car roof was a drunken escapade, didn’t you? Nope. There’s just something about parties that makes me toss my inhibitions to the wind. Oh yeah, that and I have absolutely no tolerance.) But I did dance. Have I mentioned that I lo-o-o-ove to dance? Any kind—latin dancing, swing dancing, ballroom or belly, you can count me in. I usually had a partner, but hey, if all the men were taken, I wasn’t above just grooving by a bunch of friends.

“Dance with me,” Cobb said, grabbing my hand and pulling me back to the center of the floor. Cobb was great fun to dance with—he had very good moves. And we’d been in a few dance classes together at the rec center, so we each knew how the other moved. It was a hot, energetic salsa, and as Cobb and I moved together, I suddenly saw, or maybe just comprehended, what a good-looking fella he was. I mean, I had known him for years; I knew he had longish brown hair and brown eyes and was very tall. But now I was suddenly flooded with the awareness that his hair curled a little bit and one lock had fallen into his eyes. I suddenly saw that those eyes weren’t just brown, but the color of Godiva’s milk chocolate. I suddenly felt that his chest was hard beneath my palm. And I suddenly had the urge to do something exciting.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! I stumbled back a step. Oh, weird. Cobb? Um, no. Obviously that drink had been too strong. I made some excuse and went home, assuring him that he didn’t need to walk me home.

Well, that confirmed my suspicion from that dream last night. I really had lost my mind. Seriously—Cobb?