The night has been deemed Loft Night. Loft Night is a night of female bonding and mild to moderate inebriation. With pride and pleasure I truck two of my dearest friends to the Loft in Edmonds and drop them off for a night away from the world. The sky dark and their eyes alight, I drop them off and they begin to smile long smiles that, I imagine, don’t end until they fall asleep, if then. Smiling for many is a common, habitual act, but for these girls a true smile is valuable and rare. Something one would be willing to pay to see. Being able to so effortlessly produce smiles from ear to ear on these girls is akin to parting the seas. I drop them off and know that no matter what happens tonight, I can be sure that sheers, ex-husbands, mothers, sisters; even myself, will play no part in ruining their evening of escape.
I drop them off with love and warmth, set them on a Washington winter avenue a block before the Loft so they can pull sweetly on their cigarettes for a minute or two. I weigh my foot down on the gas pedal, pull a u-turn, blow a kiss, and disappear into the night. A phantom for now. I drive through the darkened Edmonds streets, eerie with the crisp vacant feeling of the 18 degree weather. Every turn becomes a drift in my mind, every stop smooth and calculated; the lights do not turn red to stop me, I turn them red to take a break. When they turn green it’s only if I’m ready. My evening ritual: I drive to a 24-hour diner, order a breakfast plate and an Oreo milkshake. I write. When I’m done, I head back towards Edmonds; all the while commanding the street beneath my tires. I stop at the QFC to buy two electrolyte boosted water bottles so that the girls will have a less hung over day tomorrow.
In the parking lot of the QFC a man is driving an old Ford pickup truck wildly. Obviously drunk off his ass. It’s unnerving, but I am a phantom and would take a hit from his truck like a patch of fog. I head back towards Edmonds. The girls have nearly another hour of fun ahead of them. I do not tell them I’ve arrived; I want them to feel no pressure. After a very deliberate bout of parallel parking, I step carefully out of the car into the frozen night and feel naked it’s so cold.
I hop out of the car in a dance-like maneuver in my winter garb. I dash behind the buildings and duck into the alleyway. I hop onto a metal dumpster and leap up towards the roof, grabbing the edge of it. I pull my body up and over the side, rolling onto my back and making sure not to ruin any of the buttons on my pea coat. I breathe hard with adrenaline pulsing through my veins. My breath is visible in front of me, before the starlit sky, like a cloud. The Beach Boys are in my ears.
They’re mocking the night; the world. I sit up quickly and begin to prance about the rooftop like a bandit in the night. I’m frolicking up there like a raccoon in a garbage can. It’s exciting and wonderful. From business to business, I gallop over their thousands of sleeping products, merchandise all waiting to be bought, empty rooms full of money and nothing all at once. Liberating. Absolutely liberating. Living on the edge, but not criminally. I would never steal or hurt others. That’s not me. I just need to do things mildly against the rules. Bend them really. Add a spark but never light a fire.
I’m lying on the marquee of “The Fabric of Life.” The girls step out of the Loft and walk up the block, just below me. My phone rings. It’s one of the girls.
“Where are you?” she asks.
“I’m nearby. Where are you?”
“We’re smoking at the Fabric of Life.” I hang up.
I lean over the edge and shout shrilly like an old woman, “Could you girls not smoke here?! The fumes bother me.” It startles them and they retaliate.
“Don’t fuck with us when we’re drunk!”
But one of them laughs. They love me. They’re glad I’m there. I love them. I’m glad I’m there. On this night I would choose nothing different to do but be there for these girls; to allow these girls to have a night of fun the world would otherwise never permit. To say that we are simple or that it doesn’t take much to please us would be a lie. Maybe. But when pleasure comes it comes full force, and in a way that I’m sure no one else understands. The night’s a success. I run over the rooftops again, slip on the slanted edge of one and think about the embarrassment of being caught doing something so ridiculous. I realize that being caught would be worth the feeling. Like these girls and their escape in the lights of the Loft, I need this escape above the people of the streets and above all the problems of my daily life. I hop down off the roof, onto the dumpster, and walk back to the car. I open their doors one by one and help them gently into their seats.
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