I look to my left. Ana is awake, looking back at me.
“Aren’t you asleep?”
“No,” she babbles, her breath surrounding me in waves of brandy.
“Why?”
“You know why.”
“I have no idea why, but I’m dead tired.”
“Oh, stop with this sleep nonsense,” she suddenly snaps in a drunk tone. She turns around and hits the light switch, then asks in a playful tone. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re interesting? You have a terribly magnetic attitude.”
Poor woman. My magnetism is just the alcohol in her brain, damn woman.
The thought that a woman finds me attractive only when she’s close to an alcoholic coma doesn’t sit well with me.
“To be honest, nobody has ever said I was magnetic, however, I’ve been told my face asks to be punched.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not talking about your face,” she says, and her hands disappear under the blanket.
“Is it just me, or you’re trying to do things to me, ma’am?”
“Is it just me, or you’re acting crazy, sir? Ha ha… Or maybe you don’t like women.”
“I’m not interested at all in women.”
She looks at me confused, and her fingers under the blanket take a break, but a few seconds later they continue their assault.
“Hee, hee… What a cute idiot! You’ve been married several times, and you don’t like women? Tell that to someone else,” she says laughing, visibly drunk.
I try tempering this creature that keeps tugging at my pants. Her cheeks are rosy and her eyes are rolling in her head because of the brandy. She clearly is fixed on her idea, and I don’t like that.
God, help me! I swear to never get women drunk again.
“You don’t like chicks, you say?” she scolds, panting. “Did you become an enemy?”
“That’s stupid,” I protest. “I’m not gay! I never said I liked men.”
“I like men,” admits Ana. “Hee, hee, I think I’m a bit gay because I’ve always liked them.”
Okay, I have two choices. I either run out of this hotel with my clothes in my arms, and with Satan following me down the stairs, or I quickly give her what she wants and get her to sleep.”
It’s terribly cold outside, so I pick the second option, praying it won’t take long. It will probably be fast. It’s been a long time since…
“I’m impotent,” I say as a last resort.
“Yeah, right,” she laughs. “If you’re impotent, then what am I holding?”
I look down somehow curious. Yep, she caught me. I don’t know how she managed, but I could crush someone’s head with what she’s holding.
“Okay, Ana. Moment of truth. I’ll tell you why I can’t. I’m HIV positive.”
“And I have herpes. Wanna trade?”
“Hell, you’re unbelievable! I don’t even have a condom! I don’t!”
“I have *hiccup*… a condom.” Ana tries getting out of bed, but she’s so drunk, she falls on top of me like a pancake.
“You keep condoms in your purse?”
“Of course I do. Did you think I visited Vienna to go to the zoo?”
To my understanding, I found a collector of men. That’s bad luck. Now I know I really need a condom.
“Okay, you convinced me. We’ll have sex. Where’s your purse?”
“There on the table,” she moans. “My Godddd…”
“What? What happened?”
“The r…room is spinning.”
“Oh, that… I know. That’s normal. Get off me for a second. I need a condom.”
Ana suddenly screams in my ear.
“A man doesn’t belong to *hiccup*… God! Bring me the purse! Keep your paws out of it, you pig!”
I manage to free myself and bring her the purse, but her search for a condom takes forever. Finally, I get the much-awaited rubber, but I have nothing to put it on.
“See, you gay woman? See? I didn’t lie to you. I told you I’m impotent.”
“Why in the world are you shouting? You’re going to wake up everyone in the hotel.”
“I’m the one shouting? You are! You’re louder than a corporal shouting orders.”
“Leave if you don’t like my voice!” she shouts, sending brandy-flavored spit my way. “You keep coming and going from my room. You weirdo! A man must be *hiccup* sure of his actions!”
“Come on, tell me to leave one more time,” I shout in anger. “I dare you! Tell me that again!”
“Leaveeeee!” she screams.
I get up on all fours and try to reach my clothes, but Ana grabs my legs and pulls me back. The blanket flies off me. One of the pillows hits my head, and the other hits the lamp on the nightstand.
“Did you really think I was going to let you leave?”
This is not a woman, but a judo fighter. I don’t understand how those thin arms of hers are so strong. I’m afraid that if I really upset her, she’ll snap me like a twig.
“Listen here, you ass. I’ll enjoy the best sex in the world even if you don’t participate willingly,” she shouts in anger. “But you will be part of it, I assure you of that. You’ll be the guest of honor, oh, yes! You will *hiccup* be part of it! And you’ll be the best!”
She’s drunk, crazy, and with a horrible thirst for doing the dirty. Great person to share the hotel room with…
Suddenly, she weasels out of bed, locks the door, and goes to the bathroom. I hear the key clinking in the toilet and Ana flushing.
I stare at the ground in resignation. I’m doomed.
“Well, that’s handled,” she says, walking out of the bathroom. “Lay on your back and let me revive it.”
It’s a miracle. In less than a minute, it’s alive again. Ana grabs the condom and rolls it without a wrinkle visible.
Her pants fly on my head. I take them off and watch her, half in amusement, half upset about how she impales herself on me. She’s not all the way drunk, because she knows what she’s doing, and she’s doing it well. She rides me like a possessed person. It’s worth looking at. It feels like I have a front-row seat to a show.
“Not bad, girl,” I encourage her. “Why didn’t you say so from the start?”
I grab her menthol cigarettes off the nightstand, light one up, and continue watching my amazon. I swear I could marry this woman. That’s what I’ve been searching for forty years, I just didn’t know it.
Someone knocks. The thin voice of a woman threatens us through the door.
“I’m from the reception. I’m sorry but… Hello? We keep receiving complaints. Please be quiet!”
“Can’t people fuck in your hotel?” screams Ana without stopping what she’s doing. “Have patience and let me finish, and after that, I’ll give him to you. You can bring colleagues.”
I start laughing. I like her. She’s fierce. I always appreciated those who can turn a situation in their favor.
The other one keeps knocking on the door enraged, this one tortures me on the bed, but what really scares me is that this has been going on for over ten minutes, and I can’t finish. I don’t know what Austrians put in their brandy, but it seems to work for men and women both.
I get a great idea. I should pretend I’m done.
“Oh…”
“Don’t you dare finish, or I’ll kill you!” she screams.
“What are you saying? No way!”
I’m doomed. I’m going to end up dead in my prime years in this hotel. How unfortunate. Maybe if she had not thrown the key down the toilet, I’d still have a chance.
Ana is breathing fast and she looks like she’s close to getting a heart attack. Sweat pours off her in waves.
“Move a bit as well, don’t sit here like an animal,” she moans. “It’s not fair.”
I take pity on her. This energetic woman is fifty, after all, so I set her nicely in the sheets, and take over the business.
She turns too quiet all of a sudden. She lays under me like a rag. I have the weird feeling I’m screwing a corpse, so I take a small break and lay my palm over her left breast. Her heart’s still beating.
“Why are you stopping?” she asks, looking at me with one eye.
Yep, she’s alive. Defeated, I continue exploring the burning depts offered to me so generously. It takes a while, and the minutes keep passing.
It feels like a sauna in here. We’re soaked with sweat and we’re both moaning like bears. The cold from outside is not reaching us from under the door anymore. The bed keeps shaking, protesting timidly, squeaking louder and louder. A bit more and it will collapse as well.
Okay. We’re at the position number 107. I try to come up with another one, but I have no creativity left. Ana squeals, moans, shouts, and pants, then takes a break and starts again.
God damn it! This isn’t sex, but a room of the Spanish Inquisition. If I continue, we’ll both kick the bucket, and I won’t see Dubai anymore. Or Thailand!
“I can’t do it anymore; I really can’t do… it… Do you hear me? Can we leave it for another time?”
“Nooooo!” she screams, suddenly alive. “I’ll get the best… the best…”
“The best sex. I know, I know.”
I realize there are two big hammers in my head. I can hear them beating on my temples. It’s a miracle I have not passed out yet. Even the lady from the reception got bored and left.
I glance toward the nightstand and notice the bottle is not completely empty, so I pour two drinks in equal amounts and offer her a glass. We drink quietly.
“I really needed one after all this. Cheers! For the health of your brother-in-law.”
She starts laughing and chugs the drink, then throws the glass over her shoulder. It shatters and she pretends to be surprised, then hiccups and starts crying.
I look at her a bit uneasy and feel the need to cross myself. Ana sees my face and starts laughing like a deviant hyena. Who could understand her?
“It’s almost 6 AM. Go rest for a bit.”
I’ll stay with her for a bit longer to pretend I care, and then I’ll vanish out the door, or out the window. It doesn’t even matter. I just want her to fall asleep.
What the fuck? She’s crying again, and her drunken womanly squeals piss me off.
“Come here.”
I hug her and tell her she’s beautiful. That’s not a lie. She’s the most beautiful woman in this room.
“I really like you, Ana. Honestly. Calm down.”
“You like me?”
“Of course! I like you a lot.”
Why shouldn’t I tell her that? It’s not difficult.
“Tell me more.”
I tell her she’s special, very special. I wipe her tears with kisses, stroking her red hair, and gently rock her. She calms down and falls asleep with her cheek against my chest. Finally.
I keep talking to her and stroking her even after she falls asleep, then gently lay her on the bed, pick the blanket off the floor, and wrap her up. She’s breathing lightly like a child.
The condom comes off in one move and I throw it under the armchair, then lay on the bed as well. There’s complete stillness in the room, and you can’t hear a fly.
Mission accomplished!
NEXT