Page 35 of Date and Switch

He’d gotten off his bar stool and crowded me against the lip of the bar.

“Because you turn me on without even trying.” He leaned in to kiss me, I could smell the tequila on his breath, and the ocean freshness of his aftershave. “Do you want me to list all the ways?”

A group of couples entered the bar just then, taking a seat nearest the piano, and our pianist—happy to have someone to entertain—jaunted off into some jazzy little ditty.

“Maybe I pay attention more to non-physical attributes,” I suggested with a shrug. “After being judged for my looks for so many years of my life, I judge people on how I feel around them versus how they make me feel with nice words.”

Not wanting to let it go, he pushed his pelvis into me, unabashedly hard beneath his jeans.

“And how do I make you feel, Sera?”

“Seen.”

I could have told him he made me horny, or beautiful, or any other million different feelings but the most honest answer him to give was that he made me feel noticed. Like I wasn’t invisible. That he understood who I was at my core and celebrated that. Without ever suggesting I needed it, he offered his support, appreciation, or just general good guy-ness, without expectation.

“I think I’m done singing.” Bryce turned toward me, resting his head on the palm of his hand.

The couples turned the pianist—we learned his name was Dante—into their own request line and karaoke backup music all in one. They’d grown tired of Dante not knowing enough of their songs and took off for the casino. But there had been a combination of melodies that reminded me of a song I’d seen on social media where this chick sang the ABCs and then said FU and listed a bunch of shit that was wrong with her boyfriend. We sang a few, Bryce to Sarah and me to every single person I felt smited by. We’d descended into madness from there.

“Let’s go back to the room.” I signed our tab to the room—that was going to be quite the surprise at the end of the trip when this was just a faded memory—and helped Bryce off his stool and back upstairs to our room.

“Sera.” He cradled my face just before I engaged the lock on our door.

“I want to make love you to.” The green of his eyes looked like the bottom of the ocean. “I don’t want to just fuck you, Sera. You’re not a woman who you just fuck and forget about. I want to worship you, so you know for real that you are desirable and so damn special”

He fell over himself as I opened the door, trying to maintain eye contact, I assumed to see how sincere he was, while also trying to navigate our suite.

“I think we might both have had too many drinks for that tonight, Bryce.”

“Sera.” He held me against his chest, running his hands through my hair as he continued, “You don’t understand. I need to do this. There are so many things that are hard for me to say. You know? Because I just, I can’t find a way around all the hurt. But I can show you. I can show you how you make me feel. Okay? Let’s try. Go put your angel perfume on and come to bed.”

The “angel” perfume was the one that broke. On the storm of death night, that I did not need to be triggered back to when I still hadn’t quite gotten over nearly dying in the frigid water.

“Okay, I’m going to grab some water. I’ll meet you in there.”

“Oh no!” I heard a few moments later while collecting the pain killers from my backpack and high fiving my luck at still having a few Gatorades left, “My dick is broken!”

It took me more time than I expected it would to convince a forty-two-year-old man that his dick was not in fact broken, he was just drunk. Finally, after taking two pain killers and chugging a bottle of Gatorade—he would thank me in the morning for that, he passed out, his flaccid cock draped against his thigh.

Still chuckling at the rigamarole of the last twenty minutes, I went to cover him up. He took me by the hand, nearly asleep, and told me, “Maybe I’m falling in love with you.”

At least that’s what I think he said. It was kind of garbled.

He could have also said something like, “Gatorade makes me wanna poop.”

It could go either way.

Date & Switch Day 50

Oh my god! Did y’all miss us?! I can’t believe it’s been twenty days since I’ve been able to get enough juice to get this updated. Okay well, mostly it was because of shoddy internet. Sometimes it was because by the time we got back from our excursions it took all of our energy just to shower, get ready for dinner, and actually eat dinner before passing out ass up on the beds.

Do you know what happens after you round Antarctica? You spend a lot of time chilly. Ha! Get it... because after Antarctica, if you’re coming up the coast…it’s Chile? Okay fine. I’ll keep working on my one-woman comedy act. So—Chile. Good grief that is one big country.

I think I’ve gained about two inches in circumference in my thighs from all of this hiking. No one told me when I signed on for this thing that I was traveling with Bear Grylls’s cousin. I swear I’ve seen enough mountain peaks to get through to my fifties. Maybe my sixties.

Some of the coolest things from this long stint: Antarctica is freezing. Like a cold I don’t ever want to experience again. However, I am so incredibly grateful that I got to visit there. There is a level of quiet in the south pole that being in the noise of everyday life it’s hard to really explain. There’s such a lack of sound it’s almost as if that quiet is deafening. Like the lack of sound is pushing against your ears and making it seem soundless.

We saw whales. And not just saw them like oh, hey! Look over the bow, there’s some whales a million miles away. I saw them saw them. I was looking in their eyeballs—saw them. I don’t think I will ever forget that day as long as I live.

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