A Taste

Was it a form of avoidance and escapism or just a personality flaw? She couldn't really define the way she felt. It was akin to the moment you try your favorite food for the very first time. There's almost a desperation for more accompanied by a tiny but insistent fear that you'll never taste it again, so you must drink it in with all five senses in that moment. Every so often she'd see a new face, a new body, hear a new sound, meet a new personality, see a new movie star, read a new character, and that first taste - that first taste led to hours of reading, listening, watching, thinking, fantasizing and daydreaming.

She didn't see it coming, she wasn't expecting anything from her evening in the dark little club. She made plans to see the show to recapture a memory that she'd rather not consider, but she found herself enamored with the voices on the recording anyway, so she came. It wasn't even the band she came to see, but an opener - she didn't even know the band name until the end of the set. And he walked on the stage.

Her first reaction to his lithe figure and leather jacket with tousled hair was something like contempt. Oh please, who do you think you are, Elvis? He took his place right in front of her and started fiddling with his pedals and she watched with fascination. Leather jacket, tattooed wrist, less-than-friendly demeanor. His band mates came out on stage and she was momentarily distracted by the cute blonde one. The lights dimmed and the guitars started growling low and slow.

In that moment, illuminated by the red lights, she saw a familiarity about him, even though she had never seen him before. As he crooned out the lyrics into the crowd, she saw his ultra-defined adams apple skipping up and down; she stared, transfixed. Behind his ear was a tiny tattoo that she could barely see, and his face was twisted with intensity. His tight jeans left nothing to the imagination as he swayed and stomped with the music.

He walked closer and she could see the sweat glistening, dripping, sliding down his chest that had that erotic ambiguity of being both a youth's and a man's. He was slender and perfect and sharp, and consumed by the lyrics and the chords on his guitar. He tossed his hair and she felt a little sprinkle on her skin, her hot sticky skin, surrounded on all sides by pushing arms and hands and bodies. She wasn't prone to desiring band musicians, but her heart was racing and her eyes were focused on drinking him in.

Then he slid off the leather jacket, tossing it behind him onto the stage. The cryptic tattoo around his wrist winded and twisted into a sleeve of tattoos that covered his forearm. She imagined it climbing his shoulder and weaving across his back, but the only uncovered evidence was another tattoo sleeve descending from the other sleeve of his v-neck t-shirt. A silver chain caught the light and sparkled as he hunched his body into his guitar, ripping the sounds out and throwing them to the crowd.

She was consumed with the task of capturing each detail. Once she arrived home, she knew she would scour the net for information - who is this man. More often than not it led to things she didn't like and loss of interest, so for now - for this moment, she would forget that and enjoy. As they took their final bow her mind had already wandered, placing him in 1,000 different situations of interest. This was her first taste of a delicacy and she would not forget.