nobody said it was like this

When Ellie awoke it was like emerging from murky waters. She looked around at the dim lit room. It wasn't her room. Her heartbeat echoed through her body. She rose up on her elbows, looked to see if she was dressed. Even her shoes were on. That was a sigh of relief. Then she looked to her side and Elliot was smiling in his sleep.

Ellie's eyes lit. She felt herself slightly shake or what was stirring inside her... time to get out of here. Now. She sat up slowly. Her head ached and there was bitter flem in her mouth. She thought she might be too woozy to get up, but she forced herself too. Slowly. She had to bend down to get her bag, to look for her coat in his livingroom. She walked carefully as not to disturb him. It was time to leave.

Why did she ever come?

She remembered Eric telling him about Dora and how she was a lesbian. And didn't Elliot know? Then she thought of the look on Elliot's face as if it were the worst thing he'd ever heard. He was hurt. He kept backing away, and Ellie didn't know why she had to run to his defense. It just seemed the logical thing to do. She yelled at Eric. "Look what you've done!" And that's how it started. And she guessed that's how she ended up here.

First Elliot wasn't going to talk about it. Then the closer he got home and the faster he drove, he was sure he didn't believe it. It couldn't be true. It just couldn't be. They'd made out in the commons the day before their first college courses started. He talked about a lot of things after that and Ellie drank the rest of eggnog in his fridge, and they talked it all out that it was all really OK. Only, he'd neglected to tell her there was rum in the eggnog. And before she knew it, Ellie figured out vodka and rum did not mix so she spent a good hour in his bathroom throwing up. And he'd sat with her with a warm wash cloth over her forehead for the most part in the bathroom.

It really wasn't all that exciting. It was probably the worst anyone had ever seen her, and he promised how he'd see Dora again. And everything would be OK. It wasn't that big of a deal, after all. And Ellie had just listened. And she guessed it was there on the bathroom floor they'd started kissing. Just because. She couldn't think of a better reason now.

Ellie remembered how she thought she was kissing Eric in the beginning, but she wasn't, and it was hard to get used to the fact that he didn't kiss the way Eric did. It was actually slower, maybe better. No, it couldn't be better. She didn't want it be better. But it was and..and...

"We should just do this," he'd said and some how they made it kissing madly all the way to his room and his bed. There they were. It had been a slow effort to get there.

"What were we going to do?" She'd remembered once they were there on the bed, and it was so firm and sturdy. He just smiled.

"I think I can stand on my head now," she smiled back.

"You don't have to," he told her.

"But I really want to." She nodded as if he needed to see.

"No, really, that's OK." He'd pushed his fingers through her hair and had put his hands under her T-shirt and then.

"You said you wanted to do this." She pushed his hand away firmly.

"Yeah, I want to." He's kissed her neck then and breathed into her ear to give her a shiver.

"I don't think you do." She pulled away. This had nothing to do with standing on heads. So they argued about that for a while. He finally said, "Well, go ahead."

"Fine." She sighed. "I'm going to do it." And that's when she turned a flip and fell on the floor and laughed so hard on her back that she said. "God, I've never had this much fun before." He laid on the cold floor next to her, and they stared at the ceiling for sometime.

"You know, that wasn't what I really wanted to do," he told her.

She just nodded and told him Eric was her boyfriend. Her one and only. And he said there was a time when he thought Dora would be his one and only, too.

Then they got back in bed and she'd wrapped his arms around her like a blanket because her teeth started to chatter.

And now Ellie had to leave. She waited until she was outside in the cold before she called Kyle and Amanda.