sometimes your body knows. your subconscious knows. every ounce of you reads the beacon of aura another person shines from behind you. so that by the time you turn around and meet them face to face. you know that person. you've always known that person. in those moments of feeling their light... centuries have passed. wars were waged. love cycloned through you once. or twice for a second pass or stay.
and sometimes. without turning around. you body can detect someone really, really annoying is behind you.
for some reason i was body blocking her. standard concert move. matters and i were at the bowery seeing lykke li. and opener, anna ternheim, and headliner, perro del mar aka assbring. but really we were there to see lykke li. the rest was just bermanesque soprano howls of stalking unrequited pain. though anna's dry humor was not lost on the ironic masses.
as lykke li's set began to quake, she tried to get past me. i didn't even notice her. i was enraptured with my companion, and the promise of a good set from those who saw the show at joe's pub the night before. she tried to pass several times before bellowing, "excuse me." it was the kind of bellow that only a youth trying to be old could bellow.
it almost would have been better is she were committing a stripe on stripe crime like most indie rock fans three times removed at the bowery often do. (tell me, god of fashion, that they'll go away one day soon, though.) but she wore an imitation donna karan wrap dress. with a brown mosaic print. the perfect tip from o magazine circa 2001 to accent her smallish waist and draw attention away from her large rotundish bottom. her hair was blonde. and coiffed into a perfect bob. not a strand out of place even though she was. even by swedish chanteuse standards.
i moved. reluctantly. and she stepped in. right in front of me. and basically stayed there, behind her friend. that is, until. see, i forgot to mention the older "gentleman" watching the concert to my right. unassbringsuming enough on his own. about 54 years old. tall. pink button down shirt. tucked in. belted pants of some form of denim material. longish grayish hair receding in the front and not exactly clean. like his wire frame glasses weren't. i didn't see him straight on. just from the back and side. and i asked myself, "what is it like to see the world through fingerprints?"
the first hmmm: he offered her the spot in front of him. she declined, and bobbed along beside him. they exchanged a few pleasantries. "dance, dance, dance" began to play. hips began to sway.
the second hmmm: she was cold. she put her jacket on. she put her jacket on in a way that only someone strong, feigning helplessness could. he asked her, "are you cold?"
she took the jacket off in a mater of moments.
"oh my god, matters. she's flirting with him. she wanted him to help her with his jacket, which he didn't understand."
i thought i had to spell it out. matters was actually listening to the music. he was enthralled with the drummer, while i flitted between watching the strange mating ritual in front of me and deconstructing lykke li's dance moves which rotated from hip hop to old blues woman hard knocks singer to bollywood nymph. cymbals and poses included.
matters is kind of slow. or he claims to be. he did take in their earlier exchage, which was completely off my radar.
"he said something about a teenage kids. like, maybe he has a couple running around here?" i was still processing the fact that matters took in some of their conversation when he said,
"either way, he doesn't stand a chance."
" he has an accent."
"oh. well. then all bets are off."
the wrap dress turned to fingerprints. in a gesture of delicious intention, her hand floated and landed on his shoulder.
"i'm Tabitha," she announced. he said his name, in some sputtering uk bad teeth dialect, not quite grasping what was being decided for him. by all of us. Tabitha looked at us and smiled. she was shockingly younger head on.
still, matters sideways pleaded, "i don't want into their circle."
i agreed, and pondered what i should have had for dinner instead of participating in a reggae dance workout.
lykke li started bouncing to "little bit".
Tabitha's friend grabbed her hand, wanting to rush the stage to hear the song better. Tabitha, larger and in charger, pulled back. Her round bottom tick tocked to the cowbell, as she inched closer to fingerprints other parts. her shoulders waved like bright orange flags directing fingerprints down her tarmac. he didn't quite understand. or maybe he didn't quite believe what was happening. either way, he started to dance. as best he could. (insert image of stereotypically hilariously awful white man overbite... here.)
they looked at eachother (one word, here, because they were connected, as best she could will it.)
"tonight" began to unfold its wings, and the audience shushed each other, getting pissed off at talkers for infringing their allotted 4:22 of vulnerability.
fingerprints occasionally jerked his head in an expressive manner. Tabitha heaved her bosom. their bodies kind of touched. it was kind of sweet in a god that's really gross i may have thought it was cute if you didn't both keep gyrating in my personal space way.
one more song, "i'm good. i'm gone." and the set was over.
Tabitha's friend turned around looked at fingerprints.
"no."
and they stumbled away.
"it was very nice meeting you," Tabitha called behind her.
fingerprints turned around. and it was then i realized that he earned a new name. unicorn. this was due to the large goiter bindi mole forehead smacked above his unibrow.
"she was drunk," matters said with a little sorry for both of them.
unicorn looked around. confused. searching for Tabitha? searching for the teenagers? searching for an explanation as to what good fortune he almost had? searching for someone who was actually paying attention to perro del mar?
who knows.
