Frank J. Tassone

About that Night

What was it about you? Was it the look in your eyes? The way you kept your curly hair like you just rolled out of bed?

Or was it simply circumstances? Me, with a girlfriend living outside Philadelphia whom I hadn't seen since July. You, unattached, sitting on the barstool next to me at the Road House in Binghamton. Both of us sipping a mediocre beer, lost in what we weren't saying.

An awkward goodnight becomes passionate kissing, embracing, groping. Becomes me whispering, "Do you have any?"

twisted cotton sheets
wisps of cloud above
the garbage-strewn alley