Attention Whore

After a particularly rough breakup with a guy who’d led me on for months, I found myself moping hardcore.

I came straight home from work every day, locking myself in my room and watching old movies. I cried when Holly Golightly realizes people do belong to each other, and when Sabrina sings “La Vie En Rose” while driving down the countryside. (Audrey Hepburn movies are a perfect cure for anything.)

One night, a knock came at my door. I had just taken a shower, my super-short velour robe the only thing hiding my bits and pieces. I tugged at the hem and opened the door.

There was my roommate, and next to him a very cute olive-skinned boy. “This is X,” he told me. “He’ll be staying with me for a few weeks. I thought I should introduce you.”

“Nice to meet you,” X said, with a slight accent I couldn’t place. He extended his hand, and I took it: His skin was soft, like his eyes, and he held my hand a little too long.

“We should watch a movie tonight,” I blurted out. “The three of us,” I added quickly, blushing.

“That sounds nice,” X smiled. My roommate shot me a look—I could tell he had a crush on X, and was clearly hoping that extending his apartment to him would lead to something more. But I didn’t care: X was hot, and I was lonely.

When they knocked on my door later that night, I’d undergone a transformation. My dull hair was freshly bleached and conditioned, my skin was shining from a new body lotion, and I smelled like citrus—it was the first time I’d spritzed on cologne since the breakup. (But I still hadn’t put on any clothes under my robe. I mean who has the time, am I right?)

My roommate sat between us on my bed, creating a buffer, but when the first movie (“The Sweetest Thing”) was over, it was X who suggested we watch another. Thirty minutes into “50 First Dates,” my roommate gave up, claimed he was exhausted and retreated back into his room.

X moved closer to me, and before I knew it I was on top of him, kissing him, tasting his spearmint toothpaste. “Do you have any condoms?” he whispered.

But I realized I didn’t want to have sex. I didn’t even want to fool around. I wanted the attention, the validation, someone to make me feel special. And realizing that just made me feel even more lonely than I did before.

“I’m sorry,” I said, rolling off of him. “I don’t wanna do this. I just went through a breakup. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” X smiled, grabbing my hand and squeezing. Under different circumstances, maybe we would have hit it off.

Instead, he went into my roommate’s room and fucked him—I could hear them when I went to the bathroom 15 minutes later. I gave myself a hard look in the mirror, went back into my room and finished the movie alone.