Birthday Beginnings

As the morning sunbeams slowly filtered through her window, she realized to her dismay that it would be a rainy morning. The distant echo of pattering precipitation had roused her from the most wonderful dream. She was feeling good! The dream had brought her body to life and she was all warm and toasty, wrapped tightly icocococoon of two sheets, a thick bedspread, and her favorite chenille throw. Her eyes still closed, she tried to shake the last remnants of sleep from her liquor-muddled mind, but it didn’t help that her head was pounding in time with the rain.

“That is the last time I let him talk me into going out for drinks!” she groused. “Ply me with alcohol! Take advantage of me!” she jeered. Then her mind turned to more pleasant thoughts, of the dream she’d left so unwillingly. She sure wouldn’t have minded the hangover if she could have awakened in his arms. She ran her fingers over the empty place in her bed and sighed. “Oh well, maybe someday those dreams will come true.” Stretching her body lithely under the sheet, she was brought up short by the sudden stab of burning cramps in her calf muscles.

Her eyes flew open. “Oh God!” she howled. “Ow! What the hell?!?” She furiously rubbed at her calves and groaned between clenched teeth. “What did I do last night? I don’t remember dancing.” But then again, she didn’t really remember much of anything from after the restaurant. Besides, her dream had her so confused, she wasn’t sure where it ended and her actual memories of their candlelit dinner began.

Trying to figure out what exertion could’ve possibly caused such sharp pains in her gams only caused even sharper pains in her noggin. “Ohhh, my head,” she wailed. She lay perfectly still for a while, staring up at the ceiling, taking only shallow breaths. Both pains gradually subsided.

She closed her eyes and allowed herself to be swept up into the quiet tranquility of the morning. The sound of rainfall was momentarily soothing, and she decided to get up and watch the gentle summer shower from her bedroom window. When she sat up, the covers that had been pulled tightly up over her shoulders fell down to her waist, and she realized for the first time that she was completely naked.

She gave a derisive snort. “Man, I must have been really wasted.” She smiled abjectly at herself and wondered how big a fool she must have acted if she was too drunk to even put on a nightgown. She stood slowly as not to start her head or legs to throbbing again. She grabbed her blue satin robe from off the chest at the foot of her bed and slipped into it. She crossed to the window then froze. She had finally looked outside, and it was definitely not raining. ‘But I hear rain . . .’ she thought, baffled. Then the ‘downpour’ stopped abruptly. Her mind was still pretty foggy, but not so much so that she couldn’t figure out what the rainfall sounds had really been.

Her shower.