fountain running

He lay on his back like a beached harbor seal across the marble edge of one of the many grotesquely romantic Roman inspired fountains in the courtyard of Caesar's Palace. 

One hand swimming in the water. The other holding a half drunk $75 bottle of wine and a white linen napkin. 

The white sleeves of his oxford unevenly rolled up, his tie crumpled and drifting, his dress pants dotted with wine. 

His suit jacket draped across my shoulders nearly hiding all of my little dress. Neither of us knowing where our shoes are: Vegas.

"The thing is, Utah," he was saying, "it isn't the person you are with it is the way you are when you are with them. If you were with Him you would be running through this fountain and he'd be all standing here pissed at you. But if you were with a fountain runner you would be the one standing there being all pissed off. Why are you always the other way round? When are you going to do what you really want to do?"

I laugh and sit down beside him. My elbow thumps into his side in my sloppy decent and he reacts so overly dramatic that he nearly rolls himself over the edge and into the water. 

""Doctor, have you lost your mind?" I say into the air, "Might I remind you we did just run through that fountain?"

He sits up shaking his head, "No, no, no! You did that for me! Because I am a co-depended fountain runner. You are always whatever WE need you to be. When do you get to be you?"

Out of the corner of my eye I see a security guard making his way towards us. I pull on his arm and we head for the nearest bank of elevators. 

The wine, the wetness, the marble floors, even the chill of the desert night turning makes the walk feel like we are ice skating across a pond.  

And it begins to feel just dangerous enough that I stop paying attention to the blaze of us & our wild night to concentrate solely on getting him to the room without incident.

Inside the elevator we are not alone but it doesn't stop him. "I mean, " he slurs, "I want to see who you really are. I want you to find a man that you won't hide yourself behind..."

"Yes, Dear." I answer smiling at the strangers and slipping the bottle of wine from his hand.    

His weight shifts and he rests his entire mass against my bad shoulder.  It pins me behind him to the glass wall.  I feel a stitch rip loose from the strap on my dress.  He whispers into my hair, "but I want it to be me, okay?"  

And I don't remember anything else... Except for the pressure of the weight resting on my shoulders and the sound of the water dripping onto the floor.