I knew her online, and even then I was irresistibly attracted to her. They called her Sherri-neko; Sherri-cat. I secretly called her my Angel, because of college major; Religion, and the fact that I liked her. We have had many a fine debate...
I did something stupid this weekend. I left the comfort and safety of my dorm to travel into a different state and visit a couple friends. One of which, Tori, I hadn’t seen since High School, the others I had never met at all. The bus decided to be an hour late.
She was sleeping there, in the chair; curled up, and wearing cat ears. It was too cute…
I arrived at the Greyhound bus station in Charlottesville, and immediately recognized my ride, Sherri, despite never seeing a recent photo of her. I knew her through Tori, and through our several chats, had gotten to know her. I got the drift that she liked me as much as I liked her; in that way. But it was a forbidden interest. Tori was literally a psychopath with a crush on me (who still hasn’t gotten the courage to tell me, but it’s fairly obvious), who also owned a baseball bat, and if she found out I was in the least bit interested in Sherri, Sherri and I both had to fear for our lives.
We made small talk on the way to Randolph Macon Women’s College in Lynchburg, and I couldn’t keep my eyes off her...
We got to Lynchburg and went to Tori’s dorm room. The watching of movies began after a while. Tori was in her bed, Sherri and I were on the floor, right behind the dresser, and just out of Tori’s sight. We watched the some Anime Music Videos, some episodes of Invader Zim, and the first two movies in The Crow trilogy, and then went to bed. I slept on the floor, and Sherri slept in the top bunk, vacant that night.
She was absolutely adorable as we pseudo-cuddled wherever we were watching something...
We began the next morning (err… afternoon) with a rigorous tickling of Sherri’s feet. We then crawled to the floor and watched the third Crow movie. It was then, while scratching her head and listening to her purr as she rubbed her head against mine and we watched The Crow kill some one, that I think I did quite possibly the stupidest thing I could do at that moment. I fell in love with Sherri.
And suddenly the only thing I could think of was just kissing her beautiful lips. They looked so soft...
It was stupid of me. Tori has a very delicate psyche, and if it breaks, it takes years to repair. I don’t think she has fully healed from high school, but if she hasn’t, she’s close. Sherri and I had agreed to be just friends for Tori's sake. But... God, I'm stupid. More people arrived in Tori’s dorm; Dani, the roommate; Liz, Dani’s girlfriend; Leigh Anne, from downstairs; and some chick from across the hall, Amy, I think. They all knew about Tori’s crush on me, and of Sherri’s and mine agreement to ‘stay friends,’ that we told Tori, so that Tori would stop shunning us. So no more pseudo-cuddling for Sherri and I.
She sat just out of arm’s reach. Mostly so I couldn’t tickle her, partly so no one would figure anything out. How I missed her so...
As it grew later and people left, I became slightly more intimate in my touchings, but she never got back to the level she was at before Dani came. I went from head rubs and tickling to rubbing her shoulders and back. She also purred for these. I liked it when she purred. It made me happy.
She was the absolute most prettiest girl I had ever seen. But I couldn’t have her. I couldn't have her...
Sherri and I fell asleep on the floor that night. She was wrapped snuggly in a blanket. I was just outside the blanket, but I eventually intertwined my feet with hers, the only kind of cuddling I could get away with. I had trouble sleeping, so every so often I would sit up and look at her. She was beautiful in the moon light coming in through the window. My breath was taken away several times.
How I wish I could just lean over and kiss her...
When I did manage to fall asleep, I dreamed about Sherri. I think it was a dream. I dreamed that she was stirred from her sleep by something, probably my feet. She rolled over to look at me. Our eyes met, and I leaned in and kissed her. Then she rolled over again and went back to sleep. I don’t remember if/when I awoke from the dream. But I do remember later sitting up and going ‘did what I think just happened, happen?’
I finally devised a plan to kiss her. I was psyched about it, and couldn’t wait. Now to only wait till she and I ride, alone, to the bus station tomarrow...
Sunday morning we had to wake up at 10. I woke Sherri up by again tickling her feet. She got her things ready and went to take a shower. It was 40 minutes later that I realized the coughing and hacking coming from the bathroom was her; she was throwing up. She would throw up twice more, before we finally came up with a plan to get me to the bus station, an hour and a half away with only an hour to get there. Liz would take me. Liz the speed-demon. Liz got a $172 speeding ticket because of me. And we had 40 miles to go with 20 minutes to get to the station before the bus left. Looks like I missed my bus. Liz took me back to the college before heading out to where she needed to go. I hope she made it.
I was very saddened when Liz and I left, because I missed Sherri so. But I was smiling on the way back. I would get to see Sherri again...
Sherri was asleep when I got back. She was stirred by the noise I made coming into the room, and looked at me all confused like. I told her to go to sleep, it would all be explained later. Since I had missed my bus, my options were very limited. And none of them would work. But we had time to figure them out. I sat against the dresser and sort of watched anime as I rubbed Sherri’s head and combed my fingers through her hair. Eventually I just laid down next to her while she slumbered. That’s when Tori and Dani left the room to go do work in a library with Leigh Anne. Leaving me and a slumbering Sherri alone.
‘Kiss her!’ I told myself. But I replied, ‘No. I cannot, she is asleep, and it would be meaningless for her unless she knew it happened...'
No sooner had I fallen asleep than Tori, Dani, and Leigh Anne came into the room and decided that NOW was the time for me to figure out how the hell I was getting home. I couldn’t spend the night at the college. It was a Women’s college, and any girl housing a guy for more than two nights, or if a guy was in the dorm after 1 a.m. Monday morning, the girls of the dorm would be given a hefty fine. So waiting for Monday to catch a bus was out. The next bus that would have been cheapest for me to take was leaving at 8:15 p.m. from Charlottesville, but if that bus were even ten minutes late arriving back in Washington, D.C., I would have been stuck in DC’s Union Station with no cash and no ride home until 5 a.m. when the metro opened. Getting a friend to pick me up at the bus station at midnight in DC... well.. No. Not going to happen. That’s like asking for a homicide.
Sherri wasn’t taking me to the bus station again... I was severly depressed again; I wouldn’t get to enact my plan to kiss her...
We got me to the bus station in Charlottesville two hours before the bus was supposed to leave, because Leigh Anne, Tori, and Dani had kidnapped Sherri’s car (the only one available), and Sherri still had to make it home at a decent hour. I played pinball. But the game was so broken that I lost three balls to tilt (they got stuck and woudln't come out) and my last two to non-working bumpers. My score was 7,559 (the high score was well over 100,000 times that). The machine decided to be nice and give me a free game. I got the ball stuck in a pneumatic pump thing and it wouldn’t come out because the trigger was broken. It would be a half hour before I finally got it out; by nearly tipping the machine upside down. I lost another two balls to tilt because they got stuck. When I was finished, the game was no longer bolted to the floor. I had broken the 30 year old bolts in half. After I wasted another quarter on Bust-A-Move (yay!) I decided to sleep. That’s when I remembered what chair I had first seen Sherri in. I sat in it.
I fell asleep for an hour. The entire time dreaming about her. Nothing but her. She appeared to me as an angel in almost each dream…
The bus came, and I got on and left for D.C. I couldn’t think about anything but Sherri. Her big, brown eyes. Her curly hair. Her wonderfully shaped lips. Her small button nose. Her ears. Hell. Everything about her is absolutely amazing. I dreamed more. I dreamed that she and I went to an Otakucon dressed as Zelgadis and Amelia from Slayers. They had a secret relationship. You just know they did. At the end of the series, they actually show that there defiantly was. When I woke up, I was in D.C., thirty minutes early with an old stream of tears running down my cheeks. I wasn't aware I had been crying. I got on metro and went back to my dorm.
I’m sitting here. Still thinking about her. Wishing she were in my arms...
I did something stupid this weekend. I fell in love with a wonderful Angel that I’m not allowed to date because she and I both care about Tori’s fragile sanity. An Angel I cannot be without. An Angel I only wish to love dear. An Angel whose own feelings for me I do not even know...
How I wish I could be a nekozuki...