One of my favorite pastimes in college was coming home to my senior apartment post-clubbing and running into my favorite roommate, also post-partying. We’d sit together at the kitchen table nursing tall glasses of water, sometimes cooking up some instant noodles or other synthetically beefy carbohydrate delight. Then she’d ask me to tell her a story.

This one is one of the first I ever shared with her, when we were still getting to know each other within her first couple of weeks at the apartment. I remember her being totally shocked, but even moreso, I remember us laughing our asses off at what an asshole I was.

And now: How I am an asshole to guys who are both hearing and speech impaired.

When you turn 18, you are expected to do a couple of things:

1. Register to vote.
2. Buy a pack of cigarettes.
3. Walk into a porn store.
4. Go to the tittay bar.

When you turn 18 in the Bay, you also have to go to a place fondly known as Shitty Nights. (Okay, so it’s really “City Nights.”) Shitty Nights is an unclassy place. I can sum it up in three words: horny, horny, horny. Taxis shuttle their tourists here, creepy old men direct their taxis here, and trashy chicks in Charlotte Russe (Not even Forever 21!) sidle up to douchebags in hopes for free drinks at any one of the three bars.

What sets City Nights apart from all the other clubs in the Bay is that it’s an 18 and up nightclub that operates on regular club nights. While other Bay clubs organize 18 and up promo parties for the Sunday nights of three-day weekends, City Nights lets the legals hit that shit every weekend.

The result is a longstanding reputation as the single dependable spot for partyers within that 18-20 year old limbo. When my high school friends came back to the Bay for winter break, we had to get together and party the way we had for the last quarter or so at our respective institutions. On one particular night, we went to Shitty Nights. Again, we were under 21. We didn’t have much of a choice.

Cut to the club.
So we’re dancing along. When you’re limited in your access to less-skeazy venues, you find yourself enjoying whatever you can. So I think we’re having fun – From what I remember, anyway. (This story’s not really about the club or the dancing.)

This guy comes up behind me and starts dancing. (For those of you like Bongo who aren’t familiar with club dancing rituals, it is absolutely not outside of the norm for a man to start freaking a girl from behind without asking or giving a girl a glance at his face.) At this moment in time, I was still forming my rigid set of Rules to Clubbing (To be blogged. [Again.] Stay tuned!), and had just established the “One song per guy” rule. I quickly did the turn-of-the-neck background check and verified that his face was decent.

At the end of the song, I pushed the guy away and started to walk to a different position in our friends’ circle. He pursued me, though, and he also kept talking. He wasn’t creepy, but I could barely hear him. I tried to nicely end our interaction and managed to get him to walk off, but he ended up coming back a couple of songs later. He was being oddly earnest. I figured Oh well, and took him up on his invite to leave the dance floor.

I declined his multiple offers for drinks, partly because I was 19, partly because I don’t like being indebted to strange men. His determination was not shot, though. He walked me to a relatively quiet spot in a hallway where we could converse.

Even standing away from the dance floors and their booming speakers, I couldn’t hear him.

Then he explained why, “I’m hearing and speech impaired,” – Oh! – “But I can read lips really well!”

Shit. I don’t like being indebted to strange men via transactions of alcohol, but now I felt this hollowing feeling of guilt. Am I supposed to feel sympathetic to this guy? Is that pejorative of me? Is he watching my lips all the time? This is really awkward.

We kept talking and I kept feeling uncomfortable. Even though he told me to speak like normal so he could watch my mouth, I kept leaning forward to speak directly into his ear. It was by reflex and I just felt awkward knowing that this guy who was trying to spit game was studying my lips. Tell me that wouldn’t put you on the spot.

I feel like my lack of ease was dragging invisible nails down the walls, but he was all smiles. I kept making motions to get back to my friends, and he finally let me go.

But not before getting my number.

This is highly out of protocol.
Another one of the tenets of my Rules to Clubbing is: Never give out your real number. Straight from Mos Def’s “Miss Fat Booty Part II:” “Givin’ out the fake cell phone and name,” I’ve been Chelsea, I’ve been Rita, I’ve been Savannah, and I’ve been Petunia. But the number of times in my clubbing life where I’ve been Mayka could be counted on just one hand. As far as the number goes, it’s always been The Ex’s.

But tonight, this one Saturday night where an earnestly interested guy pursues me and also happens to be hearing and speech impaired, tonight he handed me his cell phone. To type in my name and number. And I freaked. I didn’t get creative. I didn’t dig into the Blacklisted Blackbook. I actually typed in my name, M-A-Y-K-A, and I actually typed in my number…

Whatever, I consoled myself as I left that night, He’s not gonna call.

Sunday Night Surprise
The next day I returned to my dorm, ready to kick off winter quarter. My freshman roommate was back from her break, too, and we were settling back into the routine of school. Okay, we were probably checking our Friendster profiles. (Remember those days??)

Suddenly, I get a call. Not a phone person, this is unexpected. I don’t recognize the number and it’s an 800 line. Don’t know what that means, especially on a Sunday night. I pick up. A woman’s voice comes through the receiver,

Stranger Lady: Hi, you’ve got a call coming through on TTY Relay. Are you familiar with the service?

Umm, what? I had never heard of TTY Relay before, and that was just my own ignorance speaking. Confused by why this strange call had come through, I answered,

Mayka: Umm, no, I have never personally used TTY Relay…

TTY Relay Lady: Well that’s okay, I’ll just explain for you. I will connect you to your caller [At which point I realized this was the Shitty Nights Guy.] and you two can converse like usual. Whenever you finish whatever you’re saying, you say “Go ahead.” For example, “I’m doing fine. Go ahead.” Is that clear enough?

Mayka: Umm, yes… [Yes, but can you just connect him to the rejection line instead or something? I mean, really, this'll just save him some pain...]

TTY Relay Lady: Okay, good. I’m going to put your caller through on the line. Whenever you’re ready, just say “Go ahead.”

Mayka: (Pause) Okay, go ahead. (Doom.)

Shitty Nights Guy: Hi, is this Mayka?

Mayka: Oh shit! It’s him! What do I say? Umm, who? Go ahead.

Shitty Nights Guy: Mayka? Is she there?

Mayka: No… Go ahead.

Shitty Nights Guy: Oh, will she be back later? [Damn, perseverent!]

Mayka: No, there’s nobody here by that name. I think you have the wrong number. Go ahead.

Shitty Nights Guy: Oh, okay. Sorry.

Mayka: That’s okay. Go ahead.

The fact that he called the day after we met aside (Goes against the Rules to Clubbing.), consider the balls it takes to call a girl you’ve met randomly. Then consider putting yourself and your “impairments” out on the line by introducing her to something like TTY Relay. Then consider the number of times you have to say “Go ahead,” only to get to the endpoint of a wrong number.

Damn, I was a bitch.

What can I say? I don’t go to the club to make friends.

I never heard what my freshman roommate thought about all the “Go aheads…”