Oh! I'm sorry....

I wish I could find my original account of this story; my memory is surely distorted after twenty years. At the very least, some of the finer details are missing. I know I wrote it down, because I specifically remember drawing a tiny illustration of the incident in the midst of my serial-killer-scrawl, but I can't find it in my journal, and it isn't in the vast collection of letters Sarah saved, so I must have written it to someone else, though I doubt whoever it was would have saved the letter. Too bad.

____________________

This was France. Again. I have lots of stories from France, especially from my year studying abroad in Besançon. I could probably compose a lengthy anthology of my Gallic antics, but this is one that still makes me laugh when I think of it.

Setting the Scene

Four girls from our group were assigned to a dormitory building on one edge of town; Michelle and I were across the hall from each other on the fourth floor, while Chandler and Emily had rooms two floors below us. It was nice that all the dorm rooms were singles, but it was weird that the halls were coed, with two small bathrooms for the residents to share unisexily. There were two or three dozen rooms per floor and a total of four toilets and four showers. That many college men and women sharing so few toilets and showers would never fly on a U.S. campus! Granted, the stalls offered total privacy from the floor almost to the ceiling... but still. I don't think there was even a sink for washing your hands, since the individual rooms were each equipped with a small sink and mirror. Or maybe there was one sink, and I'm just remembering it worse than it actually was. Either way, the bathrooms were definitely unisex and seemed to be constantly occupied. I hated having to pee, poop, and shower knowing that some dude I didn't know might be in the stall next to me, pooping. Gross.

Side Story

This one time, after more than a week of finding the same shower stall locked but never hearing water running, I suspected that someone had pulled a rude prank by locking the door from the inside, meaning everyone on our floor had only three showers to share. Tired of the added inconvenience, I recruited Michelle to give me a boost over the stall so I could unlock the latch from the inside. Feat accomplished, my suspicion was confirmed: there was nothing wrong with the shower. I felt very heroic.

photo credit to Chandler for 
documenting my agile prowess

 

Back to the Main Story

Most of the guys from our group -- including Alex and Jeremy, who became our good friends that year -- lived in a different set of dormitories on a different edge of town, accessed by a different bus line. We did most of our socializing in town, but once in a while, we'd go hang out at each other's dorms for an evening. Everyone would bring something: wine, camembert, beer, baguette, wine, beer, wine....

Jeremy and Alex 
visiting us at our dormitory

 a typical evening hanging out
(Michelle covered her entire room with fabric
to hide the dreary paint and holes in the drywall)

a typical morning after hanging out
(this mess is in my room, unfortunately for me)

What Happened (the way I remember it)

So this one evening, Alex and Jeremy rode the bus to our dorm, and we hung out alternating between Michelle's room and mine. Other people were there, too: Chandler and Emily from downstairs, and probably Emily's new French boyfriend, and Les, the nice British guy that moved in down the hall, and maybe one or two others from our group... or maybe not. I don't remember. It doesn't matter.

What I do remember was being fairly drunk and needing to pee.

I remember sitting in the toilet stall, peeing, and hearing a trickle of water pattering on the floor of the shower stall next to me, and I remember my irritation that yet again, some careless dormmate hadn't shut the faucet completely off after showering. (I swear, someone would leave that shower dripping at least two or three times a week. Whenever I heard it, with a disdainful sigh I would reach into the stall to turn off the valve with a firm twist. It was not that hard, people!)

I remember my increasing irritation with the wasted water as I finished my business and stomped (staggered?) indignantly out of the toilet stall.

I remember grabbing the handle to the shower stall and flinging the door open with the dramatic flair of a drunk college girl on a mission to save the planet one leaky shower faucet at a time.

I clearly remember seeing a skinny, pale, bare ass in front of me, and then glancing up to see a guy's head whip around, his hair wet with shampoo and his eyes wide with surprise at being interrupted during his late-night shower.

I definitely remember yelling "OH, SHIT! SORRY!!!" as I slammed the shower door shut with a bang and ran out of the bathroom and down the hall.

"Oh my god, you guys...!!!" I burst into the room, mortified, and told my friends what had just happened.

All I remember after that is laughter and ridicule.

The Aftermath (the way most people heard it)

The laughter and ridicule did not end with the evening. After that night, those who were there found great delight in telling (and retelling) the story to anyone who hadn't yet heard it, and to anyone who wanted to hear it again, to the point that it became a recurring theme for the rest of the year.

Alex and Jeremy were particularly fond of telling the tale, and since there were no witnesses to claim otherwise, they came up their own version of how things went down.

"Su-u-ure, it was an accident...." Alex would coo at me knowingly, and Jeremy would chime in,

"Of course you thought the stall was empty...."

Then their knees would go soft, their hips would start to sway, and they'd rub their hands slowly up and down their torsos. With tipped chins and mocking kissy-faces, they would gyrate around me, all sexy-like, chanting in their smoothest voices,

"Oh-h-h... I'm sorry... I didn't kno-o-ow you were in here...."

Turning to caress their undulating backsides in my direction, they would murmur,

"M-m-m-m... don't mind me-e-e... I believe that's my soap on the floor...."

Best buddies, Alex and Jeremy were constantly coming up with ways to crack themselves up (letting out a colossal fart just before getting off the city bus was a favorite), but their Sexy-Kristin-Dance became a staple comic routine, and I never knew when they would unleash it on me.

On the bus.
In a bar.
After class.
At the student office, waiting for the mail to arrive.
In the town square, with dozens of people walking by.
Outside the Château de Chambord, during a tour of the Loire Valley.

Another Side Story

While touring one of the castles of the Loire on a special Easter weekend excursion, our group followed the guide into a small tunnel where everyone had to duck to pass through. Alex, near the front of the line, suddenly stopped at the end of the tunnel. He extended his arms to keep us from passing, as if protecting us from danger ahead. Seconds later, without explanation, he dropped his arms and continued on, forcing us to walk through his flatulent stench as we exited the tunnel. These are the little details I remember about my time in France.

 

touring Les Châteaux de la Loire

(me, Michelle, Alex, and Jeremy)

The End

That was pretty much it re: the shower incident. It happened so fast (not to mention my inebriated state), I didn't know which of my dormmates I'd walked in on. For the rest of the year, I simply made a point not to make eye contact with any of the guys on our floor. Meanwhile, my friends made it their mission never to let me live it down, and the Sexy Dance is still one of my favorite memories of our year "studying" abroad.

an old-fashioned 35mm selfie