By Roxy

That night in 1988 I was at the roxy, the former cinema at the Singel in Amsterdam. It was a brooding evening and the dance floor was overpopulated with young people, who watched and wanted to be watched. The most extravagant types walked around; transvestites, sexy dressed girls and punks. You could see that people had done more than their best to look striking. Ecstasy was just on the rise and it was used by a few. 

An iron cage hung diagonally above the dance floor with a scantily clad dancer, who defiantly moved with her beautiful body like a snake. I myself went into the uplifting rhythm of the music and I danced until I got so warm and thirsty. I decided to go get a drink at the bar. It was busy, like on every Saturday night, and I was squeezing my way to the bar among the crowd. I ordered a tequila sunrise and saw from the corner of my right eye how I was watched by a tall, blonde boy. I turned to him and laughed at him kindly. He laughed back and his eyes kept following me. 

I was looking for a place to sit on the side of the dance floor and before I sat well and well, he sat next to me. He had followed me. I was amazed, but also found it exciting. He was the boy you wouldn't expect so soon in the Roxy. That aroused my curiosity. Among all those striking people, he actually looked very common. 

The first thing he said to me was, “may I ask you a question, may I have sex with you?'. I was perplexed. I actually had to laugh about it and asked what he meant by that. We got into conversation with each other and I realized that I actually found him terribly attractive; a firm blonde boy, blue eyes and a somewhat provincial appearance. Very different from my previous boyfriends. He was found to be from the east of the country and studying Psychology in Amsterdam.  

At the farewell, we kissed passionately outside in a dark alley. He still asked if I wanted to go with him, but after some bad experiences, I decided not to. I promised him that if I still think it was a good idea to meet him again the next day, I would put a piece of paper with my phone number with him in the mailbox. I didn't get him out of my mind and three days later, when I was on my way to a girlfriend, I slipped a note through his mailbox.