Office Confessions: I Slept With My Coworker

It started with a company work event that involved too much drinking. It seems this is how these things always start. Inhibitions subtracted from the equation with alcohol and after hours hilarity that’s not usually permitted from 9 to 6. There was never a previous notion, or even an interest in Lars; he was simply a coworker in skinny jeans, who kept to himself. But sometimes all it takes is a flask of vodka and a Weezer song to forever change a situation, and ultimately, the dynamic of the office.

Lars had been my coworker for six months at the time our boss decided we should have a work karaoke party. Morale was low, so what better to solve the problem than singalongs and BYOB in Koreatown? Originally, we were all against the idea. It was bad enough we spent 50 hours a week with each other, and now the owner of the company was making us give up a Friday night. We were not pleased.

Our budget for the party allowed for several bottles of liquor, beer, pizza and a private karaoke room that smelled of sweat and days old garbage. The beginning involved sulking, but as the alcohol was consumed, we started to have fun.

Lars, as usual, kept to himself on a couch across the way from me. Assuming we had similar taste in music, I was determined to get him to sing a song with me. I sat down next to him with the catalog of mostly bad songs in my hand and, as we reached the W’s, collectively decided on “Say It Ain’t So,” by Weezer. Then things get fuzzy.

I remember that we sang along in perfect unison, that he got a couple of the lyrics wrong – a trademark of his I’d learn to love over time – and by the time the song was over, my microphone was on the floor and I was kissing him in front of all my coworkers. I’m sure there was an audible gasp, but the music was too loud to hear it.

While our coworkers headed to the Museum of Natural History for a dance party, Lars informed me that he was going wherever I was. I was going downtown to a party, and apparently, I was taking him with me. It was the last big snowstorm of the year, as we made our way through the streets of the Lower East Side. When the party to which I had brought him ended up being a bust, I just brought him home instead.

It’s amazing how someone can go from being pretty much a stranger to being in your bed in a matter of seconds, that all of a sudden clothes are on the floor, and things are never going to be the same again. As I watched him drunkenly step out of his jeans, I never once thought about the Monday morning that was two days away; nor, while I slid his boxers from his narrow hips, did I consider the awkwardness that would always be present because of the fact that we had seen each other naked. All of the sticky, technical issues at the time, seemed worlds away.

At some point, the drunken fumbling became too much and we both lay on my bed facing the wall in front of us. My wall then, and even still, is covered in Post-It Notes for stories ideas – he looked at them, then looked at me on the verge of a question. Before he could open his mouth, I said, “I’m a writer;” and that was the first thing either of us ever knew about each other outside of the office. And as years would prove, far from the last.

We fell asleep shortly afterward. When he went to leave around five that morning, he woke me and kissed my forehead in an obligatory way I’ll never forget.

I spent the rest of that weekend sick to my stomach over what had happened with Lars. How was I going to approach it? Could I pretend I made it up? I would have liked to ignore it, but since I took it upon myself to dramatically throw my microphone to the floor and walk to him, as if I were in some sort of bad romantic comedy and pressed my lips to his, there really was no escaping the reality of it all. Ugh, I thought, I’ve really outdone myself this time.

First thing, bright and early on Monday morning, I broached the subject via instant messenger. I apologized for it, blamed my drinking, as did he, and I tried to gloss over the situation the best I could so working together wouldn’t be difficult. I had never slept with a coworker before then — or since. While I had had flirtations that resulted in excruciatingly dirty texts and emails, it never got physical. Lars and I never exchanged such banter, we had never even said more than 10 words to each other before that karaoke night.

By midday that Monday, I felt better about the situation; but then the rumors started and continued until the day I was laid off six months later. As our friendship evolved, Lars and I were fodder for speculation. We went from never speaking to hanging around each others’ desks incessantly, going to lunch, and leaving work at the same time. In a small office, it’s easy to notice such a shift, and even harder to hide a new found connection with someone.

To say it was an affair would be a huge exaggeration. While we worked together and became close friends, the physical part, although played up by our coworkers, only happened a couple more times while we worked together. What did evolve was a friendship that would eventually become one of the most tumultuous relationships of my life. Let’s be honest: men and women really can’t be friends, because the sex part, to quote Billy Crystal‘s character in When Harry Met Sally, will always get in the way. It’s true.

But I never regretted that night with Lars. I never regretted the brief awkwardness that followed that Monday morning, the rumors that were born from it, or the dramatic ups and downs that would follow long after the fact.

Some jobs teach us how to tolerate high maintenance coworkers and bosses, others give us a fancy title for our resumes; however, in this case, I got something else. I got someone, who although some days is the bane of my existence, does indeed, add quite a bit of color to my life. And yes, we’re still friends.

(Photo: AMC)

Do you have an Office Confession? Email Amanda: amanda@thegrindstone.com