A day in the life of hook-up culture

Arts and Culture
February 13, 2020
This article was published more than 2 years ago.
Est. Reading Time: 4 minutes
Graphic by Elisabetta Paiano / Production Editor

By Nina Joon, Contributor

Why yes, the rumours are true. I, Nina Joon, completed (finishing with a 12) my second one-night stand and I am here to shout it loud and proud. After years spent huddling under a blanket of sexual apathy, agonizing over the inevitable awkward intimacy during sex, I have finally reached a state of no-fucks-given. 

As a product of both millennial and generation Z culture, I am no stranger to the supposed perils and triumphs of hook-up culture. Now, after two engagements in the action, I think it’s safe to pronounce myself as a voice of the people, offering advice and insight into this tumultuous sexy time in our young, hot 20-something year old lives. This, my friends, is an ode to the sweaty club grind-ups and confusing “booty-Facebook-message-hookups” that you’re still trying to dissect literally months after they happened.

The classic tale of a one-night stand often begins in the club, in the middle of the month, during techno night. You’re on the dance floor, body glitter sparkling from the disco ball reflection. While looking down to admire your amazing shuffling skills, you spot a pair of humbling red converse high tops with laces caked in mud. Is this a skater? Is this a longboarder? Questions cloud your mind, so you look up to see whose face belongs to these shoes. Not to your surprise, it’s an absolute cutie sipping a rare brew of Collective Arts, dancing slowly to the tempo of the music.

You nudge your friend (hereby referred to as Derby) and point to this mysterious gem nestled on the dance floor. Derby’s eyes light up in excitement. 

“Aye! Good shout mate!”, they claim, confirming your feelings of attraction to “red-shoes”. 

You run with that bout of validation, slyly dancing your way into red-shoes’s line of vision. The music’s pumping, your earplugs are the perfect amount of hidden; this is your moment. 

“Hey, I heard it’s your birthday! Happy birthday!” you shout to cutie’s face. 

To be clear, it is not their birthday, nor is there any available information that would lead to that conclusion. You just hope that the mere randomness of your comment will spark intrigue in red-shoes. 

“Huh?” they respond back. 

“Oh my god, sorry, haha, you look just like my friend whose birthday it is today . . . my bad!”

Red-shoes uncomfortably laughs but you feel their gaze as you dance back to Derby and continue to shuffle for a half-hour straight.

It’s getting late now and you’re wondering where this cutie has gone. Derby is on their third hook-up of the night, copping two numbers and one Instagram handle. While sipping a glass of communal water, someone taps on your shoulder. You turn to see red-shoes staring into your soul with their glassy beaming eyes. 

“Hey, you’re a really good dancer”, they say. 

Stunned, you quickly make a fart noise and say “Lawl, no way! Thanks! I like your um, shoes, tee-hee”. 

Together you start to talk, eventually moving to a booth and then locking lips in a dark corner.

After back and forth flirty banter, during which you offered red-shoes a cherry Halls and they declined, the question comes up. 

“Your place or mine?”. 

You’re living at your parent’s house, so that’s not even an option. To your surprise, red-shoes calls a Lyft, signifying their uniqueness, to which you self-congratulate yourself for knowing how to pick ‘em. During the car ride home, you keep your distance from red-shoes as a sign of respect to the driver, feeling shy because you harbour culturally-internalized shame towards sex. It’s all good though, you’re learning to overcome it! 

Red-shoes leads you into their low-ceiling basement bedroom that smells like weed and 5 gum. As the making out escalates, you progressively get more excited. Then you remember you’re a #feminist who doesn’t shave. Despite knowing you’re beautiful and loving your body, you can’t help but recognize this is not a cultural norm and worry how red-shoes will react. As expected, they don’t even notice and the night seamlessly continues on to become an X-rated episode of Degrassi.

After hardly two hours of sleep and being awoken by red-shoes’s deaf cat jumping on your chest at 7 a.m., you decide it’s time to go home. Your cutie is slow to wake up, rolling around looking all hot as they enjoy the luxury of being a deep sleeper. They drive you home in their Prius, dropping you off in a Mac’s Convenience Store parking lot. While washing off last night’s face, you remember you left a recently thrifted sweater at cutie’s. You send a text asking for it back and never hear from them again.

In your hungover state, you struggle to submit a weekly discussion post on Avenue while smiling about last night’s events. Maybe you’ll see red-shoes again, maybe you won’t. Your sweater might be lost forever, but the smell of that nicely renovated kitchen will live on in your memory. You close your blinds and nap until 4:30 p.m., excited to do it all over again. 

 

This article is part of our Sex and the Steel City, our annual sex-positive issue. Click here to read more content from the special issue.

 

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