She hadn’t. Suddenly fully aware of what had happened the night before, Daria turned over, stunned but not surprised to find that she was not in bed alone. Perfectly reasonable considering that she wasn’t actually in her own bed, or in her own room, or even in her own house. Feeling round the pile of clothes beside the bed she recovered her glasses and donned them. What had initially been a flesh-colored blur beside her was now the clearly defined form of Trent Lane, passed out cold and curled into the fetal position. He had a tattoo of a Celtic triskelion on his chest that she’d never seen before. Well, she’d probably seen it last night and just didn’t remember it. It occurred to Daria that based on the way she had been lying when she woke up and the way he was lying now, his face would have been tucked into the hollow where her spine curved into her neck. How horrifyingly intimate.

 A decidedly sickening lurch in her stomach reminded Daria that the machine through which she had obtained her new lover was that devil drink, whiskey. "God," she hissed, suddenly reeling from a combination of nausea and uncertainty bordering on shame. They’d been drunk...really, really drunk. Recalling the events from a strange sort of stop-motion video perspective, she remembered Trent kissing her in the basement, kissing her in the kitchen, kissing her in the hallway, up the stairs, all the way to the scene of the crime, where kissing had given way to lots of touching and clothes shedding, followed by...well, a misdemeanor. Three misdemeanors, actually. Or was it a felony?

Whatever the penal code for last night was, Daria was pretty certain that she didn’t want to be there when Trent woke up. The possibilities were too awful to contemplate. He could be disgusted, which would be a greater blow than her ego could bear; he could be smug, which would be more than her tentative understanding of him could bear; or he could give her that lazy smile and touch her on that place on her inner thigh that...God, before last night, she hadn’t even known that she’d had a place on her inner thigh that sent those shivers up her spine and down to her fingers and toes. He’d had a lot of fun exploiting that weak spot, and the recollection brought a feverish blush to her cheeks. Jesus, she’d actually been involved in full on, no holds barred sexual experimentation with the object of all her fantasies, and all she wanted to do now was curl up on a cool bathroom floor and alternately puke and cry. How could she have been so wanton? Now that Trent knew what he did, had done was he had done, he could hold it over her for the rest of her life.

But Trent wouldn’t do that, would he? He had never shown himself to be a malicious person, yet one of the things that kept Daria’s cynicism alive and well was her basic mistrust of her fellow human beings. She had let her guard down for Jane Lane and had almost beheaded her boyfriend Tom for coming between them, as she perceived it. Now she had found another chink in her armor in Trent, and Lord only knew what kind of basket case he would turn her into. His general laziness and unconcern for responsibility had never really bothered her before, but with her sometimes obsessive need for order, she could see that the downside to the possibility of Trent waking up and not being sorry about one goddamned minute of last night was that it would mean she would have to reorder her life. She would have to trust him. And if she wanted to keep him, assuming that he wanted to be kept, she would have to change, and heaven knew how much she hated the idea of having to change.

But it might be worth it.

Trent stirred and Daria frowned. What would she do if he woke up right now? "Trent?" It was barely a whisper, but he cracked open those firelit-night black eyes and smiled at her, stretching like a cat.

"The cake’s ready," he rasped, voice heavy with sleep. "One rock back in the cabinet." And then, just like that, he slipped back into his dreaming. She nearly choked on the laugh that bubbled up in her throat, the tension in her gut relaxing somewhat. Leaning her head to one side thoughtfully, she took stock of him, his sleep the perfect opportunity to stare to her heart’s content. That wild black hair had been every shred as soft and thick as she had imagined it would be, and she picked up a lock of her own red-streaked brown tresses and studied it. Last night, he had told her that he loved her hair. It fell heavy like a shade across her face, but was light as air to the touch. She wondered how old he had been when he’d gotten the Maori tattoos that wrapped around his upper arms. They were just a bit fuzzy at the edges, suggesting at least a few years’ worth of exposure to the elements. Three silver earrings in each ear. Two necklaces. One was a black cord that circled his neck like a choker, the other a silver chain with a Japanese kanji dangling from it. ‘Ichiban,’ he had explained when she asked what the character meant. ‘It means ‘the best’.’ The best at what? She had asked. ‘Dunno,’ he’d shrugged. ‘I wanted the one that meant ‘future drowning victim’, but they were all out.’

Looking at him too long was causing some kind of strange dizziness, so Daria opted to get dressed and find some Tylenol and coffee, whichever she could get her hands on first. Luckily, all of her clothes were within close proximity of each other on Trent’s floor, except for her jacket, which she had taken off before beginning her conversation with the Old No. 9. It wasn’t until she pulled the mustard-colored shirt over her head that she realized it was torn. Seriously torn, and in such away that no explanation other than ‘fit of passion’ seemed adequate. The fabric had been pulled away from the hem at the neck, and the vivid image of Trent trying to yank the shirt directly off of her instead of over her head came into view in her mind’s eye. A little offput by that memory, as any intellectual is in the face of carnality, Daria chose to ignore the gaping hole in her shirt and try to exit the bedroom as quickly as possible.

When she opened the door Trent opened his eyes again, and flashed her a smile. "Daria," he rumbled, freezing her in place. "Camel pink highland marching gourd?"

It seemed to be an honest question, and he was looking at her a little forlornly, like a confused boy asking for an expensive toy. "Always," she answered, trying to sound reassuring. She must have succeeded on some level, because he nodded and went back to sleep, now laying on his stomach with one arm draped over the side of the bed, fingers almost touching the carpeted floor. Trent, she decided, was really not a morning person.

Slipping into the hallway with her combat boots in hand, she pulled the door shut behind her and considered finding out if Jane was awake yet. No, she decided. In fact, never seeing Jane again might be the best way to handle this new development. The chances that Jane would be willing to accept what had happened without the Twenty-One Gun Salute of Sarcasm were slim to none, and mortification was not high on Daria’s to-do list. She padded down into the kitchen in her socks, deciding that her Docs would make far too much noise in the eerily quiet Lane house, and offered up a silent prayer of thanks that Jane and Trent’s mother, Amanda, was out of town at a pottery workshop in Maine. The rest of the Lane clan was, as usual, MIA somewhere in the Western Hemisphere. The only problem with the lack of supervision in the Lane house was the subsequent lack of grocery shopping, and thus the lack of food. The search for Tylenol would be a harrowing one, although she knew from prior experience where the coffee was kept.

The kitchen was dark, but she couldn’t locate the light switch to save her life, which was strange since she’d been in here countless times. Giving up and accepting it as karma for getting wasted and giving in to temptation, Daria began opening cupboards and rummaging around for anything that looked like it might ease the growing throb that seemed to be pulsing right behind her eyeballs. The headache was even worse than the queasiness, in her opinion, and she’d managed to locate a bottle of something that was covered with dust but had a child proof cap when the lights suddenly came on and everything was awash in garish yellow light.

"Finally up, huh?" It wasn’t Trent. No, far, far worse than that, it was Jane. Rounding to face her best friend, Daria noted that Jane looked extremely alert and more than a little predatory. She also had Daria’s green jacket draped over one arm.

"You’re up early," she remarked lightly, but blushed when Jane snorted.

"It’s two-thirty in the afternoon, sunshine. I’ve been waiting three hours for this." She spied the pills in Daria’s hand and grinned. "Rough night?"

Shit, shit, shit. "Well, you know." She tried to smile, but her face felt like it was made of rubber. "I did drink a lot of that whiskey you gave me. Hoo-boy, I was riding the Tennessee lightning last night."

"That’s not the only thing you were riding." Thrown, Daria sputtered, but Jane was undeterred and took a few steps closer to the flustered brunette. "You know, if you’re going to reject my advice to wallow and choose instead to indulge in debauchery, I would appreciate advanced warning so that I don’t have to search the house for you and find you naked as a jaybird in my brother’s bed."

"You what?" Daria blinked. "You saw us?"

Jane smiled slyly. "Well, I couldn’t very well go to sleep without discovering the fate of my best friend. How was I to know that you’d found consolation in the pleasures of the flesh? I thought maybe you and Trent had been up talking and you’d fallen asleep in his bed. Turns out I was half right."

"How do you know that I didn’t just fall asleep after talking with Trent all night?" Nothing wrong with postponing the inevitable.

"Hmmm." Jane rested a fingertip against her temple. "Let me see. Maybe it was the fact that you were both totally unclothed. Or maybe it was the way his arm was thrown over your upper body. Maybe it was the signs of struggle all over the house. Maybe it’s the huge hole that’s missing from your shirt. It’s just so hard to put my finger on it..."

"Okay, okay." Daria held up her hands in surrender. "You’ve caught me. I slept with your brother. Happy now? We had biblical knowledge of each other three times before we sank into the addled bliss of alcohol and succumbed to unconsciousness." Daria gave Jane a cool stare. "What did you and Tom do last night?"

"No you don’t, Morgendorffer. No diversion tactics are crafty enough to deter me now. Tell me, how does someone go from pining over a person to making them their love slave? I’m curious, that’s all. This information could be vital when the Dark Ones come and I am given the supreme power I so richly deserve."

Daria shook her head and pried open the bottle of pain reliever. "I’m sorry, but I can’t reveal key information like that. These are things you must learn on the long road of life, Jane. They are no good to you as mere words." Dry swallowing three of the pills, Daria took a seat at the kitchen table and folded her hands demurely. "Now, to celebrate my most recent rite de passage, would you be so kind as to make me some coffee, Ms. Lane?"

Jane appeared to consider this request, then moved to the countertop and began scooping grounds out of a battered tin into the ancient percolator. "This is so surreal," she commented, pouring in water from the faucet. "I mean, you actually did it. You slept with Trent. With my older brother. Actually, that’s kind of...icky."

"Icky?" Daria sniffed. "You weren’t there. You have no idea how not icky it was. You know, that coffee smells a little like...twigs."

"It’s chicory." Jane pulled out a chair across from her and sat down, laying the jacket across the empty chair next to her. "This is so odd. I want to ask you all these questions, but because it’s, you know, Trent...I can’t tell if asking would be perverse or not."

"Well, for the sake of interrogation, we can use the alias ‘Joe’ for Trent, if you want."

"Well, I’ll give it a go, because this really is killing me. So, um, was Joe a good kisser?"

Daria almost burst out in very un-Daria giggles. This was a completely juvenile discussion best left to swing sets, but humoring Jane was probably the safest bet right now. "Yes, Joe was. Although he was kind of aggressive at times. He almost ran my skull through the wall in the hallway."

Jane nodded. "So that’s where that crack in the plaster came from. I thought that looked new. Okay, so...did you have fun?"

"Well, it was no day at the mall, but it held my attention."

"What I’m interested in is whether two years of longing intensified the experience or whether it had left you with unrealistic expectations and ultimately led to a tremendous letdown." Jane propped her chin up in her hand and gazed at Daria expectantly. "Well?"

"Strange. You sounded like me for a minute there. Um, if my admittedly foggy memory is informing me correctly, the first time was too quick to rate, the second was pretty good, and the third time we started up a pack of dogs howling outside with all the noise we were making." Ignoring Jane’s look of slack-jawed astonishment, she pressed on. "What really did it was the foreplay, though. You know how guitarists get those calluses on their fingertips? Well, when he touched, um, certain places, it felt like I was being played, like an instrument, you know?"

Jane shut her mouth with an audible snap. "No I don’t. Jesus, it sounds good, though. Maybe I should dump Tom and lock myself in the Tank with Jesse."

"Or encourage Tom to take up the bass." Daria got up and pulled two mugs from the dry rack, filled them with coffee, then reclaimed her seat and passed one of the mugs to Jane. "What I’m worried about is that Trent will wake up and be utterly sickened by last night."

Jane sipped the unsweetened brew. "I wouldn’t worry too much about that. Above and beyond the fact that Trent wouldn’t have slept with you if he hadn’t wanted to, there’s the fact that Trent is a male, and therefore is incapable of regretting sex."

"Lucky bastard."

"Are you saying that you regret sleeping with Trent?"

Daria smiled ruefully. "Even though I know it happened, it still sounds weird to hear you say it. I don’t actually know if I regret it. I don’t think I do, but..."

"But what?" Funny, but Daria had never noticed before how much Jane actually resembled Trent. It was something about their chins...and for some reason, it was more distracting than one would think similar chins would warrant.

"But...I don’t think that Trent is my kind of guy. You know, the kind who’d be into me." She fiddled with her mug, unwilling to say what she had been thinking, but desperate to get it off her chest. "I mean, I’m extremely attracted to him and all, but I worry that he’d be unhappy with me, and vice versa. I’d give it a try, but I don’t know what I’d do if he...left me. For all my admirably icy facade, I am kind of fragile on the inside. Trent seems like he could run a bulldozer through my self-esteem by accident and never realize what happened. Then there’s the fact that my parents would flip..."

Jane’s eyebrows rocketed towards her hairline. "Daria, not that you’re not making valid points here, but did you actually have to have sex with my brother before you decided that he maybe wasn’t your type?"

"God, Jane, I don’t know." The shorter girl leaned forward and pressed her forehead against the tabletop. "I have no idea what I’ve done. I’m not really sure how it happened. One minute we were drinking and talking about something or other, and the next we all over each other. I kind of got the impression that Trent hasn’t been with a girl in a while."

"He says that the music makes it impossible for him to date," Jane offered. "Apparently the muse is simply too demanding right now. But I don’t think it’s been too long for him. There are always girls hanging around after the shows, and it’s not like Trent’s made of stone."

"So where does that leave me?" Daria took a long sip of the coffee, which not only smelled but tasted like wet firewood. "Am I just like one of those band girls who crawls all over him and then disappears?"

"Hardly. You’re my best friend, Daria. You ain’t going nowhere. Trent knows that."

"You’d be surprised what you can forget after half a bottle of whiskey." Now utterly miserable, Daria slumped down against the back of her chair and finished off her coffee. "I’m really dreading facing him after what happened. I’m thinking of making a break for it and from now on only leaving my room to go to school."

"That would be a loss for us all." Jane reached across the table and gave Daria’s forearm a light squeeze. "Want me to go upstairs and see if Trent’s ripping his hair out and prostrating himself in horror and disbelief?"

Daria twirled the mug around between her hands. "Would you? I mean, he’s probably not awake, but just in case..."

"Just in case, I’ll go check."

For the approximately five minutes that she was gone, Daria weighed her options. Self-preservation was demanding that she haul ass back to the Morgendorffer two story and set up for hibernation. Curiosity kept her there, though. Maybe he’d float down there stairs and scoop her up in his arms, chastising her for ever being so silly as to think he might view last night as anything but a foray into the divine.

She shook her head. "That’s good, Daria, keep it realistic."

And if he did reject her, well, she’d just find another musician. A better one, who was in a band that had a cool name and wrote good songs with catchy hooks and thought-provoking lyrics and who’s calluses were just as scratchy and who was a better singer and...

"Miss me?" Jane reappeared in the doorway of the kitchen.

"Of course," Daria quipped. "I’m glad you’re back; I was beginning to turn to possible revenge fantasies that have about the same likelihood as me winning the Seventeen Model Search."

"Well, I wouldn’t be making any plans to make Trent suffer for turning you down just yet."

Against her will, Daria felt an irrational spell of giddiness pass over her. "He’s awake?"

Jane sat down. "He’s getting there. I asked him how he felt, and he asked where you were."

"He did?" Stay calm, stay calm, do not linger on rapidly returning memories, stay calm.

"Oh yes. He seemed worried that you might have headed for the hills. I don’t think he’s completely worked through what’s happened, but he seemed very adamant that you shouldn’t go anywhere."

"But that doesn’t mean anything!" Daria wailed. "He could just be wanting to make sure that I’m here so he can give me the brush-off in person!"

Jane looked speculative. "This is really bringing out the side of you that leans towards mania, isn’t it? The impression I got was that he was confused that you weren’t there with him, but he wasn’t too sure why you should have been there with him. I suspect that his delay in coming down here is that he’s trying to work out what exactly happened."

"What’s there to work out? We got drunk, we got naked, end of story."

"Calm down, Daria. You’re turning this into a code red when it’s nothing of the sort."

"Is that so?" She looked annoyed; good. Better an angry Daria than a sulking Daria.

"Yeah, it’s so. It’s not like you and Trent are getting married. You don’t have to be a perfect match who can live in harmony and make many babies. People our age are not supposed to mate for life. I understand that you’re not sure if you and Trent aren’t right for each other, but who the hell really cares? If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. And you’ll at least have him out of your system."

"But what if I’m hopelessly caught up in him and he drops me like a hot rock? I won’t have him out of my system then."

Jane rolled her eyes. "Woman, you are so anal sometimes that it scares me. Maybe that will happen. But how do you know if you don’t try?"

Daria worried her lower lip between her teeth. "You know, it seems to me that yesterday you said if Trent and I ever got together, you’d have cardiac arrest."

Jane gave her a roguish smile. "I guess I’m stronger than I thought."

"I coulda told you that, Janey. Hey, Daria."

Daria stopped breathing. That voice...it was if she’d never heard it before. Had it always been that low, almost nothing more than a husky whisper? How was she going to keep her cool, flat demeanor intact after he had seen her as far removed from cool and flat as one person could get? For her own sanity, she had to try.

"Morning, Trent," she said lightly, not meeting his eyes. "Sleep well?"

Jane raised and eyebrow and Trent looked at her as though she was completely insane. "Uh, yeah. Like a rock." He looked like just what he was: a pretty young man who’d just been tossed around the sheets mightily. And I’m the one who did it, Daria thought numbly. I’m the one who’s responsible for him looking like he was dropped in the spin cycle.

Those lovely eyes leveled on Daria’s chest. "Whoa...what happened to your shirt, Daria?"

Jane chuckled. "Don’t you know Trent?" There was just enough of a leer in her voice to cause Daria’s blush to come raging back. Trent, for his part, looked puzzled.

"I don’t..." Oh wait. There was something about that shirt. It had made him very angry last night, why was that? Oh yeah, it wouldn’t come off fast enough. "Oh," he mumbled, now a little embarrassed himself that Jane obviously knew what had happened. "Sorry about that Daria."

Daria attempted a carefree shrug, it came off as more of an involuntary spasm. "I’ve got plenty just like it."

"That’s cool."

Jane was horrified. They were acting even more distant than usual, and this after just having spent the night in each other’s arms. Would they have to be chained together over a steep drop-off to have a meaningful conversation? Would even that work? This called for drastic measures, and though she was loathe to do this, she didn’t see that she had any real choice in the matter. She only hoped that whatever happened, her relationship with both her brother and her best friend weren’t compromised. Because then she really would be forced to kill them both.

"I’m leaving." They both started, surprised by the break in the silence, but neither looked up to see the thoroughly disgusted look on Jane’s face. "And I’m taking your car, Trent."

"You...are?" Jane had never heard her brother sound much more than mildly concerned about anything, but she could swear she heard something close to panic in his voice. Well, tough. He’d just have to go on foot if he wanted to run away from this.

"Yessir. I’ve decided that I just have to go to the museum to check out that Waterhouse exhibit. Right now. This very second, in fact." Not waiting for her seemingly immobile brother to make a move, Jane thrust one hand into the pocket of his battered jeans and drew back his keys. "Later." Giving him a quick kiss on the cheek and Daria a conspiratorial wink, she made her exit before either of them decided to break out of their respective comas and use her as an excuse not to deal with each other.

Daria flinched when she heard the front door slam behind Jane, followed by the retching sounds of Trent’s car starting up. She couldn’t look at him and hope keep her reserve going. She’d either start laughing hysterically or screeching like a banshee. Maybe this whole situation was merely some kind of philosophical conceit and if she concentrated really hard she could make it all disappear into the nothingness that it truly was. And maybe if she wished upon a star she could become a fairy princess and float away to a land made out of flower castles. Oh God.

"Um, Daria?" Trent kept his eyes fixed at a point just above her head. "Do you want to talk? Or something? About, you know, things?"

Wow, he was really trying hard to keep things vague, Daria thought wryly, tempted to give him a wide-eyed ‘what things?’. "I guess we should," she breathed, shutting her eyes and leaning back in the chair, trying in vain to get comfortable for what she suspected would be the inevitable ‘I like you but you’re like, too young. Or too not cool, whatever.’

He sat down in the chair Jane had vacated. Daria peeked through her lashes at him. He looked like he was in a police interrogation room about to admit to a crime. His hair was more out of control than usual, and there were faint scratch marks on the side of his neck. Daria smiled. Trent smiled back tentatively. "What?"

She shook her head. "You look like you’ve been mauled by a bear."

To her surprise, he chuckled. "Nah, nothing as lame as that. Listen, Daria, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea, but last night..."

"Was a mistake, I totally understand." Daria rushed ahead of him, trying to at least make it seem as if she too was willing to forget all about it. "And you don’t have to worry, I won’t tell anyone. Not that anyone would believe me. And I didn’t tell Jane, she just...knew."

Trent’s eyes were narrowed nearly to slits. "Daria, what are you talking about? I don’t think last night was a mistake. I had a really good time."

Feeling as though her face was literally on fire, Daria finally met his eyes. "You did?"

With a start, Daria realized that he was blushing as well. "Well, yeah. I mean, I hadn’t really thought about you as anything but Jane’s friend, but I...I mean, now I can’t believe that you’ve been coming here for a year and you just...I mean, you just looked at me this certain way last night and it was like...whoa. Daria. It was like the way sometimes songs just come to me when I’m putting gas in the car or something. It’s like, you’re just spacing out, and then all of the sudden something just hits you while you weren’t looking."

"What does that mean, exactly?" She told herself not to get too excited. This wasn’t a confession of eternal love. In fact, it was as if he were accusing her of being an emotional sniper.

"I don’t really know. I’m still pretty much floored by everything, and it being daylight and all, it’s kinda hard to get things straight in my head. But I know that I’m not sorry. Well, except about your shirt. Guess I shoulda been more careful." He gave her a smile that was pure lechery, and Daria laughed aloud, something she did very rarely.

Damn, she was pretty when she laughed. And really, really pretty when had no clothes on, Trent thought, smiling broadly. "So, you wanna go get something to eat? Dega Street Gyros is calling, and I’m buying."

Daria cocked an eyebrow. "How are we going to get there? Jane took the car, remember?"

"Crap." Trent scowled, then brightened. "Why don’t we go over to your house, and you can drive me?"

"Sounds good. Just let me get my jacket." Pulling it from the chair where Jane had left it, the pair was almost out to the door when Trent laid a hand on her upper arm and pulled her close.

"I’ve got to ask you something."

Sleeping with him had definitely intensified that awkward, warm feeling in her gut that sprung up whenever they were in close proximity. "What’s that?"

"Would you, uh...be okay with...um...well, sleeping with me again sometime? I know that wasn’t the smoothest way to ask that, but it’s cool if you don’t want to."

He was slightly stooped over to talk to her, which made it easier for her to kiss him lightly. She would have liked to give him one of those doozy kisses that left men mere putty in the hands of the women who delivered them, but she was still relatively new at this whole intimacy thing. That she even tried was answer enough.

He smoothed a hand over that fabulous hair of hers. "Cool. And Daria?"

"Yes?"

"You may want to change shirts before we go."

Note: The title refers to a song by Pan American. You caught me; I’m a closet indie. Hey, it coulda been worse. My friends and I have always referred to this basic scenario as "the morning of shame", and that was almost the title.