It all began when I got a new job at a hip and trendy bar. My boyfriend at the time hated my job because it was far from home, but he quickly got over it because I was always able to give him free drinks. Perks.Anyway, at work there was this guy I had noticed. He was always quiet and didn’t really stand out in any way, aside from the fact that he had quite a few tattoos and seemed really into music (which I loved.) So we didn’t talk much until one night when I happened to run into him and another co-worker outside a gas station. They asked if I wanted to go over to his place and have a beer. Since I hadn’t hung out with either one of them outside work, I took the chance to see what they were really like.

That night I ended up getting hammered and, after much badgering, I flashed them. Now, just to set the record straight, this was very unlike me. There were a lot of cocktails and a lot of begging going on. So after that night, we all became great friends – interesting how these things work out. And slowly but surely I developed a crush on this guy. We were both dating other people at the time, so it didn’t seem like anything but casual flirting.

After many months and many flirtatious nights at work, we ended up ditching our significant others and hooking up. To a Ray LaMontagne song. It was the first night we had spent time together as single people. We were talking about music and I told him that I absolutely loved Ray LaMontagne’s new record Till the Sun Turns Black. He looked at me in shock. That was his favorite record, too! We were overcome with joy and alcohol so I grabbed the CD from my car and we listened and talked and made out and talked and it was wonderful and the whole world made sense.

It wasn’t until a few weeks later that I realized just how obsessed he was with Ray LaMontagne. We had to play that CD every time we got in my car… and, by the way, he didn’t have a car of his own. We also had to play that CD every time we had sex, which was rare, because he was always wasted. Did I mention this guy was a catch?

The whole charade became more than I could handle when his ex-girlfriend started calling me, making threats and showing up at our workplace after she saw us together at, yes, a Ray LaMontagne concert. Needless to say, we broke up shortly after that. He really bogarted my love for Ray. And my love for alcohol.