One Night in the Gaslamp District

Camilla swore the night had started with a plan. A wholesome one, too: road trip down to San Diego’s Gaslamp District, let Shioban meet up with the guy she’d been texting for weeks, sip a few cocktails, maybe dance a little, then head home before midnight like respectable women with rent to pay and hydration goals.

That version of the night died somewhere around shot number three.

By then, Camilla’s eyeliner was a little smudged, Shioban had done that thing where she fake-laughed so hard she slapped a stranger’s arm, and the boy, tall, nice teeth, very into his cologne, had ordered a round of tequila “for courage.” Courage for what, Camilla didn’t know. But she drank it anyway, because saying no would have required too much mouth effort.

Somewhere between that and the check, Camilla opened her phone, stared at a screen resembling hieroglyphics, and announced, “The hotel’s super close. Let’s walk!”

She would soon come to regret this.

The Gaslamp District, in theory, was walkable. On Google Maps, everything looked ten minutes away. But in reality? The route wound them through alleys that smelled like old beer and broken dreams, up two confusing hills, and around a never-ending loop of neon-lit bars that all looked exactly the same. And it was loud. Drunk loud. Bachelorette-party-screaming-at-a-limo loud.

Six blocks in, Camilla started to think the street was expanding in real time. Around block eight, Shioban’s heel gave up on life.

The snap was audible.

“Noooooo,” Shioban gasped, looking down at her foot like a lover had betrayed her. “These are my Prom shoes.”

“You wore your prom shoes to San Diego?” Camilla blinked at her.

“They’re versatile!”

Camilla couldn’t stop the laugh that exploded out of her chest, bent over with it, arms on her knees. “They are not versatile. They’re an open-toe death sentence.”

The boy, who hadn’t noticed they were walking in the wrong direction because he was too busy telling a story about “that one time in Cabo,” paused and offered, “I could carry you?”

“Oh my God,” Shioban said, deadpan. “Are you serious?”

He squatted in front of her. “Hop on.”

Shioban shrugged and climbed on like it was completely normal to be bridal-carried by a man she’d just met while one shoe flapped loosely from her wrist like a purse.

Camilla followed them, muttering directions, but the GPS kept rerouting like it was personally offended. She was convinced they were trapped in some kind of drunk Escher painting.

Then she saw it: a parked cop car. Just sitting there. Quiet. Solid. Stable.

She leaned on it.

Not in it. Not around it. Just on it. Arms crossed on the trunk, head down.

“Camilla!” Shioban hissed somewhere in the distance. “You cannot nap on a police vehicle!”

“It’s comfy,” Camilla mumbled into her forearm. “And I’m tired. Emotionally.”

At that point, even the boy was starting to look concerned. “Maybe we should call a ride?”

“No maybe about it,” Shioban snapped, swiping her phone open like she was about to commit a felony. “We’re summoning divine intervention.”

She booked the Uber.

It arrived in less than two minutes—a miracle.

They got in. They drove maybe—maybe—fifty feet.

And then the app dinged: $12.

Shioban stared at her screen, then at the driver, and then back at the screen.

“You moved us one building.”

The driver shrugged. “Traffic.”

Camilla tried to smother her laugh with her hand. It didn’t work. She wheezed.

Shioban was not laughing. “We could’ve crawled here.”

The Uber peeled off, leaving them on the sidewalk, somehow more exhausted than when they’d started. Camilla glanced at the name of the hotel above them—The Westin—and felt the kind of relief people in survival stories must feel when they see a helicopter.

“This is it,” she said. “Victory.”

The lobby doors opened like a promise.

Inside, it was too quiet. Soft jazz played somewhere near a potted plant that probably cost more than her car. The air smelled like filtered lemon water and people with good credit.

Camilla walked up to the front desk like a broken soldier returning from war. Her dress was askew, her eyeliner was traveling, and her hair had frizzed into a halo of regret.

“I have a reservation,” she said, with the solemnity of a confession.

The clerk looked up. “Of course. Let me just pull that up… Ah. Yes. So your room will be ready—”

Camilla felt the pause like a punchline brewing.

“—at 3 p.m.”

She blinked. “P.M.?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

It was 2:30 a.m.

Camilla stood perfectly still. Her brain made a sad little dial-up noise. Then she turned—gracefully, she thought—and floated to a plush lobby chair like a Victorian ghost preparing to faint. She sat. She sighed.

Shioban followed, still dragging her one-legged shoe corpse behind her.

“This is ridiculous,” she said. “I swear to God, if I don’t get dicked and horizontal within ten minutes, I will personally burn this entire hotel down.”

Her date looked visibly alarmed. “I mean—I’m not saying no, I’m just—”

Shioban threw up her hands. “Camilla! This is not what I signed up for!”

Camilla tried to respond but was busy trying to become one with the upholstery. “I’m dreaming,” she murmured. “Or dead. Either way, I live here now.”

That was when the elevator chimed.

Two men in suits strolled out—loose ties, scuffed shoes, frat-guy energy with hedge-fund faces. One of them stopped. Looked at the chaos. Tilted his head.

“You ladies alright?”

Shioban stared at him with the wide eyes of a woman who had absolutely nothing left to lose. “Define alright.”

The guy reached into his jacket, pulled out two room keycards, and held them up.

“Top floor suites,” he said. “We’re flying out in the morning. If you’re out before eleven, they’re yours.”

Camilla sat up.

Shioban blinked.

The man winked. “Don’t trash the place.”

Camilla reached for the key like it was a lifeline. “I will die for you,” she whispered.

The suite was enormous.

Camilla stepped inside, blinking like a raccoon that had wandered into a Pottery Barn showroom. Everything was white. Marble countertops. Floor-to-ceiling windows. A bed so large she could’ve swum laps in it.

She didn’t even take her shoes off—one had gone missing hours ago anyway. She just face-planted onto the mattress and let the down comforter consume her. Somewhere, her phone buzzed. Possibly a notification that her liver had resigned. She ignored it.

In the other suite, Shioban was making good on her threats. Camilla didn’t want to know the details, but she heard a thud through the wall, followed by muffled laughter, and what sounded like a demand for ice.

By the time she woke up, sunlight was bleeding in through the window in long, accusing stripes. Her mouth felt like sandpaper, her mascara was living a second life as abstract art, and her phone, now at 2%, had four messages from Shioban, all in capital letters.

“WAKE UP.”

“I NEED COFFEE.”

“ALSO WE’RE OUT OF TIME.”

“CAMILLA I SWEAR TO GOD.”

Camilla groaned, rolled off the bed, and landed on plush carpet like a tranquilized bear. She crawled toward the suite phone and called the front desk.

“Good morning, Westin front desk, how can I help you?”

“What time is it?” she croaked.

“Ten twenty-three, ma’am.”

Camilla hung up without saying thank you.

Seven minutes. Seven minutes to locate her bag, one functioning shoe, her friend, her friend’s new boyfriend, and all remaining strands of dignity.

She threw on her dress from the night before, now covered in something that might’ve been glitter or fries—unclear. She yanked a brush through her hair and gave up halfway through. No makeup. No shoes. Just survival.

Outside her suite, Shioban emerged at the same time, looking equally shell-shocked, her dress crumpled, one eyelash clinging to her cheek like it had fought in a war.

“Jesus,” Camilla said. “Did we get hit by a train?”

Shioban pointed at her. “You fell asleep on a cop car.”

“Allegedly.”

“And the Uber…”

“Drove us fifty feet. I remember. Spiritually.”

Shioban snorted, then winced. “Laughing hurts.”

“Existing hurts.”

The elevator dinged, and both girls shuffled in like a couple of haunted mannequins. The boy was nowhere to be seen—he’d vanished sometime in the night, presumably into the ether.

At the front desk, Camilla approached like someone on the last leg of a pilgrimage.

“We’re returning some keys,” she said.

The woman behind the counter gave her a once-over. She didn’t blink. Didn’t flinch. Clearly, this wasn’t the first time she’d seen two women looking like abandoned bridesmaids in daylight.

“Thank you. Hope you enjoyed your stay.”

Camilla nodded solemnly. “Theoretically speaking, yes.”

They stepped outside into the too-bright morning. The sun stabbed her directly in the retinas. San Diego was smug with its beauty—blue skies, palm trees swaying like nothing chaotic ever happened here. Camilla flipped off a seagull just for being cheerful.

Shioban sat on the curb, pulled a granola bar from her purse, and held it out like a peace offering.

Camilla took it. “Truce.”

“Forever.”

They ate in silence for a moment, both staring off into the distance like war veterans.

Then Shioban started giggling. “You really leaned on a cop car.”

Camilla cackled. “You really screamed about needing to get laid in a five-star hotel lobby.”

Shioban wiped a tear from her eye. “And then God sent us two drunk finance bros with room keys.”

“Honestly, saints. Messy, unshaven saints.”

They dissolved into laughter again, doubling over until they both had to lay back on the pavement, crying, wheezing, and totally unbothered by the stares of early brunchers walking by in yoga pants and smug marriages.

When the laughter died down, Shioban turned her head toward her. “That was the stupidest night of my life.”

Camilla looked up at the sky. “And somehow also one of the best.”

It wasn’t the boy. Or the booze. Or even the luxury crash pads they didn’t deserve. It was the chaos. The terrible decisions. The ridiculousness of it all. And the fact that somehow, somehow, they’d done it together. Just like they always had.

“Okay,” Shioban said, sitting up. “Let’s get coffee. I need caffeine, a bathroom, and to forget everything that happened after 10 p.m.”

Camilla stood, brushing crumbs off her thighs. “I’m getting pancakes the size of my face.”

They walked off in the direction of the nearest diner, sore-footed, headachey, a little smelly, and absolutely undefeated.

There were no photos. No video. No solid evidence that it had even happened. Just ruined shoes, leftover glitter, and a memory that would live forever in the “remember that one night—” category of their friendship.

The plan had fallen apart in every conceivable way.

And it was perfect.