A haphazard reunion with an old friend goes awry. Back on my home turf of the Monterey Peninsula, I reconnect with another friend after the other one ditches out. We drink, he drives me back to my buddy’s grandmother’s house, where he is living with his fiancé, and hilarity ensues.
Enjoy...
* * *
“Hey, hey, hey!”
I looked over and saw Alexander walk out onto the patio. He hadn’t changed a bit since last I saw him. Long blonde hair pulled back into a tight pony tail, suede shirt coat jacket, western jeans over clunky cowboy boots and still carrying around his saddle bags slung over his shoulder filled with random notebooks and business proposals. Alex and I hugged. I was quite relieved to see him.
Alex and I went inside to get another round of beers, while sneaking in shots of rye, which was always a favorite of his. Alex had all sorts of great stuff going on; his greeting card line, his publishing company and he was even thinking about opening up a café / oddball toy store in the near future.
“But I still have to do contracting and construction to keep the money coming in,” he said.
“Dude, I have to bartend at the strangest place on earth, run by Satan’s alcoholic uncle and staffed by immigrants, drug fiends and beautiful blonde women.”
“What category do you fall under?” Alex asked.
“I haven’t figured that one out yet.”
Back on the patio, the conversation was brisk and lively, except between Dave and myself. He chose to put his attention in his future bride while Alex and I cracked jokes and dug up mischief from the past.
“Remember you drank so much coffee at Tillie Gorts that you ended up tap dancing in the middle of the street for ten minutes after they closed?” I recounted.
“Or the time we went to that strip club in San Francisco and you got that mysterious stain on your pants after that ugly crackwhore lapdanced on you?” said Alex.
“Dude,” I said, “I now live three blocks from that same strip joint. Every time I walk by it I think about that night. Good times.”
The importance of this gathering was the fact that I was here to reconnect with Dave and see if after a decade we were still pals. Turns out the guy I saw just a year ago and keep in semi-contact with, Alex, was far more engaging. Shannon seemed to dominate the conversation anyway, seeing as Dave just went along with what she said or wanted to do. To be witness to that made me a bit uneasy. Dave used to be tough, a fighter, and extremely funny. The few hours I had been there made it apparent that he gave into the disability of both his back and this girl.
About 8pm the Blue Anchor was jumping and filled with people Alex knew. I was a little drunk but feeling great thanks to the energy of reuniting, that familiar smell and feel of my old hometown and an occasional helping hand from my powdery friend. I made sure to do it in small increments, just to keep me going and coherent. Last time I did blow with old friends the result was ugly and I sure as heck didn’t want to revive that embarrassing juncture. So I kept it at a bare minimum.
Dave and Shannon said they had to get going but would leave a key under the backdoor mat for me. I hugged them both, told them I would see them either in a few hours or in the morning and I would be silent as silent could be when coming in. We said our goodbyes and I returned to the little patio party that Alex seemed to have organized.
We ended up bar-hopping later that night around downtown Monterey and I actually started kissing one of Alex’s lady friends around last call. She was a very cute and slightly portly girl, who seemed willing when my hormone fueled drunkenness kicked in, allowing me to pin her to the wall outside some bar and make out with her. It didn’t last very long as Alex pulled me away and drove me to Dave’s grandma’s place.
“Who was that girl?” I slurred heavily.
“I don’t know,” Alex said. “I think she was friends with Jessica.”
“Who’s Jessica?”
“A friend.”
“The one with the face or the one with the boobs?”
“They all had faces and boobs.”
“I like...boobs.”
Alex dropped me off around 2am to which I immediately had to switch into “I’m really drunk but I have to be really quiet” mode. We silently said our goodnights and goodbyes to each other and had a good laugh about the situation and the fact I had forced some random girl to make out with me, which I had never done. Well, at least not in front of him. Alex then drove off and I stood in the bleak chill trying to gather enough chutzpah to enter a house I had only been through once and now had to navigate in total stealth, in abject darkness, hastened by a staggering beer plowed body.
Pacific Grove in the dark early morning hours is a mausoleum. Cold, quiet, tenebrific and dead. In fact, the silence was so loud I felt as if that mild squeak in my left Vans were echoing down the street as I approached the backdoor. The house was pitch black. This was going to take some experienced drunk guy ninja artistry.
The key was, thankfully, under the mat and I gently slid it in the lock and slowly turned the knob which made a distinct “clack” that resonated in eternity. Once inside, I stood wobbly in the kitchen trying to get my eyes adjusted to the dark. Eventually I began my tip toe creep-fest to the “office”, which was a few steps to the left and to the right down the hall if memory served me correctly. I found the room, slowly opened the door to avoid any unwelcome creaks or clicks, located the light switch on the wall and switched it on.
From underneath the desk a swift white furry animal darted out that caused me to scream out in abject terror.
“JESUS DONKEY BALLS!” I cried. “WHAT THE HOLY CHRIST WAS THAT!?”
Obviously it was a cat, but having it shoot past me like a fuzzy banshee out of a slingshot gave me quite the scare. It was then that I realized that I screamed much too loudly as my intoxication and fear of dark grandma houses took hold. As I sat on the easy chair, trying to regain a normal heart rate, I heard a shuffling from the room next door.
“What the fuck,” whispered Dave coming into the office with nothing but boxer briefs on. Chalk up another phobia: Thick and hearty man junk wobbling in my face at 2am. No bueno!
“I’m sorry man,” I said breathless and whispering. “It was the cat. It was...under the desk... Scared me man. I’m sorry.”
“Are you just getting in?”, Dave asked perturbed.
“Yeah. We went barhopping. You should have been there. It was fun. I made out with some chick.”
Dave looked at me despairingly. He had a hairy chest, which I always knew about, but the newly formed man-gut over those briefs with what looked like a taco shell shoved down the front made me long for the safety of the garage and comfort of the model train table. Foamy toy mountains make great pillows I bet.
“Just keep it down alright?,” Dave murmured. “Don’t wanna wake grandma up.”
“No,” I said. “Don’t wanna wake grandma.”
Dave and I said goodnight and he closed the door. Through the wall, in their bedroom, apparently, I could hear Shannon ask what was going on and Dave saying that I was drunk and got scared by the cat. She didn’t sound pleased. Nor did Dave.
The next day I was happy to find Dave busy with various things, such as a doctors visit and a meeting with his business partners about, something. This was all described to me as I stood in the sterile kitchen drinking his grandma’s horrible coffee shaking from an intense hangover.
“Mark, I hear you made quite the ruckus last night,” his grandma said. She was a nice old lady that looked much older after almost two decades or so of not seeing her. I’m sure the trauma of losing her husband of fifty years recently put on some age. She was sitting on the couch doing a crossword.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Your cat gave me quite a start. I didn’t mean to yell like that.”
“Oh I didn’t hear you dear,” she said. “I’m on so many pills that I could sleep through a bomb if it dropped right here in the living room.”
“That’s awesome.”
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