by Ted Neill
“They must have been pissed off by then.”
“Yeah, the adrenaline and alcohol were not a good mix.”
I took a nacho. The cheese made a string that stretched out between my hand and the plate, then fell down on the table. I tried getting it with my napkin. Sidney was animated, gesturing with his hands. He kept knocking the straw sticking out of his drink.
“I got to my room. They had unscrewed the knob to get in, so I couldn’t lock it. I was in my underwear, for God’s sake. I didn’t feel like letting these guys manhandle me. I had this window in my room that never stayed open. So I had a two-by-four there to hold it up. I grabbed the two-by-four and spun around and whacked the first guy that had rushed in right behind me. It must have made a big old ‘crack’ sound, but I didn’t hear it because the window slammed simultaneously. I went to town on them. The only advantage I had, ’cause I was still outnumbered, five to one—”
“I thought there were six.”
“Not after I laid out that one with the two-by-four.”
“Oh, okay.”
“As I was saying, the only advantage I had was that the room was narrow and they couldn’t outflank me.
“Sounds like the Battle of Thermopylae.”
“Thermapole-what?”
“Thermopylae. Battle in 480 BC when a few hundred Greeks, led by the Spartans, held off over a hundred thousand Persians for seven days by positioning themselves in a narrow pass.”
“Sounds pretty bad ass.”
“Still didn’t work out for the Greeks, at least not that day. They lost the battle but eventually won the war.”
“Nice,” Sidney said, nodding. “I should read about that one.”
“But your story.”
“Yeah. Anyway, they backed out the door, and I chased them down the hallway, whaling away at the last one with the board. They dove down the stairs like the house was on fire. I stood there at the top, holding the board like I was up at bat, screaming: ‘Come on, motherfuckers, you want more?’ But they didn’t take me up on it. Then I heard a crash in my room. I went back. The first guy I had hit had been left in there. He had been trying to get out the window, and it had closed on his leg. He was sitting on the sill trying to lift the window back up, but he had no leverage. He was trapped. I came in and started whacking his shin. You should have seen him squirm.”
“He was hanging out a second story window in fishnets. Show him some mercy.”
“Did they show me any mercy? A few moments before, this same guy burst in my room and tried kicking the shit out of me. Eye for an eye.”
I looked at the black-brown patch of leather fitting snug over his eye socket. He wasn’t being ironic.
“Maybe Hammurabi had it right.”
“Pause—who’s Hammurabi?”
“Babylonian King who made up the earliest set of surviving laws, Hammurabi’s Code. He was the one who said, ‘Eye for an eye.’”
I said it, feeling a bit awkward, looking at his eye patch. He didn’t seem to mind. I hadn’t meant anything by it, but even if I had, I bet he would have been all right. I was one of the few people he let ask him about his patch. When I was little, I had asked him, sincerely, how he winked at people if he only had one eye. He had laughed, made an exaggerated wink with his good eye, winding up his mouth into this ridiculous grin, and had said, “Like this, Danny boy.”
He nodded, looking out the restaurant window. “Well, Hammurabi was on to something. Someone fucks with you, you fuck them up back. Someone should carve that on a stone tablet.”
“What happened to the guy?”
“He got his leg out after a while and pulled a Peter Pan down to the ground.”
“He was okay?”
“Yeah. Bled all over my carpet though. But we weren’t going to get that security deposit back anyway.”
The waiter arrived with our sanchos. They were too hot to eat. We both cut a piece, then let it steam on the end of our forks.
“I expected immediate retaliation,” Sidney said. “I pushed my desk up against my door and got back in bed with my two-by-four. When I woke up it was light outside, and someone was pounding on my door. It was Wells. I was like, ‘Man, now I’m gonna have to whup him.’ I opened the door, and he’s standing there with his hand extended. ‘I just want to shake your hand, man,’ he says. I was like, ‘Why’s that?’ He goes, ‘We saw those pledges when you were done with them last night. You fucked them up. That’s pretty impressive. Six to one, man. I want to shake your hand.’ I realized I was still in my underwear, and wanted to get rid of him, so I shook and he promised me no one from the frat would ever bother me again. They didn’t.”
“What did Corina do when she found out?”
“Oh, she came over, said ‘poor baby,’ and then we fucked. That was the great thing about Corina, always ready to have sex. I’d come home from the gym some days, without even having a shower, and she’d be waiting at my place, and we would go right into it. It was great when I finally got my own apartment. I gave her a key. I’d get home. She’d have dinner cooking on the stove, then give me a back rub with her shirt off. She’d rub her breasts up against my back, because she knew I liked that. We’d usually end up having sex after that.”
I started to eat my sancho.
“That’s quite a girl,” I said around the cheese and beans in my mouth.
“Yeah. She got me in my share of trouble though. She was always wearing these tight, tight pants and skirts. We’d go to a party, and some drunk frat boy would inevitably grope her. Remember the time I came to visit you and had scabs on both my knuckles?”
“Yeah.”
“I had been at a party with her the night before, and this guy stuck his hand right in her crotch. Right in front of me. Then he saw me and laughed.”
“He laughed?”
“Yeah. I head-butted him, then followed with two punches to this mouth. I think I knocked one of his teeth out.”
“For groping your girlfriend.”
“I had had a bad week, there was other shit going on too, and he just became a receptacle for all that.” Sidney paused and took a bite of his sancho, his jaw moving slowly. Then he shook his head back and forth. He swallowed his food and took a drink. “But you’re right. It was no way to handle stuff like that. On the upside, the amount of physical confrontations I’ve had with people has dropped considerably since I stopped dating that girl. She was nothing but trouble.”
“I’ve never dated a girl like that.”
“It’s all right. You will one of these days. It’s a rite of passage. Come on, you’re what, in your second semester of college? It’s about time you got your carrot wet.”
The food in my mouth was too hot, and I took a drink of water. The plate underneath my sancho was damp, making the tortilla soggy. I didn’t care. I tried not to think about what might have gone on in the kitchen while they were preparing it. Every waiter knew that the food served in a restaurant was never as immaculate as it was supposed to be. Eat, don’t think.
I couldn’t imagine being angry enough to hurt another person. Sidney had once told me that when he was really angry, he sometimes literally saw red flashes before his eyes. I was too repressed to have such feelings, but I remember seeing such flashes once when I was two or three while throwing a temper tantrum and tossing a broken toy at a window.
“I’ve never had to fight to get by,” I said.
Sidney shrugged. “Count your blessings. Also, your Dad is a really laid-back guy. He grew up going to private schools and stuff. Lived in Europe.”
“So?”
“My father grew up in downtown Austin. You didn’t succeed there by being nice. He’s kind of passed that on to us. It’s that nature-nurture thing. I remember my father and my oldest brother Chris getting into it once. Dad just said, ‘We’ll take it outside.’ Chris was like, ‘Sure.’ Chris wasn’t out the door before he was knocked cold.”
“Your dad hit your brother?”
“Yeah, he was
still drinking then.”
“What did you think about that?”
“It upset me. No one likes to see their family members beating each other, but on the other hand, it was good. Things were real calm for a while after that. It was like Chris had challenged the hierarchy, and it had stood up under pressure. Dad was still king, and we all knew it.”
“That’s not true now?”
“No. Dad’s not confrontational like that now that he’s sober. He’s mellow and serene now. It’s definitely for the best.”
“What had your Dad and Chris been arguing about?”
“Nothing really. It was Chris and my mom. He had mouthed off to her, and my Dad wouldn’t have it.”
“Huh, that’s interesting.”
“My father taught us a few things to live by: always do your best, and then no one can say anything about you, and if they do, settle it honorably. But don’t step out there if you don’t plan on finishing it.” He pointed his fork at me. “Never run from a fight, Daniel. You’ll never stop running.”
I nodded and had a nacho. We ate for a while. I finished my sancho and was still hungry, but didn’t say anything. I’d have a sandwich when I got home. I ate all the nachos that had cheese on them, then picked at the olive and pepper slices that were left on the plate. Sidney started on his taco.
“All this talk about Corina is making me miss having a girlfriend.”
“You miss Corina, or just having a girlfriend?”
“Coor-reeen—aaa. That girl—the only girl I have ever met who I had perfect sexual chemistry with. I was always changing those sheets on my bed.”
Something inside me winced. I felt I’d never have sex like that. I’d never actually had sex-sex yet. I didn’t say anything.
“There is this stripper that gave me her number the other night. I might give a call when I get home.”
“How’d you meet her?”
“It was just last month. Jim’s fiancée was out of town, so we were having a guys’ night out. We were visiting all these strip joints down in Virginia Beach. Daniel, some of these girls were so fine. We got to this one place—Jim and I have this game. We try to get the ugliest strippers to do a lap dance for the other. Jim had this real fat, disgusting one picked out for me. He pointed at her and asked the manager to have her treat me to a private show in the back room. See, there are these private rooms you can go to and get a private show. The manager calls this girl over, but he points to the wrong girl. The girl that came over was so hot. Tight little body, brunette, huge boobs, and a great ass. Jim was about to shit himself. She took me by the edge of my jacket and led me to the back. I was like, ‘Thanks, Jim!’
“We get to the room. There’s two couches and a bouncer sitting there in the corner, but his chair is turned so that he can only see one of the couches. We sit down on the couch that was in bouncer’s field of vision, and she does her thing on my lap. Now, I’m telling you, Dan, this girl was so beautiful, and I say to her, ‘I know it’s against the rules, but I was wondering if I could just put my hand right there.’ I said this looking at her butt cheek. Then I said, really starry eyed, ‘You are so beautiful.’ Then she goes. ‘You’re not so bad yourself.’ Then she grabs me by the collar and pulls me to the couch that the bouncer can’t see. She takes my hands and runs them all over her body. Everywhere. I got her off a bit with my hand. She was going nuts. I went to kiss her, but she said no, she’d lose her job.”
He stopped and looked out the window. Blew some air out between his lips, then took a drink of his lemonade until the straw made an empty sound.
“What happened?”
“We went back outside when she was done. But she slipped me her card with her phone number on it.”
“Wow.”
“I’ll have to call her.”
I took a drink of the water that had formed under the melting ice in my glass. I crunched some ice in my mouth.
“We didn’t leave that place in good standing though.”
“How so?”
“Well. After two in the morning, they start bringing out the second shift strippers. All the ugly ones that look better after you’ve been drinking. Anyway, this fat, disgusting woman is up there. We’re talking two hundred and fifty pounds, maybe more. I don’t know how she moved. She had really gross skin too. I think they just had her there for a joke. All the guys were cheering for her, but Jim and I were grossed out. I sort of felt bad for her. We went to the bar to get away and watch the topless bartender.”
“After the fat woman finished her act, she came over to the bar where a bunch of guys were buying her drinks. She was so disgusting. She was old, man, and had all this hair on her chin too. I don’t know why she was dancing. Sad. Anyway, she leans over the bar beside Jim, and he moves away. Then she puts her hand on his cheek and says, turning his head to face her, ‘Hey, Honey, you scared of a real woman?’ And Jim bats her hand away and says, ‘I’m scared of the ugliest, fattest skank-ho I’ve ever seen.’”
“Now he shouldn’t have done that. He shouldn’t have knocked her hand, and he shouldn’t have said what he said. It was just mean, and that was just the beginning of it all. Because she gasps, takes her drink, and throws it on Jim, then starts slapping him, then she starts hitting him with fists. All the other men were laughing while Jim was cowering. He was half the size of her. I try to get between them, and she punches me instead. That pissed me off. I was just trying to break it up. But at that point, I still felt bad for her. I just ignored her. Then another stripper comes up and claws my face. I get really protective when people start reaching for my face. You get that way with one eye. I sort of lost control then. I grabbed her by the throat and shoved her. Then the first one came up with a bottle. I looked at the bouncer, but he was laughing. What a fucked up joint. The fat woman didn’t swing the bottle at me, but she did hit Jim with it. She didn’t hit him hard but glanced his head. Still, she could have done some damage. Jim was dazed for a second. She had this feather boa around her shoulders that I grabbed and tugged. That threw her off balance, she was in heels after all, and she goes crashing onto this table. She was crying though. Actually, she was hysterical. I guess Jim had hit a nerve. It was mayhem.”
“And the bouncers didn’t intervene?”
“No. Looking back, I wonder if stuff like that was normal for that place. Crazy. Anyway, Jim still wasn’t back on his feet, so I took him by the shoulders and pushed him through the crowd, like a battering ram. We made it out the door. The big woman was still following us with that bottle. We sprinted across the parking lot. It was gravel, so we were slipping because we couldn’t get our footing. She was throwing rocks at us now. We were laughing by now. The whole thing was kind of comedic.”
“A farce.”
“Yep, that. So we get in Jim’s truck, and we hear this rock hit the back windshield. Jim flips. He is like, ‘Fucking bitch.’ He backs out and sits there waiting for her to get closer to the truck. He had this evil look in his eye. He let her get real close, then he spun the back tires and sprayed her with gravel. She was just wearing this skimpy outfit and the feather boa, so she was getting pelted right on bare skin. That stopped her dead. Last I saw of her, she was collapsed in that parking lot, rocks falling off her as she sobbed. Jim’s a mean fucker.” Sidney was quiet a moment after that, his mouth a thin line, the corners tugging downward. “He brings out the worst in me too. But she shouldn’t have chased him.”
Our plates were empty. Sidney paid the bill and the waiter brought us change with two mints. We unwrapped them and popped them in our mouths.
“These stories are crazy,” Sidney said. “But if there’s anything you learn from them, it’s that you just got to stick up for yourself when the time comes, you know?”
He said it like he was trying to salvage the conversation, pull some moral out of it. I wondered if he was trying to convince himself, or me. The hard candy clicked against my teeth. I nodded. I guess I understood. We got up and walked towards the door. Sidney st
opped, “Hold on, I need to piss.”
He headed for the bathroom. I walked outside and waited by his jeep. I blew on my hands then dug them into the pockets of my jeans. Across the street, the Best Western sign was glowing pointlessly in the daylight. There was only one car in the hotel’s parking lot. I wondered how much warmer it was in all those empty rooms with identical bedspreads, identical bedside tables, and identical glass ashtrays. Then I remembered Sidney never locked the doors of his Jeep. The door opened, and I stepped inside. I wasn’t any warmer. The jeep’s covering was just canvas and plastic, after all. The seats actually made me even colder. I stared at the still gauges with their sleeping orange needles. Sidney was still in the restaurant. I thought about what he had said, and I knew that if the situation ever arose, and my honor was questioned, if that test ever came, I’d never be able to stick up for myself. I would fail.
I sat in the cold and silence, trying to figure out what, exactly, that meant.
9.
Tyra’s Story
In late May, Daniel went home from college for the summer. His friend Tyra stayed on campus, said she was going to look for a summer job. Daniel’s parents lived in Fairfax, where his old high school girlfriend Inez lived. Inez was Daniel’s first love. It was hard for him to drive by the Clifton Road Cineplex and the bookstore where they used to spend time together. Sundays were the worst, because then Daniel had to go to church at St. Mary’s of the Sacred Heart. It was where he used to go with Inez. Now he would go, but all he could think about how she never visited him. How she never called. They were broken up, but they were supposed to have stayed friends.
