Text to El Dominicano: Da fuck man? Who sent u dis?
Text from El Dominicano: Glassman
Text to GlassInTheAssMan: Yo wht da fuck. Who sent you tht pic?
Text from GlassInTheAssMan: Pierce.
The bell rang and I berserked out the door and down the hall, knocking underclassmen into lockers like a hockey player, in search of Pierce Stone.
“Hey Vic!” Karl shouted as I blew by him in a blind fury. “Vic! Vic?! What the fuck?”
I saw red. I popped my head into random classrooms—AP Bio, Pre-calc, Global Issues—“Yes, Mr. Ferraro, can I help you?” Nothing. I suddenly remembered that the Jew Crew would show up to fourth period late because they’d cram into Jared Rosenblatt’s SUV hidden on a side street in Little Italy to hit the “volcano” (an airbag-like method for inhaling THC that prevents the nefarious marijuana stench from sticking to your clothing) in order to enjoy lunch completely torched. I booked it for the exit and could hear wet, mucus-filled sobs emanating from behind the principal’s closed office door.
My orcish stomping on pavement evolved into a trot as I spotted Pierce Stone and the Crew at the threshold of the faculty parking lot. Before I could say anything when I got close enough, I caught part of their conversation:
“It’s terrible he isn’t back at school yet,” said Josh Glassman. “Has anyone spoken to him recently?”
“See, my dad was smart and got out early,” started Pierce Stone. “Took a fat bonus and left Lehman Brothers before the collapse. Oh, what the shit, Ferraro? Just sneaking up on us like…”
“Fuck you, man! What the… what the hell are you doing, sending that pic around the school?”
“Oh, ha! You saw that? Yo, she sent that to my friend at Seton Hall Prep. It’s everywhere now. Even Maine said they all got it at Pingry.”
“How could you do that to her, man?! We’ve known Michaela since Glenwood. What the fuck is…”
“Yo, Vic, man. Breathe, man,” said Silas.
“Don’t fuckin’ touch me, Silas. You spread this shit too?”
“Oh, so it’s okay to get a blowjob from her when she’s blacked out, but we can’t look at a naked pic? You’re a fuckin’ hypocrite, Ferraro.”
“What? Blacked out? How did… Who said…”
“Victor!” Maria came stomping down the pavement with the force of a thousand neglected girlfriends. “Victor! You didn’t wait for me after class. I told you I was going to speak with Mr. Neely after to go over the test.”
“Hey, uh… sorry, babe. But I…”
“Hey, everyone is talking about a naked pic of some junior. You know her? You didn’t look at it, did you?” Her hip tilted so fast that I thought it’d crack the axis of the Earth.
“Yeah, Ferraro, did you look at it? Who was it again? Michaela?” Pierce Stone asked, rhetorically.
“…Yeah.”
“You’re close with her, right?” said Pierce Stone, folding his arms on the inflection.
“Excuse me? You’re friends with this girl?”
“Vic and Michaela go way deep—I mean back.”
“Oh. My. God.” And Maria pivoted on a dime like she was stealing second base and headed back toward the school.
I could kill him.
“Ria, come on, babe. I didn’t…”
“Admit to nothing, Ferraro!” Pierce Stone called after me.
“What, Victor? What didn’t you do? I thought you said you only had sex with West Orange sluts! Not anyone in Millburn!”
“It was only one slut and she was from Westfield,” I said, as if the locus of the vagina somehow exculpated me from my transgressions.
“I DON’T CARE WHERE THE SLUTS ARE FROM!”
“Okay, calm down.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down. Wait… wait… Michaela? The one who gave blowjobs to Carmine and Tank? They would always talk about how good she was at…” She took a deep—eyes closed—breath. “‘Sucking the pisciadool.’ This. Same. Girl… Victor?”
With Jedi-like intensity, I attempted to warg into the mind of a squirrel darting up a nearby oak tree with a recently discovered acorn—to no avail.
“Victor?!” With a rage hotter than the deepest fires of Hell: “VICTOR?!”
“Yeah, me too.”
Crack!
Uproar.
The punch felt like a warhammer collapsing my chest. I crumpled to the pavement like Prince Rhaegar slain at the Trident.
“Fuck you!” She stepped over me like a linebacker does after a flawless sack and stormed past the uproarious Crew to her car at the back of the parking lot. Heat emanated from her frame like the horizon on a sweltering summer day.
“Holy shit, Vic, are you okay, man?” Silas said, coming to my aid. From the ground I could hear the rest of the Crew mocking my defeat—Pierce Stone was performing his own rendition of my descent to the cracked pavement. Silas swallowed his own laughter. “Hell hath no fury, brother.”
I had entered enemy territory. I could only chalk up my brother’s decision to attend college in Boston as unadulterated masochism; it was a godforsaken city that my family spoke about as if they were the encroaching Huns.
Tony’s apartment building didn’t resemble the immaculate palm tree–lined dorms that flooded the folds of the college brochures I had stuffed into a Nike shoebox under my bed. Cars were parked on both sides of the tight street so the road functioned solely as a one-way. A college kid who was smoking something on the front stoop promptly darted inside when he realized that the van inching down the street contained “parents.”
“Okay, you guys,” started my father, “we gotta be up early tomorrow to see those rotten Red Sox. Don’t be up too late. And hey!” he said as we slid open the van door. “No drinking.”
“Ha! Yeah, okay,” said my mother, who didn’t suffer from such idealistic delusions, from the front seat.
“I’m serious, Tony!” he called out the window, leaning over my mother as he symbolically put his finger between his eyebrows (translation: respect).
Tony had to shove his shoulder into the warped wooden door to nudge it loose. The acrid stench of stale beer and cigarette smoke smacked me in the face like a fart in a car. From wall to wall, our feet stuck to the blackened hardwood floors and went squish, squish, squish with every step. Tony rinsed out two used red Solo cups and dropped the tap to the kegerator, releasing a steady stream of collegiately quintessential piss-yellow beer.
“Here.” He handed me the cup. “Eyy Mikey!” he called while pouring another beer. “Yo! Mikey! Happy hour!” Mikey—or the shirtless, tattooed, and stoned college student I presumed to be Mikey—practically levitated from his bedroom to the sound of sloshing suds. “Yo, this is my brother, Vic.”
“Oh man, Tony’s little bro. The future Trojan, right?” he said without a shred of patronization in his voice. Clearly Tony had been talking me up during my formative years as a top recruit.
He greased his finger on his nose and swirled it in his cup to control the rising foam as my phone started to vibrate.
Text from Maria <3 <3: Are you at your brother’s place yet?
Text from Maria <3 <3: How was dinner? Where did you guys go?
“That the GF? Better answer it.” A solid piece of brotherly advice I neglected in an act of stubborn defiance.
“Ehh, I’ll text her later.”
“Ohhh man, your little bro is a total badass,” said Mikey, continuing with the “little” adjective, although I stood at least three inches taller than Tony.
We settled on the couch to engage in Mario Kart 64, my phone tossed to the side, out of sight, out of mind, and before I could even break the seal, the apartment filled with college co-eds from all corners of New England.
Too many people would walk in front of the TV or try and get Tony’s attention when we were on the last lap, so he
turned off the N64 and told me to start setting up the cups for beirut while he got us a few more beers.
“Yo, so you got your eye on any underclassmen?” he called from the kegerator. “I know, I know, you’re in love with Maria, but you should have something in your back pocket, Vic. You’re in prime scummin’ position,” Tony pried as we went shot for shot with our opponents.
“No, I don’t, really. I mean, there’s this one girl, a freshman.”
“Oh yeah?” He cocked his arm, leaned back, and let the little ball fly.
“Yeah, we have a class together. Ukrainian girl from Little Moscow.”
“Aww, man, that’s good stuff. What does Dad say? ‘Love ’em all,’ right?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Okay, yo, make this shot. Make this shot,” Tony said as I dunked my ping-pong ball in a cup of dirtying lukewarm water and curled the tangerine orb in my fingers. Our opponents were loud-mouthed “Massholes” who didn’t appreciate my “Paaak tha cah in Havahd Yaaaaahd” joke. “Come on, Vic. You got this. I can’t stand these guys.” I felt the weight of a brother’s pride punching me in the chest.
I took a couple of practice pumps and released. Shot. Splash. Uproar.
“That’s my little bro!” he shouted as he hugged me around my shoulders. After a much-deserved round of high fives, I checked my phone before setting up for a second game.
Text from Maria <3 <3: Where aaarreee youuuu??????
Fuck. I had become so intoxicated by the collegiate mirth (and piss-yellow beer) that I forgot to tell Maria that I was safe inside Tony’s apartment.
Text from Maria <3 <3: Oh… okay.
Text from Maria <3 <3: Fine.
Text from Maria <3 <3: No it’s fine.
Text from Maria <3 <3: Are there girls there?
Are there girls here? Are there girls here? No, Tony’s apartment exists in a post-apocalyptic vulva-less wasteland where it is customary to greet one another with high fives and the sole source of sustenance is piss-yellow beer and beef jerky.
I tapped furiously on my RAZR and got to vulva-less before I realized that perhaps sarcasm would not be in my best interest for this particular (inevitable) argument.
Text to Maria <3 <3: Yeah a few
Text from Maria <3 <3: K
The infamous K; it was like getting warhammered in the chest all over again.
Text to Maria <3 <3: Wht? It’s a college party. Of course there will be girls Ria.
Text from Maria <3 <3: OK Victor! Have Fun!
She did not, in fact, want me to have fun.
My texting had been holding up the game, forcing Tony to calm down our next pair of Masshole opponents—both with patchy beards, Bruins hats, and t-shirts representing local Irish bars.
“You two fighting?”
“What? Yeah, she’s just upset that I’m spending my birthday up here instead of with her.”
“She said that?” he said as my phone vibrated again. I showed him my phone.
Text from Maria <3 <3: I’m just gonna cancel your birthday plans because you won’t be here. K?
“Ahh, I see.” We both shot; his went in, mine was wide right by like a mile.
“You have to deal with this with Margo?”
“She broke up with me a week into freshman year, remember?”
“Oh, right.”
“Yup, haven’t had a girlfriend since. Trust me, you’ll want to be single in college. This really is… Ya know, now you’re a senior, a quarterback, got a car, and the Geigers’ old Jeep is a sweet ride… this really is the time to scum, Vic.”
The thought of not having Maria made my insides slosh.
But Tony’s attitude toward bachelorhood had not always been so cavalier. George even said that Tony drove all the way from Boston one night and was banging on Margo’s door, throwing stones at her bedroom window, shouting like a drunk Romeo, and all of the other desperate acts of teen love that plagued our psyches.
If Maria tried to break up with me, Karl and I would take the Jeep and hit the open road, putting Americana on repeat until we hit Tempe: “Bitching and Moaning in Maricopa County: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Teen.”
Text from Maria <3 <3: It was a GREAT surprise too. But have fun with the MassSluts!—I had yet to be acquainted with this nymphomaniac contingent.
Tony and I lost quickly, which was fine with me, because it was getting clammy in the apartment and I was tired of being called a “queer” by the gentlemen across the table.
I stumbled onto the backyard patio, where the pale blue light from my phone illuminated my face.
Text from Maria <3 <3: I think I’m going out after dinner w/my fam
Maria didn’t just turn the tables—she spun the tables on a broken fucking axis until I fell out of my seat convulsing and foaming piss-yellow beer at the mouth.
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“What’s goin’ on?” Tony asked, following me out the door carrying a plastic handle of Hayman’s whiskey.
I felt like a nest of snakes were snapping at each other in my stomach.
Text to Maria <3 <3: Are you fucking kidding!??! With who? Who is going to be there?
Text to Maria <3 <3: Where are you going?
Text to Maria <3 <3: Is Zeke gonna b thre? I knw u made out with him sophmorrere yere.
I signaled for the whiskey without taking my eyes off the phone, took a swig, and had to swallow the vomit that came rushing up my gullet, leaving my pipes dry and burning.
Text to Maria <3 <3: OR is it that guy from Seton Hall Prep who is alwys @ your cuzz’s house?
Text to Maria <3 <3: Andrew somthin??????
Another swig, another text. I couldn’t be stopped.
Text to Maria <3 <3: Ohhhh is it John Thompson & the BIG penis?
Text to Maria <3 <3: Fucking slut
Perhaps I haven’t been completely genuine in perpetuating that Maria was the only one acting wack-a-doo, had a screw loose, insane in the membrane, off her rocker—that she and only she was crraaaaaaZeeee. For months, we had engaged in the jealousy and counter-jealousy relationship war of attrition where our arguments had become entwined like a dirty, filthy, grimy tango from the barrio. You know what I mean, where your girlfriend perks up when a shirtless piece of man-meat pops onto the TV screen, so you perk up (perhaps in more ways than one) when the female eye candy pulls her shirt off over her head and flashes that look that turns even Mormons gooey.
Back and forth goes the dance: “Now you know how I feel!”
“If you got mad at me for doing it, why would you do it?!”
Until you’re scrolling through your text message archive like a monk and reading scripture—Aha! Here it is!—and delivering the ace up your sleeve in a dramatic rendition like you’re the narrator in a Ken Burns documentary: “June 16th, 2008, and so reads the text: I guess I think he’s hot.” Might as well’ve been the district attorney presenting the bloody knife to the jury.
But no one ever won—she’d bring up the time Stephanie Hinkle lingered on the hug in Rosenblatt’s basement and I’d bring up when she touched John Thompson on the arm that time he made her laugh and on it would go until…
“Eyy ohh, there he is,” said Tony’s roommate Mikey, still shirtless and somehow looking as if he’d acquired more tattoos since the party started. “Let me get a swig of that.” Mikey tilted back the whiskey until a bubble formed in the bottle and it was the first time I had ever witnessed the moment someone blacked out. “Eyy, Tony, Tony, Tony, Tone, where in Jersey are you guys from again? I got a cousin”—I didn’t bother prodding if this was a cousin or a cuzzo or a paisan, as Mikey was built of thick Sicilian stock—“down in South Hackensack. You guys close to that?”
“Uh, I’m not really sure,” Tony said—Tony had never taken an interest in our father’s atla
s like I had.
“Kinda,” I said. “We’re more south, outside Newark.”
“Oh, right, like where those football players raped that retarded girl?”
Uproar—internal.
Tony gave an awkward laugh and took back the plastic handle of whiskey.
“Don’t use that word.” I said it looking down, and for a moment wished that I had said it soft enough that he didn’t hear it.
“Yo, what was that?”
You’ve dug yourself into quite the quandary here, Vito. “I said… I said, don’t uuuzze that word, chief.” I shouldn’t have added “chief.”
“Yo Vic, calm…”
I’m not sure who stepped up to whom first, but before Tony could finish his sentence, Mikey and I were so close I could see the grease on his nose he’d used to stop his overflowing beer suds.
“The fuck you just say to me, kid?”
It was then, shnozole to shnozole, that I understood the bone-quivering meaning of “fight or flight.” My cause was chivalrous—what’s more chivalrous than a sister’s honor?—and so, like my European forefathers, like my Norman blood, like an Essex County Don Quixote, I lowered my lance and elected to fight… and fall… and crash down the patio steps as if flung from the propeller of a windmill, banging my head on the railing and landing in a pool of projectile vomit as if subconsciously casting out a safety net to break my fall.
Text from Maria <3 <3: … We need to talk when you get home.
As soon as I came to in my hangover haze, I sent Maria a fire-string of pitiful messages, a digital tome of groveling nothings.
I’m sorry, Love me, Love me, Ria Ria Rie Rie Rie!
Disgusting.
All throughout the car ride and all throughout the stinkin’ Red Sox game, I mashed away on my RAZR keypad as I composed pseudo-sonnets with self-deprecating themes: I am nothing, but that which I am, that which we are, you and me as one, love of my life, fire of my loins, my sin, my soul: Maria—I didn’t say they were original. And as my forefathers had done before me, I blamed my transgressions on the drink and resented—no—attacked alcohol like a prohibition evangelist: “America didn’t need repeal! She needed repent! She didn’t need rum! She needed righteousness! We don’t need jags! We need Jesus!”
Lunchmeat Page 20
