Excerpt

Last night, Bartlet’s house. Same shorts, same t-shirt as today. A walk to the Store in early fall, easily managed, taking Seventh street to purchase some beer, Red Hook, taste, thirteen dollars, walk back, beer in tow, collegially as a car payment could easily match the cost of a month’s worth of booze, proceed to start drinking. We get good and drunk before Mitch gets a call from Chris.

“I’m in dire need of obtaining,” he says. Supposedly Chuck drank all of the Miller High Life that was supposed to last them more than one night. Mitch goes out and buys case for these kids, begrudgingly at best, I think we share this sentiment of things like this that must change, or that I can’t do anymore.

“It’s just not our problem anymore,” he says, out the apartment door and whisked away in a car with fifteen minutes left before ten. He’s back in ten minutes, record time – and checking the phone while getting a ride from Lofgren it is 21:54, one of the last time stamps I can place from the previous evening.

Jordan drives us somewhere who is going to pick someone up at the Dome – Blarney’s first, spelled correctly now, located in Dinkytown, an old haunt of Mitch, myself, everyone from last fall when all friends began the inevitable 21sts. Old haunt indeed; some say it loses appeal very quickly.

Billy Mike comes across to me as an abstraction right now, visible, the scene, tired himself, the scene is bad and tired tonight but not necessarily because of him, belting songs on karaoke. No drinks ordered yet- we pick up SDS and head to Library. There we see Tim, an upcoming dignitary.

“I’ve landed a job,” he’s forced to shout over the crowd and general malaise of the stereo system.
“Where?” Barlett asks, inquisitive but drunk on beer.
“Somewhere,” and it is good enough for Mitch, who orders a vodka cranberry ($1.50) to appease the inside joke and his period with the waxing moon, claiming it to be his drink on the rocks if one exists. The four, five, six beers I have help ease hitting on the hardbodies and they seem interested. One blonde is cute while the others are simply part of the posse, out with themselves tonight.

“Best leave them alone,” stumbling, twisted and truthful in the upper part of the Bar, Mitch, “not much need to pick them up,” he finishes, fragmented as he eyes the girls himself before leading the charge to The Block Bar; where you and I have spent the second most of our inheritance money besides Downtime – more on this later, when the live band is in.

“How long are we going to be here?”
“No idea,” Mitch says, “how long have we been here?”

In that way that he asks it I cannot come up with a response, he sits down at the tables near the beer pong game, my best attempts at getting any were there, seeing two girls (unknown visages) and managed to buy them drinks. They, these visages, then head off and high tail it to quieter parts of the bar after I had managed to get in line for them while they, being short, and bitchlike, were not able to. Mitch picks up the tab for Sammy in repayment of the bacon and Bartlett for the lettuce and tomatoes of our prior sandwiches consumed with the Red Hook the other day- no, the same day as today. For dinner. At this point I meet Laura, and friend, graduate students.

“Wise to all sorts of tricks, appeals made by intoxicated undergrads don’t usually work there mate,” Mitch says as he orders another vodka cran from Jade. Little does he know that they are indeed hard to pick up but she did show some interest; my confidence was right about maxed out when I went and talked to Gulia, a friend of SDS.

“I’ll come over to your table and chat,” she lies, does not occur, I use the wrong line on her, I should have responded with “to come over and talk to use,” when she asks what SDS said about her instead of “kind of good looking,” smarmy, a probable drunken answer. I could tell I was too drunk and not thinking too clearly; self loathing began and I lost control of my thoughts, including advanced theses with the graduate students, managing to screw up.

When Laura asked me some thing about “what I was preparing to do,” after leading her on. “Allegedly it is getting late,” I think, not recalling if this was my true response but I had to get out of there before I spent any more fucking money. That much was certain. Time stamp on a drunk text to Liza was about 01:05.

Me: “Will you still be awake in an hour and a half?” I was planning on driving there immediately if she was quick with the response.

Instead I passed out by my phone and shoes, waking up on the floor with one Salomon shoe off. Crawled into bed with the other still on. I wake up around 09:55 or so to the dust and pounding going on around me. Charle sends me a text inquiring location, we go to his room, clear our heads. Thus begins the thoughts of the day.