"PAUL WESTERBERG"-PART FOUR "FRIDAY NIGHT" (3rd section)

PAUL WESTERBERG

PART FOUR: FRIDAY NIGHT (3rd section)

TRACEY

     I held Heather’s hand throughout the entire movie, plus ending credits. Everything was feeling as if things were moving forwards. To exactly where, I have no idea. Just forwards. And then, when the theater lights came back on, everything fell backwards. As backwards as it felt when we first left Heather’s dorm.

    Heather whisked her hand from mine before I was able to even look her way. “I have to stop at the bathroom,” she mumbled hurriedly and then, she practically sprinted away from me. And so it went. From leaving the Esquire all the way until we got back to State Street, we walked incomplete silence and I don’t believe that she ever looked at me. Needless to say, we didn’t hold hand again.

    When I asked her if she wanted to do anything else or go anywhere else, she said something that I couldn’t really hear at all. It sounded as if her voice was coming from the bottom of a well. When I suggested that we could possibly go to the Union—perhaps the spark of memory could help things—she said to me, but more audibly, “I said that I need to meet Abbey at my room.”

     Abbey?! Fuck. Why her?

    “She has these passes for this party at a frat house,” Heather explained quietly. “She said that we could have them.”

    “Frat house?” I questioned.

    “Yeah,” she said. “I can’t tell you which one though.”

    “Well, I have to say that Fraternity Row is not, and has never been, one of my haunts,” I tried to say in a more jovial fashion but with an air of caution as I just could not read her at all.

    We returned to Witte and at her room stood Abbey Rhode McClintock, all self-satisfied and holding what I assumed to be three tickets in her hand. She handed one each to Heather and myself, kept one for herself and we were off.

   In complete contrast to how we walked back to Witte from the movie, Heather was almost a chatterbox on our way to Langdon Street…but with Abbey. More truthfully, it was really Abbey’s slightly nasally but thoroughly irritating voice I heard the most. But nevertheless, I felt as if I was the proverbial “third wheel,” and not Abbey. I couldn’t even begin to tell you what Abbey was even going on and on about because not once during the entire walk did she ever address my presence. After a while, Abbey’s voice didn’t even sound like a voice. It just became this…white noise. White noise laced in the arsenic of arrogance and a horribly impatient need for all consuming attention and control. It is the only time in my life when I found myself wishing for a mute button.  

     By the time we reached the frat house—Kappa Delta Alpha Male Date Rapists and Racists or whatever the fuck the name was—we handed our passes to the future Wall Street criminal at the door, who proceeded to take quite the lengthy leer straight down Heather’s cleavage.

    “Have a wonderful evening,” he said to Heather’s nipples.

    “We will,” I said as I lowered my voice a register, and physically placing myself between him and Heather, successfully cock-blocking him. He backed away and we walked inside.

     I figured that perhaps by this point, Abbey would go off and perch herself elsewhere, thus leaving me and Heather to ourselves. I was wrong. Just moments after being inside this ode to Greek themed maelstrom of alcohol, wall-to-wall noise and the sounds of the surprisingly good cover band, Heather and Abbey simply took off into the crowd, forcing me to follow them and keep up, which was to no avail as it seemed as if they just teleported themselves to points unknown and I just lost them in the crowd.

HEATHER

    I needed a drink and quickly! Now I need to assure you that I am not, and have never been a drinker. In all actuality, I have never really found what Abbey would call my “signature drink” and additionally, I don’t like the idea of not feeling in control or putting myself in a position where I am not in control. It’s not like I am a control freak. That’s not it. I just want to be aware at my fullest. And as I explain myself to you, I am finding it really difficult to explain to myself exactly why I am now holding a cup of vodka in my hand with Abbey chattering incessantly in my ear about God knows what, while the frat house is spinning and spiraling around me. My insides are feeling kind of like this, now that I think about it.

   I don’t know what is happening with me tonight. I felt better once the movie started and I loved holding Tracey’s hand. But when the movie was over and I had to find myself in the position of having to look at and engage with him again, my nerves took over me. They began percolating violently, like when tiny molecules in a covered boiling pot of water start banging around just begging for the top to be lifted so they can all be released. But for me and for tonight, this is not a good thing.

   Everything around me began to look…oh…I don’t know…just larger or even faster and everything seemed to sound like it was echoing in a long tunnel. And I’m still holding the cup of vodka in my hand. I haven’t even taken a drink yet. I felt like I just couldn’t feel my breathing in a  regular way and my heartbeat was noticeable just because I noticed it, which spooked me because you never really feel your heart beating—you just know that it is. I feel like I am caught inside of a turning kaleidoscope. 

   Before I even realized that I did it, I drank the whole cup of vodka plus another cup and my throat was on fire. The taste was pungent and acrid. It was like drinking battery acid. I coughed and steadied myself to the table when the image of Tracey popped into my head. Oh shit! I don’t believe that I did this. I just left him.

TRACEY

   I stood directly in front of the cover band. I was the only one watching the overly thin, bespectacled, curly haired lead singer, pink stretch pants and all, leading his band seamlessly from some blues number I didn’t recognize straight into a cover of The Pretenders’ “Middle Of The Road.” I have to say that the singer was really impressive despite the trying-too-hard-to-be-androgynous look, which admittedly was a bold stance to adorn himself within this setting. I really liked how his voice could so easily shift from his low down growl into a near perfect approximation of Chrissie Hynde’s voice. I listened for a minute being somewhat transfixed by the visual vibrations of the throbbing bass drum head. Suddenly, I felt two hands grab my arm and to my surprise, it was Heather.

   “I’m so sorry!!” she had to shout in order to make herself heard.

   “I didn’t know where you took off to!” I shouted back. “I walked around looking for you and just ended up here!” I said, motioning towards the band.

   After listening for another moment, Heather weaved into me and shouted, “They’re really good!!”

   “Yeah!” I responded. Looking into Heather’s eyes, they just carried a glassy haze, which signaled to me that things were still somewhat off despite her unexpected boisterousness. I just wasn’t sure exactly what was feeling even different than earlier between Heather and I. She was definitely friendlier than earlier but it didn’t feel as…I guess as natural as before. In the Union, on the bus, on the phone, everything just flowed, you know? And now…tonight…it was like trying to force two pieces together that don’t quite fit and I can’t seem to figure out what to do or what to say to just get things back to how they were that very first time.

   Heather began singing. Well…not really singing as in quietly along with the lyrics but boldly filling the space of the song with The Pretenders’ backing vocal “ooohs” the cover band’s lead singer obviously couldn’t perform himself. Not wanting to feel excluded, I joined in and doubled the sound, which did carry a strange closeness to the original song’s sound. The lead singer looked directly at us and nodded his approval. We kept singing along with the band, and I was just beginning to feel the smallest trace of a connection with Heather again, however faint it was. I was just glad it was there. And then, Abbey caught up to us.

   Oh for fuck’s sake. What does she want with us, or more truthfully, what does she want with Heather now? She’s the one who got us these passes or tickets or whatever to this party and somehow it seems as if the only people she even knows are Heather and myself. JUST. GO. AWAY!!! Here she is, chattering and chittering, blabbering and blubbering directly into Heather’s ear, practically peeing in her pants with some sort of excited frenzy, which is making Heather crack up in hysterics. Jesus…what if they’re laughing at me. Now, don’t go there just yet, man. Not yet. Keep whatever modicum of cool you have and just ride this wave. The obnoxious, annoying, irritating wave that is trying to overtake anything good this night might have. It’s not over. Keep telling yourself that. It’s not over and there’s still a chance for tonight to turn itself around.

   What in the…what is Abbey doing running over to the band and pestering the lead singer for/ Wha…Jesus, stop jumping up and down like some hyperactive five year old who somehow found and ingested a ten pound bag of cocaine flavored candy. Oh great! She made a request to the band. I wonder…no, actually I don’t. Just which one will it be?

   Yup, just as I thought. R.E.M. The band launched into a version (and a strong one, I have to grudgingly admit) of “Can’t Get There From Here.” But, what I didn’t expect at all was for Abbey to leap in the air, shrieking as if the arrival of this song was a complete surprise, and grab Heather to whisk her from my side to head back towards the band to dance, dance, dance and dance some more. 

   There they were. My alleged date and even more alleged “third wheel” spinning, laughing, twirling, embracing, falling all over each other. If one didn’t know better, one would think that they were the ones on a date and from the sleazy look some of these frat guys were giving them, that is precisely what was on their minds. And there I continued to stand, in the middle of this Bacchanalian zoo, with an endless supply of hooch to serve the natives, the cover band and Heather, who was not ten feet from me but was dancing with Abbey as if she and I had never met at all, let alone consented to going out with me. I don’t know what to do. I mean—should I go over to her, demand that she return to me or perform some other move not uncommon to the Cro-Magnon man? Or should I just stay put, taking in the sideways stares from the frat guys who probably held that mock slave auction about a year ago on Halloween and are thinking that I should be the next one to go on the block, and hope that Heather will spot me and implore me to rejoin her, leaving that fucking Abbey Rhode McClintock in the dust? Or…should I just leave because as I look at her not looking at me and I am catching the eyes of everyone else who is looking at me, all that comes to mind is one, absolute thought: I don’t belong here.
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