"PAUL WESTERBERG"-PART FOUR "FRIDAY NIGHT" (4th section)

PAUL WESTERBERG
PART FOUR-"FRIDAY NIGHT" (4th section)

TRACEY

   I don’t quite remember what time it was when we got to the frat house and I was even less sure of when we decided to leave but it was close to 1 a.m. when we found ourselves near the IHOP by the dorms. “OH MY GOD!!!! I totally want some fries!! I’m FAMISHED!!” Abbey screamed into the open and crisp night skies. Yeah, Abbey is still with us or again more truthfully, I am still with them. Heather, in a complete reversal from the frat house, was somehow even quieter than when the night began…if that’s possible. But no matter, Abbey took it upon herself to fill the space with her incessant, agonizing drone.

   We entered IHOP and found a booth for ourselves. I noticed that we were nearly the only patrons save for another trio that was seated at the opposite end from where we sat. The difference was that that trio clearly wanted to have each other’s company. Our waitress arrived, took our order for a plate of fries and three sodas and if you hadn’t already guessed, it was off to the races once more with Abbey. On and on an don she went about everything that entered her every little thought—R.E.M. or otherwise—and after a while, I found myself stifling an urge to laugh as I wondered if this girl ever goes back to her room and thinks to herself, “You know, I talked a lot today!” Being surrounded by the voice of Abbey Rhode McClintock was like being forced underwater while attached to an anchor.

   Our food and drinks were delivered and Abbey then performed the admittedly impressive yet still ear abusing feat of simultaneously eating, drinking and speaking as clear as a bell, eliminating all manner of substance for all three acts in the process. I barely touched the fries even though I was hungry. And Heather? Heather Harrison sat in complete silence, her head slight bowed and with a demeanor that looked as if she wanted to disappear.

   I knew how she felt.

   Or did I? This whole awful night has been a mystery and I can’t even begin to presume to understand what she might be thinking about. All I know was that everything was wrong. It all felt wrong. Everything played out wrong. And despite my efforts, however meager or heavily wished for, it seems that there’s just nothing I could do to change things. It just feels so terrible.

   Like a s hot, heather jumped up from her seat, forced herself past Abbey and bolted towards the restrooms. “I’ll handle it,” said Abbey with needless authority and then scampered directly after Heather, leaving me alone again but this time in an IHOP booth drenched underneath the zombie lights and a plate of French Fries as my only company.

HEATHER

   I just puked. Twice. It was definitely the vodka as well as that nasty plate of fries. I just had to get out of that booth. I couldn’t be there any longer and that was even if I didn’t have to throw up.

   What’s wrong with me? I wish that I knew what was wrong with me? All I want to do right now is to go back to my room. I need to leave this place, somehow sneak back onto my floor and into my room and bed and dream this all away, waking up tomorrow with this only being a sloshy memory…and hopefully, a quickly fading one at that.

   But…I can’t move. I can’t seem to make myself get out of this bathroom stall and blow past that fucking Abbey who will not just shut the fuck up for anything because she thinks she’s rescuing me or something. I can’t stand her!! Can’t she see that? Just leave already and I can somehow sneak out of this place without seeing…Tracey. I can’t see him right now. I don’t want him to see me like this. I’m not sure if I want him to ever see me again. I want to leave. I can’t stay here all night.

   But still…I just can’t move.

TRACEY

   I should leave.

   Heather and Abbey have been gone for probably 45 minutes and who the fuck knows, maybe they both jumped out of the bathroom window, high tailed it back to the frat house and are having a great laugh on me the whole way. Right now, I’m the only person sitting here in the whole place. I don’t even want to look away from the table and this booth ‘cause I know I’ll just catch the pitying stare from the waitress. “Got shafted, huh kid?” she’d ask with her eyes. “How’d you guess?” I’d respond with mine. And then playing the role of the stupid gentleman, the person who’d always take his date safely back to her dorm room even though, let’s face it, she never cared at all about me, I would just continue to sit here, staring at this disgusting platter of fries hoping that the person who obviously already left would magically come back.

   I’m a fool. A fucking fool. A fool for ever thinking that anything with Heather would have held something special. For ever thinking that she liked me…even a little. For not realizing that the day of the blizzard was nothing more than a fluke and the postcard and the phone call were offshoots of the very same fluke. It was nothing that was ever real. It feels as if it was all imaginary. What if this is all a dream and I’ll wake up in the Union, XTC still playing in my ears and me being none the wiser other than having this strange suspicion that I have been spared from being humiliated. Why did I get so carried away? Why did I let her get tome so quickly, so completely? Why did I ever allow myself to even harbor the thought that she ever felt the same way as I was feeling? I mean—I know that I did get that postcard and she was the one who first suggested us getting together, right? I never had the chance…and it looks like I never will.

   Holy shit. Heather and Abbey really didn’t leave me behind after all. They’re leaving the bathroom and coming back to the booth. Since they’re not making moves to sit again, I have a feeling that this night is done.

   “Heather needs to go home,” announced Abbey, heather’s self-appointed spokeswoman.

   “OK,” I said, rising from my seat, feeling the blood circulating back though my legs to my feet, which were buzzing with sleep.

   Heather, at no point, looked at me again. From IHOP and a few short blocks back to Witte, she stared at either the ground or straight ahead into wherever her eyes were gazing. I just couldn’t help but to feel hurt that she never once looked my way, so hurt that I felt like crying right then and there, which I wish that I could tell you is nothing like me but after all that I have told you, what would be the point to lie right now?  

   It was after 2 a.m. when we found ourselves at Witte Hall and instead of going inside, all three of us stood on the sidewalk. Neither I or even Abbey were invited inside. I stared at Heather, feeling like she was a complete stranger who somehow played an elaborate joke on me. “Well…” I croaked. “It was…interesting.” No insults or snide remarks from me. A fucking gentleman to the end.

   Heather finally raised her eyes, which looked red and puffy, either from being tired or drunk or from crying or all three. And if she had been crying, I found myself feeling less hurt and more concerned maybe…but at the same time, I kicked myself for starting to care because I felt so stupid for letting myself care so much in the first place.

   She stood there, with that pretty auburn hair falling, obscuring that lovely, sweet face and she said in a voice that I could barely hear, a feeble, empty, “Yeah.” And with that, Heather Harrison walked away into Witte Hall and she never looked back.

   I stood on the sidewalk confused about everything that had happened. I just stared at the door Heather walked into for what seemed like a span of time so long that it could not have been measured. I stared so long that every object other than the door became fuzzy colors and shapes to my eyes. There was nothing else for me to do but to head back to Tripp but I couldn’t make myself turn around to go home.

   “Hey,” said a voice, startling me out of my miserable stupor. Shockingly, I kind of forgot that Abbey was still there. I was even more shocked that she did not automatically volunteer her commentary about the evening’s debacle. Instead, she asked me a question.

   “Where do you live?”

   Great! I already began to mentally kick myself over what I knew that I would do if the situation I was fearing would come to pass. I don’t think it really matters where I lived if what I was thinking was what she was thinking. What would matter is where she lived because what self-respecting but stupid fucking gentleman a young woman to walk home alone after midnight? Hell, I wonder if she would even condescend to letting a Black guy walk her home anyway. Well…time for Russian Roulette…

   “Tripp Hall,” I answered her.

   Abbey Rhode McClintock looked up at me, her eyes widening and sparkling like diamonds, her mouth opening widely as she inhaled.

   “ME TOO!!!!!!!” she exploded into the night. I’m stunned that she didn’t wake up the sun. “OH! MY!! GOD!!! How have I not ever seen you before??????”

   Well…you do openly disregard men of color for starters.

   “Which house?” she asked as if I was holding the nuclear codes.

   “Botkin House,” I answered.

   “That is IN-SANE!!!!” she screamed. “I live in Bashford.”

   Right now, I offer my most heartfelt condolences to the women of Bashford House. I feel your pain and torment.

   “Hey!” Abbey began again and me, terrified at what I knew was coming my way. “I’LL WALK HOME WITH YOU!!!!’

   Take me, God. Take me now.

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