Dylan deploys his ruse of not being able to figure out these trivia machines. And they weren’t leaving anyway, as it turns out, only moving up to the bar due to the spotty waitstaff service over here. Introducing themselves at last, from greatest to smallest, as Brooke and Jolene, they laugh and explain what we need to do. Even as Jolene squints up at the screen, possibly indicating a vision issue, and asks which team we are.
“HSBNDS,” Joe says, spelling out the letters rather than stating the word, which could mean he has a sudden burst of cold feet regarding this married business.
“Oh yeah?” Brooke replies, glancing up at the screen — where we still hold a commanding lead, it should be noted. “What’s that stand for?”
“Has beens,” I blurt out, with a straight face, who knows why, considering it doesn’t explain the presence of that D. Brooke’s eyes dart back and forth for a second, her smile glued in place, as though recognizing something’s wrong with this answer but either unable to place it or unwilling to say.
As they saunter off to the bar, we begin dissecting this encounter, and wondering where to take it from here. This is where the inevitable laziness factor comes into play, and rationalization rears its head. You start weighing the effort involved for landing various candidates, versus the potential payoff. While Dylan and I are certainly not opposed to nailing the short, blue eyed, silky haired blonde, Joe is already totally fixated upon her. Though, all rumors aside, I really haven’t slept with any dogs, and only one chick we might even classify as hefty, it’s true that I don’t mind a little meat on the bones so long as she has a pretty face. And Dylan leans in a similar direction, in fact is probably the least picky out of anyone in our circle. So even our half baked calculations are mostly a farce. Of course either one of us would take the easy way out and focus upon Brooke. The only real scandal here is that Joe is somewhat full of shit, as far as the image he attempts projecting, because he would as well, if the opportunity presented itself. He talks a good game about classiness and standards, but is realistically less choosy than me, too.
None of this matters if we don’t connect the next dot, however, so discussion turns to where this might lie. I definitely wouldn’t claim to have all the answers, and neither would these guys, so it’s crucial to flesh out all the possibilities.
“What is the angle here?” Dylan wonders.
“Obtuse. Definitely obtuse,” Joe muses, nodding as he pulls at his beer bottle, and sneaks a glance over at the bar.
Despite his wisecracks, Joe is advocating that we slide up to the bar, into some open seats beside them. But we need to step back a few paces from the typical mindset, and consider how a married man would act in this spot — even a married man on the prowl. Dylan and I, who are after all veterans at this wedding ring stunt by now, by comparison, skew toward continuing to sit here, blowing them off awhile. Maybe one of us can drift up soon and order a round of drinks, and casually keep the conversation flowing in that manner.
And this is exactly what happens, with Joe, who is most eager to enact this concept, the most natural candidate for doing so. He ventures up that way in the name of grabbing three more beers. The next thing we know he’s returning with not only these, but also a trio of shots. It seems he had volunteered to buy one for everybody, at which point the ladies recommended Buttery Nipples. Does this development necessitate our getting up to join them at the bar? The data is unclear. We are close enough, and it’s plenty quiet, for us to simply sit here and raise our shot glasses — Joe remains standing while doing so — as we all smile and toast and shout out our whoo hoos! or what have you, and to not feel aloof or awkward in doing so.
In one sense, some answers arrive approximately fifteen minutes later, although we cannot yet decipher them. This is progress, but moving in which direction? At a moment where Joe has wandered off to take a leak, Dylan and I sit drinking, idly watching sports, and continuing to fiddle with the trivia machine. I feel an unexpected finger tap on my shoulder. Craning my neck around, I see a grinning Brooke behind me, and Jolene beside her. Why she has chosen me is possibly explained away as, with Joe’s seat vacated, I am the closest to where they were sitting. Or else the slightest familiarity from our having met once before. Yet the real mystery, and the most positive sign, is that they bothered coming over here at all.
“Hey, we’re heading out…”
“Oh! Okay…”
“Yeah but we’re just going to pick up one of our friends. We’ll be back in, like, fifteen minutes. You guys still gonna be here?”
I glance back at Dylan and shrug, and he does the same, albeit in agreeable fashion, as we give them the affirmative. Then with a wave, they are gone, saying that we will see them soon.
It’s easy to feel like a bonehead in retrospect, yet in our defense, things appeared straightforward enough. Joe’s absence during that last conversation has opened up the window just enough for him to mildly scold us, saying we should have at least gotten a phone number. But if it had even occurred to us, doing so would have just felt like and possibly come off as paranoia. Well, needless to say, they don’t return after fifteen minutes. Or thirty, or an hour.
We can chalk it up as a learning experience, however, inching us that much closer to complete mastery of this stunt. What we don’t want to do, however, it’s unanimously agreed, as the hour mark passes, and even the remaining crowd begins to thin out, is to continue sitting here like dolts. At this point, if by some miracle they should return, that would represent a bad look for us, unless we were plainly having one outrageous, bang up time without them. This is a numbers game and we should have maybe plied our wares elsewhere around this bar, instead of kicking back and thinking we had this encounter in the bag. Instead, though, it’s time to move on, and dipping by Triads seems like the most natural option.
A cursory glance through their windows reveals that this place is much more happening now. Upon entering Triads, and claiming seats before it, Jeff grins and nods in what appears a nod-and-wink knowing fashion, although nobody asks any questions. Yet maybe this is just my predisposition, believing that somehow he has already spotted these bands on our fingers, and immediately intuits what’s up. Except, well, despite his status as a veteran barkeep and all, he is also a male, which means he’s probably not that observant.
Either way, while it’s unlikely our trusty drink slinger would betray us, this matters far less than what the females think. Apart from wanting this to succeed on its own terms, for the end goal in sight, I’m also hoping that we enjoy some highlights right out of the gate tonight. To sell Joe on the concept, but also inch farther along this spectrum of proving any doubters wrong. If Dylan and I are having a blast doing this, that only figures to expand by a nearly infinite degree with Joe on board. He’s a steady, intelligent guy and all, is currently working a full time job and attending school to become a pilot. Yet just the same, he’s also in many respects more out there than any of us, and it’s hard telling where this might lead with his brand of wackiness tossed into the blender.
So as we sit in a row here, Dylan and I repeat our previous strategy of clinking these rings on our beer bottles, cracking ourselves up in the process. We otherwise try our best to button that tendency down, to look around instead with this studied expression somewhere between just chilling and maybe ever so slightly bored. Though initially worried that such blatant signaling might prove a wee bit over the top, and threaten to counterfeit our efforts, the reality is that these concerns are misplaced. Over the top is good. The more over the top the better, if trying to draw someone’s attention in this ultra competitive nightlife scene.
Once again, it’s immediately apparent that this is working. Our attentions are soon drawn to one of the two pool tables, across the room, where a pair of women are leisurely playing, while a third, seemingly older one sits on a drawn up chair just gabbing with them. She doesn’t seem a member of their group, such as it is, and didn’t arrive with that duo, but is familiar to them. Relating some longwinded tale and laughing throughout. Sure enough she soon drifts back to her own stool, joining another equally aged woman, but will return time and again to speak with this younger twosome.
Regarding these two, the plainer, somewhat heavier girl, with curly though otherwise unremarkable brown hair, continues to shoot away, and chat with her sidekick, paying us no mind. As far as this partner, though, she is simply stunning — and furthermore won’t stop looking this way. A short, blue eyed blonde, whose appeal in part lies in the memorable, even borderline absurd outfit she has on right now: coveralls with a long sleeved flower patterned long john blouse underneath, a black velvet top hat perched at a precarious angle above her head.
Even from this distance, her default expression is readily interpreted as a suspicious one. Yet she keeps peering our direction, all the same, sometimes discreetly, sometimes not, for example making a point of facing us when speaking to the curly haired brunette, so that her eyes can drift over here without moving her head. And the other consideration is, even if suspicious, suspicious about what, exactly? We don’t recall seeing her before, so it’s unlikely she is computing some disparity with these rings. So maybe suspicious isn’t the right word, maybe it’s more accurately summarized as the blanket face made to match the equally all purpose situation where you’re wondering what someone’s deal is.
Can she even see or hear the clinking rings from here, anyway? Or does she just find one or more of us attractive, or is she merely curious about our stories in that particularly female busybody way? To begin narrowing down our options, I make a point of strolling past them, bound for the front door where I paw through some free newspaper racks, eventually selecting the weekly events calendar publication. Am so absorbed by this task that it’s only as I head back in the other direction and glance up at my comrades when I realize this chick is suddenly over there, standing beside them at the bar.
From this point, the action transpires in somewhat of a jumbled up blur. This has far less to do with any alcohol induced brain fog, instead that there is suddenly a whole lot more happening. One minute, after I rejoin everybody over there, the blonde in the top hat is introducing herself as Mary, her friend as Hannah. The next thing we know, lo and behold…here come Brooke and Jolene, sans any purported friend, waltzing onto the premises.
Of course, it would be equally incorrect to say the developments which follow are not the least bit alcohol related. Even so, these are almost all pluses, with just one or two possible minor exceptions. And anyway, my pair of male associates are both in slightly worse shape than me on the coherence front, though none of us detrimentally so.
By my count, then, it’s three more rounds of beer and two additional Buttery Nipple shots apiece, as we all continue clustering around the bar, whether seated or standing. At some point, likely unable to miss this action, that older woman who was chatting with Mary and Hannah earlier, she begins inserting herself here and there, during the occasional flyby, as some sort of jealousy induced stunt. Introduced as Donita, her whole shtick is evidently being obnoxious as she can, ostensibly for “laughs.”
Then again, Dylan and I both are on a mild though selective sharp tongued streak ourselves, as for some reason we can’t resist messing with an increasingly agitated Mary and Hannah. We’re cracking ourselves up, as they’re meanwhile becoming borderline unnerved by our senses of humor and off-kilter arguments — even if I would maintain they instigate much of this, by choosing to get involved and perpetuate these discussions.
It all starts when Dylan questions with a smirk if this one passing beauty is worthy of an ass smack. In our married states we are of course coming nowhere near that particular stunt, though it remains safely within bounds as a philosophical topic. Something shy of a serious academic debate, in fact, merely presented as a joke. Nonetheless Hannah overhears our back and forth banter, and makes a disgusted scoffing sound, accompanied by clicked tongue.
“No guy had better ever try that shit with me!” she declares, eyebrows raised for emphasis.
“Oh yeah. Tell me about it. I’d claw his eyes out,” Mary says.
“Mmm, well…I think it’s really all about context,” I reply, “a lot of the time I feel like people are just going along with what everybody else says is offensive, but they don’t actually care themselves. Not to mention, I mean, attitudes about this stuff does change over time…”
“I know what you mean, dude!” Dylan agrees, “like I was watching an old Saved By The Bell episode the other day and Zack’s casually mentioning, eh, yeah, we drilled peepholes into the girl’s locker room years ago. And he’s totally serious, like it’s no big deal. And I’m thinking, man, this isn’t, like, American Pie or Revenge of the Nerds or whatever, this was a Saturday morning show aimed at kids! But holy fuck, dude, that shit would not fly these days, would it?”
“No! That was never okay! Huh uh! I don’t fuckin think so!” Hannah angrily declares, shaking her head as if this action alone would dispel that thought ever gaining traction.
I cackle wildly, blowing past her, because his remark just reminded me of something else, a similar insight I recently entertained. “Yeah, totally! That’s like I was flipping channels a few nights ago and happened to catch a bit of Dazed and Confused? Have you seen that?”
“I think so maybe…what was that one about?” Dylan says.
“Okay, well this one was set in the 70s and it’s a bunch of high school kids going around getting into shit. Anyway it’s got Matthew McConaughey playing this somewhat older guy, and he’s constantly smacking chicks on the ass and pointing at them. And they sure seem to be digging it. I’m thinking, whoa! So this did used to be a thing! I mean, I know it’s just a movie and everything, but still…it seemed pretty accurate overall…”
“Mmm, well, Matthew McConaughey can smack my ass anytime…,” Mary purrs, over the top of the drink she’s sipping.
“Yeah,” Hannah giggles, “tell me about it.”
I raise a palm like a stop sign and announce, “Okay, but no. No. This is exactly what I’m talking about. You don’t really find it all that offensive. 99% of this stuff is just going along with what everybody else is saying. It’s either cool or it’s not cool, so which is it? Unless you agree that’s it all about the context?”
“Yeah I’m thinking it’s pretty cut and dried with me,” Dylan notes with a chuckle, “pretty much any chick could smack my ass any time she felt like it. I would never really be cool with dudes smacking my ass. Wouldn’t matter who it was. There’s my context.”
“But has any guy ever smacked you on the ass?” Hannah pointedly challenges.
“Well, yeah, I’m sure it’s happened, like you’re playing sports and the coach is saying atta boy!, or they make someone do it in Truth Or Dare or something…,” he offers with a shrug.
“And you thought it was cool?” Mary challenges.
“I wouldn’t say it’s cool, but you go along with it.”
“But you went along with it?” Hannah asks, grilling him with her head pointedly titled toward him.
“Well, yeah…”
“Okay then,” she concludes, halfway glowering, features a scrunched up ball glaring forward over the top of her drink.
“Okay then but what about when you ladies are out on the dance floor? Ever had any random guys just come up from behind and shove their junk into you? Start grinding up against you?” I question.
“Oh yeah.”
“Of course. Happens all the time.”
“Happens all the time,” I repeat, then add, “well, you go along with that…and if you’re telling me that smacking a chick on the ass in passing is more offensive, I would have to disagree with that assessment.”
This night long swirl of occasionally competing factors coalesces, as the hour approaches closing time. Joe has spent the duration of this discussion with Brooke and Jolene, for example, but now our entire combined mob reunites. Then we’re standing here waiting for Jeff to close out our respective tabs when Donita strolls up out of nowhere and says to me, “I’m too old for you!” To which I shrug and look at her as though replying, and am in fact thinking, okay, what is your point? She was never the focus this evening, which I guess is the actual thrust behind this comment. But also, and more significantly, Brooke has just invited us back to her apartment, as in right now.
We now find ourselves at the next inflection checkpoint. As it turns out, though I’ve lived in my apartment complex for nearly two years and never met Brooke until a week and a half ago…she has resided there as well, albeit in a different building, for just as long. She doesn’t have room for the three of us along with her and Jolene, in a very cramped miniature sports car, however. Yet we walked here, of course, and though not necessarily dreading the return, there is the matter of how much time this will eat up, particularly as they are already heading out the door and we’re still paying our tabs.
Will they have lost this buoyant mood, by the time we traipse that far, or even gone to sleep? This is the question. And yet fortunately, overhearing this conversation, Hannah pipes up to volunteer that she can give us a ride in the bed of her truck. And so this is what we do. Lying as flat as possible to buffer ourselves from the whipping cold, Hannah at the wheel and Mary driving shotgun, they whisk us over to the coordinates Brooke has given and deposit us there.
As we pop out and shout our thanks, by happenstance standing on the passenger side of the vehicle anyway, Mary rolls down her window and shakes all three of our hands. To Joe alone she says, “I just want to say, you were the only gentleman tonight.”
“That’s nice,” he replies, nodding as he asks, “can I have a hummer?”
Smacking her lips together with disgust, Mary then morphs into merely a shocked, offended face. Before she rolls up her window and they streak out of here.
While hopping from foot to foot and rubbing our hands together in an attempt to warm up, we make time for a quick huddle before approaching Brooke’s apartment. They haven’t asked us any hard questions, yet it seems highly likely that the time for that is fast approaching, and therefore it’s imperative we get our stories straight. It helps we are all of a same mind, that keeping things simple as possible is the best policy: no kids; the names of our wives will be the same as our last respective girlfriends (Angel, Jenna, Jodie); but then, in our lone bit of speculative market testing, we will branch off with three slightly different scenarios to see what works best — Dylan is happily married; Joe is in the process of a legal separation; I’m somewhere in the middle, where my wife and I have experienced some problems, you know, but we are determined to stick together and work through them.
Upon knocking and gaining entry to Brooke’s blessedly toasty place, the scene is an inviting one beyond the elevated temperature and any obvious prospects for where this might lead. She has every available light on, it seems, in the living room and the kitchen, which can only add to the warm ambiance, and from the stereo, some sort of r & b classics mix emanates at a soothing volume. Her pad is not just accentuated with all the feminine touches which make it far classier than mine, but it’s also just a nicer place anyway, at the base level — my first inkling that, having never stepped inside a unit in another building before, these apartments were internally much different though externally identical.
There’s also some kind of chocolatey scent in the air, soon revealed to us as the alchemy of this hot cocoa Brooke’s making in the kitchen, brought to life with a little vodka. From the couch, Jolene’s receptive smile is doubly warm and sweet. As we fall into formation either on the furniture or the floor, our hostess begins bringing out the drinks, and we are soon gathered in this loose circle, sipping them in a nearly synchronized rhythm while discussing our lives, whether fictional or factual.
Brooke, it soon emerges, is moving out of this complex in another month herself, to a more expansive pad on the west side. It has already occurred to me that, now down to just two days remaining in my own apartment, there’s a good chance we never would have met if any of this were delayed by so much as a week. Hearing about her impending shift compounds this sensation, however, making this all seem even more surreal.
She’s working for the big insurance company downtown and pulling in some decent coin now, figures she can afford better digs at this juncture. As for Jolene, though much more tight-lipped, we eventually tease some semblance of a history out of her. That whole business about her alleged virgin status was of course some running joke. The whole impetus for this is that, while her own long-term, serious relationship ended months ago, she still hasn’t slept with anybody or for that matter even dated anyone since. Brooke is unable to resist needling her about these statistics constantly, with increasing fervor the longer this drags out.
Talk soon moves into us and our marital situation, as expected. For this we are immensely lucky and thankful to have covered the bases mere moments ago — knowing us, this could have easily gone down as a glaring point that we somehow all overlooked. Having not just fleshed out this material, though, but done so right before entering, these talking points are fresh and roll right off the tongue.
“Dylan’s like that Hall & Oates song, you know, he’s a family man,” I cackle, when we are discussing how he is probably the most happily married among us.
When the girls smile and then turn these warm, encouraging, clearly impressed beams his way, he shrugs and grins, admits, “eh, what can I say? Life is good.”
He is nonetheless absent when the funniest exchange of the evening transpires. Having dipped outside for a quick cigarette, it’s just Joe and me, left alone with Jolene. Brooke drifted into the kitchen to refresh some drinks and her unwitting sidekick here just admitted that the recently terminated relationship was the only serious one she’s ever experienced, in fact he was the only guy she’s ever had sex with. Quite naturally, we are offering our condolences in subdued, appropriate tones.
Reentering the room with more steaming hot mugs of cocoa, Brooke says, “why is it we can never meet any single guys as cool as you three?”
Joe and I both nearly choke on our fresh beverages, though at least we have this prop to blame it on, are able to play this off as a temperature related event. “Why, what are single guys like?” he recovers in admirably swift enough fashion to ask.
“Always rude, trying to get you to come home with them,” Jolene explains, grimacing.
Like the proper gentleman that he is attempting to portray, Joe goes out to start her car, get the heater going, as Dylan reenters the picture. “You guys are cool, we’ll have to go clubbing sometime,” Jolene tells us. After hugging her and telling both girls that this will definitely happen, we exchange phone numbers in every possible combination and head out the door.
None of us have mentioned that I live in the same apartment complex, nor that we walked to the bars tonight, both of which seem like possibly important points. They might do some homework based on this and expose our fraud — a far-fetched notion, possibly, but it’s true that any discussion with my neighbors whatsoever would blow our cover to smithereens. Once we have traipsed the short distance to my place, inside and holding our hands over various vents in an attempt to defrost, I have enough blankets and pillows remaining on hand that we are able to crash semi comfortably in various corners of the house. In this regard, the healthy alcohol intake certainly helps a great deal.
“Dude! This is the best ten dollars I’ve ever spent!” Joe marvels, holding his wedding ring aloft in the light, lying on his back on the living room floor.
“See man? That’s what we’ve been saying!” Dylan concurs, still pacing around the premises himself, unable to wind down just yet.
While this highlight reel recap is occurring, I’m over at the answering machine, checking my messages. There’s just one of consequence, but it’s from Ann, which initially has me more excited than anything else that’s happened tonight. Except the content is brief as it is unmistakable, neither being any good.
“Pssh,” is all she says, and hangs up the phone.
Ann soon disappears from the frame, but it really doesn’t matter. We are clearly making progress. Wedding Rings 2, Pez Dispensers 0.
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