SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME – the book

It was a little after 7 pm. Sara was still fast asleep on my bed. I stopped reading “Sophie’s Choice” because I thought killing myself in front of a guest might look tacky. The sun had set. The temperature was probably 85°F. I had done periodic wellness checks on Sara and confirmed that she wasn’t dead. She didn’t smell very well. She was breathing, so that was good.

Ten minutes later, I woke her up. Without saying a word, she sat up, drank the entire carafe of water I left on the nightstand, and flopped back onto the bed. Staring at the ceiling, she looked puzzled and asked, “Did I pee on myself?”

“Yes. Yes, you did.”

“What’s that smell?”

“That would be you.”

“Really? That can’t be….oh…..Mama Bear’s very embarrassed.”

“Here, take a few towels. Take more than a few.  The shower’s a couple doors down from the bathroom where, based on the sound effects, you had your supernatural encounter with the Colon Fairy.”

“Okay. Thank you. Oh, ick, ick, ick.”

“I believe a mandatory wardrobe change is in your immediate future.  I present to you the latest in very fashionable T-shirts and gym shorts. You shall be the Belle of the Ball. You’ll shame all the other girls. All the boys will be enchanted and serenade you with songs of their eternal love and admiration.”

She gingerly walked down the hall to the shower carrying a white polo shirt and black gym shorts while muttering, “Ick, ick, ick, gross, ick, ick….” 

Did you and Lukey have a tiff? You hardly mentioned him. When did you start wearing skin-tight jeans and half a T-shirt? Who are you trying to impress with the white-trash, trailer-park wardrobe? 

I didn’t ask those questions. I wanted to.

I wondered how Luke felt about it. Luke had a heart of gold and was built to provide comfort and joy to the world. He was Dudley Do-Right in thought and deed. However, he was controlling in his effusively positive and highly proper way. Luke was very conservative in manner and appearance. When they first started dating, he mentioned admiring Sara for not dressing provocatively and wearing no make-up. I wondered if the new look had gotten under his skin.

Luke liked to control his environment and the people in it. Sara never seemed to be someone who wanted to be controlled. She was intelligent and independent. Plus, she didn’t care what anyone thought of her.  Luke was brilliant, highly dependent, and deeply concerned about the opinions of others.

I didn’t see Sara lasting very long as the timid,  semi-subservient girlfriend. On the other hand, they were nauseatingly gaga for each other, which can mitigate many conflicting agendas. 

Until the day comes when it can’t.

Sara re-emerged from the shower. My polo shirt went down to her knees. She was wearing my gym shorts. The shirt covered them. I found this look much more endearing than the “Linda-Lou-Looking-to-get-Laid” outfit she had been wearing earlier.

I smiled at her and said, “I like this ensemble on you very much.” 

She twirled and imitated a runway model as she strutted down the hall.  

“Should we track down your lesser half?”

“He’s going to be sooooo mad at me-yeee. Told him we’d be back after lunch. Mama’s in big trouble.”

“Well, I’ll testify on your behalf vis-a-vis your religious experience in the bathroom. He’ll understand.”

Sara shot me a grimace that said he wouldn’t. 

“He worries. Then, his imagination goes wild. Then he gets insecure. Then he thinks I’ve left him forever. Then he thinks I’ll have sex with all the men in town because they’re better at it than him. Then he thinks everyone’s lying to him. Then he gets angry. Then he pouts. Then he won’t talk. Then he’ll tell me how tormented his life is when he has to wonder if I’ll ever come back. Then we’ll have sex. Then he’ll tell me he’s going somewhere for an hour. He come back two hours late so that I can experience the same torture, which I don’t. Then he gets insecure again because I didn’t suffer. Then he says he loves me more than I love him. Then we argue….”

“Well, at least there’s a little lovemaking amidst the drama. Sorry.”

She shrugged. “He tries too hard. I wish he could relax and play and just let it happen. He puts too much pressure on himself.”

“Sounds like our Lukey. He will grit his teeth and achieve inner peace no matter how often he has to beat his head against the wall.”

“I know….”

She hugged me. I hugged back. She began to cry. We kept hugging, and she kept crying. This went on for a few minutes. I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing. There’s a great line from Glengarry Glen Ross when Al Pacino tells Kevin Spacey, “You never open your mouth until you know what the shot is.” 

And, at that moment, I had no idea what the hell was going on. Whatever was weighing on her far exceeded the standard annoyances that go with couples navigating the tunnel of love for the first time. I figured she’d elaborate if she wanted. 

We hit the road to Sara and Luke’s place in their open-air World War II Jeep. Sara drove, which was unfortunate as she drove like shit. She never realized that one might gradually disengage the clutch when changing gears. As was the case for every other driver in Mexico, she only applied the brakes as a last resort to keep the jeep from flipping over. Plus, as with every other car in Mexico, the jeep had no shocks. The road to their place qualified as a road hazard, of course. Sara did a magnificent job finding every pothole and driving directly into it, an experience even more rewarding as the springs supporting the seats had completely rusted. 

One hundred yards from a massive police station, while driving 150 miles per hour, Sara turned right and slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting a tree. Things went flying forward, me included. My forehead hit the windshield. After stopping, Sara, without saying one word, immediately backed up, navigated past the tree, and we arrived at a small house shaped like a box.

Sara glanced at me. “They need to get rid of the tree.”

Do you mean the tree twenty feet left of the driveway? The driveway you’re supposed to be driving on?

“They really should have someone read you your last rites before letting you drive,” I muttered to myself. 

“What?”

“Oh, nothing. Am I bleeding from my forehead?”

“Yeah. Seen worse. You’re fine. Gives your face some character. Welcome to the Emperor’s Place. His Hiney might be asleep. Poor Dear left to save the world at 4:00 this morning. He’s probably upstairs.”

“Will I be disturbing the Emperor?”

“Nah, he wants to see you.” She opened the door and yelled, “Oh, Ricky, I’m home! Babba-Lou! I got some ‘splaining to do.”

Silence. 

I tried. Loudly. “Yes, hi. I’m your regional Angel of Death. Our records show you should have died nine months ago—a bit of a clerical error on our actuarial table. It’s not your fault for still being alive, so that’s good. And, uh, just wondering if you might come down for a, uh, word.”

Deafening silence. 

Sara shrugged. “Guess Mama needs to wake him up. Cerveza in the fridge. Food galore. Don’t go away-yee.”

Again, acting the part of a runway model, she sashayed upstairs. I grabbed a beer, sat on an exceptionally comfortable bean bag chair, and listened to fifteen minutes of emphatic whispering. I was too relaxed to care and started drifting to sleep. A very apologetic and weepy Sara came back down. She told me Lukey was angry and felt it was all her fault.  She was upset and embarrassed. 

“It’s not your fault. The fault falls squarely upon the hand grenade you had for lunch.”

“I’m so sorry. I need to talk to him. I can give you a ride back to the hotel later if that’s okay. I’m so sorry. I’ve been a terrible…..”

“You’ve been wonderful. Not terrible, not in the least. I’m happy to see you and, someday…, hopefully…, Lukey. I’m incredibly relaxed and incapable of moving. All is JFG. Go ahead and straighten out the young man. You’ll know where to find me.” 

She bent down and kissed me on the lips. Not a lengthy kiss. Not a quick one, either. She followed up by taking my hand and kissing the back of it. She stood up and asked, “What’s JFG?”

“Jolly Fucking Good, of course.”

She laughed and shook her head. 

I smiled. “Bonne nuit, ma Chère.” 

“Night, night…and…love yeeeew.”

A kiss on the lips, a kiss on my hand, and an awkward “Love you.” 

I considered all this very seriously for about eight seconds. Then, I fell asleep. Only to wake up an hour later listening to the young lovebirds who had resolved their differences and decided to mark the occasion by having sex. Loudly. Their bedroom door was open, and the bed springs sounded connected to speakers you’d typically use at a Metallica concert. The entire house had no carpet, so the sound of every breath, utterance, groan, kiss, thrust, and position change ricocheted off the hardwood floor at total volume.

Speaking of the cartoon noises people make during sex, I remember another time I was in Mexico. It was the early 2000s. I was in Mexico City on a business trip. I was on the top floor of a twenty-five-story hotel.  I had eaten the guacamole earlier that day and was sick as a dog. I couldn’t even stand up due to nausea. I couldn’t crawl more than five feet from the bathroom for fear of throwing up all over the hotel’s carpet. It felt as if I had a fever of 135°. I had my head on the tiled floor in hopes of cooling off. My entire body felt like the Cactus Fairy was visiting it.

Guacamole on the rebound, by the way, leaves a lot to be desired. It doesn’t taste any better the second time. If you intend to throw up later in the day, then it is best to steer clear of the guacamole.

Based on the noises from the next room, I must have been in the suite next to the honeymoon suite.

The couple occupying the honeymoon suite were busily consummating matters. I think they were new at this sort of thing. This was a very unrefined attempt at lovemaking. It sounded like one of those professional wrestling matches where one guy gets body-slammed, then the other guy crashes onto a table, hits each other on the head with folding chairs, and then pins each other. Pictures were falling from the walls, luggage was getting knocked off tables, and the nightstand was getting kicked around the room. 

The dialog wasn’t enlightening:

Her: Hey, wait.  

Him: What?  

Her: Not so fast. 

Him: Ouch.

Her: Not there.

Him: Oh, sorry.

Her: Ouch.

Him: Oooof.

Her: Not yet.

Him: Argh!

Her: Lookout.

Him: What?

Her: The lamp.

Him: Lamp?

Lamp: CRASH.

Him: Oops.

If you’re arranging the furniture in the honeymoon suite, I’d suggest putting the bed headboard in the honeymoon suite away from the other side of the wall from another resident’s bathroom. The sound coming from one side of the wall doesn’t necessarily enrich the lives of those on the other side.  

They must have heard me throwing up and continuously flushing the toilet. I can’t imagine that was inspiring for Romeo and Juliet on the other side. 

Their headboard kept banging into the wall. Not in the rhythm you’d expect. It was more along the lines of, “bump, bump……bump bump bump…. bump….CRASH…..bump bump……bump…bump….CRASH….”

I laughed out loud at one point. I quickly flushed the toilet in hopes they didn’t hear me. I had a feeling they did, as it was followed by a minute of silence before they went back into action. 

Then, we had an earthquake. The hotel was swaying back and forth. I was throwing up and losing my balance. Caveman and Cavewoman continued with their tackling drills.  

The following day, I left my room just as they left theirs. They both looked pretty beat up. Caveman had a black eye. I looked at the woman and said, “The earth DID move, didn’t it.”

She smiled but looked highly embarrassed.

Anyway, Sara and Luke were making high-volume whoopie. I tried not to listen. I made some noise by coughing, yawning with gusto, stomping to the refrigerator, and grabbing a beer, thinking that might motivate them to close the door. It didn’t. As I mentioned before, I’m not a Puritan. I don’t worry about what the rest of the world is getting up to in bed. Plus, I went to college. I lived in the dormitories. Except for “Parent’s Weekend,” you heard people having sex all the time. 

In college, three freshmen were shoved into rooms built for one. People slept in alcoves, closets, utility rooms, and any other space that would fit a bed. Privacy concerns were eased by the fact that there was no privacy. For the first few weeks of the fall semester, people would try to have sex quietly. By the time midterms came along, nobody cared enough to be quiet about anything. 

During a Parent’s Weekend, I experienced a painfully awkward moment. I was living in one of the exquisite college dorms. One of my roommates, Jason, set up his bedroom in the walk-in closet. Bed, portable TV, small refrigerator, and a lamp. And a girlfriend. A very loud girlfriend. Amy. That was her name. She was affectionately referred to as Screech due to the occasional screams from the closet.

You may have an idea where this is going. 

It was early Sunday morning. I was staggering back to my dorm room after visiting my girlfriend’s walk-in closet for the weekend. I hadn’t slept in two days and could barely open my eyes. In front of my room was a well-dressed, middle-aged couple who appeared displeased. They knocked on the door. As I approached, my temptation was to keep walking and pretend I didn’t live there, but I was exhausted and desperately needed sleep. 

The closer I got to the room, it became clear, based on the moaning and groaning, that Amy was having a grand old time with Jason in their little love closet. I stopped at my door, indicated to the couple I lived there, and asked if I could assist. By this point, Amy, in her thunderous way, was letting the rest of us know she was about to reach the top of Olympus, as it were. 

The couple and I stood looking at each other for a moment before the woman started the conversation:

The Woman: “Are you Jason?”

Me: “No, sorry. I’m Drew. Would you like to speak with Jason?”

(Amy in the background: “Faster!!! FASTER!!!”)

The Man: “No. No, we would not.”

(Jason in the background: “I’m going as fast as I can!”)

The Woman: “We’re Amy Grayson’s parents. We heard she might be visiting someone named Jason.”

Me: “Ah, yes. We do have A Jason. I’m not sure if he’s….in….I mean, the one you’re looking for. I just got back myself and, uh, well…not sure….”

(Amy in the background: “Oh, oh, Jasonnnnnn, OOOOH!”)

The Woman: “Amy wanted to meet to attend church together.”

(Amy in the background: “Oh, God, oh, God, ohGod, ohGod, OHGOD!!!”)

Me: Ah, yes, I do see. Right-o. Indeed. Well, uh, let me pop in and have a look.”

The Woman: “Do you know Amy?”

(Amy in the background: “Ooooohhhh, ooooohhhh! ARGHHHH!!! YES!!!”)

While fumbling with my keys, I said, “Amy? Me? No. Well, I know of her. I mean, we’ve met. I don’t know her. Not in the Biblical sense, at any rate. We speak to each other. It’s casual. Completely. Like, I’m not her boyfriend or anything and…. Right. Would you like to come in?”

The Man: “No. No, we would not.”

(Amy in the background, having hit pay dirt, so to speak: “AAAAHHHHHHHH!!! YES!!! AAAAHHHH!!”)

During Amy’s screaming orgasm, the three of us stood silently, looking past each other. That was the awkward part. Her mother looked mortified. Her father looked homicidal. One of the most significant challenges in my life was trying not to laugh in front of Amy’s parents. It was not easy. I was biting my lip, tears started forming, and I was praying to get into the apartment before losing my resolve.

I mean, it was funny. The proud parents were ready to share spiritual time with their young, innocent, delicate, God-loving, pure-as-the-Arctic-snow daughter. Traditional family time in church, to be born-anew, sanctified, purified, and to reclaim the child-like innocence that comes from true faith. Instead, they have to listen to their precious little Amy hammering away with some sleaze-bag in her unholy pursuit to satisfy desires that were definitely, and I’m being mild here, earthly. My genuine temptation was to say, “It’s fine. Amy generally lets us know when she’s having a good time.”

I did want to say that to see their reactions, but I was too tired to start that conversation.

Instead, I smiled at them and said, “Well, let me just take a quick peek to see if your daughter…., Amy, might be here….visiting, uh, Jason. Altogether unlikely, to be sure. Uh, uh, one never knows, do one. Right. Don’t go away.”

I walked into the room, quickly shut the apartment door, grabbed a couch cushion, held it over my face, and laughed as quietly as possible. I pulled myself together long enough to announce to the closet door, “Hi, Amy. I hope all is well. I hate to interrupt the study session. You’ll be delighted to know your mom and dad are here. Now. Right now. You mentioned looking forward to attending church with your parents….who are here. At this moment.”

I heard them both scrambling around, trying to pull themselves together.

I opened the apartment door very slightly and told the parents, “Well, it turns out Amy….your daughter….is here. Surprisingly so. Shocking. Of all places. It’s not like she is ever, uh, here. So… She may be a minute or two. She just needs to, well, get her bearings, and, well, so….uh…..right…..bearings. She’s getting them. Currently…. Would you like to come in? She should be….”

The Man replied, “No. No, we would not.”

“Right. Right. Well. I hear Amy is doing extremely well. Academically, I mean.  You must be very…..proud. Right. Well, pleasure meeting you both. Uh, yeah….”

I shut the apartment door, flopped face-first onto the sofa, and let Amy’s parents seethe in peace in the hall. Amy flung herself together and headed out of the apartment door. She said, “Thanks, Drew. Are they upset?”

“Fuming. Good luck with this one.”

“I’m gonna need it.”

“I’ll put some beer on ice for when you get back. From church.”

“I’m gonna need that.”

“It’ll be waiting for you.”

She left, and I could hear them walking down the hall. 

No one said a word.

Back to Mexico…

Where was I? Ah, Sara and Luke. I tried to fall asleep during their full and frank exchange of views. No luck, though.* 

The weird part was Lukey making very loud and enthusiastic statements to Sara about how in love he was with her, how lovely she looked with her clothes off, and how fabulous she was in bed. Sara wasn’t replying in kind.  She kept whispering at him to keep his voice down. Luke still occasionally chimed in with a statement loud enough for me to hear.

It finally occurred to me that Lukey was trying too hard to ensure I knew what a happy couple they made. He didn’t sound happy. He sounded contrived, obvious, insecure, and unconvincing. I heard Sara say she wanted to close the door, but Lukey insisted they continue their blissful lovemaking uninterrupted. 

Sara and Lukey eventually went to sleep, as did I. Not before wondering if all my future trips would be as strange as this one. 

The answer, as it turned out, was yes. 

—END OF CHAPTER FOUR—

Next Chapter

* As far as euphemisms for sex go, “Full and frank exchange of views” is my absolute favorite. It’s brilliant. I pinched it from one of John Le Carre’s books. I can’t remember which one. Le Carre rarely mentioned sex in his books, but when he did, he had the perfect turns of phrase. “…she astonished him with a joyous and refined carnality…” I mean, how great is that?