A party of any kind seemed to me a terrible idea. Three people coming over for beers made my stomach churn. Not just because I didn’t like beer just yet, but the last thing in the world I wanted to do was entertain guests. Everyday after class at 12:30 or so, I’d have to shoot down Second, turn left on Warren, right on Trumbull, down I-94, get off on Ford Road, left on Greenfield, right on Michigan Avenue, sit in Dearborn traffic, be half an hour late to work. Five hours later, at 5:30, I’d get off work, order a pizza, take it home and eat half of it with Mom, then shoot back down Ford Road, down I-94 traffic, right on Trumbull, left on Forest, back to the apartment, put leftover pizza in the fridge with a note that says “MINE! DO NOT TOUCH!” and barely make rehearsal by 7:00.
With all of this wallet-wrenching effort, you’d think I was the lead in the show. Not the case at all. Given that I got the part by asking the director for it, it was only right that my part was to run onstage at the end of the second act in my underwear, scream about a guy with a gun, and run offstage fifteen seconds later. That was my debut for the Bonstelle Theatre Company and I had to be at every rehearsal five nights a week, just sitting. In my underwear.
But none of this was a problem; I was living the dream! I was an actor, and real actors go through this kind of thing everyday, sacrificing their energy (or lack thereof) for their craft. This is how stars were born. Mom always said, “The bullshit opens doors,” and I was certainly dealing with a lot of it. After the show had its premiere, directors were going to say, “That kid in his underpants was fantastic! And he’s only a freshman, you say? We’ll cast him in every show next semester!” Next semester would be better. Casting agents would go see my shows and think I really had something. They were going to approach me afterwards, cards in hand, saying, “Call me. We’ll make you a star, kid,” but I’d say, “If you make me a star, you have to make Scott one, too.” Scott and I could then move to Chicago and realize our dreams as the most successful actors to come out of Detroit Rock City.
I got back to the apartment in time to find a party of six people and half of my pizza gone. Good thing they were old friends, too, because I snapped.
“Peter!” Ryan said, running up for a hug.
“Who’s been eating my pizza?” I blurted, pushing Ryan away.
“Nice to see you, too, man.”
“I had an entire pizza in this fridge! Now it’s damn near gone!”
Scott walked up with a smile. “Pete Nut, you’re so uptight. Just sit. Have a drink.”
“I want my pizza,” I grumbled, munching on what was left of it. I went and sat in the living room with other familiar faces, among them was Katie, saving a seat next to her on the couch for Scott. It was by no means a party in the least, but I wanted everyone out. I wanted my apartment to myself and I wanted my whole pizza.
When everyone left, I remembered the other half of the pizza was what Mom and I ate at home only hours before. I silently felt like a jackass, but I quickly got over it when Scott retired to his room with Katie, softly closing the creaky door.
“Luke, doesn’t Scott still have a girlfriend?” Luke just shrugged and went to bed himself.
The next morning, Scott claimed not to have had sex with her.
“God, chill out, Pete!” he boomed. “We just cuddled, man! It wasn’t anything! Sometimes it’s just nice to cuddle, ya know? We didn’t do anything else!”
“Well, she obviously likes you. Be careful.”
“No, she doesn’t! She’s gotta boyfriend, OK? And, I mean, my girl hasn’t exactly been around for a while—fuckin’ gymnastics an’ shit—so why not cuddle with someone? You gotta lot to learn about love, Pete! Jesus!”
* * *
Our first party at the apartment was a complete flop. Our friend Diana was one of two girls there and Scott’s cousin went between both the entire night telling each how much she looks exactly like Jessica Simpson and he might have a part for her in his movie. He knows a director somewhere and it’s going to be a Box Office smash hit.
Everyone else complained about what a damn sausage fest it was.
This is where Mike stepped in. Mike was a guy from Scott’s music business class. He was a tall and suave young man with the nicest wardrobe I’d come across. The man liked his boots, zip-up sweaters and bandanas, all of different colors. He pulled it off well. I kind of wondered if I’d look like an idiot if I tried stealing some of his style. The sweaters maybe, but bandanas were not an option given the shape of my head.
“Ya’ll need to learn how to throw down a party,” Mike told us one day after class. He was right. At the end of the first party, none of us were drunk or having sex. It was a disappointment. “So I’ma help you stooges out.”
Mike told us that in order to get a party going, we had to start getting the word out to everyone at least two weeks in advance, and he meant everyone. Tell your friends to invite their friends. You don’t have to know these people, but who cares? A party’s a party.
The living room would have to be cleared out. A room as big as that had to be a dance floor. All it took was Scott to move all of the furniture into my room a week before the party.
“Where do I sleep with a coffee table on my bed?” I asked when I got home from work one day.
“Pete! This shit’s gotta get done, man! It’s not my fault you couldn’t help us move this shit!”
I guess I didn’t help them move things around, so I could at least volunteer my room as storage, but a week before the party?
Luke came back to the apartment a few days before the big night with some important news. “‘Jenny’s staying the night Saturday!” he said with a big grin on his face.
“Fuck yeah, mother fucker!”
“Cool, man. How’d you manage this one?” I asked.
“Well, she’s back from college this weekend and when I told her about the party, she got really excited!”
As was Luke. He spent his free time cleaning his room so as not to scare off the girl he was sure would take his virginity. He managed to keep his composure until Friday night rolled around. We were all sitting in Luke’s room, imagining what it would be like for him the next night. How perfect it would be. He and Jenny would both be a little drunk and probably lie down to cuddle and talk. The talk would lead to whispering sweet nothings, which would lead to kissing, groping, feeling, dry-humping, feeling, kissing, groping, kissing, kissing, kissing…
“Oh shit!” Luke panicked. “What do I do then?”
From what I understood, Jenny was a girl of experience. I also understood that Luke’s experience with the opposite sex rivaled mine in the ‘slim to none’ department. “Seriously, fuck, what do I do?” Luke asked. “She’s gonna know I’m a virgin and get all freaked out!”
It was a good thing Scott was there to help us out. “What do you need to know, man?” he asked
“I don’t know! Where do I go after making out?”
Scott stood up in the middle of the room and acted out his own game of charades, doing the motions he was describing. “Well, let’s say you’re going at it and you’re dry-humping the fuck out of each other, right? Let’s say she starts breathing hard and moaning (Scott closed his eyes and began feeling himself up), ‘Luke! Oh Luke! I want you! I’m so hot! Oh, my God! Oh, my God, Luke!’ right? And she’s fuckin’ humping you, man, I mean fuckin’ yeah, and she’s pretty experienced, so she knows what to do, but she’s gonna want you to take charge.”
“So how do I take charge?”
“Just tear her bra off, man.”
“Well, that’s what I’m talking about!” Luke realized. “Like, I’ve never even done that!” I began to feel that Luke and I had more in common than I thought.
“Dude! It’s easy!” Scott was even more excited at the idea of actually having something to teach us. “You just sorta—ya know, you’re goin’ at it—and you just sorta reach around, grab the clasp and snap your fingers, man! It’s easy!”
“Snap my fingers?”
“Yeah, because the clasp is like a hook, right? Two hooks come together and…”
Luke wasn’t getting the visual very well. I had a vague idea from doing Mom’s laundry, but that didn’t mean I was at any advantage.
“Ya know what? Here!” Scott said, a light bulb going off. “I’ll be right back!” He ran down the hall to his room, leaving Luke and I with bewildered expressions. Whatever Scott was up to, it had to be good because he ran out with such enlightenment, you’d think he just figured out how pick up his dishes.
When Scott came back to the room, he had a black bra with him. I hoped it wasn’t Katie’s, because they didn’t have sex, just cuddled, right? Anyway, Scott strapped the bra to the back of Luke’s computer chair and demonstrated.
“See man, like this,” he said, reaching around the chair and unhooking the silky bra so that it fell softly to the hardwood floor. “Now you try.” He refastened the clasp around the chair and stepped away.
Luke leaned over his chair. “So like this then?” he asked, reaching around the chair and fiddling with the backside. “Huh, this is really… Damnit, I almost… Shit. Scott, I can’t do this.”
“Dude! It’s easy! Just fuckin’ do it! Pretend it’s your girl, man! The chair is Jenny, saying, ‘Luke! Take it off! Please!’ Do it, Luke!”
“I can’t! The chair is really weird! I need something more, ya know, shaped like a person!”
“There’s gotta be something else around here,” Scott said, looking around the room, thinking about what else was in the apartment. “How about a pillow, or a folded blanket, or a…”
Scott stopped thinking when his eyes rested mischievously on me. The dawn was frightening.
“No!” I said. “No, you don’t! No way!”
“Oh c’mon, Pete!”
“I’m not putting on a bra!”
Luke was cracking up at the thought of this, but showed no sign of protest. “Pete! Do it!” he enthused with Scott. “Oh man, put it on!”
I especially didn’t want to do it for the benefit of Luke Duncan. What did he ever do for me, huh? Nothing! He was just some stupid asshole who was invading my space and now trying to invade my body!
“No, Scott! I’m not putting on your girlfriend’s bra!”
Ten minutes and a world of coaxing later, I was sitting shirtless on Luke’s bed with a scowl across my face and a glossy undergarment across my chest. Scott couldn’t control his laughter, and between spurts of his, Luke put his hand on my leg. “Hey baby,” he said with a wink.
“That’s it!” I jumped up. “I’m not doing this! This is stupid!”
“Sit down and take it like a man, Pete! Don’t you want Luke to get laid?”
“Yeah, don’t you want me to get laid?”
“The chair was working fine!” I tried convincing them. “Let’s just use that again!”
“Oh, sit down! Luke would do the same for you!”
“I wouldn’t want him to!”
“Why? You don’t find me attractive?”
“Oh, Lord.” I slumped on the bed and submitted to the moment. There was no getting out of it anyway.
“So how do I do this again?” Luke asked.
“It’s just a clasp,” Scott explained again. “Like snapping your fingers.”
Luke reached his right hand around the left of my waist. I’m very ticklish, so I squirmed a bit. They both stifled giggles at this. When Luke was having difficulties with one hand, he tried two, wrapping his arms around my shirtless back. I fell over in discomfort.
“Pete!” Luke yelled. “Stop moving!” When the hilarity of the situation passed, my roommates became dire. “This is important!”
“Yeah, seriously. He needs to work on this!”
Luke finally got it a few times. When asked if he could do it just one more time, my answer was a firm “No.”
Scott and Luke were giggling as I sulked back to my room with my tail between my legs and humility between my gray matter. I fell asleep that night hoping that this story would never get out. Ever.
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