Cooler Than Carlos

Writing about the Festival so much sends me back to previous years there, back when things were Right, and we were in the Four Points Sheraton. Posh rooms, quality service, full access to a gym, pool and jacuzzi. This story starts there, the Jacuzzi. I just discovered Jacuzzi was a brand-name for hot tubs, but like both Kleenex and Band-Aid, have become the commonly used nouns for these products. Anyways.

Carlos was in the hot tub with us once. And instead of just sitting across from the other strangers in the tub, not looking at them or speaking to them, and engaging in mild low conversation with each other as we relax in the hot bubble streams...we did not that. We met Carlos and his lady friend Heather.

Carlos was an Irene Ryan candidate who’s scene I had seen. Quite a good actor, he stood a bit under six foot five, long black dreads, African American, and very muscular. He was from the Boston area, close to where Justice Train was, so they chatted up about that for a bit. We told him we were from Maine and his only comment on it was “I keep hearing you’ve got better weed up there than we do.” Which made us all laugh with that awkward breaking the ice with common ground material, in this case adolescent drug use. So we chummed about that for a bit before departing.

Carlos went on to the Semi-Finals, and then the Finals. He had some quality material he delivered with excellence. He had my bet, and was way better than the two fellows that actually won. After the Finals, there was a Dance.

Now. I must preface. There was.. Ireland. A girl. I had been crushing on her for a bit now and things were sort of happening about it at the Festival. We had a bit of history. You get the picture. She, Ireland, was there, at the dance, out of sight. Not out of mind.

Meself, Justice Train, Whitesnake and maybe some others were too, but it was really lame. Not anywhere near as cool as this year. We were kind of talking about things had been going with Ireland before Justice Train mentioned, “well hey buddy, things might not get better, some cowboy is moving in on your ranch,” or something kind of clever like that. I, confused, turned, to see Carlos dancing with Ireland. Dirty dancing. “Grinding.” Totally gross and inappropriate.

Ireland made eye contact with me, and her eyes essentially said “Help Help Help Help Help.”

Some men would have done nothing. Some men would have left. Some men would have let this stunning sexy pinnacle of male potential simply dance with the lady and sweep her off her feet. Some men would then go drink himself into a stupor over not taking a chance and doing something about it, soaking in his defeat and self-loathing. Normally, I would have been that man. But.

I am not that man. I did something.

I walked right on over to the dancing pair, Ireland’s eyes beamed, and I put my hand out on Carlos’ shoulder. He looked up to me.

“Hey Carlos, look... I’m sorry, but I’ve got to step in right here.”

This made him laugh out loud, flashing rows of white perfect teeth. I despised those teeth. Ireland laughed too, but I was keeping focus on Carlos, gauging exactly how he’d react to this. Bow down and walk away? Just say “No” and keep dancing while staring straight into my eyes with an intensity that could potentially combust my person? Suckerpunch me in the face? These are the decisions other people make that shape your life forever.

Instead:
He laughed, put his hand on my shoulder, but looked at Ireland and said, “You know what I like? I like how he said ‘Carlos, I’m sorry’ but I have to step in.”

Ireland and I both nervously laughed. But he said “Okay, man, peace,” and faded away. A wash of relief fell over me and then it was just me and Ireland standing there, semi-awkwardly, to a heavy hip hop beat. So we started dancing, with nervous laughter.

WHAM! Hand on my arm, I swivel and there’s Carlos with a grip on me. I look at him, eyebrows up, adrenaline rushing up and down me so fast I think he might have smelled it. Or maybe that was something else...

“Hey, man,” he said, smile still wide. “I’m sorry but I have to step in...” and he started laughing again.

I laughed with him right away and maybe a bit too loud and sort of said things like “yeah, man, yeah, funny, ha ha, yeah,” then turned away, and with Ireland, walked right out of that dance.

He appeared to be joking. Maybe he was testing to see if I was joking. Maybe he really wanted to step back in and steal her from me. I will never know his intentions. All I know is in a later conversation with Ireland that the whole encounter was quite awesome and she really appreciated it. Things with her didn’t end up working out due to the history unfortunately catching up to me and a truly poor decision on my part. I wasn't very cool. It’s a huge regret of mine. We’re still friends though, not as good as before, but still friends, years later down the road.

But on that one night, I was cooler than Carlos.