The Festival. The Final Night.

It was the final night of the Festival. The Finals. My friend Speckman was in the Finals, he did very well. After an hour break, we watch the 10 Minute Plays that had gone on. There was a large Awards Ceremony after. Some folks from my school won Awards. It was very Happy, but when we returned to the Super 8 Motel...we were very sad. It was a difficult morose to describe. There was a still a night to be had, but we knew it was the last one. A dance was scheduled to go on right after, in celebration, but we were in no hurry. Stuff was on our minds. We fell back on simple activities, to take our minds off this. Beer.

Our stocks had depleted, and it was time to kill off what was left. Looking over the amount of beer and amount of us, we feared the night would not last long. Bones and I made a run for the Liquor Market across the street, but arrived seven minutes past Eleven, their closing time. Further saddened, we returned, and funneled down the rest of the Blue Ribbon. I wanted to go to the dance, to revive our spirits and add some adventure outside of the Super 8 to spice up our last night in this ugly, ugly place. Justice Train wasn’t down, neither was NFC, but I found a similar interest in adventure in Bones.

Bones had met a Pretty Goth Girl, who wasn’t really goth, just played one in Columbinus, and had left his sunglasses in her room. She was at the Dance and had his sunglasses there. So feeling a bit tipsy, we once again crossed the busy Mass street to the Sheraton for the last time.

And Thank God we did. Pretty Goth Girl was right through the doors, and Bones went up to her with some coaxing. I located another group of friends from my school who were breaking it on down to some tunes. Typical school dance material: whatever hip-hop is popular at the time, Love Shack, Pour Some Sugar on Me, yadda yadda yadda. I shook my groove thang with them for a fair bit, as well some other people from the Festival I’d met, before I came across the Nine Parts of Desire kids from the night before.. They recognized me, and I relearned all their names.

“What are you doing after?” this one girl asked.

“Drinking heavily?” I postured.

This was their goal as well. I neglected to mention our lack of booze, but it was irrelevant at this point. I noticed Bones dancing with Pretty Goth Girl, and this pleased me as I was sure it was pleasing him. I learned Empathy was one of my strong points this week. As well as my Libido. The Pretty Lady from the Elevator a few nights before was at the dance, and I watched her leave, and decided to maaaaaybe see what my friends were up to at the Super 8 before partying with these kids. So I peaced right on out.

Called up Justice Train, said he and NFC were tired and headed on their way out but could use a GNB. I didn’t know exactly what he meant. He meant good night bowl. I complied. After the sess, I roamed the first floor but could not hear my friends. The dance was going on much longer than scheduled so I traveled around some rooms before I heard their partying through the door (I had forgotten their room).

Apparently they breed beautiful people in Connecticut, and they all go to Central Connecticut State University. This room was full of beautiful people. Not just the girls from the dance, but the dudes playing beer bong. They were all fashion magazine worthy, but strangely familiar, with nice friendly eyes that looked at me and talked to me with an invested interest. I felt like each one of them looked like someone I knew, just glossed, prettier and richer. They were definitely rich. They had an odd way of looking at you, and talking to you. Could just be my libido at play but it appeared every one of them was hinting slightly at hitting on me. Maybe they were just tired of each other, I don’t know, but they were very down with Bones and I. I mean, we’re pretty men, but I just found their sole communicating with me flattering.

One dude, looking like Arj Barker, asked us to play. We accepted, and played this dude who looked David Love Joy and his partner, dude who looked like Nick Cyr. Except Lovejoy was a bit more of a jock, and Cyr was way more of a douchebag. Think the most smarmy shit-eatting talkative douchebag and put him in Nick Cyr’s body. Lovejoy broke down some of the rules for us while Douchebag Cyr corrected him and they debated over technicalities. They played oldschool with beer in the cups instead of water. My lack of drink was solved the more I lost.

Pretend with me for a moment, that Penelope Cruz was a real person, somebody you could meet. Stunning, gorgeous, but real, there, in front of you. Now double them. Twins. These two twins of realistic Penelope Cruz look-a-likes sitting there in front of you. And they’re talking to you. With an interest.

I had found Heaven on the first floor of the Super 8 Motel.

Another girl, looking a bit more like Michelle Rodriguez, with less attitude, touched my chin at one point during conversation. I asked her why and she said I had a very nice defined face, and I looked like someone she knew. I asked if it was her boyfriend, which made her laugh a lot and kind of slap my chest.

“Why? What if I was like ‘Oh my god,” she leaned in close to me with these eyes...damn those eyes. “‘You look just like my boyfriend’ What would you do?”

“I’d...” think of words think of words “ be...a bad man.” This made her laugh even more and told me she used to be a bad girl that “didn’t draw lines.” She then asked me how I was a bad man, and I could have gone into it, but the topic changed as the game went on.

They kept getting phone calls from the front desk, right down the hall, telling them(us) to be quiet. This happened about three times before there were some knocks on the door. The loud bad kinds of knocks. The closest guy went over and peeked through, and turned around pale as a sheet. “It’s the fucking cops” he mouthwhispered. Douchebag said “Shut up” but the look this guy gave back was like “No, you shut up. That’s the cops.”

In every situation like I’ve been in, people either run to hide all the booze or run to hide themselves. Here, different story. No one moved, except Lovejoy and Douchebag, behind the corner, out of view. Douchebag said “Hide the beers” to no one. I wasn’t closest but I couldn’t move all the glass bottles lined up on the table without the clinking that would tell the cops exactly what I was doing. The two owners of the room just sat there, motionless with fear.

“Someone open the door” was also whispered. No one moved, except this one blonde chick. Bones was standing at the end of the table closest to the door, he widened his stance to try and block as much of the table as possible. This blond chick went down the hallway to the door. About to open it.

I’ve narrowly escaped the police many times, by either fractions of a second or just by turning, fleeing and eventually exiting out a window. But I didn’t want to do that this time, with all these beautiful nice people. I’m of legal drinking age. I wasn’t too drunk. I did have two eighths of grass on me, with a bowl, but these guys couldn’t search me. I moved in between Bones and the Blonde. I widened my chest. Game time. She opened the door.

Tweedle-Cop-Dee and Tweedle-Cop-Dum stood on the other side, both fat, both police, both with hats saying in big white letters “POLICE.” They were leaning into the doorframe, ready for action.

“This the party room, huh?” Dee didn’t really ask. “What’s the deal, you bother this guy (motioning down the hall) three times already. It’s early in the morning...”

It was 4:05 in the morning.

Douchebag then decided to make his appearance, wheedling around the corner: “Hey, hey, we’re really sorry, yeah, we’re disbanding right now. This girl here is sober, she’s driving people home.”

“Well where are you going?” Cop Dee interrogated, Cop Dum just stood there looking big fat and menacing.

“Oh...I’m, I’m staying here...” he trailed off, dodging the fact he was staying in the room. He slipped back around the corner.

“We’re disbanding,” Blonde girl affirmed.

“Really? So if I have to come back here in ten, twenty minutes, what then, huh?!” Cop Dee postulated.

“Look.” I spoke up, my voice a deeper register than usual. “You basically just scared the shit out of us and we’re all leaving now.”

Cop Dee liked this, sp he and his butt buddy marched off down the hall.

Douchebag was at the door, watched them leave, shut it quickly, turned directly to me and shook my hand. Expecting a thanks, instead I received:

“Hey, I hate to kick you out, but yeah. Peace.”

I was fine with that, said goodbye and nice to meet you to Lovejoy and all the pretty, pretty girls who in my own mind I totally impressed with my honest bravado in the face of the Man. It hurt to leave them like that. So Bones and I left, no beer, no tail, but not in jail. And that was okay with us.

Our last night of the Festival was memorable. And that was all we could have asked for. Besides more beer.