1.
2011 started out like every year in the new millennium had for me. Drunk, holding someone’s hair back, and singing. I would like to pretend to be the cool guy here, and say something like “I don’t really care about New Years”, or “I was at a very exclusive party”, but I wasn’t. I was in my bathroom, singing loudly while my friend John threw up about forty dollars worth of my rum.
“Ugh,” was all he could manage to really say, unless I directly asked him a question. So I would, just to keep him from passing out in the toilet.
“You want a candy cane?”
“No.” He threw up more.
Some of his hair fell down in front of the puke-fall. I pulled it back. He’d have to shower after he was done.
“I want to hold your hair-eh-air-eh-air! I want to hold your hair!” I sort of sang along with the Beatles, who were blasting out of my computer in the living room, where John’s girlfriend and my wife (two different people, if that isn’t clear), played with a stray cat which had wandered into the apartment.
John threw up again.
“You want some water?”
“Ugh, yessss.”
“Okay, I’ll be right back.”
I stood up and left the bathroom, stumbling into the door frame on the way out.
“Is he okay?” Kris, John’s girlfriend, asked from the living room.
I grabbed the fridge to steady myself. “Yeah, he’s fine. I’ve got it under control.” I looked out at them. “Is that a fucking cat?”
My wife smiled up at me. “Yep! His name is Rupert Fluffy!”
“What the fuck,” I said, and took a cup out of the cupboard. I turned on the sink and let the water run over my hand until it was cold, then I filled the cup.
“Can we keep him?” Marie, my wife, asked.
“No.”
“Awe. I hate you.”
“I know,” I said.
I shambled back into the bathroom.
“You okay?” I asked John.
His head was in the toilet. He looked like he may have passed out. I poured a small stream of water down the back of his neck. “I’m pissing on you.”
“…asshole”
“I’m not pissing on you. Lift your head, I have water.”
John lifted his head, and looked at me. Sort of. He held out his hand and I gave him the cup. He drank almost all of it. I think he may have tried to swish it at first and gave up. To be fair, swishing isn’t easy. When he had finished the cup, he shoved it back in my direction. I took it.
“You want more?”
“No.”
“Are you done throwing up?”
He didn’t say anything. The question was too complicated to answer. Maybe he was done, maybe he wasn’t, but his brain was just incapable of calculating the probabilities. So, he remained silent.
He stared back down into the bile filled toilet.
“John?”
“Ugh, what?”
“Are you okay?”
“I think. Yes.”
“Are you ready to sleep?”
He didn’t answer at first.
“John?”
“What?”
“Are you ready to sleep?”
“Is he okay?” Kris asked again.
I ignored her. “Stand up John.”
“I can’t.”
I put his arm over my shoulder, and lifted him. He was 175 lbs that felt like 300.
“Stand with me, John. We’re going to get you some sleep. You’ll feel better.”
“Okay.” He stood with me.
Like Saving Private John, we left the bathroom, and headed towards my guest room.
“Is he okay?” Kris asked a third time.
“Yes, Kris, he’s fine. He just needs to sleep it off.”
“Is there anything we can do?” Marie asked.
“Yeah, get me something he can puke in. Something big. And a water bottle with ice water.”
“Okay.”
“And a slice of bread.”
“Okay.”
I walked John through the house. Well, ‘walked’ may be an abuse of the word. John sort of dragged as I fell into furniture and walls every three or four steps. Eventually, we made it to the guest room in the back of the house. I dropped him on the bed, and he fell asleep almost immediately. Marie and Kris came in behind me with supplies. Marie had brought in a large steel popcorn bowl. It was perfect. I could basically set it anywhere within a three foot radius of John’s head and still be in the proposed target area.
Kris handed me a cold water bottle and a slice of bread. “I hope he’ll be okay.”
“He’s fine. He just needs sleep. Go back in the living room and I’ll be out in a second.”
“Okay,” she said.
“Thank you for getting the stuff guys.”
“You’re welcome,” Marie said.
The women left.
“John,” I said. “Can you hear me?”
“Yes.” His eyes were still closed.
“You need to wake up for a second and look at me.”
“No.”
“Yes. Sit up.”
John sat up and wearily looked at me.
“Eat this,” I said, and handed him the bread. “It’ll soak up some of the alcohol.”
He mashed it into his mouth and chewed it more than bread is used to. He swallowed, and began to lay down.
“Nope, stay up, just one more second.”
“UGH!”
“I know, but look at me.”
He looked at me again. Wide-eyed, but I doubt he saw much.
“Drink this.” I handed him the water bottle.
He drank it, and laid back down, dropping the bottle on the floor.
“Can you still hear me, John?”
“Fucking, yes. God.”
“I know, but listen,” I said, “If you need to puke, there is a large metal bowl on the…”
John’s arm shot out from under him and grabbed the bowl. He lurched out of bed and stuck his head in the bowl. He let out a large dry heave and only drips came out of his mouth. It was probably the ice water. Should have used warm water. I could never remember which it was.
He puked and then laid back down on the pillow.
“John?”
No answer.
He was breathing, his mouth was wide open. I pushed him onto his side.
“Sleep tight.”
I left the room.
He tried, but John was a shitty drinking buddy.
2.
In the living room, Marie and Kris were making Rupert Fluffy happier than I bet he’s been in a long time.
He was a long haired gray cat. It looked like he might be blind in one eye. His purring was so loud I could hear before I got to the living room, and wondered if that was healthy.
“Rupert’s a girl!” Kris said.
“What? No way!” Marie.
“Yep, look!” Kris spread Rupert’s legs. Indeed, little was to be seen.
“Huh. Well, Miss Rupert Fluffy, you’re a girl,” Marie said.
I walked into the kitchen. John’s episode had sobered me up a little, and I needed to rectify that. I was out of rum, and would now move on to a bottle of red wine. I filled a large beer glass with it, and drank half of it there at the sink. I filled it up again, and walked into the living room. The Beatles played on.
“How is he?” Marie asked.
“He’s sleeping. He threw up again, but he’s fine,” I said. “I’ll check on him in a little bit.”
I went and sat at the dining room table while the women continued to fuck with the cat.
“You want to pet her?” Marie asked.
“No,” I said.
“Fine then poopy. What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. Drink, I guess. How’s your drink?”
She held up a cosmopolitan glass that was nearly empty and smiled goofily at me. “De-lic-ious.”
I raised my glass to that, and drank down half of my wine. I put the glass down, and let the warmth slide over my body. Paul McCartney told me I would begin to make it better, my beautiful wife was happy in front of me, my friends were around me, and I was smiling and felt great. At this rate, 2011 was shaping up to be a banner year. Naaaaaa, na, na, nanana naaaa, na na na naaa , hey Jude.
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