FIVE

-5-
“Riding with Lady Luck”

As it turned out, the University didn’t take kindly to having one of its students completely sauced at the dorms. Though I’d seen plenty of star football players regularly stumble through the hallways on Friday nights, I didn’t put up much of a fuss. Sure I felt slighted and had no immediate options, but who can argue with the athletic department? I was informed that I could appeal the decision and try to provide reasons for me to stay on campus. From what I read in my handbook, the appeals process could sometime take up to four weeks. While it most likely would have been a good idea to get the ball rolling on the appeals process, I was in no rush to get back to living in the dorms.

Things with my roommate Pat soured fairly quickly. In fact, they never really got off of the ground. I had never really made a complete effort to hang out with him outside of the dorm room. We had gone to a few concerts, maybe a party or two, but nothing too exciting. A few of our Friday nights were spent bowling at the Student Union Building. Event hat was a hassle because the Christian Student group would be there and they couldn’t help but come and preach to us. To them, were lost souls and needed to be saved. Other then that, life was Pat was uneventful. It was hard to even get him away from Tory. The two of them were practically attached at the hip. If we went to eat, she was there. If we were playing video games, she was there watching. It got to be quite annoying as a matter of fact.

Don’t get me wrong, Pat was a nice enough guy. We had a few things in common, which was nice. We both liked sports and had the same taste in movies. Pat was very personable, but by December I was ready to move out. Our dorm room had turned into a collection of dirty laundry and dirty dishes. There were literally ten to fifteen bowls and plates with rotting food still on them. The putrid smell was not an inviting one, to say the least. I had asked once or twice for him to clean up. He would happily oblige, but the clean room would last only for a day or two. It didn’t help that Tory was practically living in our cubicle as well. Despite having a separate dorm room, she might as well been paying on ours. Her bras, shirts, and jeans were strewn about with Pat’s entire wardrobe on the floor. The two of them hardly left the room and my alone time was sparse. It got to a point where two of them having sex didn’t even bother me.

The straw that broke the camel’s back had happened when I got back from class one day. I walked in and the first thing I noticed was the smell of sex. You know, that sweaty, wet towel, dirty locker room smell that fills up a place after copulating? That’s the one I’m talking about. That act alone didn’t bother me. I was irritated, yes, but this was nothing new. I looked around and noticed Tory asleep on Pat’s bed. There was a used condom on a pile of clothes in the center of the room. On my bed, sprawled out, was Pat. He was playing video games. His feet, shoes and all, were propped up on my pillow as he scratched himself. He looked up at me and gave me a head nod. With no questioning by me, I lost my cool. “Have some fucking respect,” I yelled directly at him. I didn’t even wait for a response. I turned, stormed out of the room, and slammed the door behind me.

We basically had an understood avoidance of each other the next few days. I went home for Christmas for those few days and when I had returned, he was still at his parents home. The place was clean because I’d guessed that he’d thrown all of his clothes into a garbage sack and taken them home to be washed. He had done this once a month throughout the semester so I had his routine down pat. At that point, I was continually praying and wishing that he wouldn’t return for the second semester and I could live alone. I guess in a round about way, my wish was granted.

The people on the dorm board gave me a day to gather my belongings and figure out my options. The one place I knew wasn’t an option was returning to my parents. I had a weird sense of pride in that I didn’t want to crawl home to my parents at the first sign of trouble. I’d already felt that I had let them down by getting kicked out of the dorms. I didn’t want to leave school as well. Plus, despite my lack of interest in classes, I was pulling decent grades. I was close to being on the Dean’s list and all, so that helped my decision to tell them this little white lie.

I still had plenty of money from my years of summer jobs, so money was not an issue. My Financial Aid was also on its way, which gave me an option to live alone if I had to. Part of me wanted to live out of my car. I wanted to have that rich, vagabond history that you hear all of the celebrities talk about. You know, the ones where Joe Blow was down and out in Hollywood, using his last dollar to buy three hamburgers at McDonalds on Hamburger Sunday. Mr. Blow could only afford a little bit of food, so he’d sleep in his car and got to auditions the next day after bathing in a sink at a convenience store. That was going to be my brilliant plan until I realized that it was January in Idaho. I did not want to freeze my ass off, so I found a cheap hotel and promptly checked in.

The room was forty dollars a night, but when I said my stay would be indefinite, the lady at the front desk gave me the room for $225 a week. She said that if I choose to stay any longer, we could renegotiate the rates after the first week. The lady was older, probably in her early fifties and she took pity on me. I would have gladly paid the full price, but bless her soul, she insisted I take the cheaper rate. I did not argue anymore and I kindly thanked her for having a warm heart.

I was going to live like a king. Or at least like a man with a king sized bed and cable. I entered the room and I was already feeling more at home then I ever did at the dorms. The first thing I did was search for the bible. I’m not overly religious, not since my days of Catechism, but it’s a habit I picked up in high school. I would always need to find a bible or I would never feel comfortable during my stay. The routine itself was simple. I would locate the bible, flip to PSALM 23, and silently read the passage. I would place the greatest work of fiction back in its drawer and then never think of it again during my stay. In this particular situation, I located the bible and my passage. In my room, all alone, I read PSALM 23 out loud. I felt powerful in doing so and I grew more excited with the reading of each word. The power of Christ compelled me and I had a new form of confidence. Yet true to form, after I was done, I tossed the book back into the nightstand drawer and never looked at it again.

My new found freedom in hand, I placed a call to Eric. He had is finger on the pulse of social affairs in the city, and I needed some fun. A quick phone call was made and sure enough, Eric already had a party lined up. Something very low key, he told me, but I didn’t mind. As much as I enjoyed watching free cable, I needed to get out. Maybe have a few beers, find the woman I needed to get my mind off of Christa, and have some good old fashioned fun.

The party was at Eric’s friend Christopher’s house. He rented a three bedroom home on the East side of town with his girlfriend and her best friend. I picked up Eric around ten and proceeded to make our drive across town. I hadn’t talked to him since New Year’s Eve and I fully explained to him my current situation. He told me we should find a place because he was looking to move out. I told him that sounded like a good idea, but in my mind, I knew it might not happen. Eric currently had no job and couldn’t save money worth a shit. The one saving grace was that his financial aid was also coming in, so there was a chance everything would work out.

We arrived at Christopher’s place and I was able to pull right up in the driveway. It seemed the party hadn’t started yet, which was mildly disappointing because I hated to be the first one at a party. For a few seconds, Eric and I even debated as whether or not to go in. That passed over quickly and we stepped out of the car. As we did so, a girl came storming out of the house carrying an arm full of clothes. She was sixteen at best and I wondered just exactly what I was getting myself into. Eric and I had parked next to her car and I stepped aside to let her pass. She was crying and I had half a thought to comfort her and see what was wrong.

I soon got the answer when a heavy set man walked out of the house. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, which only added to his weight, it seemed. He was about six foot three, 230 pounds, so not huge, but certainly bigger than me. A cigarette dangled from his lip as he yelled after the girl, “That’s right, run home to mommy!”

She didn’t respond as she threw her clothes in the back seat and jumped in her car. She flipped on the headlights and proceeded to start the car. She threw it into reverse, flipped the man off, knocked over the trash cans as the car ran into them, and sped away. I stood in awe as she drove off. I heard the voice of the man say,

“Fuckin’ bitches.”

“Amen,” replied Eric.

Still in a state of slight disbelief, Eric introduced me to Christopher. We shook hands and he invited us in. He proceeded to explain that the girl who left was his girlfriend Laura and that she’d be fine. Christopher said her best friend had just moved out. In his rage of now needing to find another roommate, he had accidentally kicked Laura out of the house, too. Now without roommates, all Christopher wanted to do was get drunk and pass out on the front lawn.

And drink we did. The party was low key, with about ten people in all showing up. I did not meet a girl that night to cure my virginity, but I did smoke enough pot to kill a small donkey. The stuff made me really tired and I felt useless, but it took away some of the pain from New Year’s Eve. And through our night of boozed up stupidity, Chris, Eric, and I decided to become roommates. I had once again lucked out and would only have to stay in the hotel for a week after all. I could forget about the white lie with my parents and move into something new and exciting: Forgetting about sobriety.