Happy Sinday Ochieros. Not a typo either. Sin away...if resting isn't your speed.
Here is a bit of Olde School for us Olde Fools. This is an ancient Ocho concept. Doctor Hooey and I have been batting around ideas for years about a novel and screenplay about the restaurant biz. Hooey's idea of an Altman-esque screenplay about the lives and loves of the young and foolish I decided to make a bit of my own. He didn't mind and I've written proably less than 70 pages of badly produced events and dialog. Please no editorials. This is fiction based on real events. The names have been changed to protect the innocent (and not so innocent). My title for this novel is called "86'ed". For those of you not savvy enuff to follow, "86" is a restaurant term that has its etymological roots in martitme language. It means to run out of an item or get rid of it. If somehting has been "86'ed", it is no longer available. The restaurant is a shameless Hard Rock Cafe rip off called "Reruns". Their tag line is "Stay Tuned!". Think a TV oriented HRC. In this following scene, the protagonist Jerome finds out about the firing of his best friend and roommate Duncan.
I hope you enjoy.
Duncan’s Dismissal
Chapter XX
“What?” Jerome
“I was fired.” Duncan
“For what?” Jerome
“They said it was my attitude.” Duncan
Jerome drags long on his cig and looks over his shoulder at the large TV jutting out of the wall across the street. The ‘Stay Tuned’ tag line in a banner under the tele set. The TV actually worked; it wasn’t just there for show. It played the same played out garbage shown inside but with no volume. When the doorman opened the door, one’s ears could catch a drift of Raj and Dwayne or what ever happened to be playing that second.
“Those bastards.” Jerome.
“Fuck them!” And Duncan sticks his middle finger up at the boisterous rectangle. “Three years, man. Three fucking years! Assholes!” Dunc was upset to say the least. “I knew something was up when I couldn’t get into the TruTouch.”
“What?” Jerome
“My number was locked out of the system. I had to use somebody else’s number to ring in orders. They decided to fire me last night. And the manager this morning didn’t even know about it. Shit, at shift change, Chuck asks Stan what I’m doing here and makes Stan fire me on the spot! What clueless, stupid jerks!”
“The only reason they gave you was that you had an attitude?” Jerome
“Yeah. They said ever since I was promoted, I go around thinking I own the joint.”
“You do. Sorry…did.”
“Hey, shut up.” He was angry with Jerome for saying that
“Sorry, buddy. Just cracking wise. Let’s get you liquored up. How’s that.”
“All right.”
Jerome and Duncan go down the street to William’s, the trusty Reruns hangout with the cheapest pitcher of beer in the city. Pinball solace saving lost souls, pool table to lie in a self made bed of misery. Duncan was all into that. And more. By the third hour, Duncan had consumed more alcohol than some microbreweries produce in a day. Well, it seemed that way to him at least.
After bashing Reruns management, then the Red Sox, then the management, then the Sox in that order; after order and order of beer, Duncan decided to quit mummifying his liver when his head hit the bar.
“…So the rope says to the bartender, ‘No, I’m a-frayed-knot!’ Get it?”
“Tee hee hee…” says a local cutie with blue eye shadow and an agape gum chewing mouth.
“Dunc?” Jerome notices his companion’s disposition and requests that transportation be made available through a livery service. He said those exact words to his blue-collar barkeep, whom which crooked an eyebrow at Jerome, picked up the phone, and speed dialed a taxi.
Jerome was lucky to have acted so deftly when he did. For the second Duncan emerged from the pumpkin carriage, he gave back what was given to him.
“Thanks, buddy.” Jerome says to the driver of the Orange Cab of Boston as he’s handed a Twenty.
“Sure, don’t mention it.” Says the cabby as he turns back onto the street.
Jerome looks at his fallen comrade, like a placed down marionette on the curb, head heavy and dry heaving ‘tween his legs. “C’mon, pally. We bi-pedaling this or do I have to do this fireman style.”
“Hoahknnnnnm.”
“That’s the best thing I’ve heard you say all day.” And Jerome bends over and puts his shoulder to Duncan’s waist. “Don’t warn me if you’re gonna heave.” Which is the first thing Dunc does when Jerome is upright. Jerome stumbled back a step or two, the vino coursing through his veins as well.
Jerome places Duncan, clothes and shoes, in the shower, upright of course and turns the warm water on full tilt. Duncan, noticing his wetness, starts to complain in his new alien tongue.
“Trust me, you won’t drown. I used to do this all the time. You can rinse out your own clothes when you get your
land brain back. This way you can shit, piss, and puke yourself silly, stay hydrated, and keep it all self-contained. All at once. What a country!” Jerome tussles Duncan’s mop of black hair. “I’ll keep checking on you.”
Jerome considers burning his own vestments as he removes them. He dons his plaid comfy pants and a sweatshirt and plops down in front of the TV for some SportsCenter. An hour later, he enters a steam filled loo and cops a squat.
“Hiya doin’, chief?” Jerome asks with a smile. Duncan still hadn’t disrobed but seemed a tad bit coherent than before. A tad.
“I didn’t want her to go away. Why did she go away?” Dunc’s wet mush mouth mumbles
“Because she didn’t want in her bed what I got in my tub.”
“Was it something I said?”
“Was it when you asked her how Bazooka and Budweiser taste together?” Jerome cracks up. “No, buddy, no. You were doing great. Until you started buying Jaegermiester shots for the three of us.” Jerome grabs some T.P. and does the obvious. “Watch it.” And he flushes while a jet of hot, hot water streams down.
“Oww!” Duncan looks up and sees the same thing Janet Leigh must have seen in Psycho.
“I’ll be back.” Jerome wipes his washed hands on the towel and leaves the door half-open. “Yell if you need water wings.”
“Fuck you.” Jerome hears Duncan from the door crack.
“That’s the spirit!” He yells back.
