Returning To Texas

   The following month was an interesting one. Eric and Lori tried to date each other long distance. I was working at a bank in which my roommate Chrissy would write me bad checks to pay her half of the rent. It is very embarrassing to be pulled aside by your supervisor to be informed that you had depositing bad checks into your account.  After the first time, I begged Chrissy not to do it again and to just tell me she didn’t have the money and yet, it happened again and again. In turn, I would be forced to cover the rent with my own money.

Chrissy had quit Motophoto, because she hated it there. She had gotten a new job downtown that paid more, but the schedule forced me to drive her to work and pick her up on certain days of the week. 

   Chrissy would still borrow my car on her days off and not be there to pick me up when I got off, forcing me to walk home. That was getting annoying, but when one weekend Lori and I were going to go to the Zoo and she wanted to borrow the Jeep I had let her. I told her she had to be back by 1PM and absolutely no later because I had plans. Of course, 1 O’clock came and went. I was on the phone with Lori and I just went off. I had kept all my issues with Chrissy to myself up until that point. Now I was done.

  Needing to get away myself, Eric and Lori convinced me to drive down to Texas for a weekend.  We left pretty much after I got off work and drove through the night. At the time, Lori didn’t drive, so I drove the whole time.

 About twenty miles from Fort Worth the Jeep had gotten a flat tire. Conveniently enough, it happened right in front of a sign that said “Flats Fixed” for a service station about a quarter mile ahead. Seriously, this place was in the middle of nowhere. It was still early, so the place wasn’t open yet.

 

So we went next door to the café, the only other business in the area. We asked them when the garage opened and they told us the place didn’t open for another 45 minutes. We had it on good authority because the guy who worked there was eating breakfast. We had to wait. He was nice enough to open 10 minutes early just for us. The whole time we tried to maintain our composure because this guy was showing serious butt crack with really yellow underwear.

  When we finally got to Eric’s place he had a bouquet of flowers for Lori. We hung out and had a good time. That night a bunch of people were over for a party. I got to see AnnMarie and Heather again.

  Earlier this month, Eric and I had made a bet with Lori about the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Colorado Avalanche were playing the Dallas Stars. Lori thought Colorado would win, and Eric and I thought Dallas would. Whoever lost the bet was going to have to do a shot for each goal the winner scored over the loser. Eric and I owed about 12 shots of the drink of our choice. Eric chose vodka and I chose Black Haus. It took me most of the night but I did them. I was wrecked. (I found out much later that Eric and Lori collaborated earlier and arranged for him to only drink water instead of vodka as a prank on me.)

 

 Heather had created and gotten a few of us to play ‘Strip Jenga’ but it was more harmless than it sounded. I only got AnnMarie out of her socks.

By the end of the night, AnnMarie and I vanished into Eric’s bedroom, but it was more innocent. Both of us did drink a lot and the way Eric’s apartment was laid out, you need to go through his bedroom to get to the bathroom. Waiting in line took too long so both AnnMarie and I found comfy places on the floor to rest or pass out as it may be. Every so often we heard yelling from the other room…

“AnnMarie?!”

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ew Roman’; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri”>“Yes?” she replied sleepily, yet whimsically.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes.” She’d answer.

“Kerry?!”

“Yes?” I’d answer in a sleepily whimsical way as well.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes.” I’d answer.

I heard that we were rather adorable.

 The next night we went and saw a movie at the “Alamo Brewhouse” and on Sunday afternoon, after going on a hike Lori and I drove home. As soon as we drove away from the house Lori asked to find a dumpster for the flowers. “What am I going to do with flowers?” she asked. She was right. They were going to die by the time we got home. Again, I drove through the night so I could be at work in the morning.

  By the time I got to Denver I was shot. I still needed to get Lori home and she knew I was falling asleep. She put on a Monkees CD and got us to sing along with it to keep me awake. It did the trick. I dropped her off, got home with enough time to take a power nap for about an hour and went to work.