Oil of Roses Ch. 15

"Gut, that way it won't leave a mark that the ladies will ask about."

Eddy drew back his fist and Harry tried to relax but found it impossible. How is someone supposed to relax when their abdomen is ground zero for an asteroid strike? He closed his eyes. "If you're gonna do it Eddy, for fuck's sake do it and get it over with."

The huge fist hit his gut with the force of... a crumpled piece of paper. His eyes shot open and he stared at Eddy. The big man's face was working as if to hold back the tears that were leaking around his eyes in spite of his efforts.

"Eddy, you okay?"

"Harry... when you married that screamin' skank... I thought I'd lost the best friend I've ever had... but I figured you'd finally realized what a shit head I was... then you were back and Carol told me about it bein' Angie's fault you'd dropped everyone... and I understood that... I've done stupid shit for women I've loved... and I was so glad to have my best friend back... and I was glad you were happy... and then you do this... you're the brother I never had... the one that's been there for me since we were twelve... and I love you."

Harry threw his arms around Eddy. "I love you too, big man. I was so... scared... you'd tell me to fuck off after I sort of ditched you for three, four years." He let go of Eddy. "Sit down, tell me about last night. Leave out any of the real private stuff because frankly, it's none of my business, but it's evident that something happened, something pretty fine."

The two old friends sat and talked until Margo came to tell them everyone was ready to go to brunch.

* * * * *

As they headed downstairs, Harry said, "Tamara and I will take the next elevator, you go on ahead."

After some strange looks from the group, everyone went on ahead and left Harry and Tammy.

"Tamara, I talked to Eddy. It sounds like you two had an eventful night after you left the party."

"If he said we did, then we did. It's not my place to discuss such things."

"You've made my best friend very happy, although I'm sure there are still going to be some very tough times ahead." He knelt and looked into her eyes. "If you or he needs anything, you let me know. I owe you a debt I cannot repay but I welcome any chance to try."

"Harry, sir, you don't owe me anything... he's saving me as much as I'm saving him, if not more so."

"Tamara, I say I owe you a debt I cannot repay. That statement brooks no argument. That he is saving you as you save him is merely a most welcome case of synchronicity as far as I'm concerned."

"Yes, sir."

"That's better. Let's go down and get something to eat. I don't know about you, but I'm starving."

* * * * *

"... so finally Eddy gets into Margie Delgado's pants, we're all stoned out of our minds and he's got her in the back of this shitty fuckin' Ford pickup he drove, the shocks were shot all to shit, he's got a mattress back there, and Eddy ain't no lightweight, even in high school, and Margie is a girl with some ass mass and she's on top and they start going at it. We're all sitting out in the field next to the truck on some blankets, fooling around, and the back of his truck starts hopping up and down like a jack in the fucking box and we're seeing Margie's head and those big old titties of hers come flying up and down. Now you finish it Eddy."

"Aw fuck, do I have to?"

"Oh yeah, you've told enough stories about me, this one's on you."

"Alright, so we're doin' the bouncy-bouncy and Margie's crashin' back down on me like a gawddamn freight train and I mean she's so high on the up side that I'm damn near outta her. So one time she goes up and I pop out and she comes down and I go back in.

"Only trouble is, I go back in the wrong gawddamn hole. Two fuckin' things happen pretty much simultaneously. Her ass muscles clamp down on the base of my dick out of shock and they hold on like it's a matter of life an' death... and she bounces back up, aided by her tryin' to get away from the guy who just stuck his dick, uninvited, up her ass. Bitch lifted me up off the mattress yowlin' like a banshee and lookin' at me like any second she was gonna plant her foot in my face and stamp me out like a cigarette butt. I'm hollerin', she's yowlin', I got a passel of friends just a few feet away who are all laughin' so hard I'm afraid they might die or somethin', kinda like y'all are laughin' now, and here's this big Hispanic bitch gonna rip my dick off and beat me to death."

After his audience had quieted somewhat, he continued.

"So after thirty or forty years of hanging by my dick, sure any second it was going to fail it's fuckin' structural integrity test, she drops back down, wraps both her hands around my neck and yells at me to get my dick outta her ass or she's gonna kill me. I'm tellin' her she's got to relax her grip on it or I can't get it out. Finally she calms down and I pop out of her ass and we're both laying there waiting out the pain. After ten, fifteen minutes, she looks at me and tells me she likes it up the ass, she just wants a little warm up next time. I thought I was gonna bust a gut laughin'. Now if y'all will excuse me, I'm gonna go get some more o' that prime rib."

An elderly couple near their table flagged down a waiter who spoke with them for a moment and then showed them to another table, much farther away.

* * * * *

"...anyway, here's the chemistry teacher, got dosed by one of his students, nothing too serious, just a little something to make him nauseous as all hell, goes home to find his wife fucking the quarterback of the football team who she had in her senior English class. Next day, we all come to class to find a collection of chemicals under the lab hoods and these sheets of paper at all our desks. The papers said this was an experiment test and the results would be fifty percent of our quarterly grade. We were to divide into eight teams, as there were eight lab hoods and start working. There was this procedure outlined on the papers. This was first year high school chemistry; no one really knew to be too suspicious of a procedure that involved nitric acid, sulfuric acid and glycerin."

"You're shittin' me, Carol! The sick bastard left y'all instructions for nitro?"

"Sure did, so we're all going to town, getting things squared away and ready to start doin' our damndest and one team's hood ventilation isn't kicking on, and that's kind of required, so they go looking for the other chemistry teacher down the hall to see what she wants them to do about it. Mrs. Walicek, this dinosaur from when teaching chemistry was how to combine the four basic elements in different combinations, comes down to the classroom, picks up one of the sheets and immediately goes all drill instructor, bellows, and I quote, "Every last one of you little motherfuckers better put down whatever you have in your hands and back away from the hoods or I will slap you to the fucking ground"... "

"YOU ARE SHITTING ME!" Harry said.

"No sir I am not, it got our attention and she repeated it for those of us who might be hard of hearing. Everyone put whatever they had down and backed away, she slapped the intercom, got the Vice Principal down there at a run, showed him the sheet, told the ignorant jock what it meant and promptly fainted.

"They checked and neither he nor his wife was on school grounds, so they sent the cops to go collect him. He yells at the cops that he has explosives strapped to his wife and they'd better back off. The cops bring in SWAT and we hear from Paul, whose daddy was on the team, that Mr. Dilwicki had evidently made some nitro earlier in the day and taken it home because he had her holding it while he shoved a vibrator in and out of her. The officer in charge wouldn't let them take the shot because she was sure to drop it so they just watched. It looked like her arms got too tired after awhile and the whole back of the house went up. Good thing they'd evacuated the surrounding homes.

"If you want to read the accounts, go look for the September 28^th, 1996 special evening edition of the Emporia Gazette, Emporia, Kansas.

"Harry, sir, while you're up would you get me another piece of that divine poached salmon? Thank you."

A pair of middle-aged ladies left their meal in the middle and walked out of the restaurant.

* * * * *

"Hello? Okay Perry, you've done everything you can? Alright... give me, oh, twenty minutes to pick up the gear and another twenty to get there, so forty minutes. I'll see if I can shave some time off of that. You sit tight and be careful.

"Harry, Perry and Bevy may have a situation at your house. You stay here and don't argue with me about it because this is the kind of thing I get paid the big bucks for. I'm gonna go take a look, you watch Tammy for me. I'll call you the second I know anything."

The large man bent down to kiss his Theresa good bye. "Don't worry. I'll be back for you. I promise."

An air of worry settled over the table so that when the restaurant manager came by to say that the hotel would be more than happy to serve their whole party in a private room from now on, no one even laughed.