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FITTING IN
Now I wish I could tell you that I fit right in and that people would give me nods of approval for bringing such a hot date but I was anything but suave. I was mocked for going back to ask that they put some Coke in my 18 year old Scotch so that I could actually choke it down, I had people say to my girl “If you’re tired of playing with boys and want to meet a man then why don’t we…”, and the harder I tried to be cool the dumber I looked. To make matters worse, there was this one guy who seemed to take a lot of comedic pleasure in everything about me, and I ended up in his grasp for quite a while as he told me a very long story that I could not follow in the least. I don’t remember his name but he was a big bald loud-mouth. He had on a nice suit with enough buttons undone to reveal a giant mat of chest hair and a thick gold chain. I would not have guessed him to be that much of a catch among women but his girlfriend was super hot and 10 years younger than him so he must have more going for him than meets the eye. The girlfriend smiled and laughed at various points of his story and I took my cues from her about how to react. The story took so long because he seemed to know everyone in the place. Every time someone would walk by it was always a similar scene “Heeeey! Johnaaaaay! How the hell are ya?” followed by a manly hug. Then he would turn back to me and jump straight back into the story. I would only throw out minor reactions as he spoke “Really?”, “Oh that’s hilarious”, “Hmmm”, “Seriously?” and occasionally he would respond as if I said something significant like “Ya, you know exactly what I am talking about,” then turns to his girl, “this fucker really gets me,” and back to me, “You’re a pretty good shit you know?”. Even though I could not follow the story it was worth sticking around with him because Sherri and I would talk with his girl when he was off greeting someone and I liked standing around being seen with not one, but 2 hotties. She was also very flirty which was good in itself and it also seemed to make Sherri draw a little closer to me. Real nice girl and seemed like the complete opposite of this giant bald man. It was also good because he would often introduce me to people with a glowing review like “You gotta meet this guy, this SOB is hilarious” but I don’t recall ever saying anything that was ever meant to be funny.
So even though my encounter with my new friend seemed to be good for my social status I still wanted to find a way to detach and do other party things. Most notably so make things go well with Sherri. My attempt at an exit was “Well great to meet you but my drink is empty so we’re going to hit up the bar”. This turned out to be absolutely unacceptable and he stared at his own drink in disgust, “Well hell, I’m empty too.” He wasn’t, but after a big swig the last of it quickly disappeared. He turned to his girl as if this was somehow her fault, “Why don’t you ladies fix this little problem while we finish talking” he said as he jingled the remnants of ice in the otherwise empty glass. His eyes were back on me and his glass was extended out to his girl. I thought that she had half a mind to throw it in his face but she didn’t. She grabbed his glass, then my glass then linked arms with Sherri and cheerfully responded “Let’s get our boys a drink.” I locked apologetic eyes with Sherri for a brief moment before she was hauled off.
They did deliver the drinks but then the girls went off dancing and I remained stuck. I heard more stories and met more people. I also learned that in this circle everyone knew my brother as “Bean” (I asked him later and he doesn’t even know where it came from). He was apparently well liked, and advertizing the fact that we were related added to my growing reputation of “Being a good shit” and a “Hilarious SOB”. The only downside of this is that I immediately inherited the nickname “Little Bean”. I was not even sure I liked Bean as a name let alone Little Bean. So I may not have achieved the debonair status that I was looking for, but at least I managed to fit in somewhere. Sure I was more like a mascot or a pet than a peer but at least I was “in”.