My Best Man (20 page)

“Yes!” Yay-yus.t “And give them little pep talks like, “Y’all are great!” and “Go git ‘em!” “

“And sell double shots to those fat, fraidy-cat housewives in those tan ky station wagons, and give advice like, “Punch the shit out of the accelerator and close your eyes!” “

We quit joking, have a moment of silence, as we approach the expressway.

“Get ready,” Amity whispers, pretending to straighten up. Our mission is to catapult onto Suicide Express, head south, and somehow arrive downtown alive. I’m behind the wheel, but Amity’ s hair is so jacked up it’ spractically blocking my sight. “Move your hair,” I order.

“I’d need a crane,” she answers.

There’s a car sitting on my tail, which makes me even more nervous than usual. The air conditioner is blasting. I call to Amity to turn it off for extra power.

“Air off!” she calls, my copilot. “Take a hit, baby. Take a hit,” she encourages, holding the joint to my lips.

I suck in. All the way. Gun the engine. Pop the clutch. Jettison the Beamer into traffic and exhale the smoke.

“Yay!” Amity yells. “We’re alive!” She accidentally drops the joint, and by the time we find it there’s a hole burned in the vanilla-colored leather seat.

We’re stoned out of reality, riding up the escalator to the ball room, both of us grinning at the high cheese factor of the big event. On the escalator, she slips one leg through the slit on her dress and hikes it onto the step above her. Her legs are so tanned and smooth she doesn’t have to wear panty hose. “Squirrel shot!” she yells,

showing me her bare crotch. We roll off the escalator laughing so hard that everyone in proximity stares. We stop first at a table where they give Amity her five-year service pin a 747 that’s rising for takeoff. Amity pins it on so that it’s pointing downward toward her breast a 747 crashing into a mountain. Then she’s handed two drink tickets that entitle us to one cocktail each. Any more and we’ll have to pay. Tacky. We know we’re “Couple of the Month” for the moment the Texas Babe and the Gay Yankee so we play it to the hilt, going table to table, as if we’re the President and the First Lady at a fund-raiser, while various Southern belles scream with delight at seeing Amity and carefully hug her while stabbing her with a dull kitchen knife in the truth of their imaginations. Amity’s hair gets caught in another stewardess’s hair clip, and everyone gets a good laugh when the women are unable to separate. The guys shake my hand, hard, and slap me on the back, I presume, because I’m the gent lucky enough to land Amity Stone, former Slut of the Month.

I wander off to get us our two free drinks, and when I return she’s not there. And I can’t locate her in the crowd. So here I am, among these straight guys some with ill-fitting polyester suits over their big bellies and horse shit on the heels of their cowboy boots; others looking downright elegant, like male models in tuxes and tails; and all of them highly heterosexual.

Some guy about a foot taller than I am nods, strikes up a conversation. “Did you watch the game yesterday?”

Was there a figure skating competition on TV?

“Nolan Ryan is the man,” he continues, not waiting for me to answer. “They can’t pay that guy enough as far as I’m concerned.”

I stand there with a glass of champagne in one hand, my dark rum and soda with a twist in the other. “Definitely.”

“Who’s your favorite team in the American League?”

“The 49ers.”

He looks at me as if I’ve cut a fart. “That’s football.”

“Right.”

“I’m talking about baseball.”

“Oh!” I have to think quick. “I thought you were talking about Nolan Cromwell.” I know Nolan Cromwell is a football player because he’s a local Kansas boy who made good by going on to be a star in the NFL. But that was with Los Angeles, I think. The Rams. “I just heard the name Nolan, and that’s why I thought you were talking about football,” I explain.

“It’s June,” the guy says. “Football season is over.” “Right,” I say. “It’s too hot for them to wear those outfits.”

He sort of frowns, swills the spit back at the bottom of his beer bottle, and says, “Excuse me.”

Strike one. That’s baseball, right? I slam my rum and soda, set it down. Fuck the coupon. I’ll pay for another one.

I start to head for a couple of flight attendants I recognize, but before I reach them, an operations agent who recognizes me calls out, “Hey, Harry, I didn’t know you were dating Amity Stone.” He’s never said two words to me at the airline, but tonight he calls me by name and acts as if we’re buddies.

He’s standing with two other guys. I stop to answer. They all hold beer bottles while I clutch Amity’ schampagne glass. “Yeah, we’ve been dating for a few months,” I say with a confessional grin. “We live together.”

“You live together?” He wriggles uncomfortably, as if he’s just shit in his tuxedo.

“Well … yeah,” I say, a questioning smile on my face.

One of his buddies speaks up. “Old Perry here went out with your girl.”

I’m not defensive. Broaden my smile. “Hey, we’re casual. I mean, I don’t blame you. she’s a beautiful girl.”

“How long have you two been living together?” he asks. “Since January,” I tell him.

I watch him do the math in his head, and I know he’s slept with

her since then, because he looks a little red in the face. He takes a sip of his drink. His buddies laugh, shift their feet in their uncomfortable shoes.

“It’s no big deal. We’ve only started really dating in the last couple months,” I assure him.

He relaxes. Frees up. “Man, she’s pretty fine, huh?”

“She sure is.”

“I’ve never known any girl like that,” he says. His friends laugh again.

I know that he’ sreferring to her blow jobs and that he’ sen lightened his buddies. I let my face tell him I know what he’s talking about. “Me either. She’s incredible.”

“Hey,” the guy who has yet to speak blurts out, “you know who I think is hot? That Jennifer Beals. Man, I’d do her in a minute.”

Please. That horrible perm?

“No shit,” Perry says. “And the way she can move. you could bend her over from the front and do her in the back.”

It was a stunt double! She can’t bend like that or even act.

“Did you see the porno version?” one guy asks. “No shit. There’s a porno movie out called Flashpuss.”

Oh those poor women in porno. White legs and bruises. Plastic high heels. Blue eye shadow. They should unionize.

Perry’s buddies howl and give each other high fives. He turns to me and raises his hand. I raise my free hand to high-five him. And miss. And fall into him and spill Amity’s champagne on his tux. He backs off. “Shit!”

One of his buddies: “Whoa!”

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry.” I set the champagne glass down on the nearest table and grab a napkin. Without thinking, I start wiping him off.

He backs off as if I’m some kind of faggy flight attendant. I’ll do it,” he says, trying to be polite in his disgust.

His friends look at me differently. Chuckle. Strike two. It’s a lousy baseball season.

Reunited in another part of the ballroom, I hand Amity the glass of champagne. Since the spill, there’s half a swallow left in the bottom of the glass.

She looks at the paltry amount. “This pathetic airline.” Airlawn. “This is just typical of their idea for a free employee drink.”

“I’ll get you another one,” I say, feeling like an idiot for not replacing it already. I just want to get out of this place.

“Don’t worry, babe. We’re about to eat. There’s supposed to be red wine with dinner.”

“I wonder what church they stole it from.”

“The Catholics, I hope. They always have the best booze.” We turn and practically bump into Eva Catrell and her boyfriend. He is a shit kicker. His hair is combed straight forward, and the knot of his tie is thick. His hands are as rough as Eva’s voice, and he’s drinking beer from a bottle. He didn’t even try to put on clean cowboy boots. No doubt he drives a pickup with a rifle hanging in the back.

Amity turns on her smile, full bright, and looks at Eva in that Southern way that says, “Sorry, darling’. I win.”

I’m uncomfortable, but I smile, and Eva smiles and we all kind of say hi for one second before Eva raises an ann of her beaded dress and pushes her boyfriend on. He has no idea.

For a moment we stand and watch the women some in ball gowns, others in thousand-dollar cocktail dresses lead their uncomfortable dates, imprisoned in their tuxes and dark suits from table to table. Taped orchestra music is playing, and slide shots of airline workers are being flashed up on a big screen. We watch the screen to see a shot of a fat guy throwing luggage into the cargo bin of a DC-10, then scan the party crowd to see him now wearing a ridiculous light blue tux with ruffled lapels, his buddies slapping him on the back.

The ten-foot-tall picture of the mousy ticket agent, with greasy straight hair, hoisting a piece of luggage onto a scale, belies the glamorous girl in the indigo, off-the-shoulder, beaded gown, her hair now swept up into a French twist. Every once in a while there’s a random shot of our passengers, who, for this presentation, are solely aristocratic families and high-powered business travelers rather than our usual cargo.

After gristly prime rib, the awards begin. The CEO and President, Mr. Gherkin, the religious zealot who measures about five feet tall in his lifts, takes the stage. He stands behind a podium, pulls the microphone down to his mouth, and unconsciously adjusts his toupee. The parade of aviation heroes begins.

Best Voice, Reservations Agent Category. Most Permanent Smile, Flight Attendant. Best Landings, Pilot. Most Christian Bag gage Handler. Most Pleasing Secretary. Best Groomed, Janitorial Staff. Most Optimistic Mechanic. And on it goes until we’re drowning in a sea of hugs and kisses, and the acceptance speeches are waxing gushier and more illiterate with each new award. Amity and I are kicking each other under the table, laughing into our wineglasses as if they’re spit cups at the dentist, using our napkins to cover our hyena mouths. And then … “For her ability to keep everyone happy, passengers and fellow employees alike, for always maintaining her poise and charm, and for always offering an encouraging word and kind compliment to anyone and everyone she meets, the award for Most Congenial Flight Attendant, 1984, goes to … Amity Stone!”

For one second, she looks at me with this hysterical bullshit face, and reaches under the table to grab my crotch, and when that second is over, she transforms herself into an Academy Award winner, rises to the applause, gives the crowd a brief wave of acknowledgment, and walks glamorously toward the stage to accept her award.

As she steps up to the dais, the creepy little president comes out

from behind the podium, his lips still wet from the last babe he bussed, and plants a kiss on Amity’s lips that’s just a little more than Christian. She stomachs it beautifully, accepts her little silver 747-shaped award, and takes to the microphone.

“Y’all are so sweet!” There’s almost a tear in each eye, and she looks deeply touched. “I can’t believe I’ve been honored with this wonderful award. G’yaw, how am I going to live up to this? Does this mean I’m always going to have to be nice, even if JR

Ewing is on my flight?”

The crowd chuckles.

“This is a wonderful airline. I just want to say thank you to everyone that I’ve flown with in the last year and how much I’m looking forward to meeting all the new people who come on board as we grow. And to Mr. Gherkin, our president: Thanks for giving me a job I promise to never tell your wife our little secret.”

The audience howls and applauds, and Amity winks at the president, who is laughing uncomfortably. And then, with magic sincerity, her blue eyes become the same two spotlights as on the day we met, and she looks right at me and finishes, “And I want to thank Harry Ford, my fiancee, for making 1984 a year for new beginnings.”

Home run. Out of the park. With the bases loaded.

Everyone applauds, I look over at Perry’s table, and see that he’s watching me, not Amity. I look back to Amity, she lifts her award and motions to me, and I nod, and suddenly this is the finest, most legitimate award program on earth.

We’re tanked, flying down Suicide Express with the moon roof open, headed for a restaurant in the Knox-Henderson area for dessert and coffee. Amity’s screaming, “I’m an award winner! I’m an award winner, baby!” She holds the award up and announces, “Best Stewardess in a Foreign Bra and Panties!” And then she throws the statuette out the hole in the roof.

“Amity! What are you doing!” I try to watch it in the rearview

mirror careening into the dark. I look to see if it hits another car. I can’t find it.

“I don’t want that cheesy award, Harry,” she laughs. “They give those things to the butt suckers and brown nosers Besides, that thing was cheap. We can do better than that.”

Dressed in black-tie elegance, Amity and I are the best dressed couple in the restaurant. The place is packed, and we confidently squeeze our way into the bar. There’s a devilishly handsome waiter, about six feet four inches tall, with blond hair and blue eyes. He’s immediately attracted to Amity, I can tell. We’re sitting at the bar, and every time he approaches to get drinks for his dining tables, he gives her a glance. But he’s smart, and he smiles at me as well. It works I’m not jealous. In fact, he’s so gorgeous, I would want anyone I know to have him, including me. Amity and I acknowledge what’s happening, and she loves the attention and approval she’s getting from both me and the waiter.

We’re finally seated, and we find out that we have a different waiter, a Latin guy who’s really hot looking and energetic, who introduces himself as Nicolo. He’s around 5‘8”, with a beautiful strong nose and dark eyes, and a perfect body with one of those tight asses that’s got scoops on the sides, quite evident to me in his stretched-to-breaking black pants. He says hello and reaches out with the menus, but accidentally drops them and they crash onto a wineglass and break it.

“Boom!” Amity laughs.

He grimaces and apologizes, but I’m hardly listening to him because he’s just so fucking handsome, and I had just the right amount of red wine with dinner to make me feel sexy, so I’m boldly staring him down. He picks up the broken pieces of glass and tries to tell us what the specials are, but he’s too flustered to remember.