true.
Whether you’re a mild-mannered accountant or a whip-wielding dominatrix, you still make your own judgments and observations as if you’re sane and everyone else is nuts, as if you’re the voice of reason. Do psycho killers go around thinking they’re insane? Course not. Do bunny boilers and stalkers? They think they’re romantic. It’s this discrepancy between what we and everyone else thinks that causes wars and arguments.
Now did that sound profound or childish?
Either way, I’m getting off topic. What I’m saying is, regardless of how sane I might sound right now, I’m not as calm as I appear to be.
I’m not rational.
I just want to get smashed.
I’m at one of Susan’s rooftop parties and we’re all drinking mulled wine that was poured into a giant bucket (for those after a brief lesson, mulled wine is a combination of red wine, sugar, brandy, oranges, lemons, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, all of which are heated to a simmer – although some misguided fools boil it). The wine’s so potent I’m feeling it after just a few glasses, which might explain why I’m getting dating advice from Rick, a dysfunctional vegan by-product of hippies.
There’s a common myth that children always rebel, leading lawyers to have wild hippie children and hippies to raise the next generation of lawyers, thus completing the circle of life. It’s a cute but deluded theory. In real life, if you bring up someone with no discipline then there’s no way in hell they’re going to sit in an office from eight to six making someone else richer. They won’t even have the discipline to survive more than two semesters at uni, as Rick proves.
I don’t mean to sound harsh – he’s a lovely person (unwashed and misguided, but lovely) – but not the type you ask for sage advice. He’s the type who once thought he could earn a living playing pokie machines and who’s never lasted in a job for more than two weeks because he inevitably considers his bosses demonic meat-eating homophobic capitalistic pigs.
Which, in his defence, they probably are.
He’s the type to now tell me that Tori and I were never astrologically suited for each other because my moon is in Sagittarius while Tori’s is in Pluto, or something like that.
“And I doubt her relationship with that actor will last long either,” he says.
“Why? You don’t know when he was born.”
“No, but I’d love to know,” he says, eyes widening. “Can you ask her?”
“No.”
“It’s a pity,” he says. “But I was talking about him being an actor. They’re flighty – it’s their job to be flighty.”
Kettle, meet pot.
“They’re always meeting new people on set, and having to make out with different people in love scenes, and they always fall in love with whoever their new co-stars are. Relationships with actors never work out.”
You know … he might actually be right. In fact, the more I think about it the more obvious it seems – after all, Tori is high-maintenance and she doesn’t like to be neglected. How long could it last? A few weeks? Months at the most?
The relationship’s doomed.
“I could hug you,” I say to Rick, but he’s just seen someone new and is greeting them with a high-pitched “Hellooo …”
Temporarily stranded but perkier than before, I stumble off to get more mulled wine and arrive at the punch bowl at the same time as Steve.
“Great minds think alike,” Steve says, no doubt thinking he’s a great wit. I grimly smile and gesture towards the bowl to indicate he should refill his glass before I do. Ladies first, right?
Fuck, I’m as bad as Steve when it comes to bad jokes.
Steve slops the wine in his glass before standing awkwardly beside me.
“Great party,” I say lamely.
“Thanks mate. Seen Susan?”
Last I saw, she was feeling up a gym-built junior designer from work half her age.
“Afraid not,” I say.
Two attractive women (by this stage everyone’s attractive – after a few more glasses Steve will look a peach) come up, clutching their empty plastic cups eagerly, and Steve acts the gallant host by filling them up before asking where Susan is.
“Don’t know, sorry,” says one, who is tall, skinny and has dolphin earrings that suddenly give me a flashback, making me think of a mobile that hung over my cot as a toddler. I loved that mobile, which had blue dolphins that danced above me. I restrain the urge to reach out and swat an earring to see it swing – and to stick my thumb inside my mouth.
The other woman, who has a cleavage like the Grand Canyon, shakes her head. Perhaps I was a bottle baby, since I find myself drawn to her even more than the dolphins.
Steve looks perplexed, muttering he doesn’t understand how he could lose his wife on a rooftop.
“Maybe she went to the loo?” Ms Dolphins suggests.
I parasitically introduce myself as if attaching to an unwilling host – ok, maybe I do have self-esteem issues – but they seem happy to talk and we soon discuss what makes a good party.
Plenty of liquor, we decide, is a must, as is good music – Steve nods his head, acknowledging his contribution to tonight – but an excellent party needs something else.
“Scandal,” Grand Canyon says. “We need someone to get so drunk they do something wrong …”
“Like grope the host,” Ms Dolphins says.
“Or have an affair with them,” I say.
Steve looks uncomfortable.
The music changes; the Beatles’ Day Tripper starts.
“I love this song,” I say, and Grand Canyon shakes her head wildly, creating a mild tremor amongst her cleavage as she says, “Yeah!”
There’s a lot of brandy in this mulled wine.
Nodding her head to the music, she starts singing …
“She was a daaaaay tripper …”
She hits me hard on the bicep, motioning to me to sing along.
Jesus, we only just met.
“One way ticket, yeah …” she continues.
Then again, it would be nice to nestle, maybe even nap, snugly within those nurturing breasts.
“It took me sooo long to find out – and I found out …”
Oh, what the hell.
“And I found out!” I join in.
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