Chapter 3: Fist of Fury

A night out with Thaddeus and Young Lad has a distinctive and predictable anatomy consisting of three distinct and important parts, the first of which is the pregame. Depending on the time of year, day of the week, color of the sky, alignment of the planets, and barometric pressure, pregaming can begin as early as noon and technically commences with the first beer, wine, or finely aged, single barrel scotch whisky enjoyed with dinner. But to suggest that festivities on which the success of the remainder of the evening will rest simply happens during a meal or can be as paltry as one beer in the afternoon downplays its importance. Like warming up and stretching before any major sporting event, drinking before drinking simply prevents injury and readies the mind for competition.
The second part, most obviously, is being out. My exposure to bars in at least three cities indicates that this experience is almost universal, varying only in details and how many shots your wingman approaches you bearing Jaeger and how much dancing or live music takes place at the location you chose. Young Lad, Staunton and I tend to avoid what is often referred to as the “club scene” mostly because I have the high dancing threshold owing to multiple generations of Protestantism and the general body sense of an adolescent. After fifteen outright rejections of my increasingly pathetic advances or last call – whichever comes first – I make the push for third part of the evening equation: the postgame.
The postgame, or in some regions, afterparty, is far and away the highlight of the night. It offers the opportunity for hopeful men to bring unsuspecting women back to a location with a bed, counter, couch, or shower within a stone’s throw while continuing to enjoy their company. I particularly relish the opportunity to better apply my linguistics skills to the art of game without having to yell over “raaaaa raaaaaa RA AHHH AHHHH.” Also, as the nature of tort law increasingly ignores personal responsibility in favor of large settlements, bar tenders are less and less likely to serve enough liquor for one to get Mel Gibson drunk before last call. But on a recent Saturday evening, after what were fairly standard parts one and two, part three went tragically wrong. While imbibing at a local bar, The Lad and I ran into a group of female friends and acquaintances led by the fearless Rady Friend.
To even begin to understand what follows, one must first attempt to develop an understanding of what exactly makes Rady Friend worth keeping around. Rady fluctuates between two states of being: blackout and hungover. Of course she spends the occasional hour being neither, but such anomalous occurrences represent outliers and may simply be observational errors rather than conscious decisions to behave like the rest of us. Some portion of Rady’s propensity to reach a state of pure inebriation that most others only dream about can be attributed to her stature as well as her origins. Standing only three apples high in heels, the little partier is currently China’s only representation in the Lollipop Guild. Despite what sounds like the lifestyle of an alcoholic homeless person, Rady is in fact an incredibly well meaning and often generous person who offers sage advice to friends like “you’re too old to only be giving handjobs.” At times, she can even be an outstanding wing woman when she is not trying to find a new stranger to take home for herself.
Hoping to be a good wing woman for me, on this particular Saturday, Rady encouraged two of her good friends to come home with Lad, a good friend from out of town who I will call the Dutch Rudder, and me. While neither girl was outstandingly attractive, they were at least better than many of the Picasso like options that appear inexplicably just before bars close, but regardless of our feelings on their appearance, the two young ladies would have been welcome company had one of them not been an incredibly unlikable person who feels that “you’re a loser, buy me a drink” is an effective pick up line. After tormenting my dog, insulting my beer, panning my choice in music, and making disparaging remarks about how the television is too big, I decided that I had my fill and settled in to slumber.
Just as my dog and I were starting to doze off, I heard a stream profanities coming unmuffled through the paper mache walls separating me from the ongoing postgame activities. Young Lad had reached a sudden breaking point and finally snapped at our bitchy houseguest. With high pitched and aggressive tone, he questioned her upbringing, suggested that she fornicate with herself, repeatedly and with fervor, and then vacate his place of living in the very near future. Shortly after making this harsh but ultimately understandable request, I heard a sound with which I became casually and personally familiar during my time as an active member of a fraternity: the distinct thwunk of hand going through a six panel hollow core door. As it was at least the twenty third time I have heard this sound, I knew that the damage was already done, doors are easy to replace, and that seeing at least some small amount of destruction coming from what is normally an infinite but completely impotent rage would actually have a calming effect. No one was hurt, and the damaged door has become a shrine to grown man temper tantrums everywhere.