At the time,
life seemed to be treating Owen well - he was on a winning streak after
obtaining a job at Lord of the Fries.
High on animal rights and veganism, he seemed to be in a rare state of
contentment.
We met in the
city, just in time for Owen to finish his evening shift, and caught the train
out to North Melbourne. I had never been to Owen’s previous house – the details
of which seemed shrouded in secrecy. His
new housemates were friends of friends, and were unlikely to be home that
night, so we had the place to ourselves.
Arriving under cover of night, Mitch and I cautiously entered the front
door and surveyed our venue for the night.
A bachelor pad
in the truest sense, the living room was populated by a dilapidated sofa and an
old tube TV on top of which sat a novelty bong shaped like Yoda. The only other furniture seemed to be a
broken coffee table housing a torn sports magazine and a black top hat. The stench of dirty socks and cigarettes hung
in the air. A glass door led to a small balcony overlooking the car park and
presented a breathtaking view of the luminous cityscape, only a few kilometres
away.
“I wouldn’t
touch anything in there if I were you” cautioned Owen as he saw me heading into
the kitchen.
Undeterred by
the stained counter and soiled Tupperware on show, I continued to explore.
“Got anything
to drink?” I queried as I opened the fridge, revealing an empty expanse
occupied only by a small glass jar half filled with a translucent red
liquid.
“Nope”,
replied Owen matter of factly.
I
took a deep breath, drinking in the existential horror of the environment and
regretting not bringing some bottled water with me.
Owen completed
the grand tour by showing us a clogged up toilet and mould covered
bathroom. His bedroom consisted of a
wafer thin mattress and several stacks of boxes randomly placed among an
elegant tapestry of jocks and socks on the floor. The room smelled like boy.
Deprived of
our creature comforts (and drinking water), we resolved to have an enjoyable
night getting acquainted with Owen’s plastic bong. I had never used one before and was somewhat
intimidated by the device – revolted by its threatening face hole and murky
bubbling water. The bong seemed
strangely symbolic of a transition of sorts for me. I was no longer just a guy out for a bit of
fun. I was on drugs – good and
proper.
As a child, I
had broken my arm falling from bunk bed.
I still remember how quickly it happened, and the shock of beholding my
twisted limb. Smoking the bong was the
same. It was startling. With one breath, I was propelled backwards in
time, through a maze of dazzling colours and scary clown masks.
I slowly
reclined into the broken sofa, allowing myself to relax. The stresses of my lonely work week fell
away, giving rise to a warm, pleasing disorientation. I passed the bong to Mitch, his eyes greedy
with anticipation.
“You okay man?” said Owen, sitting across from
me grinning widely, clearly amused by the loss of my virginity.
I nodded my
head in slow motion, vaguely aware of Mitch smoking next to me, the faint
bubbling of his bong water drowned out by the music on the stereo and the
twinkling city vista. Even though I was
in an unfamiliar place, the gathering storm of nightmares seemed a distant
memory, conveniently washed away by the herb and the presence of my best
friends.
I became aware
of a clicking sound, somehow metallic. I
slowly surveyed the room, taking a few moments to realise that a key was being
turned. Someone was at the front door.
As a man
frequently engaged in an illegal activity, I had become unfortunately accustomed
to this experience. I lived in fear of
being ‘found out’ while smoking. On many
occasions I had imagined two surly cops angrily invading my apartment and
finding my weed as I sheepishly looked on, red eyed, trying my best to feign
surprise.
It didn’t take
much for me to get paranoid when I was stoned.
I had experienced it many times before, and knew that full blown terror
was just around the corner.
Four burly
guys tumbled through the front door, beers in hand, immediately shattering the
quiet zen we had cultivated. They were
all at least six foot tall, with broad shoulders. Owen’s housemates had arrived.
Like hideous
caricatures, they burped and farted their way into our space, thudding down on
the couch next to Mitch and I, now squashed into a small corner by the
window. Taking ownership of the room,
these guys seized the space with their powerful presence as we sat back,
stunned, and far too stoned to do anything.
Our attempts at awkward small talk proved fruitless and yielded one word
responses or mere grunts. These guys
were ‘proper’ men. Fresh from an evening
spent binge drinking and fighting.
Owen looked
crestfallen as he tried his best to make conversation with the giant men. He laughed a fake laugh and glanced over at
me.
“I’m sorry”,
his eyes said quietly.
Years later, Mitch
would liken these guys to a “den of pigs” as we remembered the sting of
disappointment. Their booming voices and
crude humour sealed the fate of our Saturday night. It would be a full week until we would have
the opportunity to hang out again, and they had taken it away. Their intrusion meant I would face a full
week of perilous work politics and loneliness without so much as a weed fuelled
bender to show for it. Unbeknownst to
me at the time, it would be much the same for Mitch.
It wasn’t long
before a small herd of drunken girls arrived, each one more scantily clad than
the last. All three of us seemed to
share the same thought.
“How old are
these girls?”
Despite my
compromised cognitive abilities, I could see these girls were young. Attired like prostitutes, they sat on the
laps of these men, fawning over every stupid remark and bodily function they
produced.
“What do they see in those guys?” I thought, still
confined to the corner. I imagine every
man has thought that particular thought at some point in his life. Wondering why women prefer volatile,
uneducated men over their more refined counterparts. For Mitch and I, they highlighted an uncomfortable
crisis of confidence in our own sense of masculinity.
“I need some
food!” belched the biggest of the three guys, his considerable belly hanging
out the front of his t-shirt.
Owen stood up
immediately.
“We were just
gonna go for a Seven Eleven run”.
“Yeah I’m
starving, also I need some smokes” I chimed in, ecstatic at an opportunity to
leave the den.
“Come on dude”
I said, prying Mitch out of the seat next to me, careful not to sound too
enthusiastic lest it cause a confrontation.
“Can we get
you anything?” I slurred absent mindedly as I gathered my wallet and stumbled
towards the front door.
“Donuts!” said
the Big Guy. He reached into his wallet
and casually handed me a fifty dollar note.
His eyes were wide and bloodshot and his breath reeked of beer and
pretzeled bread.
I examined the
note.
“How many
dude?”
“Twenty
seven”.
“Twenty
seven?!”
The Big Guy
nodded, and then returned to slapping the arse of the poor young girl
obediently sat on his lap. She screamed
in mock surprise, but her eyes were filled with foreboding. I
carefully pocketed the note and rushed out the door with my friends, scared
they would leave me behind.
Downstairs, I realised
the full extent of the bong I had smoked.
My body trembling, I walked down the street like a newborn calf trying
to find its footing. After slamming into
a mailbox, I lassoed my arm around Mitch’s shoulder for stability, and the
three of us laughed and shared a collective sigh of relief. Granted temporary reprieve, we trundled off
into the night. I had never been so
stoned in my life.
***
The lights in
Seven Eleven were blindingly bright. I
squinted as I opened the door, allowing my eyes a few moments to adjust. Almost immediately, Owen and Mitch abandoned
me, leaving me to attend to the voluminous donut order. Still shaking from the bong, and barely able
to walk, I ambled over to the glass cabinet where they were kept. My paranoia began to kick in, and I was
suddenly aware of everyone else in the store looking at me, their heads shaking
and tongues clicking in disapproval at the young stoner.
Disoriented, I
slowly began loading donuts into the small flat cardboard boxes supplied. Mitch came by to check on my progress, eager
for me to admire the handful of candy he had decided to purchase. Owen was on his hands and knees in one of the
aisles. He was searching for something
vegan, and unstacking the shelves as he thoroughly examined every item, much to
the chagrin of the attendant at the counter who looked over angrily, muttering
in Hindi.
Each donut box
would only hold four donuts. The Big Guy
had requested twenty seven. I was
overcome with dread as the stack of boxes grew; scared of having to carry them
back and wary of the judging eyes of the other customers. Owen and Mitch seemed oblivious to my
difficult task. Neither of them helped
me.
Still
trembling, I packed up the last of the donuts and took the small stack of boxes
to the counter where the angry Indian man looked at me incredulously. My hand dove into my pocket and produced the
money I had been given.
“Fuck this
place” came Owen’s voice. He stood
behind me, arms folded and eyes aflame with indignity. As it happens, obtaining vegan food from a
Seven Eleven is quite impossible.
We paid the
attendant, and started our trip back, quietly listening to a vegan sermon from
an empty handed Owen. I was hoping that
his housemates had gone to sleep or retired to their bedrooms with their
jailbait. No such luck. The Big Guy eagerly accepted the stack of
donut filled boxes and began quickly shovelling them into his mouth as his
female companion looked on in revulsion.
We stayed up a
little longer, the weed gradually wearing off and fatigue setting in. The Big Guy eventually went to bed, slinging
the teenage girl over his shoulder as she screamed in protest, pounding his
sizeable back with her fists to no avail.
Mitch and I pretended not to notice.
Later we heard more screaming as she locked herself in the toilet and
refused to come out.
Wearied by our
stressful night, the three of us retired to Owen’s bedroom for a few hours’
sleep. I curled up on the floor, my head
resting on a pile of Owen’s musky clothes, Mitch not far away from me. Ignoring the screeching coming from the next
room, I drifted off into a restless sleep, cold and afraid that one of Owen’s
giant housemates would steal my shoes or murder me in my sleep.
Obviously fed
up, Mitch was determined to catch the first train to the city at 6am. The two of us left Owen to his slumber and
embarked on our journey under the blue light of the morning. Braving a brain piercing headache, we walked
to the train station together in silence, like broken soldiers returning from
war. We both knew that our weekend fun
time was over. Exhausted and thirsty, I
stared at the pavement, yearning for the comfort of my own home and a shower.
We never hung
out at Owen’s place again.
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