Snowflakes In Autumn, 3c

Sorry, gang. I’m upsetting the schedule’s apple cart today, but it can’t be helped. Trey’s last day home has proven very busy, and I’m just not ready for it to end. And, since any time I would otherwise spend sitting at the computer pecking out an essay for your reading pleasure today is time that I wouldn’t be spending with my little boy before he goes away to his dad’s for a month, I’m moving the essay to Friday. Instead, I’m doing a quick and dirty copy-and-paste to continue the next installment of Snowflakes In Autumn. I’ll conclude Chapter Three tomorrow, then post some random and fascinating errata in Friday’s entry.

Before I go, however, please take a minute to check out something indescribably cool. Susan Ellison, the lovely wife of literary giant and indefatigable madman Harlan Ellison, has recently pillaged The Lost Aztec Temple of Mars (their home in sunny Los Angeles, California) and is putting up for sale an assorted mix of interesting rarities that anyone who isn’t an enormous fool would love to get their hot little mittens on. Check out the brochure of the proffered items here, which will be available for purchase from July 6-8. The details are in the brochure, so check it out. Don’t be a moron.

Snowflakes In Autumn
Chapter Three, Part Three

(click here to start at Chapter One, Part One)

We packed our bags and left for Disneyworld on New Year’s Day. Wade, my best friend, arrived early that morning with his six-year-old son (my godson), Ryan. We loaded our bags into the truck of his car, and headed out of town down Interstate 10. The car was filled with the sort of unbridled enthusiasm you get at the very beginning of a vacation, when the open road is a future of endless possibilities. Wade was driving, and I was in the passenger seat. Ryan and Cathy were in the back of the car, chattering and playfully arguing about what they wanted to do first. Cathy insisted that we go straight to the castle to meet Cinderella. Ryan, however, was adamant that the very first thing to be done on any vacation to Disneyworld is to meet Mickey Mouse. Wade had taken him to The Disney Store in the local mall to buy an official autograph book, and the little guy was chomping at the bit to see Mickey and get his signature. Unfortunately, our limitless enthusiasm proved to be entirely limited to the first few hundred miles of the trip.

The drive along Interstate 10 is a long and boring one, the only scenery a handful of hay bales and an endless ocean of power lines. Somewhere in the middle of Louisiana, Cathy and Ryan fell asleep and Wade and I started talking.

“So, what made you want to bring her along?” he asked, nodding a motion towards Cathy in the backseat.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean, you’ve never taken any other girl to Disneyworld.”

“Yeah, well we don’t exactly live very close to it. I’ve only ever been with my family.”

“That’s not what I mean, though.”

I tilted my head to the side and asked, “Then what’s your point?”

“My point is,” he said, “that there’s obviously something special about this girl. I’m asking what it is.”

“What’s special about her?”

“Yeah, what made you want to bring her?” He paused and took his eyes off the road for a second to look at me. “And for that matter, what’s so special about her that she’s even still around?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, filling the sentence with as much defiance as I could muster.

“You do realize this is officially the third month you’ve been together, don’t you?”

“No, we met in, like, mid-November, so the third month won’t technically start until sometime around my birthday, I think.”

“Oh please,” said Wade. He waved his arm dismissively, “You’ve never stayed with a girl for more than two months. You do realize this, don’t you?”

“That’s not true,” I said. “I was with what’s-her-name for almost a year!”

“Who?”

“You know, that girl I told you about. When I was off at school.”

“Your fuckbuddy?”

“Yeah.”

He shook his head and laughed. “I don’t think she counts, man.”

“Why not?”

“Did the two of you ever date?”

“Define date,” I said, seeking clarification that I knew would disprove my argument.

“You know, date. Dating. To date.”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

He looked at me again, this time with a smug and infuriating little half-grin on his face. “So you took her on dates?”

“Sure, why not.”

“Did you ever take her on one single date? You know: dinner, movie, dancing, whatever.”

“We went dancing.”

“Where?”

“Well, I met her and some of her friends out at a club one night.”

“Did you go home with her, or one of her friends?”

“Neither.”

“So you didn’t go home with anyone?”

“I didn’t say that…”

He slapped the steering wheel and laughed. “Right, then. Doesn’t count.”

“Well,” I said. “I brought Mexican take-out to her apartment once.”

“Stop. You’re embarrassing yourself.”

I folded my arms and slumped in my seat. “Fine,” I said. “I guess we never dated.”

He waved his arm theatrically. “Exactly! So she doesn’t count. I rest my case.”

“What was your point, anyway?” I asked.

“Just that you’ve never been with one girl for very long.”

“I’ve made it longer than two months, though.”

“Name the girl.”

“Name the girl what?”

“Name the girl you were with for more than two months. Give me the name of one single girl that you truly dated by taking her out on actual dates to real places and that that you, at some point, identified to other people as your girlfriend. That girl. Name her.”

I reached forward to turn on the radio. “Shut up,” I spat as I switched it on. Huey Lewis started screaming about the power of love, and Ryan groaned in his sleep.

Concluded in Chapter Three, Part Four

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