Omar flipped open his phone and saw it was Pete. He sighed and turned it on, greeting his best friend. It’d been a few weeks since he’d taken the kid’s calls. He felt bad, censoring him like that, but it was too much of a drag to talk to the kid sometimes. He often felt he disappointed Pete.
But it had been too many screened calls in a row and Omar answered it now while his girlfriend was at the wheel of the new car they bought for her. She had picked up Omar across town from his work.
“God damn it.” He said and collapsed the cell phone in his hand.
“What’s up baby?” The petite blonde asked, taking a hand from the steering wheel and placing it on his thigh. He shook his head and took the pale hand in his own dark hand.
“Nothing. I just had to tell Pete I can’t go to Colorado with him.”
“Ah, baby, you’re not going?”
“No. I can’t.”
“I went to Florida, you should go. You’d have a lot of fun.”
“That’s not the point, V. We can’t afford it. You got this new car and you want to move to Ann Arbor and we got bills. Fuck.”
“That’s ok.”
“No it’s not. You’re just like him. It’s not ok. It should be, but it’s not. I got 153 I have to pay in student loans a month, 1000 for a down-payment on that new place, 600 for May rent and 450 for June rent for the other place, cell phone and then two credit cards. It’s just not plausible.” He said, exhausted at the list he’d etched in his brain.
“But it’d make you so happy and you’ve been planning it for a few weeks now.”
“Baby that’s not the point.”
“You should just do it.” She said freely.
“Baby, you don’t get it. We’d lose these things that we now have. It’s more than the cost of driving out there and cheap hotels and campsites. The cost is that I can’t work when I’m gone. You went to Florida for that certification and you were gone for a month. It was a good economic decision but you didn’t work that month. That’s a long time for only one wage. We still had all the same bills, plus the cost for that school.”
As they drove the dark highways she slowly let the subject drop and he sunk into his own thoughts. He was envious of his friend, who had no debt and no responsibilities, had no permanent girlfriend and no car payments or anything. They had always done those things in the past, road trips like that, taking off for several weeks. Their last adventure was to Nova Scotia where they had run out of money and wanted to stay. They spend nights in their car and days wandering the tide flats, then driving and throwing a tent at the side of the road. Pete was an expert in this vagabond way and Omar felt blessed he’d been able to join it.
Omar thought about different careers he could get into. A degree in philosophy was not opening any doors. Perhaps journalism, he mused as she drove.
They arrived home and started drinking. She was a vodka girl and he a whatever-type-of-drink-was-in-front-of-him guy. That night it was two quick kicks of vodka and then light cans of Coors, Cures they called it.
Omar was sitting in a chair and V was in the kitchen getting a plate of carrots and dip. Omar looked at his TV. It was too expensive. He had a high-speed Internet connection and over 100 channels he hardly watched. Pete had talked to him about this before, how he had too many things going on. Financially, that was. He didn’t need that TV, a modem connection was fine, but really he only needed the neighborhood coffee shop with its free connection. What about their rent, could they downsize that? A one bedroom was nice but what about a studio? Cell phones were nice, but not essential. And groceries and living expenses? Did he have to drink that much? All those were valid points but Pete made them selfishly. He wanted Omar to hike with him.
Dan came over and flirted with V. Omar watched and wondered what the fuck his friend was doing. He didn’t like the kid but they’d been friends for years now. Since high school and Dan just came over to his house, wherever he was living. V said she hated the creepy advances by Dan. But there he was, putting his hands across her back and telling her she was the only stable thing in his life.
Dan had issues with drinking. For nearly a year he went through a phase where he woke up drunk and would start drinking again before he became fully sober. There was one occasion when Omar was living in a different house, renting a tiny room with a house of three girls and two guys. Dan came over and parked his car in the driveway. Walked to the tiny entryway and proceeded to remove every article of clothing and fold them neatly in a pile and then walk in the house with his clothes tightly piled on top of each other. He then lowered his naked butt cheeks into the center of a couch of girls, sending them scattering with high pitched squeals.
To Omar it sounded like the cry of young pigs. The room was then empty except for Omar and Dan. Omar simply looked to this friend and shook his head, then drank from his long neck. When he later asked Dan about the incident Dan said he did it because he wanted a better seat for the Pistons game that night. Omar gave him the ephemeral label of Astrix, because of the black-eyed, wrinkly, ass-hole he’d showed the girls before they fled.
