The Drive-In

14

Not even two hours have passed since leaving Eddie at the drive-in before Steve is tearing up the road toward Family Video. He knew he was going way too fast, but he needed to speak to Robin immediately.

He'd got home, chucked down some aspirin, and went for a swim to clear his head. Every other lap, he'd turn his head to breathe and catch a glimpse of the pool loungers. Then his brain, like a TV with a bad signal, gave him flashes of the program. Eddies face lit up in a cool blue light. Eddie's hand outstretched to him. Eddie's lithe torso stretched back on the lounger in front of him.

He felt that feeling again, nervous. No, not just nervous. It was something else. He'd gotten so annoyed with himself, being unable to pinpoint this feeling and given up on the swim, headed for the shower again and returned downstairs to tidy up.

He'd caught a glimpse of the refrigerator and noticed a small plastic bag with a few pre-rolled joints stuck to it and a note.

'For emergency recovery only!! E'

Steve smiled and shook his head, and started to load the dishwasher. He checked in the oven. There was indeed another stack and a half of pancakes. Eddie was bad at measuring for someone who played a game that seemed to Steve like a glorified math problem. Too good to waste, Steve had thought and wrapped them up.

Then trash bag in hand, he'd begun the mission of locating all the randomly placed beer cans, including the tower of them in the den.

Jesus, they'd drank so much last night. Steve could hold his drink, but there was much more to him than Eddie. How neither of them had been violently sick somewhere in the house was a miracle.

Steve cringed a little as a sudden memory of him throwing his arm around Eddie a few times permeated his brain. He shrugs it off. Eddie hadn't mentioned it. Lots of people do that when they're drunk. It was fine.

He had left the doors open to air out the rooms. He knew the maid could have done all this tomorrow, but he didn't want her to wade through all this trash and the thick smell of weed, tobacco and beer that had consumed the house.

He'd disposed of the cans and returned to the furniture that Eddie had tried to move back the best he could, but nothing was exactly where it should be. Once it had been rearranged to perfection, Steve went to assess the damage and honestly, there wasn't much. A bit of a shoe mark on the table that Steve easily wipes away and a little pile of ash by the stereo next to the box of mix tapes.

Steve clears away the ash, looks back at the tapes, and wonders...Did they invite girls round? Steve vaguely recalled dancing, so they must have. When his curiosity had gotten the better of him, he'd opened the tape deck to read the name. Jackie? No, surely not. The Disco girl? That had not ended well, and Steve doesn't remember seeing her at all.

Steve rewound the tape a little hoping that music might jog his memory, and it did. He remembered someone dancing up on the table, and he got that nervous feeling again. No, it wasn't just nervousness. It was something else as well. Steve had shut his eyes and let the music take him back to seeing an outline of a tall, slender girl dancing on the table. That's when that nervous feeling translated for him finally. He'd fallen for them. His stomach flipped at the recognition like a reward.

He got flashes of zoomed-in pictures in his mind. Her smile, one of her eyes with beautiful long eyelashes, a wave of her dark hair, he's holding her hands, and he could almost feel her wrapped up in his arms.

Maybe Jackie paired off with Eddie, and this was one of her friends? That had made much more sense. Steve had figured the girls had probably decided not to stay over. Eddie had probably freaked Jackie out and messed up Steve's chances with this mystery girl.