The Adventures of a Scrawny Musician and a Compulsive Liar

6. Champagne, McDonald's and My Future

            “So… where were you last night? I tried calling you to find out when the calltime for this thing was.” Evan asked from behind the drums while adjusting the toms and tapping the snare a few times to test the sound. Isobel was tuning her bass and Nathaniel was switching his mouthpiece for his trumpet. Attempting to look mysterious, I gazed out over the crowd of rich yacht owners drinking their champagne from little plastic cups. I could barely contain the wide grin threatening to burst out from behind the expressionless face I was miraculously upholding. “Laurie… hello? Laurie! LAURIE!”

            Avoiding looking at him, I busy myself with testing out the microphone and playing a few tuning notes on my saxophone. Brushing imaginary lint off my crimson-colored tie, I simply reply, “Out.” After taking a cursory glance around at my surroundings, I risked a glance at Evan and couldn’t contain myself any longer. His whole raised eyebrow, “what the fuck” face had me hideously guffawing immediately. Conveniently forgetting that my microphone was on, I looked out only to see the whole crowd of immaculately dressed rich people looking up at me in expectation. My cheeks were stained red in a matter of seconds. I look back to see Evan snickering and the pianist, a thin girl with long, dark hair, murderously glare at me from behind her music stand.

            “I guess intermission’s over,” I softly murmur to myself. Turning towards the crowd with a fake smile on my face, I announce, “So our next song will be ‘Sing, Sing, Sing’ which features our drummer, Evan Stanley, me on my sax, and Ron Lee on the trumpet.” With that, Evan launched into his tom solo and we were off.

            “Dude, I want your nuggets.”

            “…Excuse me?”

            “I want. Your nuggets.”

            “No.”

            “Why are you being like this, man? I just want your nuggets.”

            “No.”

            “Just give him the damn nuggets, Laurie!” Evan exclaims while Isobel starts picking out the chicken, cripsy noodles, cheese, mandarin oranges, beans, and almonds off of her Chinese Chicken Salad leaving only the green leafy parts behind. Putting the toppings on the plastic lid that came with the salad, she pushes it toward Evan and starts chewing on a lettuce leaf. Evan absentmindedly pops a few orange slices into his mouth.

            Seated in a slightly dingy, red-and-white-themed McDonald’s we discovered on the drive back to our homes from our fancy dinner performance, we stand out in our black-tie formal wear against the usual suspicious crowd of teenagers huddled in the corner and the odd middle-aged mustached man that usually inhabit a McDonald’s at ten PM on a Saturday night.

            “Evan,” I start, intensely staring into his moss green eyes which hid behind a pair of black framed glasses. “My body is starting to take on that of a malnourished African child. I actually wish to gain muscle mass during some point in my life; preferably before I turn old and die alone as a skin-covered sack of bones.”

            “Come on, Laurie. It can’t be that bad—oh.” Nathaniel removes his hand from my bicep. I take the moment while he’s momentarily distracted to scarf down all five McNuggets that I had left at one time.  “Ugh!” He huffs. “You little bitch!”

            “You’re one to say.” I counter, noting his short height.

            “Hey—oh crap. I missed curfew. Helen’s gonna go apeshit,” Nathaniel groans, glancing at his watch and referring to his step-mother of two months now. Helen was a pixie of a woman standing at five feet. She was extremely kind and made the best strawberry crepes I’ve ever had in my life. However, she was no Mrs. Holder, Nathaniel’s former mother who practically was my second mother. Their divorce was a particularly painful one for all of us, but everything seemed to be alright now. Helen loved Nathaniel like he was her own kid, Nathaniel was reasonably friendly towards Helen, and Mrs. Holder constantly visited Nathaniel and his father—sometimes even bringing her new husband and twin toddlers.