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.About four hours later, I found myself in a cab back to my parents' house without Greg.I was still pretty high, but now the Chinese babies were at my eye level and were on foot.At some point in the evening, my brother and I had separated.After the restaurant we'd gone to a bar across the street where they actually had an area designated for dancing, called a dance floor.I'm pretty confident I spent most of the night humiliating myself on it, but I had no idea when or where Greg had removed himself.During the ten-minute cab ride to our house, I became increasingly concerned over Greg's whereabouts.Although I have been lucky enough not to ever have had a bad reaction to the drugs I've experimented with, some people are not as fortunate.It dawned on me that he could have been freaking out somewhere in a roadside bush.Once we pulled onto the dirt road that led to our house, the cabdriver recognized the road and said he had just dropped another person here an hour earlier.Thank God, I thought, and was able to go back to my previous jubilation of being in a paranoia-free zone of euphoria.This wasn't the first time Greg and I had crossed paths with the same driver in the hours of darkness.A year earlier we had some hillbilly cousins from a small town outside Portland, Oregon, decide that it would be a good idea to get married.Neither of us had been invited to the wedding, but Greg called me in California and asked me if I wanted to crash.I had no desire to be in attendance at an affair that was most likely going to take place at either a VFW hall or a Chili's.He persisted in convincing me that we should go together and that it would be good material.Material for what was never specified.I had no real commitments at the time, being twenty and just recently moved to Los Angeles, where I was in between thinking I should get a job and getting one."Fine," I finally said."You need to use your miles for my ticket, and I'm not staying at a Super 8 or at one of our 'pseudo' cousins' trailers." I had to be very specific with Greg, as he is prone to spending as little money as possible, and that is something, try as I might, I cannot get behind."I want nice dinners, Greg.No Colonel Sanders shit." I had nothing against the colonel himself but am very leery of the idea that there was ever a colonel in the first place.What kind of colonel would allow his establishment to turn into such a mockery? After a lengthy negotiation, we compromised on moderately priced dining, as long as I agreed to at least one serving of the colonel's chicken, or, as I had grown to refer to it, Kentucky Fried Pony.The wedding "reception" took place at a karaoke bar, which is one thing I do not and will not participate in.I've found that many of the people who have a passion for karaoke too often have misplaced confidence, which can become aggressive and at times border on sadistic.I know my limits, and karaoke is where I draw the line.I wouldn't put anyone through the hell of listening to me sing a song, and I sure as shit wouldn't wait in line to do it.The bartender told me the kitchen was closed, so I looked around for my brother, who was hard to find in the sea of mullets that were related to me.Since this wedding celebration hadn't provided any food, it was my duty to provide myself with some sustenance.I looked in the closed kitchen.The perfect condition I like a kitchen to be in when I decide to test out my culinary skills.I opened the freezer, got out some hamburger patties and some frozen onion rings, and then looked around for something to cook these items in or on.Soon after, I gave up and walked outside.I was standing in front of the bar, looking at the adjacent strip malls and intersections, with my forefinger pointed at my temple, trying to find something that piqued my palate.Taco Bell was in the near distance, but I was in no mood to walk more than one-eighth of a mile, so I waved down the first car I saw.A man in a dark brown Toyota low-rider sort of sedan stopped.When I leaned in, I saw that he had a nice smile, weighed close to four hundred pounds, and was solely responsible for the car being low-riding."Any chance I could get a ride to that Taco Bell right over there?""Sure thing, kiddo, hop right in."You are a lifesaver." I smiled, calculating how many tacos I could buy with five dollars.I walked around to the passenger-side door and hopped in."I know it's not far, but I'm at this wedding with no food, and I'm starving." I looked at his body out of the corner of my eye and concluded that if circumstances called for it, he would be able to crush me.However, he would have to catch me first, and unless he was some sort of Transformer or fat vampire, this was unlikely in his condition.He was a very nice man indeed, and I liked the way his big fat body leaned when we were turning in to the intersection.He asked me where I was from, and when I told him New Jersey, he slapped his thigh.I couldn't tell which because together they equaled one gargantuan slab of meat.I wondered how many chicken tacos the geniuses at Taco Bell could make out of his carcass [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]