We Are All Naked at Some Point
We Are All Naked at Some Point
“Three aces.”
“Fuck that!”
“Three aces.”
“Well Goddamit Harley, Just who in the hell of God’s green garden wins four hands out of five?”
“I do. And I’ll have them panties now please.”
She took them off of course. It’s the rules and all. I didn’t care much if she didn’t like it, didn’t care if she thought I was cheating. (Which I was of course) What I did mind, what mattered to me was that I see little miss sunshine in all her glory and that me, Harley Templeton, was the one that got it done.
You can call me reckless and maybe, I suppose call me a fool, but I grew up in one hell of a one horse town. We had the MacDonald’s, and we had some pretty fine stores; Dollar Tree and Wal-Mart, of course, and even a God Damn brand new TGIF restaurant down on Main and River Street. Good damn grub in that place.
My point being that I ain’t stupid and I know what life is and that if this was my lot in it I was bound and determined to see Holly Peterson naked as hell just one time before I died.
So this is what I did.
My folks had been saving up for four years to take some cruise to some damn Island in the Bahamas. Four years? Can you imagine? Anyway that kind of detail and longevity of planning has to include the entire family so I probably knew their go there and come back schedule better than them. So I figure, being fifteen and all, a party was in order and sent the word out the week they was getting ready to leave.
It worked out fine. You don’t need much to have a party at that age except some free air and a parental free unoccupied dwelling. They was leaving on Friday and from what I’d heard in the hallways and homerooms of High School I had myself a regular event scheduled that very Saturday evening.
It went something like this.
“Hay Harley; party at your place?”
“Yah Stacey, bring your brains in something black and lacy along with your friends.”
“Sup Harley; your house this weekend?”
Yah Early, bring your brains and some beer.”
It went on like that for a few days. You get the picture. The bottom line is that I had an EVENT going on and then, on Friday, right after sixth period little ole Holly Peterson, the twelve month suntanned, raining Ms. Glory of the world herself came up to me and said;
“Hay Harley..I heard you were having a party this weekend and I haven’t seen an invitation for the life of me.”
First off; who in the hell talks like that? But second off, I was damn happy to reply;
“Well now Holly, why would you need an invitation? “ I thought it was pretty slick.
The rest of that day I rode a wave of something; joy I guess that I’d never experienced before. You don’t know me but let me say this. I wasn’t the smartest kid, I wasn’t no athlete, didn’t care much for drugs, wasn’t all that good looking (although my neighbor Sissy kept trying to kiss me when we walked home together) and sure as hell never got so much as a wink from Holly Peterson. I don’t even want to know what those Chess Kids did in school but I wasn’t even invited to that. I guess what I’m saying is that I wasn’t much of anything. I’d felt uninvited most of my remembering life and the fact that I was inviting felt pretty God Damn good.
So Friday came and I suddenly had more friends than I knew existed in my town. Saturday all day I prepared.
I bought me some chips and dips and little hot dogs in little bitty dough buns and all kinds of shit. I even spent twenty dollars on some fresh shrimp my Uncle Bobby brought in off the Gulf and put it all in a nice glass bowl with sauce in the middle. Little salad leafs gently falling out from the sides of the bowl and everything. It was all pretty fucking cool.
And then they came.
Waves and waves of people came to my door. I didn’t know them, and the ones I did, I didn’t want to know ever again. My house, before I knew it was filled with the assholes and miscreants that had tortured me for years. They were enjoying MY house, eating MY food, fucking up MY (well my Father’s perfectly fine sound system).
And I reveled in it. I wallowed in it like my cousins pigs and thought, wondered really, at how amazing a host I could be.
Then I heard something break. Glass shattering and laughter from the drunken, uncaring mistake; I heard Bobby Taylor, through cigarette mist shout about a poker game in the bedroom. My bedroom. And I was a bit fucking curious about that.
I’ll set the stage because it’s kind of odd. Was to me anyway:
It’s me (of course)
Bobby and Tre Stevens and Mike Burkwoltxz and Lisa Finch and Tanya Lanski and (of course) Holly Peterson.
I have a pretty big round table in my room, it’s just always been there and so we start the game.
Strip Poker. One hand, one piece of clothes per winner.
Well I suck at poker and Bobby and Tre are pretty good I learned and before you know it Lisa and Tanya are about as naked as you can get without having a tag on your toe or a birth certificate. Holly, God Bless Her, is sitting there in a white bra and refusing denim bleach washed jeans.
Bobby and Tre decide the game is as good as it’s going to get and stumble off in some strange lurid wobble walk with Lisa and Tanya; down a darkened hallway towards empty bedrooms and I thought about how much laundry soap was left in the laundry room. Sheets were going to have to be done tomorrow. The girls were giggling but then, they giggle at everything.
Mike figures he would rather puke in my hallway bathroom than anything else on Earth.
So then it’s me and Holly.
I deal and she looks at me carelessly and laughs. A smart laugh. She laughed and tossed her hair her eyes held no ridicule, or judgement; but they did have something of challenge in them. Like C’mon, I dare you.. no, I double dog dare you.
She deals and I see laughter, feel pain and the curious sting of hope.
I deal and I wonder.
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