Still, we don’t get around to assembling the Buffett costumes until our ship is about to leave the harbor, when the final horn is blowing. As the first big party weekend of the unofficial summer approaches, Dylan’s lame coworkers nonetheless cobble together this idea for a massive, three day blowout up on Lake Erie. We threw in our money basically as soon as this flare gun was fired into the air, the actual stated purpose totally irrelevant to us — a sort of bachelor and bachelorette’s throwdown, or something to that effect, for his coworker Sally’s impending wedding to her cop boyfriend, Dave. Even so, it’s only with an hour to spare, after work, before driving up there, that he and I divebomb into different thrift stores, seeking to assemble the pieces. We both recognize that this dry run is about as perfect as it gets.
And there’s also no time this afternoon for any second guesses about the outfit. Fortunately the cargo shorts I already own have universal applications, and will work in this context. Ditto the sandals I have stowed in the open suitcase, lying in wait on my bedroom floor for days. As far as the more outrageous components, I grab a trio of Hawaiian shirts, ranging from not too ridiculous to completely over the top, and also this light blue fishing hat which has a zippered pouch on the side. Perfect. Along with some sunglasses and the brand new blender — no less its intended contents, readily available at our favorite liquor store — we acquired last week, this party barge has everything it needs and should soon set sail.
Back at the apartment, I can see that Dylan has made many of the same stylistic choices, having hit a pair of discount thread shops himself. The greatest difference, really, is this hilarious straw hat he has purchased, which somehow instantly calls to mind that old Island of Dr. Moreau movie, the one with Marlon Brando. In fact, although not technically the least bit a beachy or Buffett-esque nickname, I will subsequently refer to this as his Dr. Moreau hat. Then again, wasn’t that a tropical island? I believe it might have been.
Beyond this, however, we are moving at too frantic a pace for me to contemplate the finer points of Dylan’s ensemble. As I have pulled up in front of my place, I can see there’s already an unfamiliar, black, nearly new looking SUV parked perpendicular to Dylan’s truck, which I assume is surely the third participant of this bizarre travel itinerary. Peering inside as I drift past, I spot some slightly older gent behind the wheel, chatting on his phone, who can only be Sally’s ex-boyfriend Dennis.
“Duuuuuuude,” Dylan tells me, upon my entering the living room, “I think we’re in trouble!”
“Oh really? Why do you say that?” I ask, fearing the worst, the sunny rays of this Caribbean smile instantly clouding over.
“This motherfucker seems like a total George Clooney type, man. You know, smooth talking middle aged guy, the whole salt-n-pepper buzz cut, or whatever, really well dressed…we probably don’t stand a prayer with all these cougars this weekend. Not with him around.”
Are they even cougars, though? While it’s possible the ladies in our entourage might loosen up after a few glasses of Sutter Home zinfandel, I’m not stashing all my coconuts on that particular beach. Actually, while the presence of a George Clooney is admittedly not great, I have long felt that, considering the everyday lameness of that troupe, not to mention that many are bringing their own men, our best bet would undoubtedly involve meeting strangers up there on the lake anyway. And the addition of even the smoothest talking ladies’ man can only impact so much, in fact there’s a case to be made that he might improve our chances in that regard.
I toss one Hawaiian shirt over my ratty tee right now, the rest into the world’s ugliest suitcase, and make my way downstairs. Somewhat sweating the prospect of us three cramming into either Dylan’s single truck seat, or even worse my tiny deathtrap of a car, it’s a relief to learn that this Dennis has already volunteered his ride. Otherwise, my roomie has already loaded everything, including that blender and its intended contents.
“He took one look at all that alcohol, and I could tell he was thinking, what a bunch of fuckin idiots,” Dylan cackles, as we lock up and head outside.
After we climb aboard and take off, however, it soon emerges that many of these fears are unfounded. Though this Dennis character might resemble the quintessential smooth middle aged ladies’ man, and can if nothing else project that front at first contact, we soon discover that he’s actually a major goofball. And now this whole enterprise is making quite a bit more sense, as in why Sally would have ever invited an ex-boyfriend along in the first place. Considering her fiancé will be present this weekend as well. This guy is totally harmless and not much of a threat to pull off anything.
More encouraging, though, is that if nothing else he comes across as respectable enough, and basically on the same page as us, to suggest he might make for a decent sidekick. This is crucial as our destination, South Bass Island, which is more commonly referred to by the name of its most prominent feature, Put-In-Bay, promises to be jumping this weekend. For once in our lives, Sally’s guest list has included far more women than men, and even the booking of our very room, all of which she singlehandedly arranged, holds implied promise — it’s Dylan, Dennis and me, plus Sally’s sister and some other chick, which we collectively know either not that well, or not at all. And this says nothing about the legions of wild, drunken women sure to be strewn about the island this weekend, nor of one other significant twist I’m just now learning about.
“Oh, I forgot to tell you, man!” Dylan says from the backseat, having volunteered for such a seating arrangement, as I’m left in front with Dennis, “Jodie’s gonna be up there this weekend. She and her friend, the other Jody. You remember her, right?”
“Oh yeah, totally. Wow, that’s pretty cool.”
“Yeah man! This is shaping up like it might be quite the weekend…”
Jodie is Dylan’s own ex of many years prior, a blue eyed blonde whom I always thought attractive, although her personality could go either way after enough drinks. Reliably frisky in that state, you could count on that much, the only question being what this might entail: sometimes excessively bubbly and flirtatious, which bodes well for Dylan, sometimes much more argumentative. Which might not bode well for anybody. But on balance, I agree with his assessment, that this is probably some great news. Particularly as her friend, whom I always think of as Jody With A Y (though uncertain how she even spells her name) has gone on record as telling Jodie she thinks I’m cute, and somewhat thrown herself at me the few times we have met. Nothing has ever happened, though, mostly because by some messed up fluke I’ve always had another female out with me any night she’s been around — and I’m not exactly well known for bringing my women out around the crew a ton. In fact, the last time I saw her, as I was leaving with my then fuckbuddy, Jody came right out and asked me not to go home with that girl, to stay with her at the bar instead.
Why I’ve never gotten her number is I guess an indefensible question, but yeah, this is possibly a great weekend for that development, too. Even if it does have me suddenly questioning the ridiculousness of this getup. How committed are we to this angle? We could be harpooning ourselves in the foot. Should we possibly stick to just tee shirts instead, leave the Hawaiian ones and maybe even the hats in our suitcases? I’m not sure, but do have a couple hours to ponder the weather forecast.
“Whatever happens on the island, stays on the island!” Sally has stated repeatedly, as this weekend’s intended catchphrase, in emails and in person for the past few weeks. But that’s just it, we are kind of hoping — at least we think we are — that some of these developments are not shipwrecked up there, that we are able to transport them home with us. Then again, this weekend voyage is a yearly tradition, for the women in the group, only made coed this very year due to Dave’s presence in her life. So she’s surely spouted that sentiment, which was lifted from Vegas marketing materials anyway, for who knows how many years.
Yet if there’s any year where that would threaten to suddenly become meaningless, it’s this. And having Dennis on hand for this lengthy ride north might prove key, to pick his brain in isolation prior to arrival. Though his relationship with Sally withered and died off twenty years ago, predating this summer tradition, he does at least know some of the players. Dylan is somewhat familiar with Sally’s sister, Karen, our weekend roommate, and I’ve met her once. However the other woman lodging with us, Sally’s cousin Monica, represents a total unknown. Therefore we can’t help but ask Dennis to describe Monica with a few key bullet points.
“She’s a slut,” he says, and nothing more.
Apart from cracking up over this, we are mostly listening to Dennis drone on about his job, something to do with driving around and checking the performance of cell phone towers. Yet at least from where I’m sitting in the passenger seat, this is preferable to the dreaded silence which would otherwise eat up mile after endless mile.
“Now see, like that. Each one probably has two or three companies using it, it’s cheaper for them to just rent space on a tower that’s already built instead of building one themselves,” he offers at one juncture, pointing at a specimen we are about to pass.
“Ah yes, that makes sense,” I say.
Owing to some construction and a fast food pit stop, two hours becomes more like two and a half, but it passes quickly enough regardless. During breaks in conversation, or even while Dennis is talking, it’s only natural that my mind lists to port now and then, specifically wondering what this purported slut Monica might look like, to internal debates about any potential Karen might hold. She’s borderline hot for a somewhat older lady, and gives off the cool aunt vibe. The only downside is that as Dylan explains it, she just had “pussy surgery” and therefore her nether regions are totally out of commission this weekend.
As we pull into the ferry parking lot, at the edge of Lake Erie, I consider it a good signpost that some hack on acoustic is bludgeoning his way through Jimmy Buffett songs while we wait. This settles it, then, the Hawaiian shirt and fishing hat are staying. And when this boat finally materializes over the horizon and draws to shore, any fears we’d had about accidentally dropping yon monstrous liquor cache into the Great Lakes evaporate as well.
The entire setup here is really quite smooth. Some humorless fat blonde girl of maybe twenty-two brings a motorized cart around, with a trailer behind it, onto which everyone loads their gear. A twelve foot wide plank descends from the ferry, which she is able to drive right up, depositing our goods, as we passengers pile in behind her. Battening the hatches for this three mile ride over to the island, this shaky yet presumably quite sturdy, triple decked craft lurches to life once more.
Having climbed up top for a better view — in both senses, meaning the distant sights but also those directly beneath us — an exceptionally windy twenty minutes will follow. The main reason us three were saddled together is that we were evidently the last ones leaving town, as virtually everyone else is enjoying a four day weekend or skipped out sometime this morning. But it already seems obvious how this dynamic is likely to play out, and that it has potential for being a fruitful one, all weekend long. Dylan and I acting as some sort of advance scouts, maybe, with our jackass shtick, while Dennis, goofball or not, hangs back and hopefully smooths things out, with what is almost surely a more conventional approach.
By the time we land and pick our pieces from the luggage trailer on the dock, it is now almost fully dark. I look back the way we’ve just came and observe that as far as I can see, boat after boat is tied off in the bay, from here to that jutting piece of rock in the middle, Gibraltar Island, which apparently belongs to Ohio State University. The appearance this lends is that a person could hopscotch from one vessel to another, from here to there and back again, without even touching water. And if nothing else sure sounds like something some drunken idiot will attempt during these next three days.
Considering that everything is uphill from here, and we don’t feel like hanging out to rent transportation, a slog with this luggage awaits us. Our hotel looms above, one full layer behind these bars and shops on the main drag, meaning that even with most of us wheeling our gear along, we are seriously earning our much delayed, soon forthcoming, post-happy hour refreshments. By far the greatest burden lies not with any personal effects, however, but the third piece Dylan and I collaborated upon, the suitcase containing our alcohol stash. As such we rotate pulling this monster, with even Dennis game enough to participate. Then again, he will surely enjoy these spoils right alongside us, preferably as soon as we check into that room.
“This thing sounds like a freight train!” Dylan cackles, while we zigzag our way through this melee of bodies, cars, and golf carts, zipping around us with only a slight concession to order.
“Has about as much torque as one,” I note, chuckling in return, as the current barnyard animal yoked to this wagon.
After we turn from the lake adjacent Bayview, onto perpendicular Catawba Avenue, we pass a park and another side street, both flooded with bodies, as is this road. The sounds of a tropical tinged cover band or three jostle for position above already elevated human voices, whoops, laughter, shouts, as well as regular old vehicle noise, clanking glass, and every so often a lone acoustic guitar-slinging troubadour cutting above all, if everything breaks just right for him. And improbably enough, before we’ve even reached our hotel, who should we spot strolling down the hill but our remaining roommates for the next few days.
Karen, the slightly known commodity, has light blonde, shoulder length hair framing her face, slightly mischievous blue eyes and a slender yet curvy frame. Other than a theoretical lack of sluttiness, she’s essentially the dictionary entry of a cougar, at or near the top of the line model for such, and this includes her easygoing, quick to laugh personality. Then there’s Monica, a fortysomething chick who looks totally fine as well, yet otherwise hits almost none of these marks, upon my first impression. Her head sports a spiky cut dyed bright reddish orange, accentuated by a nice ass and okay face, and while I would certainly not decline if she decided to share some precious bed space with me, her whole gimmick, I can tell already, is presenting herself as the sassy one of the bunch. Not exactly the best demographic for dealing with Dylan and me.
How she represents this now is by acting as nonplussed as possible, and not having time for the likes of us, because they’ve met these guys from Michigan that she is over the moon about. Therefore ditching us shortly after introductions are handed out, while Karen alone agrees to lead us back up the hill to our room. All of which means that the fluke encounter, stumbling upon those ladies, has saved us untold hassle — otherwise, without either of their phone numbers, and for that matter with our names possibly not even on the bookings, who knows how much time this might have devoured. Now, this happens so quickly that upon stowing away our belongings, Karen hands us the spare room key, and we are out the door again without even bothering to set up the blender.
Karen is a well-seasoned vet at navigating this landscape, and nimbly leads us down an only slightly less insane side street, then with dexterous ease around the backsides of various buildings, as if by scent. I’m reminded of our college campus scene back home, albeit with a population much more evenly tilted toward those middle aged and older. These impressions all collide when we arrive at some tiny sliver of an alleyway beside our destination, the Beer Barrel Saloon, which bills itself as the longest continuous bar in the world. Where we promptly encounter two more women that Karen knows, members of our extended posse, one of which is bent over puking. The other, who has a cast on her left leg, is some older blonde woman, patting her on the back and helping hold her upright.
Is this a triage unit or a roving festival? Or a little of both, crammed under one giant carnival tent? Amid this chaos, hail thee well mets are handed off in passing, where we learn that the damsel in distress — even younger than we — is a skinny, otherwise cute brunette named Mary Jo, while her slightly immobilized sidekick is Tracy. They are but two of the other four chicks staying with Sally in room 237, merely a few doors down from us. Though it is dark, both appear certainly double enough, each representing potential dim alleys of their own for us to explore.
And then with a tip of our tropical hats, we continue bushwacking our way around the corner, our destination’s front door. Inside, the college campus vibe isn’t a wavelength or an aura, it’s a blunt instrument bashing us over the heads. Though the cover charge isn’t too horrific, jostling our way through this dense forest does leave one wishing he had maybe a machete or something, and when we reach the admittedly impossible to miss World’s Largest bar, and Dennis immediately volunteers to spring for a bucket of beer, I’m surprised his wallet doesn’t float to the ceiling after forking over the cash. I can only hope we are not expected to maintain a frantic pace at those prices this weekend, or else the next two days might involve nothing but the hotel room and our liquor stash.
A couple other temporary troughs are placed in strategic locations, to keep up with the demand. Onstage, a party band covers all the expected classic hits and then some, as they drift from Blister in the Sun to Laid while we’re still making our initial rounds and cataloging the landscape. During which, by the next inexplicable miracle, we soon stumble upon Jodie and her friends, seated at a round table not too far from the door, though somehow missing them and they us when we first entered the premises.
Accompanying her is Jody With A Y and three other girls, ranging from highly to somewhat attractive. The lowest ranking is one whom I feel little Pete would nonetheless verbally spar with me over, defending her hotness in his sparse ledger: a bone thin, short, plain and weary looking one who does admittedly possess an okay body. Then again, even Jody With A Y, though a fair complected, curly haired blonde, isn’t quite my ideal body shape, as she stands a couple of inches taller than me. But I am certainly not taking issue with this if she doesn’t.
As we fall into formation around them, Dennis proudly planting the beer bucket like a flag in the middle, the three of us crack open one apiece and continue surveying more distant lands. Just one table over, five older women with wedding rings are all grinning over at us, which might provide some opportunity for playing these two factions off each other. Not for the last time, though, while mostly committed to this new drunken sailor type gimmick, I’m wondering why we ever got away from wearing those left hand accessories ourselves. And meanwhile, standing nearby in the opposite direction, Karen is chatting solo with one of those Michigan dudes.
“What’s happ’nin, Jody With A Y!” I cheer.
“Jody With A Y? What? What’s that?” she questions above the din.
“I don’t know,” I shrug, “that’s just how I think of you. On the rare occasion I do, I mean. J-O-D-Y.”
“No. Who said there was a Y? There is no Y.”
“Oh. Okay. Can I call you…Jodi With No E, then, instead? I mean, you gotta give me something, here.”
“Ummm…sure, whatever.”
As for Dylan, his Jodie is clearly quite plowed already, and in this instance it’s boding very well for tonight if not the remainder of this weekend and beyond — for all of us. At one point, as the evening advances but before we’ve even been here too terribly long, I look over and she’s knelt down, licking Dylan’s crotch through his cargo shorts. This development arriving shortly before, and finding him in better spirits for enduring, the development whereby she lifts up her shirt and bra, flashing all of us and anyone else with a sightline. Jiggling her tits around with merry whoop. Still later, Dylan dips off to the restroom, and Jodie divebombs my face with a wet, sloppy kiss, one I am fortunately too shocked to respond to in the slightest.
“You and Jodi should hook up!” she shouts, nimbly switching gears as if this had always been the intent.
“Oh yeah? Why do you say that?”
“Come on! It’s obvious you two like each other!”
“Uh…but wait, isn’t that what you say about Cassie and me, too?”
Despite my deflection, Jodie’s observation is not exactly a newsflash, not when considering what she’s already heard from her friend. Meanwhile Jodi With No E is pretending not to have seen the sneak attack nor to pay any attention to this conversation, though shooting transparent sidelong glances. Even so, though everything is trending in the right direction, mine and surely Dylan’s greatest fear is that Jodie might be getting a little too sloppily drunk.
This is the blemish besmirching many a promising evening, after all, which either nobody wants to talk about much, or we all seem to somehow forget: how many more occasions did we do everything right, and things were plainly heading in an undeniable sexual direction, until the chick got so smashed she couldn’t keep her eyes open? It seems like we could each add a good 10% to our tallies, as a result, which we should have had and were not our faults — unless maybe you consider our inability to cut the girl off — without this being any stretch at all.
Nonetheless, despite this seemingly unstoppable slide toward incoherence, Jodie remains functional. Functional enough, anyway. And one thorny, extremely pertinent, unanswered question, which Dylan now confronts at this very moment, is the deft handling required when it comes to these exes. In many respects, this is both much easier and much more difficult than dealing with someone new, as nonsensical as that would seem on the surface. Easier to fall into bed with again, and resume a serious relationship with as well. Yet far more complicated if you’re not sure about the second half of that equation, how to navigate this, hopefully pull off the first while not totally torching your legacy together. Assuming she somehow isn’t already hip to your game and pulling the plug before this even happens.
Dylan finds himself in this predicament, right now. Owing to the considerable time gap, I find tremendous parallels between these two, and the current state of affairs with Helena and me back home. A couple key differences, which almost balance one another out, are that it hasn’t quite been so long for him and Jodie, yet they’ve also experienced much less buildup to this unexpected reunion, and it has blindsided him to some degree as a result.
These matters require almost surgical precision, in the art of hanging around long enough but not too long. And as if circling this point with a magic marker, the happy hour portion of our posse begins splintering. Pussy surgery or not Karen seems destined for further adventures with this Michigan guy (his pack of bros even arrived here via their own boat, bolstering their cool factor considerably,) but not tonight, as she stretches and yawns and announces she’s heading back to our room alone. I make a derogatory remark about this lame showing from a member of the Happy Hour Crew, which she responds to by flipping me off. But then laughs and attempts tickling me before sauntering off into the night. Meanwhile, Michigan slinks away to another corner of the bar, rejoining his buddies.
Things are happening way too fast, and I feel as though we are pulled in fifteen different directions at once. Jodie’s friends get on this kick pointing at Dylan and laughing, crowing, “look how mellow he is! I’ve never seen someone so mellow!” Mostly a running commentary on his responses to Jodie’s advances, which find him apparently too shell shocked to act upon. I get it, though, having sat only semi-thawed myself, in a similar frozen state with Helena, before the heavens eventually parted and illuminated the way, melting the rest of that ice.
But now I hear Jodi With No E lean in and tell Jodie, “Dylan and Sid and their friend here should come back to the campground with us.”
They are staying over at the State Park campground, I know, at the far end of this tiny island. This does indeed sound like quite the convivial scene, and Jodie nods at this proposal herself. However, when I mention such to Dylan, what Jodi With No E had just said and that this might be my opportunity to hook up with her at last, he assures me, “oh, she’s just a cocktease, dude,” and waffles mightily at this proposal, refuses to commit to it, even though his Jodie has continually stated such herself.
I’m disappointed, but understand where he is coming from. Surrounded by this ocean full of fresh prospects, all but jumping out of the water and begging to be hooked, he is surely wondering, did I come all the way up here for this? To merely wind up sleeping with his ex-girlfriend instead, or even, who knows, wasting our time heading over there, only for her to pass out in a drunken unfulfilled stupor anyway. It’s one of those situations which sounded awesome to Dylan until we got here — a tantalizing backup plan, though quickly losing its luster if becoming the only plan.
So although Jodi With No E even places a hand on my arm, looks me in the eyes and says, “I’m serious! You guys should come out!” and I nod, shrug, agree to see what I can do, it’s possible I’m dropping the ball to some extent by not asking more questions, pressing the case farther with Dylan, or for that matter even getting her number, after all these years. But as that whole crew leaves, I figure we’ve got all weekend, and it’s best to just chill, hang back and seem unconcerned. After all this is already a very encouraging and action packed first few hours. Dylan and Jodie share a brief kiss, even, but then these girls depart.
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Thanks and have a great week!
