Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

So I finally get home at like eleven or twelve, and as I walk in I hear a car engine revving and a horn blaring. This means only one thing - my roommate is playing Driver for Play Station - one of our favorites. Now let me explain this game to you. Most people, when they play this game, will play it the right way and try to actually progress through the game…not us. Our goals when we play are to see who can make the coolest wreck and/or flip the car, who can get the most cops after them and avoid them the longest, who can find jumps and make the car go flipping through the air, and if you’re really lucky, and this is rare, get caught in the scenery of the game because there’s some sort of glitch. Oh yeah, and you are supposed to wail the horn as much as possible. It probably doesn’t sound like it makes much sense, but oh man, at three in the morning it’s pure bliss! The scary part is that there were times when, after playing till all hours of the morning, I would be driving to class and see a cop on the side of me. As God as my witness I almost instinctively jacked my wheel so I would crash into him in an attempt to drive him off the road, maybe into a telephone pole, and start the chase. Luckily the part of my brain that cares about not going to jail kicked in and stopped me in the nick of time. I don’t blame it on the game though like most parents and crazy people do…I think it’s unsafe to be driving to class before noon.

So I go into the living room to see how he’s “progressing.”

“What’s up?” I ask as he pauses to wipe the sweat off his hands.
“What’s goin’ on, dude?” After some honking, “How was your day?”
“Sucked.”
“Oh yeah?”
“What’d you do?”
“I’ve been playing Driver all day.”
“Nice.”
HONK!HONK!HONK!HONK!HONK!HONK!“Cool man.”HONK!

I stay and watch for a little while longer, then head to my room to start my homework. Now remember I said I was a Music Major? Yeah well, tonight anything music related will be last on my list. Instead it’s Latin. I know, I know, “why did you choose Latin? Why not just do something easy like Spanish or French?” I already took Spanish in high school, so if I did it in college I would have to take a more advanced class, because I’m supposed to already know some. Too bad for me I’ve had a four year lag in between to forget everything (not that I really learned anything to begin with). French just makes me mad because sooooo many of the letters are silent. Plus whenever I think of “French” I think of French-Canadian senior-citizens who combine French and English, or creepy French men hitting on dumb American girls. So I’d either feel like a sixty-year-old or a pervert. Plus I think music should count as a second language. That one I can read, write and speak fluently, probably better than English (At least I pronounce my R’s). I was actually interested in Latin. I liked that it was a dead language that many of the others stemmed from and it has a timelessness to it. I was also fond of Gregorian Chant and was interested in incorporating it into my music somehow, so I thought this would be a good way to get very familiar with it. Yeah right! This was the hardest class I have ever taken…EVER! That was the only time in my life that I felt stupid. I know I’m not stupid but Latin did a number on me. I would spend hours doing a simple translation. I guess it wasn’t what I thought it would be.

So I’m in my room getting ready to start my Latin. I’m sitting on my bed, I’ve got my notebook, my note cards, which have key vocab words on them, my textbook, which has other information key to correct grammar translation, ant the translation book that has the story in it that I’m supposed to translate. This is all spread around me in a semi-circle so I have easy access to all of it. I get to work, still hearing the horns and revving engines from Driver in the next room.

At one point I notice there is silence which must mean that he paused the game because his girlfriend is here and he has to let her in. I hear the muffled greeting in the kitchen and I get jealous. Why don’t I have a girlfriend that will come visit me? I guess it is my fault though. My last girlfriend I pushed away until she broke up with me, which I have to say I wasn’t too disappointed with. I had a good time being single after that, I had a decent amount of hook-ups, both random and old stand-bys. I guess every now and then I miss the closeness of actual human contact (beyond the “human contact” of partially naked bodies I mean). I guess it wouldn’t have been so bad though if I was doing something other that Latin. If I was working hard composing my Magnum Opus, maybe it wouldn’t bother me so much…

As they move to the hallway and then into the living room, I start to actually hear what they are saying.

“How far did you get?” she asks about his progression in the game.
“You don’t get anywhere, you just play…and crash things.”

RRREEEEEVVVVV!HONK!HONK!HONK!HONK!MMMMMMM!!! And that’s Driver. He goes right back to playing and every now and then I hear his signature “HONK! HONK!HONK!HONK! HONK! ….. HONK! HONK!” (Shave and a haircut, honk, honk), and them laughing at the pandemonium. I continue with my Latin while he plays for about another half hour or so, then I hear it become silent again, so I listen.

“What to go see if Tim wants to watch a movie?” she asks (how sweet of her)
“Not really.” he says (I know he’s just kidding, or he just really wants to keep playing)
“Come on.”
“I’m just kidding.” (see)
“I’m getting sick of watching you play this. Go see if he wants to watch a movie.”
“All right, let’s go do that work, man.” (it’s an Italian mobster thing, don’t ask)

I go back to work, pretending like I didn’t just hear that he was coming in to ask me if I wanted to watch a movie, and I notice what a mess my stuff has become. My stack of note cards is now a pile, I lost my place in the book, I can’t remember which point in the translation I’m at (I think I’m about one quarter of the way through) and my notebook page is half torn out of the spiral from turning the page back and forth so many times.

“What’s goin’ on, man?”
“What’s up?”
“Wanna come watch a movie with us?”
“No, I can’t. I got WAY too much shit to do.”
“Latin?”
“Yup. It fuckin’ sucks, like I can’t even like work on my music or anything, I gotta just fuckin’ work on this shit, ALL the time!”
“That’s URI for ya’”
“This and work, that’s it.”
“All right, Dude.”
“Well have fun.”
“Yup.”

He goes back into the living room and I listen.

“Hey, what did Tim say? Does he wanna watch?”
“Oh, no he can’t watch, he’s got too much work.”
“He works too hard.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, do you know what you wanna watch?”
“Uuuuummm, let’s watch this.”
“Okay.”

I hear them getting the movie started and him tapping on his legs (he’s a drummer too), and I can tell that the light in the living room has gone off because it isn’t coming into my room anymore. They are probably snuggling under a blanket on the couch, when I hear the opening music to one of our favorite movies to watch together…and then I go back to doing Latin.

They have a very cute relationship. They have their ups and downs like any other couple, but over all they get along really well. They’ve been together for about three years now, since sophomore year, sometime during marching band season (yes, we’re all band geeks, but cool band geeks). He’s one of the few guys I know, maybe the only one, who puts his friends before his girlfriend. They do get alone time and do romantic things, but he’s not that guy who disappears when his girlfriend comes over. A lot of times, the three of us hang out all together, and it seems to work out pretty well: I’m used to being a third wheel and don’t mind it. She and I have kind of become friends too. There are even some times when she will come over and if my roommate has work to do, she and I will hang out. One time, for fun, we made a list of all the girls I’ve kissed and hooked up with (I’d say it was about average). Sometimes the two of us just need to vent to each other, because there are things that only the two of us understand.

I’m still working on Latin long after the movie finishes and they’ve gone to bed (It was late, even for me). I finally drift off to sleep at some un-godly hour, probably close to sunrise, but at least it was still dark out. All of a sudden the phone starts to ring. I snap awake, all freaked out because I was in that place half-way between dreaming and reality. You know, when you feel like you’re falling and all of a sudden, BAM you hit bottom and wake up. I wasn’t sure at that point if the phone really rang or if I had dreamt it, so I just laid there panting. The phone rang again, so now I knew it was real. I shot up to go answer it, my mind racing wondering who it could be, if something was wrong. I make it into the kitchen and then trip over the recycle bucket as I pick up the receiver.

“Hello?” I ask half asleep and disoriented.
“Hello, Timothy,” a sultry woman’s voice.
“Who the fuck is this?”
“I’ve been watching you.”
“What!?”
“I can’t wait to finally meet you in person…and I bet you can’t wait to meet me either.”
“Whatever.”

I slam down the receiver and head back to my room. When I’m at my door, about to go in, my roommate peeks his head out of his room.

“Who the hell was that?”
“Some bitch.”
“Great. G’night.”
“Night.”