“Listen Sam, I need this to go well. I don't like her, and everything that has gone on with her, but still, she is my boss, and she controls our financial future for the time being” Sydney said slowly, looking at Sam’s profile as he focused on the road ahead of him.
(More, of course, after the break)
“Bear left in four hundred feet” said the slightly English sounding woman from the GPS device mounted to the front windshield.
“I’m not sure why you are so worried about me, I’m great with this kind of stuff” Sam said while checking his blind spot.
“Well, sure, as long as you don’t drink too much. If she offers beer or whatever, just come up with some excuse or something”
“What kind of excuse could I come up with? After the Christmas party I’m pretty sure all your coworkers know my relationship with beer, and alcohol in general.”
“Turn left to arrive at Destination” said the voice with a sense of accomplishment.
“You at least ate a big lunch like I asked, right?”
Same put the car into park in front of Destination. “Lunch?” he asked in such a way that the answer was clearly no.
The concern Sydney had was that her husband, while very funny sober (though slightly withdrawn), and still funny drunk (and very outgoing) was also far too honest for his own good after imbibing ethanol. Especially with things she told him in strict confidence.
These things include:
“Keri (her boss, the host of the dinner) is such a bitch. I was on the toilet when her and Lindsey (co-worker, presumably) came into the bathroom and started talking shit about my work ethic. Like, that I was so lazy, and that I never finished my assignments on time. Fuck them! At least my work makes sense and doesn’t have to be redone like theirs.”
Or:
“Keri just had to invite us to dinner publicly, didn’t she? I mean, seriously, she could have sent a private message on our mutual social networking site, but instead, she wrote write on my profile page. Hey, come over for dinner, I’ve missed you outside work!. Missed! As if she had ever spent time with my outside work!”
Or:
“I can’t believe how much she was hitting on you after I told her who you were! Just because she lives with her sister and is like, forty, at least, doesn’t mean she can just throw it out after every guy she sees”
And she always waits until Sam is good and drunk until she brings these things up, as he is much more interested, and willing to agree with her vehemently.
“Oh god” she said, face palming.
“Let’s just get this over with babe.” Sam said, opening the driver side door and stepping out.
They walked down the cement walkway towards the door. The house was large, but for a supervisor, unimpressive. All the houses in the neighborhood looked slightly different, but, Sydney noticed, they all had the same amount of windows on each floor. She imagined they would all look exactly the same on the inside. It was better than Sydney (a renter) could say, not being able to live somewhere with the illusion of uniqueness.
Before she could start thinking about the politics of knocking, the door proper opened. There was Keri, the six foot tall blond in all her amazonian (Amazon was Sydney’s derogative of choice, being five feet tall herself) glory.
Sam, she knew, had a thing for tall women. He was five feet and six inches tall. This irritated her.
Keri waved her hand toward herself, signaling them to come in. Sam opened the glass door (it was one of those common dual door setups, glass or, whatever the plastic equivalent is in transparency) for Sydney and immediately-
“Syd! So great to see you! You have to see my bedroom! I’ll give you the grand tour!” she paused as Sam stepped into the house after Sydney and looked at him, saying “Oh hello Sam. I only only part of the tour I think you will be interested in is the last part, the bar, which is right down the hall in the kitchen. Help yourself” and then she winked.
Sydney waited until Keri’s back was to the both of them to glare at Sam, and he just shrugged his shoulders and smirked as in (Well, she is offering and all, and anyway, this is my reward for this, so there).
Sam walked into the kitchen and looked around until his eyes landed on the neat rows of liquor bottles. Jackpot. He walked up and grabbed a glass, noticing there was even a ice bucket filled waiting for him. He wondered why they didn’t visit more often.
He reached for the first dark bottle of liquor he spotted when he heard from behind him-
“Why, you must be Sam!”
He turned only to see Keri, without Sydney.
“Where is Sydney?” he asked, looking around Keri as if Sydney would just jump out from somewhere.
“I haven’t met her yet either!” Keri replied, smiling without a hint of irony.
“But… she works-“
Keri laughed, then shook her head. “No, no, I’m Keri’s sister Sherri. We are twins, and I am shocked, and at the same time not surprised that she never mentioned me.
“Seriously?” Sam asked, hand still on the neck of the whiskey bottle.
“Well, yeah. You know, it’s too bad you are ma-“
“Sherri! So glad you are introducing yourself to one of my guests!” Keri piped in from still out of site.
“Go ahead and pour your drink handsome, you are going to need it” whispered Sherri.
Sam poured.
Keri walked into view with Sydney and said, to the whole room, “And this is the kitchen, inside my wonderful kitchen you will notice a modestly stocked bar and my twin sister who, yes, unbelievably, still lives here!”
Sherri yawned.
Sam took a large gulp of the whiskey.
The silence that perpetuated itself made it clear to Sydney and Sam that this would resemble more of a family dinner than a friends dinner, with the tension and politics that go with it.
“So, um, need some help getting dinner finished Keri?” Sydney asked, her voice squeaking, as it always seemed to do when breaking a silence.
Sherri laughed and left the kitchen.
“Sorry about that” Keri said softly to the both of them. She leaned her body to look down the hall Sherri had exited to, and then straightened back up.
“It’s just that…”
A part of Sam’s brain that had not be accessed due to the effects of ethanol on memory had been unlocked by the trigger of the sudden aura change. It was something else Sydney shared with her about her boss, another complaint:
“She always tries to open up to, like everyone, about her personal problems. Like, sex, money, all kinds of stuff. Especially her sister. I’ll just run into her in the hallway and she will stop me and say something like: Hey Syd, my sister didn’t flush the toilet again this morning, and she always leaves this tiny little rabbit turds that just refuse to flush, and I can’t sit on a toilet worried one of these little stinky rabbit turns are going to float up on me, you know?
And I just nod along and when she finishes ask her if she knows where the back-up printer paper is, and without beating an eye she will just tell me where it is.”
Stinky rabbit turds was trapped inside Sam’s mind even as he tried to tune into the personal information being divulged.
“- and she always just hangs around when I have men over, and then they get this like twin sex thing stuck in their minds and I just know it’s over from there. And don’t get me started on the bathro-“
BEEP yelled the oven.
“Ah, the roast is done, ready to eat? Go ahead and grab a beer out of the fridge Sam, help yourself as well Syd”
Sam finished his drink and made a beeline to the fridge, opening to see a neat row of Indian pale ale waiting for him (his beer of choice, it was noted at the office party where he drank all of the bottles of IPA someone had brought [“Does Sam have a drinking problem Syd? Because I could totally feel for you there” had been an attempt at bonding that particularly pissed Sydney off, especially since she had pulled Sydney aside during the party]).
Sydney knew this was likely to happen, this coaxing of Sam to drink. She guessed Keri either knew it would get Sam talking (which could lead to fights) or would reveal him for the abusive alcoholic she projected him to be.
“Did either of you want anything?” Sam said, pulling his key chain bottle opener from his pocket.
Sydney just shook her head as Keri put on an oven mitt. “No, I don’t really drink, but thanks Sam” said Keri, looking at Sydney.
Sam didn’t really want to drink alone, but he had already started, and the thought of suffering through this potentially horrible dinner sober was unthinkable to him. Besides, she wasn’t going to drink all this delicious beer…
As Keri pulled the roast from the oven she sighed. “Sorry I didn’t mention she would be here. And I’m pretty sure she intends to eat with us, of course. It’s as if her whole life is devoted to ruining mine” Sydney just stood five feet away, switching between looking at her feet and looking at Keri. Keri just stared down at the roast, her eyes tearing up.
Sam shut the fridge and turned to see the first tear and immediately looked towards Sydney and made a face that said approximately: Oh shit! Do something!. He thought of just leaving the room quietly but instead just sat there with the cold beer in his right hand and the bottle opener in his other hand.
Keri put both her mitted hand and her bare hand on the counter, and just started weeping over the roast. The heat-steam rising to her face as the tears started flowing. Sydney was frozen, having never actually felt empathy for her boss, but now she couldn’t help but be moved. She thought of saying something but knew it would come out squeaky, so she broke her paralysis and walked over to her, putting her hand on her back.
“Oh Sydney, you are my best friend” Keri said, turning to face her right away. She wiped the tears away, and smiled again. “Okay! Let’s eat!”
Sam and Sydney headed to the next room over where the glass table was, with four seats around it. Sydney and Sam sat across from each other. They were alone in the room while Keri was preparing to bring out the full course, but they were to perplexed by the situation to talk about anything they would be comfortable being over heard. Sam sipped on his beer as Sydney examined her finger nails.
Sydney saw Sherri enter the room from the hallway they hadn’t entered from. She took a seat, and Sydney, fearing Sam might mix the two together (obviously not noting that they were in fact wearing different clothes) said “So, uh, how long have you two been living together?”
Sherri rolled her eyes and said “long enough”.
Keri walked in from the hallway Sherri now faced in her chair carrying two dishes. She placed them on the table and left again.
“Keri told me I couldn’t drink one of those beers” Sherri said, as Sam went for a drink, but then, as she said it, just put it back down instead.
The floor, Sydney and Sam just became aware, was hard wood. The awareness of this came from the loud tapping of Sherri’s shoe against the wood. Sam noticed the beat lined up with his heart rate.
“Well someone sounds impatient” they heard from the ill-lit hallway as Keri slowly appeared with the roast.
“I don’t care about the food Keri, I care about the closet”
Sam and Sydney exchanged confused looks, which was quickly becoming a theme.
“I don’t know what you are-
“The locked closet Keri, the one upstairs. It is locked, again.”
“It’s my closet, and we can talk about this-“
“I never agreed with that. And nothing of mine is locked. What if something of mine is in that closet? I think my jacket might be.” Sherri’s arms were crossed and lying on the table, pushing down on the plate in front of her so the plate was raised in front of her in a thirty degree angle.
“Please Sherri, not now” Keri said sitting down. “Sam, Sydney, please! Help yourselves”
“thanks” they both said in unison, and softly, as if they didn’t really want to be heard.
“Fine, whatever, I’ll be right back, I’m going to get a drink. One I bought” She raised her crossed arms off the table quickly and the plate fell loudly onto the glass table.
When Sherri had left the room Keri looked at her guests and mouthed “sorry” and put food on her plate.
“So,” Keri said, a smile reappearing on her face, “we should get lunch together more often at work. I’ll let your extra break time slide” she winked at Sydney on the word ‘slide’.
“Absolutely, I agree, definitely” Sydney said quickly. She was looking at Keri, and from behind her saw Sherri enter with a bottle of vodka and a can of soda.
“Oh god” whispered Sydney.
“I already helped myself to a few shots in the other room, hope no one minds. Oh here Sam, brought you a beer. She reached behind her and pulled a beer from, to Sam’s surprise, her back pocket. “Uh, thanks Ker-Sherri.”
The meal went on with only the sounds of eating and Sherri placing the vodka bottle back on the table after taking a swig and making the “I just drank liquor straight” face, until she drank enough soda to make the face disappear.
The quiet went on until Sherri broke it with a slowly rising laugh. “Fuck this” Sherri said as she stood, wobbling slightly. She left the room quickly, obviously determined to do something.
“Sydney…” Keri said weakly, “could you please come upstairs with me?”
Sam could only describe Sydney’s face as horrified, but she just said “Yeah, no problem” and followed her out of the room. Same sat alone, drinking his beer, poking the rest of his food with a fork.
He felt the presence of someone enter the room and he looked up to see Sherri walk through the room with a sledgehammer in her hand. She didn’t stop to look or talk to him.
He wondered if he should follow her.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Sydney sat with her boss on the bed she was shown earlier. “The truth is Sydney” Keri said between sniffs, “well, I never have guys over here”
“Well, I don’t understand that Keri, because you-
“I have women over here”
Sydney didn’t attempt to finish her sentence.
“Do you understand what I mean?” Keri asked, hesitantly.
“Your gay?” she said, trying to sound as supporting as possible while also trying to sound unsurprised. The effect was monotone.
Keri just nodded and turned to look into Sydney’s eyes.
The sound of a sledgehammer hitting a door outside of the room would have been relieving to Sydney in this situation had it not been the sound of a sledgehammer hitting a door. They both stood up quickly and rushed out into the hallway.
Sam decided not to follow an angry drunk six foot tall woman with a sledgehammer. Instead, he wondered back into the kitchen and, well, what the hell, opened another beer.
“Sherri stop!” Keri yelled as the scene of Sherri swinging a sledgehammer full force into the doorknob of the closet came into view. It was too much for Sydney to handle, the fact that her boss had almost come onto her, and now seeing two tall women fight, one wielding a deadly weapon.
“Fuck you, I’m getting into this closet, don’t even try to get in the way”
The next swing knocked the doorknob off. The door slowly opened. Keri fell to her knees and sobbing begged to her twin sister.
“Please… please just wait until Syd has left, then we can talk about this and I’ll move out and just please I’ll do anything”
“What the hell is all this shit” Sherri said, pulling out a picture frame.
Sydney, down the hall, practically hugging the door frame of Keri’s bedroom, stared at the frame as it was turned toward her. The face that came into view was her own.
“Is this a shrine?” Sherri laughed out slowly, dropping the sledgehammer.
Sam had heard the loud booms, but being much smaller than these women, decided to let family matters stay just that.
Sydney took the chance, Keri on the floor sobbing and Sherri distracted by the Sydney shrine, to make a run for it.
She ran to the kitchen and spotted Sam leaning on the counter gulping out of a beer bottle. “We have to get out of here NOW” Sydney said at a conversation volume, but at an intensity that said she wanted to scream it.
Sam put the bottle back down on the counter and followed her out.
“I’ll drive” said Sydney, putting her hand out waiting for the keys to be put in it.
In the car the first ten minutes of the drive was silent except for the voice of the GPS unit.
“Merge left in two hundred feet”
“So, what happened up there?”
“She came onto me and then her sister found a shrine to me”
“Oh”
“But it’s ok that we left like that. I don’t think I have to worry about being fired, or her talking to me about your alcoholism-
“My what?”
“- or asking me to lunch anymore. So, this dinner couldn’t have gone better, really. Thanks for coming with me Sam”
“Sure, but what were you saying about-“
“Keep left for four miles and then arrive at Destination”
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