The sun comes up, in a very metaphorical sense in that it has surely been up for some time, but the metaphor here is such: the sunrise is the vehicle and my memory is the tenor. I’m running down the hallway towards our room. I have a tremendous urge to urinate, no shoes, no key, no clue how or why I am doing what I am doing. All I know is 17004, our room number.
The door is locked. I search my pockets and there is nothing but an ATM receipt for four-hundred and four dollars and ninety-nine cents. Troubling, but I have no time to make sense of it and stuff it back into my pocket to use both hands to knock on the door. My hands get sore rapidly, so I start to kick the door. This occurs to me as being strange behavior so I begin to head-but the door.
I take a break, close my eyes, and prepare myself to urinate in the same ice machine drip drain Darby had used however long ago it was he had used it. I run down to it and find that in this phase of intoxication, the return, this place makes so much less sense as a bathroom and so much more sense as a bad idea, so I run back to the door and continue my pummeling.
Then it opens. Not our door, that is, but the one next door. I am instantly embarrassed as a sweet looking middle aged couple in country club attire steps out, sees me and steps back in quite quicker than one would expect or consider normal behavior. I think how disturbing a sight I likely am and stop pounding to catch my breath leaning against the door.
The man comes out. He’s nice looking, got the over the calf white socks and low top white deck shoes, Bermuda shorts and a cheesy shirt circa 1980 that screams “Midwesterner.” He smiles at me.
“Hey buddy, you okay?” He asks with a twang that corroborates the shirt.
“Yeah, I’m just locked out and I’m trying to wake up my buddy’s to get back in.” I am still out of breath but now running in place to distract my body’s ever growing urge to rid itself of whatever toxins had built up in the plumbing.
“Well, do you want to use the phone? I don’t know, maybe call them?” He asks. His wife comes out the door he his holding open and flashing a warm smile.
“Phone?!” I yell. It is a strange word to me and an even stranger idea. I don’t know Darby’s phone number by memory, I don’t know who else is in there and I don’t know their numbers by memory either. What would a phone do? I could call home. I could call my mom and tell her I’m locked out of the room, the only phone number I have memorized is my own and my parents’ home phone. “What would I do with a phone?” I ask. “I don’t even know how to use a phone.” I hold out my hands, palms up like I’m holding two handfuls of oranges and let them shake for emphasis.
“Calm down buddy, I meant…” The lock pops and Darby’s pale hung over face is in the crack of the door, I push it open and run inside because I still have to pee and the confusion about phones only made it worse. As soon as I pass him I am hit with the warm stench of stale vomit. Min is sleeping on the couch, his pants are on the floor, I wonder what he is wearing under that blanket, but only briefly as I turn into the bathroom.
The bathroom is a scene. It has no odor aside from soap. Someone took a shower. The Jacuzzi tub has glasses in it. Three or four red wine glasses, three or four tumblers, a couple pint glasses and a souveniere yard glass girls get full of weak slushly margaritas. I had the best piss of my life. Two minutes of total body relaxation that felt like the last breath before you go to sleep, or the first drag of a cigarette. It feels so good I have to stop halfway through to sit down so I get the total relaxation bit.
The ice in the sink is not yet melted and the beer cans have that sweat on them that makes them irresistible, especially in Vegas at whatever time it was. So while I sit pant-less on the toilet for no reason I grab one and the tv remote and fire away. The channel is still ESPN, the ticker says 1 pm mountain time. Mountain time makes about as much sense to me as telephones at this point, but I slowly surmise that it’s around noon, or one. I also realize that I have no idea what time zone vegas is in.
I finish the beer before getting up so as not to harm the fragile food and bathroom code which more or less states food opened in the bathroom may not be consumed anywhere else, and it is half done and I’m still drunk so I just want to enjoy it in peace and I’m not shitting so it’s totally okay unless someone sees me because it totally looks like I’m shitting and I have been in here awhile which is another point for shitting, so I chug it and put it in the bathtub with everything else.
I re-enter the room and the vomit smell is back. I edge closer to Darby who is passed out face down in the 10 inch gap between the bed and the wall with his boots on and give him a whiff. To my surprise he smells like soap, which explains the bathroom smell, but he’s still wearing his boots which makes no sense because who puts there shoes on between shower and passing out face down on the floor?
I walk over to Min and the smell gets to be too much to bear. I have to stop every foot or so to get acclimated to the stench so I don’t vomit myself and I do not know why I have to get so close and why I don’t stop but eventually I’m standing right over him and it is awful. His breath reeks of it, his shirt collar is caked with it and he has this perverted smile that tells his entire story without saying a goddamn word.
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