9. Piper
NINE
Piper
Dear Super-Secret Diary,
You will never guess where I am RN. Okay, I’ll tell you! I’m on a plane, from Boston back to New York. As a very mature unaccompanied minor! First class! There’s a guy on this flight who looks like a young Jensen Ackles. His dimples are a ten. His butt is a TEN. But he also has a girlfriend with him who is a ten… Sad trombone. Still, I had the most amazing trip, and I will write about most of it in my other journal, because, tragically, the true story of my trip to Harvard is PG-13 enough for my snooping mom to read about. My aunt’s husband’s cousin turned out to be a very responsible one-day guardian in his own way. I can’t tell if Declan will be relieved or annoyed to learn this, LOL. I truly thought that Billy would be the one guy in my extended family who wouldn’t do his best to ensure that I remain a virgin for the rest of my life .
And yet he did his best.
At least his best was fun. What was really fun, though, was meeting the future Mrs. Boston. LOL. I have a total girl crush on her, but it was so cute to watch her and Billy and how they’d watch each other when they thought the other wasn’t looking—but I was looking. I have a new OTP, and I still have a swoony contact high from being around them. I am totally inspired, and that is why I have to write about it immediately!!!
Good Will Ghost Hunting
Everyone in his family had a theory as to why William O’Sullivan was still single. The Cannavale and the Cassidy and the O’Sullivan men all had one thing in common—amazing butts. And most of them had something else in common now too—amazing wives. All except for Billy. The theory among most of his relatives was that he was too busy having fun to have a girlfriend.
For Billy O’Sullivan was not just good at having fun—he was a wicked awesome genius when it came to shenanigans. To him it was an art, a science, and a way of life. He was always coming up with new equations for fun. If there was a seemingly unsolvable party problem, Billy could solve it.
Everyone’s getting tired and morose? Crank up the air-conditioning and the Meat Loaf songs!
Rental company didn’t deliver the bouncy castle? We’re goin’ to Walmart to get a big tent and a large inflatable bed—gather all the pillows you can find!
He knew all the equations, and he’d write them on his mirror in erasable pen when he couldn’t sleep: Guinness plus whiskey plus Cannavale cousins plus Nolan plus Chumbawamba equals multiple unaccounted for hours and hundreds of question marks the next day.
Thanksgiving plus toilet plus firecracker equals urban legend.
But ironically, he did not understand the most important equation of all: Billy plus Donna equals true love forevah and evah. Because he did not realize that he loved her and that she loved him. He had no idea how romantic he actually was. He was, in fact, troubled by what he perceived as a lack of romantic instincts. Oh, will I, William O’Sullivan, ever get my HEA? Will I? he found himself wondering. “Have I wasted too much of my life partyin’? And will I nevah find myself a bride because of this?” He’d become haunted by these questions, one might say.
But he would eventually find the answer to his HEA problem, and Donna would be both his teacher and his solution.
One night—a night that was seemingly just like every other—he went to a Harvard bar with his buddy Murphy. “ Where should we park my car when we go to the Harvard bar?” Billy asked his friend. “Just kiddin’! We’re takin’ the T ’cause we’re gonna get hammered!”
The place they went to was much like any other dive bar around Boston. Except that Murphy quickly spotted a wicked hot, curvaceous, and very smart redhead at the end of the bar counter. “Whoa,” he said. “I’m goin’ in.” He smoothed down his gelled hair and sauntered over, in his tracksuit, to where the lady was sitting by herself.
“Oh, hello there,” he said when she finally noticed him.
“Oh, hello,” she said politely.
“My name is Murphy,” he said, feigning a classy air. “What might your name be?”
“My name is Donna,” she said, shaking his outstretched hand.
“Donna, Donna, Donna, yeah. I thought I recognized you,” Murphy said. “I think we had a class together last semester.”
“Oh yeah?” she said, playing along. “Which one?”
“Yeah, Theory of Love, I think it was. I sat behind ya.”
Donna continued to politely chat with this fellow because she was a nice person—not because she was into Murphy.
But then a snobby Harvard student with thin blond hair that he wore in a ponytail came over with his equally snobby pals. “Excuse me,” Ponytail Guy said to Murphy, even though he was not being polite. “What class did you say you were in with Donna? Theory of Love, you said? ”
“Yep, that was it. Don’t wanna brag, but I got an A.”
“Did you? Well, then you must be well versed in all the major theories of love. Perhaps you could enlighten us about Gary Chapman’s theory of the Five Love Languages?”
Murphy clearly had no idea what Ponytail Guy was talking about. “Uh, yeah, sure. There’s, uh, Baby Talk, Dirty Talk, Filthy Talk…”
Ponytail and all his dumb friends laughed at him—and not in the good way.
“Oh, why don’t you just go away,” Donna said to Ponytail.
But then Billy walked right up to Ponytail, because loyalty was one of Billy’s Top Five Greatest Attributes, after Awesome Butt, Boston Accent, Charming Grin, Genius of Fun, and Nice Hairy Chestiness—oh wait, that’s Top Six. “Naw, naw, let’s talk about marriage counselor and internationally best-selling author Gary Chapman, PhD, and his theory of the Five Love Languages,” Billy said to Ponytail, getting all up in his boring face. “You wanna talk about his trademarked Acts of Service, Receiving Gifts, Quality Time, Words of Affirmation, or Physical Touch? Or would you like to also include the two recent additional love languages coined by dating site eHarmony—Shared Experiences and Emotional Security? Maybe you’d like to enlighten us about the Triangular Theory of Love, courtesy of Robert J. Sternberg? ”
“Of course,” said Ponytail. “You’re speaking of Intimacy, Passion, and Decision slash Commitment.”
“Yeah. I am. And you’re speaking of words you memorized for an exam. You’re about as passionate as my left shoe. Not the right one, though, because that one is wicked passionate and it’s about to make itself real comfortable up your ass if you don’t apologize to my buddy here right now.”
Ponytail cleared his throat and mumbled “Whatever—sorry” as he walked off with his ponytail between his legs, so to speak.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Murphy called out after him. “My boy’s wicked romantic!”
And then Murphy went back to the other end of the bar to drink beer.
“Wow. That was amazing,” Donna said. “Here’s my phone number. I want you to call me so we can arrange a time for you to come to my house and help me with a problem.”
“Okay,” Billy said. He was more than willing to help her, simply because she was red hot and he wanted to smash that. But he would soon learn that she was so much more than just a dump truck and nip nops.
And then they said goodbye to each other because Donna had to leave.
It was the month of Halloween, so when Billy saw Ponytail Guy sitting inside a nearby coffee shop when he left the Harvard bar with Murphy, he sauntered over and banged on the window. “Hey,” he said to Ponytail when he got his attention. “Do you like candy apples?”
“I guess,” said Ponytail, shrugging.
Billy slapped the napkin with Donna’s phone number up against the window in Ponytail’s face. “Well, she just gave me her numbah, so fuck you and your candy apples, mothahfucka!”
A few days later, after Billy got arrested for being too much fun, he called Donna and she gave him the address for the house her patient had left for her. She was having house troubles of all kinds—primarily the haunted kind. William was more than happy to help her with her pipe troubles. He laid her pipes good. Real good. So good that Donna never wanted another plumber. Even though they told other people and themselves that they were just friends, they did all kinds of things together. Billy did things to Donna’s sensational body like no one else ever could. Donna kissed Billy all over and made him feel things he never felt with anyone else.
They did it in every room of that house of hers, in a lot of different ways. Ways that gave Billy the opportunity to show her how good he was with his tool. And his abs. And his butt.
They had so much fun together.
But one day, when they were fixing the house up, Donna said to Billy, “Billy, I want you to move in with me, but I need you to get rid of the ghost first, so we don’t have to be scared.”
“Don’t say that to me,” Billy said. “Don’t say somethin’ if you can’t get a take back. You’re gonna move into this house, and then you’ll find out somethin’ about me that you ain’t gonna like. Like about how I like to jump off rooftops and break into Dunkin’ late at night. I’m just some fling you’re havin’, meanwhile you’ll go off and marry some guy who wears loafahs and doesn’t got anywhere near as nice a butt as I do.”
“First of all, your butt is fire—no one has as nice a butt as you do,” Donna said, because she had not yet met any of Billy’s relatives nor seen their behinds. “And second—what’s a loafah?”
“You know—those boring shoes that boring guys who are born rich wear—loafahs.”
“But I want us to be together, Billy. You and me, without the fears or the ghost. If you tell me you don’t want to live with me in this house, then I will leave and you will never see me again. Even though you should be the one to leave because I am the one who owns the house. And even though we currently live next door to each other. But I need to go.”
Billy gathered up all his stubborn, frightened strength and said to her, “I don’t. But I will hunt the ghost for you so you can live here by yourself, because I am a good guy, okay?!”
Donna cried and left. She drove away from the house. Billy was now alone in the big house.
Well, not exactly alone …
As soon as Donna left, there was a thunderstorm. “Come out, come out, wherevah you are, ghost!” Billy shouted. “I’m not afraid a youse!” The lights inside the house flickered and then went out. But in the darkness, another flash of lightning revealed the ghost. “What do you want from me?!” Billy cried out.
The ghost just regarded him kindly.
“Who are you?!” Billy asked, loudly—for Billy said all things loudly.
“I am the Ghost of Parties Past,” the ghost howled. The ghost was a gentle man with a beard and he wore a brown sweater and brown corduroy pants. He seemed very sad. But also scary, as it is very frightening to be confronted by a ghost, especially one who understands you as well as this one understood Billy, in ways that Billy was not yet comfortable talking about. Because even the most brilliant of geniuses are not fluent in the language of the heart until they realize it was the language they were born speaking—they just forgot how.
“Oh yeah? Cool, man, what’s up, cocksucka?” He said that because cocksucka was sort of Billy’s love language. It was rather charming the way he said it.
“What’s up is I know about all your partying and shenanigans, Billy. I know about all the stuff you blew up. I know about all the penises you’ve drawn on the faces of people who were passed-out drunk. I know about the prank calls to the Afflecks and the time you lost your wallet and convinced the guy who sells hot dogs at Minuteman Stadium that you’re a time traveler and if he didn’t give you five hot dogs and a beer the entire world would explode.”
“Yeah, that was wicked genius of me. How’d you know? What—did you look at my file or somethin’?”
“There’s no file, William. I’m a ghost. I just know things.”
“Okay. Well, big deal—everyone knows about the partying and the shenanigans. I’m legendary.”
“It’s not your fault,” the ghost cried out.
“I know.”
“No, I mean it,” the ghost said, taking one ghostly step closer. “It’s not your fault.”
“Whaddya talkin’ about?”
“It’s not your fault you’re afraid you partied too much for too long and don’t have what it takes to be a husband.”
“Naw, naw, not you, man.”
The ghost took another step closer, cornering Billy. There was thunder and another flash of lightning. “It’s not your fault.”
“Don’t fuck with me, man. Not you too, man! Not you!”
“It’s not your fault.” The ghost whispered it this time as he attempted to embrace Billy, who was now weeping in a very manly, badass way. But alas, the ghost’s arms just passed right through Billy. Because he was an apparition.
“I’m sorry,” Billy sobbed. “I’m sorry I told Donna I didn’t want to live with her, and I’m sorry you’re dead.” Billy wiped away his own tears since the ghost couldn’t do it for him. And then Billy said to the ghost, “And I am sorry that I must ask you to leave. So that I may in fact live here with the woman I love, Donna, after I drive away and find her and bring her back here.”
“It’s cool,” the ghost said, smiling softly. “It’s time for me to take a trip anyway. Gotta get back out there.”
“Okay, mothahfucka,” Billy said, also smiling softly. “You don’t have to go home, but ya can’t stay here. Me, I gotta go see about a girl.”
And with that, the ghost nodded his approval and then vanished, along with the storm and all of Billy’s fears of loving and being loved.
Then Billy drove away from the house, back to the apartment building he and Donna both lived in as neighbors, found Donna, they kissed, and then they drove back to the house again together. There, at that house, they once again did it in every room that night.
And they did it nastily, and happily, evah aftah.