Chapter 39 Chris
CHRIS
Wait, slow down, what do you mean?” I said.
We’d been snowmobiling for two hours and had just made it to the bar. Mike was quiet when we left, hadn’t said a word on the ride, and now he was pacing in front of the men’s room telling us Larissa broke up with him.
“Broke up with you? For what?” Jesse asked.
Mike looked stricken. He didn’t answer.
“Just tell me what happened,” I said.
“Bro, you guys were living together for literally five seconds. How could you possibly fuck things up this fast?” Jesse said.
Xavier glanced at me, his face unreadable.
“When did this happen?” I asked.
“Right before we left,” Mike said.
I shook my head. “But why?”
He raked his fingers into his hair and squeezed. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Maybe she’ll take you back?” Jesse said. “Just apologize.”
“I did. It’s over.” Mike scrubbed his hands over his face. “She’s fucking done with me, dude.”
We all made eye contact with one another while Mike stood with his palms to his eyeballs.
“I want a drink,” he said.
“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” Xavier said.
“Me either. We’re on snowmobiles,” I said.
He took his hands from his face. “Fuck it. I don’t care.” Then he turned for the bar.
“Just do a beer!” Jesse called after him. Mike ignored him.
“Damn, the dude’s a mess,” he said, watching him go. “I’ll drive. We’re doubled up anyway.”
I squeezed the bridge of my nose. What the hell was going on?
Larissa was crying, Mike said they were fighting, now they broke up? I looked wearily over at the run-down bar.
“Let’s get over there. He doesn’t need to be getting drunk right now,” I said.
We got to the bar right as Mike was taking a shot.
“Okay, no more,” I said.
“Fuck you,” he muttered.
“Hey…” Xavier said, giving him a disapproving look.
Mike ignored it. “Give me another one,” he said, tapping the counter.
“NO,” all three of us said collectively.
“You’re not my fucking babysitters,” Mike said. “Another one.”
The bartender looked at us, then back at Mike. Then he filled the shot glass again. Mike pounded it and got up.
“I want to play darts,” he said, shoving off the bar. “Who wants to play darts with me?” he asked, raising his voice to the room full of strangers. Nobody answered, so he went over and started playing by himself.
“Why am I thinking he shouldn’t be throwing sharp things right now?” Jesse asked.
“We need to get him back to the cabin,” Xavier said, his voice low.
“With Larissa there?” Jesse asked. “Nah.”
“Maybe I should take her home?” I said.
“That’s probably not a bad idea,” Xavier said.
But getting Mike out of the bar was not in the cards. He refused to leave. We spent the next two hours wrangling him like an unruly toddler. He bounced from darts to the pool table to inserting himself loudly in strangers’ conversations until all three of us were exhausted.
He ordered shots despite our protests until he got obnoxious enough that the bartender cut him off, which made him worse. When he told the bartender to go fuck himself, we finally got kicked out. Then we had to figure out how to get him home.
We were deep in rural Minnesota at a hole-in-the-wall bar on Christmas.
It was an hour drive for one of the women to come pick us up in a car, but all of them had been drinking when we left—except Larissa, who wasn’t an option for obvious reasons.
So the snowmobile it was. The three of us had to dress Mike in his gear like a child to make sure he didn’t get frostbite on the way back and we put him on Jesse’s rig, thankful he was at least coherent enough to hang on.
I hoped the two hours and frequent water and pee breaks on the trail would sober him up enough to be manageable by the time we got to the cabin.
It wasn’t.
He stumbled into the house, shouting for Larissa. Xavier and Jesse got him into his room and stood sentry outside, while I went straight to tell Larissa and Heather to pack their things. I found them in the hot tub.
“Hey,” I said, sliding open the back door. “We need to head back early. Can you guys pack your things and head to the car?”
The four women looked at me like I’d lost it.
“Uh, it’s Christmas Day?” Becca said. “We’re staying until the first.”
“What’s wrong?” Larissa asked.
I could hear Mike arguing with Xavier down the hall.
“Mike’s a little agitated. I just think it’s better if we go.”
Larissa was already getting out.
“Is everything okay?” Heather asked, following her.
The shouting got louder.
Larissa grabbed a towel and wrapped it around herself and came into the house. “My stuff is in the bedroom.”
Shit.
“Get the fuck off me!” Mike yelled.
Larissa made concerned eye contact with me. Then Mike came down the hall into the kitchen with Xavier and Jesse on his heels. He paused in the doorway and spotted his ex-girlfriend. His face fractured the second he saw her.
I’d seen my best friend heartbroken before.
I’d seen him during his parents’ divorce, during breakups.
I’d been with him that day in the hospital when the doctor told him he’d never play professionally.
I saw all his goals and aspirations and dreams go up in smoke.
But I’d never seen him in pain like this.
He looked at her like she’d died. Like his soul had been ripped from his body.
“Babe,” he gasped. “Please…”
Larissa looked at him with wide eyes.
“Please, babe, don’t leave me…” he slurred.
She took a step back. “Mike…”
Xavier grabbed his arm, but Mike shook him off. He pushed past me and cornered Larissa against the counter and put her face in his hands. “I can be better,” he whispered. “Let me try, I promise.”
“Mike, get off me…” she said, a touch of panic in her voice.
He put his forehead to hers.
She tried to wriggle away. “Mike, I mean it, let me go.”
“Hey, Mike, let her go,” I said, putting a hand on his arm.
He ignored me.
“I love you,” he said. “I love you so much. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. What’s wrong with me?”
She pushed uselessly against him. “Mike!”
He pulled her in and kissed her.
Her eyes flew open. He wrapped his arms around her in a bear hug and doubled down, kissing her harder.
She made a frantic noise in the back of her throat and I grabbed his arm. “That’s enough, get off her!”
He was like a vise grip made of rock-solid muscle.
I couldn’t move him. Woofarine started snarling and pulling on his pant leg.
Jesse and Xavier took him by the elbows and the three of us managed to peel him away, sobbing.
The second he let her go, Larissa staggered backward against the kitchen counter catching her breath, and I put myself between her and my wasted best friend.
Heather, Samantha, and Becca were coming in, the cold blast of air from the slider blowing through the kitchen while Woofarine barked.
Mike was wailing. Guttural, heartbroken wails.
“Go get you stuff,” I said over my shoulder. “Now. Go now.” Larissa didn’t move. I turned to look at her. She had her fingers on her mouth.
“What?” I asked.
“Did you eat nuts?” Larissa asked, her voice shaking. “My lips are tingling. Mike, did you eat nuts?”
The whole room froze.
Mike didn’t answer. He was in his own universe, tears streaming down his face, too drunk to even comprehend the situation.
I looked at him. He had crumbs on his shirt. Rainbow crumbs.
My heart started to pound.
“Mike, did you eat the macarons?” I asked.
He looked at me with bloodshot eyes. “What?”
“Did you eat the fucking macarons in your room?!”
He just stood there, gasping.
“I’ll go check,” Jesse said, bolting down the hall. He came back a moment later holding the clear packaging. Half the cookies were gone.
No… He’d eaten the damn cookies that he was careless enough to buy her and then he’d fucking kissed her.
The look Larissa gave me was pure terror.
“Where’s your Benadryl and your EpiPen?” I asked, trying to stay calm.
Samantha flew into action. “I’ll find her purse.” She darted down the hall.
Heather ran to her side. “Let’s wash your mouth out. Stay calm,” she said.
She and Becca bent her over the sink and turned on the faucet. I didn’t wait for Samantha. I ran for my luggage. I got my EpiPen and was back in the kitchen in less than ten seconds.
Mike was pacing now, his hands on his head having realized at least to some extent what he’d just done. “Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck!!!”
I pulled a chair up next to the sink and when Heather was done rinsing Larissa’s mouth, she sat her down. Samantha had come back with Benadryl. “I couldn’t find her purse, but this was in the medicine cabinet.”
I poured the pink liquid into the cap, my hands shaking. Larissa took it and swallowed the dose. She looked pale.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
She shook her head.
Splotches.
Hives, popping up on her bare chest and neck. Her lips looked swollen.
Then she started to wheeze. I could hear it even over the noise Mike was making.
She was going into anaphylaxis.
“We’re going to have to give you your EpiPen, okay?” I said.
She nodded, fear in her eyes.
I pulled the cap off the pen. “This is going to be quick,” I said gently.
I put a palm on her bare thigh. Set the nose of the EpiPen against her skin between my thumb and pointer finger. Pressed. Clicked. Held for ten seconds.
Larissa was crying.
I always told myself that I could never touch her. That it would do something to me that I couldn’t undo.
It did.
I set the empty EpiPen on the kitchen counter. I turned slowly to Mike. Then I stalked across the room, pulled my arm back, and punched him in the face.