Page 80 of The End of Summer

“Yeah,” she agrees. “But it’s one party. What other choice do we have?”

I nod. “Okay,” I say. “I’ll get the shot cups and start filling trays up.”I don’t have a good feeling about this.I look down the other end of the room, where Saffron and Indigo are practicing a move called the Bird of Paradise. “Cherry?”

“Yeah?”

I look at her solemnly. “Have you heard from Arrow?”

She nods, turns her back to the girls and lowers her voice. “She had to take Kit to a hotel. They’re staying there together until Jenny gets out of rehab.”

“When will that be?” I ask.

“July 21st.”

I calculate this in my head. “So, like, just over a week.”

Cherry nods.

“Then what? Will she come back?”

“She’s trying to get Jenny to agree to move back here, from what I understand. But Jenny’s in rough shape. Ricky’s back in jail. It’s a mess over there.”

“Okay,” I sigh. “How’s Kit?”

Cherry smiles. “Thankfully, she’s like a beam of light in a really dark situation. She’s doing well, all things considered. She gets to visit with Jenny a few times a week, and she and Arrow are like two peas in a pod. Kit calls her Auntie Joy, which is maybe the cutest thing ever. She put her in a half-day summer camp at the YMCA so she gets to swim and go to the playground and stuff, which is a whole lot better than being stuck in some random hotel room all day.”

“That’s good,” I say. “Please send her my best.”

“I will,” Cherry says. “Now, go get those shots ready. They’re going to be here any minute.”

The party consists of 23 guests, all from New Jersey. They roll up in limousines (thank God, no tow lot tomorrow), come decked out in micro-dresses with sky-high heels and hair extensions and extra-plump lips. Many have flashing penis necklaces on, and the bride is wearing a pink plastic crown made up of tiny upright penises. Several of them come into the space double fisting bottles of hard liquor: Patron, Absolut, Jim Beam, Smirnoff. One girl has a bottle of Boone’s, which would strike me as funny if I wasn’t undergoing a current alcohol crisis. They’re not supposed to bring in outside booze, but maybe if we make an exception just this once, we won’t burn through our own supply. I mean, they’re going to do shots either way. Might as well let them drink what they want. I look at Cherry, silently asking her the question of whether or not we should allow this, and when she shrugs, I get the sense that she’s thinking the same thing I am.

So, shots become more of a situation where most of the girls have affixed themselves to the bottle of their choosing, as if these were water bottles during a workout. I put the pretzel bites on early, because the group gets turned up pretty quick. They’re grinding all over each other, all over the poles – one of them gets sloshed so quickly that she actually starts licking a pole.Nasty.

By the time the strippers come, the group is largely out of control. The three guys are dressed as wealthy businessmen in aFifty Shadestype of tribute, and before long the girls begin using silks and handcuffs and all sorts of other BDSM-light toys that seem a bit over the top for the way we usually run things. But, hey, who am I to say what’s okay and what’s not? Cherry’s back now, so I look to her for guidance. Only, she appears to be just as much of a deer in the headlights as I am. Even the guys look a little surprised, but they’re busy being pawed at by the parched partygoers, one of whom clearly has a testicle fetish and keeps grundle-grabbing our guys. I can only shake my head and pray this all ends soon.

I pay out the boys in the back office as the food arrives: they’ve ordered edible phalluses in every variety you can imagine, in keeping with their penis vibe, I suppose. There’s sausage and peppers, foot long Sabrett hot dogs, pigs in blankets, you name it. It’s actually quite repulsive, the stench of all that processed meat and condiments, but, um, the heart wants what it wants, I guess? And if it wants dick-shaped dinner doused in sauerkraut? Ugh. I don’t even know.

It doesn’t take long for madness to ensue. There’s a girl by the end of the buffet who loses her footing. Another girl catches her. As soon as the first girl stands upright again, she vomits.

Right into the tray of Polish kielbasa.

I am reminded of the first time I met Arrow. “There are two things that fuck up a good time,” she said.

Vomit and death.

Saffron, Indigo, and I eyeball each other when it registers that this has escalated in to one of those, “If you’re going to puke, thenI’mgoing to puke” situations, and before I can figure out what to do, a second girl throws up. The vomit gets into the first girl’s hair. Cherry’s eyes bug out of her head.

I shift into crisis mode.Get them outside,I tell myself. I hesitantly wrap my arm around the first girl and begin to usher her toward the door. She stops to throw up once more on the way out. Another partygoer follows me with the second sick girl, thank God. I leave her out there with the two friends to get sick all over the gravel lot in front of Cosmo-pole-itan.

Back inside, the remaining girls have been ushered away from the food. Indigo tries to get them back on the pole, and some of the more inebriated ones follow her, while Saffron offers each of the ones who are complaining of still being hungry a dry hot dog bun. I guess she figures bread will keep this from continuing. Meanwhile, I grab a black garbage bag and begin to throw the contents of the buffet area into it, trying desperately not to inhale the scent of regurgitation that lingers heavy in the air. Cherry grabs the mop bucket and fills it with water and disinfectant, and she begins to mop the area.

I prop the door open to remove the filled garbage bag and check on the girls outside.I’ll have to hose down the lot,I realize.It reeks out here.The first puker, whose name I learn is Amber, seems to have gotten most of it out. The second puker, Jessica, is only getting started, and I narrowly avoid getting a fresh round of splatter on my shoes as she gets going again. The caretaker, Fiona, is studying to be a nurse, I learn. She asks me if we have any water or electrolytes.

A lady walking a dog by flashlight notices us, but thankfully, doesn’t stop – just gives us all a disgusted, judgmental look.I get it lady. I’m grossed out, too.I go back inside to get some water bottles.

Which is when I see Cherry holding her side.

“What happened?” I ask.

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