11⎜The Dinner

I stared at the door before me, a million worries colliding about in my mind. There was a soft murmur audible from within the structure, but it was nothing like the volume during my first encounter here. Shakily, I lifted my finger up to the round button, and pressed down, closing my eyes tightly for a moment as the deep tones floated about on the other side. A few seconds went by, and then the door swung open to a duo I knew, but wasn’t familiar with seeing together.

           A tall dark-haired boy had his arm loosely draped over a blonde girl in a yellow dress and pearls who looked as though she had just eaten an entire lemon. The guy had a goofy grin on his face like he usually did, and he stuffed his free hand in a pocket of his khaki pants. He had worn a short-sleeved collared shirt of the color red, and on his feet were boat shoes. When the girl noticed that I was standing before them, her expression changed drastically, and she managed to escape the hold of the other guy, greeting me with a smile and a tight hug.

           “I’m so glad you could make it, Eric!” she drawled as her arms pressed into my back.

           “Uh, me too,” I lied.

           “By the way, you look just wonderful!” the southern girl complimented once she had detached herself from me. I grinned, thankful that she hadn’t described my appearance as “a tool bag who smells like they were dunked into a vat of Abercrombie perfume,” like my dear roommate, Seth, had said before I left. Besides the fact I didn’t even like Abercrombie, I actually happened to be wearing some type of Ralph Lauren cologne. If Seth was going to insult my obscure metrosexuality, then he should’ve at least gotten his facts straight first.

           Before I had left, I had basically gone through every single article of clothing that I had, trying to figure out what was appropriate to wear to a frat dinner. In the end, I had settled with a pair of khaki shorts, a light green (I was almost positive the color was called “mint”) button-down, and boat shoes. It was a pretty standard outfit, but it worked, and I was comfortable in it. Seth, on the other hand, clearly had an issue with what I was wearing, because he only insulted it, like, eight times.

           “Thanks,” I said as the two ushered me inside.

           “Yeah, Wilson,” said the other individual who had invited me in the first place, “you look good.”

           “But you always look good, Eric,” the blonde added as they lead me down a dimly lit hallway and towards the evident commotion.

           “Thanks, Kay,” I said with a gulp, my nerves increasing the closer we got to our final destination.

           “What about me?” the tall boy demanded, implying that I owed him, too, an acknowledgment of what he had said.

           “Thanks, Scott,” I sighed as the mentioned boy slung an arm over my shoulder in a manner that he had with Kay just minutes before.

           “Welcome, Wilson,” he squeezed my shoulder. “Now, Ari was third-wheeling with Kay and Houston when she got here, which was, like, thirty minutes ago, so I swooped in and ditched my date to chill with her.” He paused as Kay elbowed him in the side, because I was guessing that she wasn’t too in favor of, well, anything he had said. Scott continued on as if nothing had happened, ignoring Kay completely. “Anyways, if she seems especially distant, then it’s just because she’s daydreaming about me.”

           “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” I told him with a light laugh.

           “Scott, do you even know your date’s name?” Kay questioned with more than a dash of that southern sass of hers that only rarely surfaced. We had made our way through a dim hallway, and were now at the doorway of what appeared to be a dining room of sorts. The muffed sound of meshed conversations could be heard loudly, and I was dreading even the thought of walking through that threshold.

           “She’s a hot fake blonde—heavy on the fake, easy on the blonde, mild on the hot—and seems pretty slutty. I think she’s a freshman, maybe?” Scott expressed the basic information that he had collected about the girl he had most likely randomly selected to accompany him this evening. Kay shot him a look drenched in absolute disgust, and I didn’t say anything. Scott’s love life wasn’t my place to step in, and as long as he wasn’t getting into anything illegal or abusive, I didn’t really care. “If you expect me to know her name, Kay-Rodg, then you, my dear, clearly have no idea who you’re talking to.”

           “In case you haven’t guessed it already, Eric, Scott has just about zero respect for women,” Kay said, crossing her arms over her chest in a defensive manner. Scott stuck his tongue out childishly at her in response, and Kay just shook her head, which tonight comprised of a tight bun in the back of her head.

           “I respect women,” Scott argued, though not in the tone of one who was particularly secure on their viewpoint and all too keen on forcing the opposition to change their stance. “Sometimes I respect you, Kay, and Ari is practically my little sister. During the time that I’m not, uh, terrorizing her, I think that I definitely respect her.”

           “That’s two, Scott, what about the rest of the population? The girls you go out with?” Kay pressed on about the topic.

           “You know, I think that it’s about time we save all three of our, um, dates from sheer boredom and go in to meet them!” Scott suggested, trying desperately to ditch the current conversation, for I had a hunch that he knew he would lose. Though Kay seemed sweet 24/7, when she made her mind up about something, it was set in stone. There was no changing what that girl thought, and she wasn’t one to compromise—ever.

           As I thought about Kay’s obstinacy, a sudden revelation came to me that made pretty much everything in the world make more sense. Before we had a chance to step through the wooden mold of the room before us, I quickly asked, “Kay, you’re going to law school, aren’t you?”

           “Well, assumin’ that I get in and graduate without a problem, then, yes, that’s the plan,” the blonde confirmed my suspicions. “How’d you know, Eric?”

           “You just seem like you would make a good lawyer,” I explained casually.

           Kay just grinned widely at that, and then Scott decided to ruin the moment. “No offense, Rodgers, but if I ever get in trouble with the cops, you’ll probably be the last person I call to represent me.”

           “When you get in trouble with the cops,” Kay corrected him sharply, “when.”

           And before I could listen to the glorious escalation of the dispute, I decided to trudge into the battlegrounds myself, without backup. I walked about a foot, and finally entered the dining room, not surprised at what I saw. There was a large table that stretched the entire length of the room (which was quite a bit), and was pretty much the focal point of the space. It was adorned in a tablecloth and all the other necessities one would think went along with a nice dinner like this, ranging from shiny silverware to bouquets of flowers placed in the center after every few place settings. People were socializing in outfits similar to mine, and then there was the occasional texter, who looked like I was feeling—they wanted to be anywhere but here.

           “Eric Wilson!” someone called after I had taken a few steps within the room. I turned towards the source of the low voice, and smiled as I took in a very yellow Houston Walker. Like Kay, his chosen color for the evening was yellow. He had put on a yellow button-down, white shorts, and yellow boat shoes. I owned more than a few pairs of the preppy shoe, and in all my years of existence, I had never encountered yellow boat shoes, and even if I had, I probably wouldn’t have bought them.

           “Houston Walker,” I greeted back with my plain, accent-less voice. He gave me a strong, one-handed hug, which I returned, and then stuffed his hands inside the pockets of his shorts.

           “So, Eric, I’m glad that you’re here, and later on we should definitely talk,” he grinned at me with a nod. I wasn’t sure what “and later on we should definitely talk” entailed, but I had a hunch that I didn’t want to find out. As I thought about it, though, I had done nothing that would lead me to believe that the phrase had some negative connotation. Since it was such a strong and open-ended clause, however, it still left me with a bucket of angst in regards to what exactly it meant.

           “Yeah, totally,” I agreed, plastering on a confident and assured expression.

           “Awesome,” Houston smiled genuinely. “Ari is sitting in the middle by herself, playing some game on her phone, and Scott’s, uh, date is right across from her. Have fun, dude.” And with a pat on the back, he was off, and I was alone, expected to approach the girl I had asked to come with me a mere four days prior.

           After discussing it a bit more as we lay on the grass and looked up at the moon, Ari and I had decided to come to the dinner separately, for she had had a meeting with a teacher right before, and it just made more sense. As I surveyed the room, looking for an expressionless girl with dark curls, my eyes finally caught sight on the one I had been searching for. Unlike Scott, I actually knew her name—which happened to be Ari Remon, just for the record.

           Like Houston had said, she sat in the middle of the table, not too close to either end. In her hand was her black phone, and she seemed to be tilting it from side to side continuously. Her hair was down, and it looked nice—the curls sprawled across her shoulders. From where I was, all I could see was that she was wearing some sort of white top, sticking with the traditional and limited color scheme of her wardrobe. And figuring that the longer I stood in one place, the more awkward I would look, I took the courageous steps towards her, and then sat down in the empty seat beside her.

           “Hi,” I said.

           “Hi,” she said. She didn’t bother looking up from her phone, but I didn’t mind. It wasn’t that she was being intentionally rude per se, but rather that she was in a zone of complete disconnect from the world around, her phone being the device that merely aided in accomplishing that overall goal.

           “You look nice,” I complimented.

           She still didn’t glance over to me, even as she said, “And I’m sure you do, too.”

           I let out a sigh, drumming my fingers on my thighs nervously as the chatter about the room slowly but surely began to dull. People started taking their seats, and others remained standing, talking in groups of three or four. I noticed Kay walk in, and then immediately ditch Scott in order to float over to Houston. When the couple was standing next to each other with Houston having a possessive arm around Kay, I realized something, and decided to verbalize it to Ari, though I was fully expecting her to either not respond or respond with indifference.

           “Kay and Houston are matching,” I stated, the two creating a yellow blur when put together.

           “Yeah,” Ari mumbled, tucking her means of distraction away so that she could look at me. Our eyes connected as she continued to speak, and I noted that Ari’s eyes were just like everything else about her—lively and bright with a tinge of sorrow etched in permanently. They were still a mesmerizing chocolate color, but there was just something about her eyes that made me sad, because they were sad. “Kay usually makes sure that they match at events like this, just so that everyone knows that they’re together.”

           “Oh,” I said, not really seeing the logic, but going along with it, nonetheless.

           Ari then dropped her rainy voice down twelve notches, so that it was just barely audible to me. “See the blonde across the table who we met a few weeks ago and was totally into you?” I didn’t, so I glanced up, and sure enough, the same blonde girl with the fake tan and giant boobs who had attempted and failed to pursue the Eric Wilson was sitting directly parallel to Ari and me. Her head was down and focused on something in her lap—most likely her phone.

           “Yeah,” I finally said in response to Ari.

           “She’s with Scott tonight,” Ari said with what I wanted to say was a droplet of repugnance in her tone, but wasn’t quite sure.

           “She’s his date?” I questioned for final verification.

           “Scott doesn’t have dates,” Ari informed me, tucking a loose strand of her twirled hair behind her ear, “he has screwing buddies.”

           “Kay and you aren’t fans of how Scott deals with women,” I observed aloud. Between the way that Kay was raging on and on about Scott’s lack of respect and Ari’s attitude towards the girls that he took out, it didn’t take a rocket scientist or any scientist at all, really, to figure out that Scott had some type of reputation. I wasn’t going to go out on a limb and call him a player, because Scott just didn’t really seem like the type to earn the title, but there was definitely the possibility of a strong detachment when it came to commitment on his part.

           “No, Kay and I are not the biggest fans of how Scott deals with the girls that he bangs,” Ari corrected, adding her own ending to my comment.

           “Ira, Wilson!” a familiar male voice greeted, though I wasn’t fully sure to whom they were addressing. I glanced back over to the blonde, and then noticed that Scott had taken a seat next to her, and was grinning at us.

           “Ira?” I reiterated in confusion.

           “That’s Ari’s nickname,” he told me, putting a tentative arm over the shoulders of the girl beside him, but she paid him no mind.

           “Why?” I asked.

           “Because my name backwards spells ‘Ira’ and he thinks it’s clever,” Ari answered as I mentally rearranged the letters in her name, nodding as I found that they did, indeed, form “Ira.” It was a strange nickname, but with a name as short as Ari’s, there weren’t too many options, so at least Scott was being creative. I didn’t really think that Ari needed a nickname, because her name was just so unique and fitting for her that nothing else truly sufficed. Ari: the girl with the rainy voice, enigmatic gloom, and curls. It definitely worked for me.

           “It is clever,” Scott said firmly.

           “Whatever,” Ari sighed in disinterest.

           “Eric, right?” someone else’s voice suddenly piped up. I shifted my gaze from Scott to the (random) girl he had brought, surprised that she had actually acknowledged anyone, let alone me.

           “Uh, yeah,” I gulped.

           “You’re so hot,” she said with a smirk that made me nervous. “If you ever, like, want to hookup, just ask, and I’ll totally clear my schedule!”

           “Firstly, babe, you’re with me tonight,” Scott told the blonde sharply, “and secondly, uh, Ira, and I guess Wilson, this is Ash—”

           “Tiffany,” the girl cut in, “for the last time, my name is Tiffany!”

           “This is the part where he apologizes and tells her something generic and sappy,” Ari whispered to me, looking smugly at Scott as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

           And sure enough, the next few words that exited Scott’s mouth were in the form of an apology, mixed with generic sap. “Baby, I’m sorry, of course your name is Tiffany! You just look so much like this super model named Ashley that I was getting confused,” Scott covered up his tracks more bumpily than desired. “You’re an original like the Mona Lisa, babe. There’s nobody else like you on the planet.”

           “He’s used that line at least fifty times,” Ari told me quietly, “it’s always a good one.”

           “You think I look like a super model?” Tiffany said, the rest of Scott’s bullshit not really mattering to her.

           “Of course I do!” he insisted.

           “Well, I know that I’m hot, but he definitely looks like a super model,” she pointed directly at me, winking when our eyes met for the briefest of moments.

           “Yeah, well he’s banging the girl sitting next to him, so he’s off-limits. Sorry. Besides, again, you’re with me tonight. Not him. Me,” Scott said in huff.

           “We’re not even dating,” I stated blandly at Scott’s bold assertion.

           “We’re not even friends,” Ari decided to take it one step further. Though what she had said was perfectly accurate, it made me wonder what our relationship could be called. We were more than acquaintances, but less than friends—it was that in between space that we were stuck in.

           “So, you’re, like, available!” Scott’s blonde guest beamed, as if she had cracked some mystery and was about to receive a prize.

           “No,” I said decisively. I wasn’t looking at girls to date, and I didn’t need them looking at me as a viable option to consider dating, either. Therefore, “available” wasn’t a term that could be applied to me, because it would imply that I was open to looking, and I most certainly wasn’t. I was just fine being a single not ready or wanting to mingle.

           Before any other words could be passed between anyone else in the group of four, someone raised their voice at the end furthest away from the table, causing all the commotion to stop. All eyes then zoomed to the guy who was standing up, a glass in his hand as he smiled confidently. My vision sucked, so I could see who was speaking, just not too well. He looked older than Scott and Houston, and there was something about him that just oozed a mixture of authority and certainty.

           “That’s the frat president,” Ari informed me in a bored manner.

           The guy made a speech about the fraternity, and when he mentioned something about the history of the brotherhood or whatever, I pretty much zoned out. I didn’t really care what he was saying, and the wall behind Scott’s head was becoming increasingly more interesting by the second. Ari, too, had completely spaced out, and even resorted to closing her eyes. I feared that she would fall asleep, but there was also the possibility that she was just thinking, so I didn’t bother interfering with her.

           “Hey, Eric Wilson,” Ari began, her eyelids still shut. Her lips barely moved as she spoke and she was quiet, like a light drizzle, if the rain analogy was applied.

           “Yeah, Ari Pomegranate?” I said, keeping my voice as hushed as possible. After the night of moon gazing, I had told Ari that any time she used my full name, I would use hers…well, the variant of hers that I liked more. Ari Pomegranate. It had a nice ring to it. Definitely better than Eric Wilson—that was for sure.

           “Even though Kay, Houston, and Scott will probably cut your balls off and stab me in both eyes for it, do you want to get out of here?” she asked.

           I thought over what she had said for a brief moment, exhaling an answer, “Yes,” she was about to say something more, but I stopped her, continuing to speak, “but that would be really rude, so no.”

           “Do you want to be here right now?”

           “No.”

           “Great, neither do I. Before we get trapped by the meal, let’s go,” Ari pronounced, already rising from her seat. She reached down and took my hand, urging me to get up, too. Scott had this incredulous look on his face the entire time as he witnessed us move, but as I stared at what Ari was wearing on her bottom half, I didn’t care—not even for a second.

           In combination with the white top eluding sleeves, she had on a black skirt that flowed outwards, and stopped way above her knees, showing off her legs. Damn, those legs. They were long and toned and had color in them, but not too much color. Either she or Kay had decided that showing off some skin was a good idea, and whoever it was, I would be sure to send them a thank you note, once this whole ordeal was over.

           “If you’re done ogling at my legs, can we go?” Ari hissed, snapping me out of my daze as I begrudgingly lifted my eyes up to meet hers.

           “I, uh, wasn’t, and I’d rather not, but sure,” I managed to say as she pulled me past the many pairs of staring eyes belonging to the dinner attendees. I felt like I was under a microscope, being studied closely by others. It wasn’t a good feeling.

           After what felt like forever, we finally reached the door at the end of the room, and without another word, we were off.