Nothing Ever Happens on St. Practice Day Except to DJ Fingerblast

I walk home. I thought I had appropriate party clothes for all college parties: ugly sweaters, hippie beads, fake mustache stickers galore, and enough Daria ensembles for ten years of Halloweens. Needless to say, somewhere along the line, I missed a nineties party.

Nevertheless, I had a Clarissa costume with a foo-foo hat I bought in a thrift store on 11th Street across from a playground. The little kids with dirty faces would just stare at all the effing hip money people walking around the neighborhood. Basketballs bouncing always sounded out-of-place. I put on the hat and frown a little.

Adrienne texts me and says, “I got some ice cream instead of clothing.”

I start to get dressed. Liza is home. She’s sitting on the couch deciding where to party. I tell her to go to the party at Adrienne’s. She complains a little about having choices. Later, her boyfriend comes home and we go to Meijer’s, the chain grocery store in Michigan. I go because I want to get booze at a cheaper place than the area convenience stores that are all marked up for the college kids.

We climb in. He’s listening to Neutral Milk Hotel. They have a couple conversation that’s lilting in tones of fake arguments and jokes about listening to Neutral Milk Hotel with me in the car. I make a lot of sounds like “Okay” and “Uh-huh” and feel irritable until the conversation gets preternaturally nostalgic.

“The parties at that house aren’t nearly as good as when La Kor used to live here and was Soc. Ed. Remember when ZZ punched Benny Stoofy in the face?”

“That wasn’t La Kor. I was Soc. Ed. That was me. I did those parties.” I can’t believe people have already forgotten. Nothing lasts a week here. Nothing ever happens.

“Oh, that was you.”

“Yeah, that’s how I know The Telephone Callers and all them. From booking those shows.”

“Every time I see that guy from Benny Stoofy, he thanks me for saving his life. I went to a show in Detroit once on acid and he just pops out of nowhere and goes, ‘You. You’re that guy who pulled that other guy off me at that party. Thanks, man.’”

“Ha. That’s cool.”

We go into the store. I wander around with Liza for awhile while Dave, her boyfriend, gets some real people food. She’s going as Gwen Stefani. It’s a good costume because she has blue hair. We’re looking for a bendi. We walk past the cards.

“I don’t know what to use for a bendi.” She walks towards some glittery stuff.

“Um, maybe a red star sticker and just peel off the points of the star?”

“I guess that works. Or, what about just a red circle sticker?”

“Oh.” I feel dumb. “Let’s go to the craft section.”

We look at the rows of stickers and find birthstone stickers, one for each month. The ruby one will make a perfect bendi. We go back to find Dave. He’s got eggs, flour and milk. He’s making a cake for her for her birthday but she’s not supposed to know about it (and yet she clearly does know about it). It’s one of those surprises that are cute but not a surprise at all. I email myself a picture of these giant signs they have for eggs at Meijer to put on Facebook later. I wonder whether my life is really about cataloging these relics of social media to make other people think I’m properly socialized.

We get in the car after Dave finishes shopping. He wanders around for awhile because he’s looking for pomegranates. I’ve never seen someone so upset that Meijer doesn’t have pomegranates in stock. I think he’s acting like a baby and Liza looks anxious. I tell her to mention the pomegranate-flavored Burnett’s to him to console him.

“Baby, we don’t need pomegranates. We have these pomegranate-flavored Burnett’s.”

He laughs weakly, then wanders up and down a couple aisles absently. Liza goes to wait outside because she’s twenty-two but forgot her ID and the grocery store is stiff about that. I find out that the pomegranate is for part of the recipe for the cake, which is why he’s bumming. The woman at the register is reading the advertisement section of a newspaper.

We meet up with Liza at the car and she goes, “Look, Meijer gave away these bendis for free.”

“Cool,” he says.

We walk outside and climb into the car. We’re listening to Neutral Milk Hotel again. They’re a good couple, I think. I lean back, feeling vaguely jealous. But, I’m also aware that part of hanging out with a couple means feeling jealous of them. In fact, that’s one of the perks of heterosexual coupledom.