Christine Lemonopolous does not call. Guess she didn’t need my help moving her belongings out of Mrs. Oppenheimer’s McMansion.
I don’t go to Josh and Mike’s kegger, either. If I did, I might have to arrest myself for a D and D. That’s drunk and disorderly.
And Ceepak would hear about it. Probably on his police scanner two seconds after it happened.
Instead, I just go to bed.
Sunday morning, I resist the urge to swing by Dr. Arnold Rosen’s beach bungalow to check in with Christine again. Instead, I actually go to church, something I’ve started doing a little more often lately-even though my mom and dad aren’t in town to make me. They moved to Arizona a few years ago. It’s “a dry heat.”
I guess I go to church because of The Job.
The deaths I have witnessed.
The deaths I have caused.
After church, I head home, have a couple beers, watch baseball, order a pizza.
I spend a couple more minutes thinking about Christine. Wondering why I never noticed how hot she was before. But then I remember I only ever saw Christine when she was with Katie and gawking at your girlfriend’s girlfriends, saying stuff like, “Wow, check out Christine’s hooters,” would, basically, be stupid, not to mention rude.
I call my mom and dad in Arizona. My brother, Jeffrey, has moved out there, too. He’s at their house, smoking Turkey Jalapeno Sausages over pecan logs. I’m told they do this sort of thing in Arizona.
“When are you moving out this way, Danny?” he asks.
“How about never?” I want to reply.
But I don’t.
Instead, I give the answer I give every time we talk: “We’ll see.”
Eventually, after my brother tells me how awesome Arizona is and how I could make a ton of money managing his Berrylicious Frozen Yogurt franchise, we say good-bye.
I head to the fridge. Pound down my last beer.
Around nine, I fall asleep on my lumpy excuse for a sofa watching a movie starring Sylvester Stallone. Or Arnold Schwarzenegger. Maybe Bruce Willis.
Sometimes Sundays can do this to a guy.
Make you wonder what the heck you’re doing with your life when you could be pumping Berrylicious Frozen Yogurt into swirl cones and starting a family.
So I’m very happy when the clock radio goes off at 6 A.M. and Cliff Skeete’s DJ voice booms, “Rise and shine, people. It’s Monday morning. Time to put your nose back to the grindstone.”
And then, of course, he plays “Manic Monday” by the Bangles.