Beep.

For years, I had been debating on whether or not I would actually write this particular story from my younger days. Personally, I have always found that some stories are funnier when they are told, rather than read. However, a question lead to the inevitable “second act” where I have made a valiant attempt to capture my thought processes as the events unfolded…

“What has been your worst uncalled for cock-block moment?”

It was the summer of 1999, and it was by a woman.

In the beginning of that summer, I had arrived at the realization that the woman I had been courting long-distance for the previous 7 months was not the woman I could see myself staying with for much longer. Though she came out to Hawaii to visit for two weeks, very little felt right about the relationship. Two days after she left, my sister visited for two weeks, and by the end of the month, I was effectively and completely broke.

After being badgered to go out because it was “dollar pitcher Margarita night” and told to roll quarters by my best friend who would hear none of the financial excuses, we picked up one of our female co-workers and headed out for the inevitable shenanigans that young Army folks always seem to find. And find it we did – the mini-pitchers over runneth and I was working my way through the ballast of rolled coins that competed with and threatened my wardrobe’s integrity.

At some point, I was dancing – which is never a good sign for where the night is headed. Not only that, I was dancing with a very lovely and lithe Filipina… long, shiny dark hair…beautiful eyes…and the horizon was devoid of anything but possibilities… I was out of my earlier rut and into a carefree mode of chaotic kinetic and potential energy. I may have been slightly out of my mind, but that was evident much later in the evening.

At some point, my partner excused herself to go to the restroom. While she was gone, the third wheel – our wonderful female co-worker wobbled over in her typical state of unsteadiness (her sobriety in those days was best classified as “part time”) and began to offer the best coherent advice she could manage:

“Mike! You need to dance with her!”

I was looking over her shoulder at my partner, who was returning with a smile and preemptive wiggle that showed that we were about to resume where we left off. “I am dancing with her – she went to the bathroom and will be back in a sec.”

“Mike!” She repeated, loudly. “You need to dance with her – I know you guys have that whole ‘Asian-fetish’ thing…”

My partner’s smile dropped as fast as the Yen was falling those days. She heard.

She heard, she retrieved her purse, and she promptly left.

The rest of the time there was a blur of avoiding my co-worker, more Margaritas, and less weight in my pockets as I proceeded to convert cold, hard coins into mental haziness and (probably) more dancing. On this last point, I am not entirely too sure – there is nothing odder than being that guy – drinking his frustrations away, but doggedly trying to have fun in the process.

The “slightly out of my mind” bit from earlier manifested itself at about 3am in front of the barracks… and became legend between my friend and I…

He was the designated driver, and at the time was rocking one of those huge full-size Broncos. We pulled up in front of our passed-out friend’s building, cut the engine, and he had me slide over from the passenger seat to the driver’s section of the bench seat so he could drag her out and fireman-carry her cock-blocking self up the four flights of steps to her room. Honorable guy… and big… which was good because I was definitely not in any state to be negotiating my own process up the steps without grievous bodily harm, let alone someone help anyone else up anything higher than a curb.

While he was trying to respectfully extricate her from the back seat, I looked at the horn in the middle of the amazingly round steering wheel and drunkenly giggled as I pressed it briefly.

Beep.

“Dude. Stop. It’s 3am.”

Indignant that he dared be the boss of me, I repeated that wonderfully happy action.

Beep.

“Mike. Stop. Someone’s going to call the MP’s.”

The MP’s? They weren’t the boss of me either.

Beep.

He stopped wrestling with our friend-turned-inanimate object and stood at the open passenger door. “I’m not fuckin’ around. Stop, or I will come over there…”

Ah, good sir, a challenge! This fuckery is where I excel, and I shall prove it:

Beep.

“That’s. IT.” He turned and moved around the front of the Bronco.

Ah, but if I locked the door, I could continue those shenanigans until I grew weary of my festivities.

“Really?” He had appeared at the door with a decidedly unhappy look and immediately reached through the rolled down window to unlock and open the door in one swift and stern motion. “Out.”

Beep.

He grabbed me, and I immediately turned into a bizarre cross between an octopus and a cat that refuses to take a bath. I tangled myself in everything – the steering wheel, the seatbelt, the doorframe, and his angrily grabbing arms. After a while, I found myself horizontal: the only points of my body contacting anything was my head (in a chokehold) and my feet (hooked onto the steering wheel). I’m pretty sure I was either going to black out or vomit from the demonstration of futility when it comes to getting dragged unwillingly out of a vehicle, but I still had enough fire (and air) in me… to… move… one foot… just a little… to the right…

Beep.

I’m fairly certain that he dropped me out of anger and disgust – maybe even irritation. I do remember standing unsteadily and looking at him out of breath… then back at the steering wheel a few feet away.

“If. You. Move… I WILL punch you. Understand?”

Yeah. I was done – he sounded serious, and I really couldn’t understand why.

To this day, we still laugh about that.