...And a Happy New Year

January 18, 2014

Chaney woke up in her bed alone, much to her relief. After finding John hitting on her co-workers, she found herself quickly indulging in as much drinking as she could muster. This of course led to her nasty hangover that she was dreading having to nurse this morning.

She muttered to herself, “God, I really need to stop drinking. I can’t drink this much all the time anymore.”

She clutched both sides of her head, as she tossed back and forth in the bed from her massive migraine. Ducking her head under her pillow, she hoped to escape what little light was coming through her blinds. Luckily she didn’t hear any movements around the house which most likely meant that she once again had the house to herself.

After lying in bed for what she deemed was long enough, she reluctantly rose from bed, and stumbled to her bathroom to retrieve headache relief and some water. If she was lucky, maybe she’d finally throw up everything she drank, not being able to the night before. Opening the doors of the small cabinet above the toilet, she found her saving grace in the form of 100 mg pills of ibuprofen. She got a couple tablets from the bottle before returning to the sink to fill up one of the disposable cups with water so she could take them.

She was in the process of splashing water on her face when she heard a groan coming from her left. Not expecting anyone else to be home and not hearing anyone come in, she hesitantly rose from where she was leaned over the sink. Relief and annoyance washed over her features as she saw the irritate expression adorning Alex’s face.

“Think you can nurse your hangover somewhere else? I need to get ready. I have places to be.”

She rolled her eyes at his bluntness before huffing and bequeathing the bathroom to her brother.

The second she was out of the bathroom, he pushed past her and closed the door.

She would never understand why he was so hostile towards her and when exactly this riff between them happened. She was determined to find out if she had to beat it out of him. She was sick of not being able to talk to her brother. As much as she hated to admit it, she missed their constant teasing and his nagging at how embarrassing she was.

She made her way downstairs and sat at the kitchen table while she waited on Alex to finish getting ready, in hopes of catching him before he was whisked away to whatever special plans he had.

***

John woke up with a new determination and fire burning in him that he hadn’t experienced since the band split with their former label. He had no idea why exactly he had this desire to expose the kind of girl that Chaney was to Halvo other than wanting to look out for his best friend.

Halvo had always been there for John as long as they knew each other. John had been fighting his own personal demons over the last couple years, and Halvo was one of the only people outside of the band that knew what was really going on with him. He was determined to keep as much of his personal life under wraps as possible. He never liked to show his weaknesses and as long as he could keep up the façade that he was alright, he would suffer through whatever he was going through.

Part of his determination and disgust with Chaney stemmed from the fact that over time, he saw himself being able to trust her. He surprised himself that day at the coffee shop when he casually mentioned that he had skeletons in his closet. Anyone that listened to his music could tell that. However, when he told Chaney that, there was more that was hidden behind the way he said it that she no doubt was able to catch. He wasn’t sure what it was, but she had this presence about her that made him comfortable. He knew Halvo trusted her, and that fact alone made him more willing to get to know her.

He couldn’t say the same now however, and in a sense felt betrayed by her. He struggled with this new burden he was now carrying, afraid that he was making too big of a deal about this whole thing, but if she wasn’t the girl Halvo thought she was, he would be doing Halvo a favor by showing him her true colors. Chaney seemed to have Halvo wrapped around her finger and under some spell that he wouldn’t be able to escape from alone.

With this in mind, he decided to call him up, hoping he didn’t already have plans, and maybe test the waters with this whole thing. See how deep Halvo was with Chaney. He didn’t necessarily want to mutilate their friendship, but he didn’t want her to lead Halvo on if she wasn’t interested.

***

Halvo was casually sitting on his couch, eating a bowl of cereal when he heard his phone go off. He leaned forward to place his bowl on the coffee table as he reached to grab his vibrating phone off the table. The smile on his face growing when he saw it was John calling him.

“Hey man! What’s goin on?” Halvo asked enthused, not waiting for John to address him first.

John just laughed at Halvo’s exuberance. “Uh, not much man. Just uh, wanted to see if you had anything going on today. Thought we could hang out. Ya know, since I did kinda ditch ya last night…” he said sheepishly.

“That’s right! You asshole!” Halvo retorted with mock hurt. “You left me all by my lonesome while you hit on a table of very attractive, very available women. I’m hurt.”

“Dude, I have all their numbers. I’m sure one of them would date you.”

“Now I’m just offended. I don’t want your scraps. I’m more than capable of getting my own woman. I can be quite charming.”

Laughing, John conceded. “Alright Casanova. Let’s go find this woman you can so easily woo.”

“Just name the time and place.”

“I’ll drive over now.”

“See ya soon dude.”

“Later.”

Halvo hung up the phone, the smirk on his face only growing as he laughed. Halvo knew John wasn’t genuinely upset, and was glad that after all these years, they still had the ease in their friendship that they had when they first became friends. John had become like a brother to him over the years.
Halvo had no more finished his cereal and put his bowl in the sink when he heard someone, that he assumed to be John, at his door. His suspicions were confirmed as he opened the door to his best friend on the other side.

“Hey man, come on in. I just need to finish getting ready.”

John sat on the couch while Halvo went back to his room to grab his shoes before rejoining John in the living room.

“Alright, where do you suggest we go. I can get women anywhere, but uh, since you ‘claim’ to be such an expert, I’ll give you upper hand and let you choose where I should unleash my seduction prowess.” Halvo made his claim with complete seriousness as he was putting on his shoes.

“Dude, I don’t even know what to say to you right now.” He looked over at his friend. He had to admire the guy’s confidence. Not that Halvo was inept at finding a girl, but he was often too quirky for most girls’ taste, which often times left him empty handed at the end of the night. He was determined to help Halvo out like Halvo had done for him so many times before.

Rolling his eyes Halvo replied, “Dude, you’re talking to a Halvorsen. I just exude sex appeal.”

“Whatever man.” John laughed. “Let’s just start by going to the record shop and go from there. They just got a new shipment in early this morning and I wanna check out their new stuff, see if they got anything I haven’t got yet.”

Nodding in agreement, Halvo put his wallet in his back pocket and grabbed his keys off the hook by the door before following John out to his truck.

They drove to their local record shop that they frequented at least once a week. Even if there hadn’t been any new shipments in, they always loved spending a couple hours down there looking through the various vinyl records. It was something they had been doing since they discovered they both liked the same kind of music and they were both able to afford purchasing a record player.

John pulled his truck up to the small shop and parallel parked in his normal spot in front of the doors. They both got out and made their way inside to being perusing the aisles of records. They both saw one of the workers putting some of the new records on the shelves and they approached him, each knowing who it was.

“Hey Alex!” They both said in unison, before they turned to each other with questioning glances.

Alex hadn’t worked at the record store that long, only a week or so which is why he was stuck doing the grunt work of stocking and unpacking boxes.

Alex turned around slowly with a raised eyebrow and greeted both the guys before returning to stocking shelves.

Halvo turned to John. “Dude, how do you know Alex?”

John looked at him incredulously. “Uh, he was on the baseball team back in high school. How do you know him?”

“He’s Chaney’s brother…”

John looked back at Alex, who had since tuned them out, and he was beginning to see the resemblance between them.

“Wow, all these years, and I never knew that he had a sister our age, much less that he lived across the street from me…”

“Ha, man you really are unobservant.”

John threw him a look that Halvo just brushed off before returning back to Alex.

“So dude, how’s your sister?”

Alex merely groaned in response. “Why don’t you ask her yourself. You know we don’t talk.”

“Yeah and why is that exactly?”

“Seriously? Do you two rehearse what you’re going to talk about with each other before you leave the house?”

“Uh…no. Why…?” Halvo asked, curious to find out what was going on.

“Oh I don’t know, maybe because she did the same thing this morning and almost made me late to work. She wouldn’t quit giving me the third degree about our ‘failed siblinghood’ or some bullshit. I don’t even know. Honestly I don’t care. She burned that bridge long ago.” He finished placing the records that were in his hand on the shelves before climbing down from the ladder and going straight to the back to unpack more boxes.

Halvo and John both exchanged confused glances before deciding to just look through the records and hope to find something they didn’t already have. A few hours later they both found a couple of records that neither of them had and went to the counter to make their purchases.

Since the shop was pretty empty, and the hours Alex was working were the shop’s down time in terms of customers, he was the main one on the clock, with one of the managers in the back. That being the case, Alex had since finished unpacking and stocking the shelves with the newest shipment they had received and was now sitting behind the counter where John and Halvo were approaching to buy their albums.

Alex was still pissed off from earlier, and made no attempt to hide that fact. His sister annoyed him and what was worse was having her best friend coming to the place where he worked and question him about it. He was at least relieved to see John, knowing him for the couple years they were in school together on the baseball team. He was just disappointed to find the company he was with. He had never been a huge fan of Halvo, and didn’t understand why he always tried to act like they were best friends. Halvo only was concerned about him when it had to do with Chaney. He never cared about his and Alex’s relationship. The only time he did is when he told him to bug off so he could hang out with Chaney.

Alex would never admit it to either of them, but Halvo’s friendship with Chaney played a huge role in why he no longer wanted to be around his sister. They went from being inseparable to barely speaking a word to each other once Halvo came in the picture, and he would never forgive Halvo for taking his sister away from him. Did he miss spending time with her and hanging out like they used to? Sometimes, but by this point in his life, he didn’t care anymore. He had been so bitter for so long that he didn’t know how to act differently towards either of them.

That’s why when Halvo approached the counter first, putting his records on the counter to be purchased and giving Alex a small smile, it took all of his patience to simply scan the records and put them in a bag instead of taking them and damaging them before returning them to him. He knew he could potentially get fired for that, but he didn’t really care. This job was only temporary.

He didn’t even tell Chaney, but he had decided to take his last semester of classes online so he could save up some money to buy an apartment. He had been pretty frugal during college and had been saving up to hopefully buy his own apartment once he graduated. He hated living at home and even more so, living at home with Chaney. He had grown to resent her over the years and the quicker he could get out of the house and away from her, the happier he would be.

His better judgment took over and he completed Halvo’s order without damaging his records, much to his dismay before taking John’s records and completing his purchase. Once he finished he gave the bag to John and they both waved bye to him as they headed out to John’s truck.

Once they left he groaned, hating how his awful day only continued to get worse. He was stuck working the register for the next couple of hours, and then he could go home and escape to his room. He hated being cooped up at home, but he really didn’t have anywhere else to go. All of his friends from school lived too far away and he didn’t really keep in touch with his friends from high school.
He was perplexed when he saw John come back in the shop and approach him at the counter.

“So Alex, I know we don’t really talk and haven’t really since we played baseball together, but uh, me and some of the guys are gonna get together tonight, have a couple of beers, and play some cards. You wanna come?”

Alex was wondering why John was suddenly interested in being his friend. It’s not that they ever disliked each other, but they never really hung out outside of baseball practice. Deciding he didn’t want to be stuck at home again, especially with the chance that Chaney would be at home, he turned to John and replied.

“Actually, yeah. That sounds good. Where at?”

“My house, 7:00. You know where I live right?”

Alex looked at him like he was stupid.

“Right, right, I was just kidding. But uh, yeah, come over whenever. We never really start at a set
time. Later.”

Alex was intrigued to say the least, and was looking forward to actually hanging out with the guys again. He knew the guys John was friends with as John had been friends with them for as long as he could remember. A couple of those guys he knew through baseball, but mostly he knew them because they would come to their games to support John and he always envied the support system he had. Alex was lucky if either of his parents showed up, much less his friends. The only friends he had in high school were on the baseball team with him.

John walked back outside to a perplexed Halvo waiting by the passenger door of the truck.

“What was that about?”

“Oh, just inviting Alex to our guys’ night tonight.”

“We’re having a guys’ night tonight?”

“Yeah, I uh, just thought of it. We’ll call everyone later.”

“Cool, I’ll go ahead and text In—”

“Don’t even think about it dude. Chaney is not coming.”

“Why not? I always invite her to our parties.”

“Exactly. Tonight’s a guys’ night. She’s not a guy.”

“Dude, Indy is just as much one of the guys as I am.”

John just glared at Halvo, calling him out on his lie.

“Okay, maybe not, but she may as well be! She comes to all of our parties.”

“Doesn’t mean her presence is warranted.” John mumbled more to himself.

“What was that?”

“Uh, nothing. Just…don’t invite her. Don’t even tell her. It’s a guys’ night. We don’t need some girl interfering.”

Halvo clenched his jaw at John’s casual reference to Chaney as ‘some girl’, but decided it better to not argue. He just sat in his seat as John continued to drive and tried to keep his cool.

John instantly noticed the shift in atmosphere in the cab, and realized he must’ve somehow unintentionally hurt Halvo by rejecting Chaney’s invitation. This wasn’t the way he was hoping to convince Halvo that Chaney was deceptive. He didn’t need Halvo to turn on him just as he was just starting to form a plan. He had one of her co-workers, and now he had, hopefully, her brother. His luck with this plan was turning out better than he expected, and he only hoped by the end of it, Halvo would see what a manipulator Chaney was.

No one, not even John, had any idea of the ramifications his plan would soon have on every relationship he was involved with.

***

Alex got off work and decided to go straight to John’s and not worry about changing because he would just be chilling with a couple of the guys. He also wanted to get there because he ended up having to work an extra shift because his relief never showed up, and as a result had to close up, meaning that it was now 8:00. He was just hoping that he wasn’t too late to play cards.

By the time Alex pulled into his driveway, he could see the series of cars parked in the driveway and along the road of the O’Callaghan residence. He got out of his car and walked across the street. He began walking towards the front door when he heard a series of yells coming from the backyard. He instead redirected his path towards the back of the house, and over the fence, could see about 10 guys sitting around a table playing cards. He carefully opened the door, hoping it was okay to just walk in, and John looked up seeing him coming in.

John smiled at him and waved his arm, signaling him to come over to the table and grab a seat.
Alex looked around and noticed there weren’t any open seats, until John nodded with his head towards the back of the house which was a few feet away from them. Alex looked over and saw a stack of folding chairs leaning up against the house. He grabbed one, as well as a beer from the cooler before looking for a place to sit. The guys all shifted around the table and left him a place over by John, since John seemed to know him the best.

He was greeted with many “hello’s” and “what’s up’s” as he got his seat.

John then began to introduce him to the guys around the table.

“Alex, meet the guys.” He then gestured to his right and began working clockwise around the table introducing him to everyone. “This here is Halvo, which you already know. Tim. Moose. Pat. Garrett. Ken. Jared. Chris. And Vito.”

Each guy waved as their name was called, and they cleared the table as John got up to get the game they were to play.

“Alright guys, this one’s a classic. Figured since it’s Alex’s first time here, we should induct him.”

The guys all looked at each other mischievously as they knew to which game John was referring. It was a favorite of all of theirs, and was a tradition to play every time they got together.

John returned to the table and dropped the cards on the table.

Alex looked around and questioned what game it was.

“Cards Against Humanity. You ever played?”

Alex shook his head.

“That’s alright, it’s pretty simple. This game however, shows us what kind of guy you really are.”

He just looked at John nervously, as John slapped his shoulder as he sat back down at the table.

They all explained the rules to Alex as they played and by the third round, Alex was throwing down cards with the best of them, and had them all in fits of laughter at the cards he would put down.

A few hours passed, and Alex was having so much fun hanging out with these guys. He was beginning to despise Halvo less and less as the night went on, and actually found himself enjoying his company.

Halvo realized that Alex was a pretty cool guy, and regretted not ever trying to be friends with him before, because he fit in with his friends really well.

After a while, Halvo pulls out his phone to check the time and screams, “Shit! It’s already 3:30. I gotta get to sleep. I have Sunday brunch at home at 8:30.”

The guys all began to tease him about being a momma’s boy as he got up from the table and put his jacket on, flipping them all off as he walked back towards his car.

Alex realized shortly after that he had to open the store in the morning, despite working almost all day today, so he decided to head out, thanking John and the rest of the guys as he left. He was glad he decided to go, and that John invited him to come. Despite the fact that these guys were Halvo’s friends, he liked them. He found himself hating Halvo less, and could see why Chaney enjoyed his company. Didn’t mean he disliked Chaney any less.

He was quickly reminded of this fact as he unlocked the front door, and made his way upstairs, only to be shocked to hear someone’s voice calling after him from the living room. He wasn’t expecting anyone to be up due to the late hour.

He walked towards the living room to see who it was, only to see Chaney curled up on the couch watching a movie on TV. She paused it and turned to him.

“Where have you been?”

“Work. Then I went to a party.”

She was shocked, but glad that he was finally getting out of the house.

“Oh? That’s great! Who’s party?”

Seeing the joy that was exuding from her face only made his stomach churn, until he realized that she wasn’t invited. With a mischievous look in his eye he replied simply, “Halvo and John’s” before walking upstairs with a smug look on his face.

Chaney just sat there dumbfounded. She couldn’t believe that Halvo co-hosted a party with John and didn’t invite her. On top of that, Alex of all people was invited she thought to herself. She couldn’t believe that Halvo didn’t at least tell her about it. Especially given what happened the night before and what she expressed about the rift between her and John.

Without thinking she pulled out her phone and instantly texted Halvo.

I can’t believe you had a party with John and didn’t invite me. Oh yeah, and I found this out from my BROTHER. How the hell did he get invited and not me? Thanks asshole.

She then threw her phone on the coffee table and resumed her movie, now losing all interest she previously had in the movie. Was she losing Halvo now, too?