The night started in my bedroom. Cindy McCain or sexy sailor? Once my Michelle Obama bailed on me to be a Hooters girl (go figure), it looked as if I would be sailing the high seas. Then I put said "sexy" costume on. At risk of my ego, lets just leave it at not so sexy.
On Halloween, there is a very thin line between looking cheap and looking easy. Easy? Mission Accomplished. Cheap? Better get back to the drawing board... so I did. What I came up with completely rivals my Halloweens of lore. Sky high heels, a shiny gold barely there dress, fur stole, sunglasses, and a giant and noticeable coke smear down my right nostril (compliments of Maybelline). Best part is, my costume came with a punch line. "What are you supposed to be?" ... Oh me? I didn't dress up this year.
Geared up and ready to go, my first stop was with my two
very in love friends Maria and Matt. Little did I know however, Maria and Matt were with their very in love friends Ben and Sarah. There I am crashing a double date, in a packed restaurant, to have a literal 5th wheel pulled to a corner of a table for 4. Did I mention dressed like a coke-addict home-wrecker? The latter actually played to my advantage as the awkwardness of this situation was immediately made better by all the attention I was getting from fans. It was Beacon Hill so I'm pretty sure there was a toss up between people who laughed, people who were offended, and people who thought I was just in desperate need of a mirror.
The waiter, "Rehab Reject", comes to the table. Thinking himself to be funny, "Can I get you anything, maybe some coke?"... ha. No, I'll just take a vodka soda,... and an extra straw. P.S. keep them coming, you have no idea how much one needs to drink when they're the misplaced chair in the corner at a restaurant of Bunnies and Hef's, Wilma and Fred's... you get the point. Speaking of the point, I always thought of Halloween as an excuse to freeze your ass off in October because you're wearing little more than a thong and go home with some guy in a mullet wig. Upon explaining this to my coupled counterparts, they somehow take this as a reason to furiously try to set me up with the waiter.Okay, I'm sorry. Just stop it! I'm single not a leper, and this is supposed to be the only holiday where my no strings attached, fly by the seat of my pants attitude pays off. Why is it that all smug couples feel the need to then push you into a pairing? The Waiter... really? Rehab Reject? Are you fucking kidding me. It is after this event, I switched from vodka soda to shots... all of a sudden, Rehab Reject wasn't looking so bad.
After a toast of "To Ben and Sarah, my second family, Maria, the woman who makes every day worthwhile (did I mention I am sandwiched between Romeo and Juliet) and then to me... uh... good friends!" dinner is over. We head over to Max and Dylan's which can simply be described as a place where if you're with the people you want to be, is just fine. Not that I don't love my friends, but it's Halloween! I want to flirt with strangers, maybe get frisked, be taken advantage of and so on. The only one taking advantage of me here is the bartender via $8 drinks. With a costume this good, it's all about exposure and I was getting close to none of it. The whole truth is that not only did I want to be frisked, I wanted to be frisked by a very specific someone who I had planned on meeting at a party later in the night. So now, I'm looking hot, surrounded by couples who could give a rats ass, and the literal ass who's supposed to care seems to have fallen off the face of the planet.
I texted at 6pm, again at 11:30 - and as I've been on dates I wasn't invited to all night, I'll be damned before I walk into yet another place I'm not welcome. I need some sort of "hey, im here, come!" confirmation before I schlep across the city and reapply my coke smear. This being said, I am up to my eyeballs of people in love perfectly content with being nowhere as long as they're together. If another one of the other third wheels in the place comes over to say "well at least we have each other", all said person will have is a black eye. And god damn it! I'm not wearing underwear - text me back!
I would just show up at the party by none of my girlfriends wanted to go and I can't walk in alone - that surpasses even my level of crazy stalking. So instead, I do only what drunk frustrated me knows how to do: leave choice words on a voicemail. His fault for not picking up. Probably my fault for the fact that he'll never pick up again.
Embattled and defeated, I wave my white flag. I have had enough. I exit stage left and stumble down to the corner of Tremont St. to get a cab. Thinking the worst was behind me.. I was wrong - dead wrong. Usually hailing cabs in skimpy clothing is the best therapy money can buy - not tonight. I got shout outs ranging from "where you going?" to "stand there long enough people will start asking how much". Yea buddy, thats right. I'm telling all the open cabs to go past me so I can stand here listening to your 2 cent suggestion? I think not. My favorite of all the car calls however? "You're a man".
In one night, I've gone from single girl to desperate girl to now, not even a girl at all. Things just keep on getting better. Finally, my white and shining crown victoria sweeps me off my feet. No, seriously, he came so close I thought I was getting hit, which in retrospect, would have been a plus to my night as nothing else was hitting on me. I get in the cab, give him the address, only to find out that my cabbie had a few more questions than just "where to?".
"So you're going home?".. uh huh
"Why so early?"
Are you kidding me? You don't think I know it's 12:30. I don't see the crowds of cats, bumblebees and police officers? How about we back up to life before your game of 20 questions: you keep driving. I'll keep sulking. Hoping that something is happening somewhere, I send a mass text. My harvard friend replies but that means I'd have to endure an extra 20 minute ride with Inspector Clouseau the cab driver - forget it. We turn onto Harvard Ave. when my dominican driver comes up with yet another great idea:
"Lets pull over and get a drink. Im alone - You're Alone".
If there was ever a moment when you wish his car really did hit you: this was it. "Im alone... you're alone" - oh hell no. Any self esteem I had prior to walking out of the house looking like a coked up slut only to walk back in as party of one has now been completely decimated by cab #263. Scrambling to pick up the pieces of my broken self all over the backseat , "actually sir, this corners just perfect! Friend just texted, party right around the corner! (Lie #1) and... I'm not alone, I just broke up with my boyfriend! (Lie #2)... keep the change!" Luckily, I did see my building from where I 007-ed out of the taxi, so my "big stand" only equaled out to walking 2 blocks, but blisters of the foot are far easier and cheaper to fix than the blister this cab driver was developing on my ego.
Home at last and not a second later does Jamie storm in cursing the day all Halloween revelers were born. "What the hell are they screaming about out there! Its Halloween, they're not protesting Castro for christ sake! If I had the right speakers, I'm in the mind to go out there like Evita!"
I guess I have met my match after all. We sat drinks in hand, telling of our Halloween horrors, singing Andrew Lloyd Webber until the sounds of schmucks in Santa suits couldn't be heard over "dont cry for me Argentina"
