Shoot Club: Saving Private Donny
TomChick - Columns - Comments - 07/11/04
When Donny gets here, everyone says hello. Eric calls him 'Little Man'.
"You did not just call me 'Little Man'," Donny says.
"Sorry. That's what I say to my nephew."
"How old is he, like ten?"
"He's seven."
"Well, I haven't been seven for a while. I even get to watch R-rated movies."
"Just educational ones," Trevor adds.
We break into teams. We're playing a LAN game, since we won't be able to enforce our plan online and Donny might end up having fun. Trevor, Peter, and Donny are on one team. Eric, Jude, and me are on the other team.
The game starts and I can hear them in the next room. "Hey, you just shot me," Donny says. "I'm on your team."
"Oh, was that you?" Peter says. "I couldn't tell."
"Turn friendly tags on, dickweed. Hit 'K'."
"Language, Donny," Trevor says.
"'Dickweed' isn't a bad word. They say it on Mystery Science Theatre."
"Bullcrap. 'Dickweed' is bad. They can't say that on Mystery Science Theatre."
"They do," Peter says, "They say 'dickweed'. Crow says it."
"He says 'dickweed'?"
"Yep."
"Man, what's this country coming to? Okay, you can say 'dickweed'. But you have to say the 'weed' part."
"They say 'pussy' on Howard Stern," Donny says.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, you can't say stuff from Howard Stern. Just Mystery Science Theatre."
"Can I say 'pussyweed'?"
"Donny."
"I'm just asking. Why is 'dickweed' okay, but 'pussyweed' isn't?"
"Would you pick a spawn point and play?"
"I did, but your dickweed friend shot me again."
"Oh, was that you?" Peter asks. "I think I received faulty intel. You know, I don't feel so good. I think I have to take a break."
"You see, Donny," Trevor explains, talking too slowly to sound sincere, especially to a 14-year-old, "this is what war is like. It's total chaos. You never know when you're going to get shot or who's going to shoot you. It's all very confusing."
"I think you guys just don't know how to play Joint Ops with friendly fire on. Look, they're taking all the bases." Donny spawns and rushes out of a bunker.
"Friendly fire is a fact of life, Donny. Remember that." Trevor shoots Donny with the .50 mounted on top of the bunker. "Oops, I thought you were one of the rebels."
And then the door opens and there's Lisa. Fucking hell, I'm still not used to seeing her. We broke up, what?, seven or eight months ago and it's a huge downer every time I see her, knowing she's with him. Her hair is longer and she's got it in braids. She's wearing this skirt that I made the mistake of never mentioning how much I liked. She looks great and now I'm just sitting here staring at her, miserable about how good she looks.
And I immediately feel even worse, because here I am, mooning over this sort of stupid adolescent crap like who my ex-girlfriend is fucking while Donny's brother is halfway across the world with his ruined hands in bandages and probably morphine or vicodin or something pumping through his veins giving him weird dreams while doctors look on to figure out where they're going to peel off his skin to patch up his burned arms. Bullets patter onto the ground around me and then thwack into my flesh. I cry out, gurgle, and die.
"Ha, I got one of you pussyweeds," Donny cries out from the other room. Trevor leans out and shoots a deadly glare at us. We've failed him.
"Is that Donny?" Lisa asks, incredulous.
While I get Lisa's photo albums for her, I have to explain a number of things. 1) Joint Ops is T-rated. 2) We're not letting him have any of the beer. 3) We're trying not to cuss, but there's been some debate as to whether 'pussyweed' counts. 4) What's really going on here is that we're trying to keep Donny from being sent to Iraq. It sounds incredibly stupid when I'm explaining it to her. Which is to say, it sounds incredibly stupid. But I generally don't realize this about things that are between me and the guys at Shoot Club.
"Donny, do you need a ride home?" Lisa asks him once I've given her the photo albums.
"No, my Mom wants me to stay overnight with Uncle Trevor."
"I'm sorry to hear about what happened to your brother, Donny. I'm glad he's coming home."
Donny noodles around with the mouse and doesn't say anything.
"I like your haircut, Donny," she says, "It makes you look older."
He got a haircut? How do women notice stuff like that?
"Thanks," Donny says.
On her way out, as she's clutching the photo albums to her exquisite chest, she angrily hisses at me that it's all in very poor taste and that we should have asked Donny's mother about it first. She's trying to keep her voice down, but everyone can tell I'm getting in trouble. Now I don't even get the chance to be mad about her new boyfriend. I have inadvertently plummeted from the moral high ground.
| | Previous | Next | | More Columns by TomChick |
|
|
