“I am!” Phil said, raising his.
Then it dawned on Phil what he’d just offered.
“Okay, but I’m pitching,” David said with a straight face.
“Yep! Best trip ever,” Greg agreed.
Once they’d reached cruising altitude, Lexi encouraged them all to sit with someone new. David drew Wolf. After a short while, Greg called from the back.
“Tell us about your trips last summer and fall.”
“I know. Tell everyone about Tim getting the shit kicked out of him by the women’s volleyball team,” Wolf suggested.
“We promised that what happened down under stayed down under,” Tim reminded them.
The three of them had dirt on each other, so they nodded their agreement to Tim’s comment.
“Tell them about the carnival,” Lexi called out.
David stood up to tell his tale. He chuckled, remembering what happened.
“We were in Australia, filming in some remote locale. After a few days, people got excited that a carnival was coming to town. To say it was seedy looking would be giving it too much credit,” David said.
“It was a rolling dump,” Wolf agreed.
“At one of the booths, they had a stage with a big curtain. The barker was as funny as hell. He was calling out the manhood of any guy who walked past. He was offering a thousand dollars if anyone could stay in this cage for a full minute. All they had to do was put up fifty dollars. He even fanned out a wad of bills to show them what they could win.
“One bloke got all wobbly, thinking he could earn some moolah for a tinny,” David said in a bad Aussie accent.
“One guy got excited thinking he could earn some money for a beer,” Tim translated.
“When the guy paid his money, the barker pulled back the curtain. Inside the cage, an orangutan was sitting on a stool, looking bored. The bloke puffed up when his mates called out different strategies for winning the money. If it were me, I would have carefully stepped into the cage and stood very still. The bet was to last a minute. I wouldn’t have run at the ape and tried to knock him off his stool,” David advised.
Lexi, Tim, and Wolf were all chuckling at the memory of what happened.
“The guy had to weigh at least 200 pounds. The orangutan didn’t even get off his stool. He just grabbed the blokes’ arm and tossed him against the side of the cage. The guy had to have flown at least six feet through the air,” David shared.
“I thought he was dead,” Lexi confessed.
“It did knock the wind out of him. He rolled to the gate and begged the carny to let him out,” Wolf added.
“You would think these Aussies would see that and get smart. It had the opposite effect. They now had a line. Let me paint you a picture of the type of guys we’re talking about. They were all in their wife-beater shirts, scrawny, with homemade tattoos, and looked half in the bag. Their wives and girlfriends were egging them on, calling them pussies if they acted scared of a little monkey.
“The next guy’s attempt was brutal. He decided to run from the ape. His dancing around for about twenty seconds. The orangutan watched him, looking disinterested, which made it all funnier for some reason. The beast looked over at the carny guy, who nodded. The next thing anyone knew, the orangutan exploded off his bench. He reached out and grabbed the poor bastard through the leg hole of his scuzzy shorts by the nut sack,” David shared.
Both Tim and Wolf instinctively covered up.
“I didn’t know you could pick a guy up like that,” Lexi said to clarify what happened.
That made all the guys cringe as they imagined hanging in the air by their nut sack as an orangutan held them up with its scrawny-looking arm.
“It took till the third guy before everyone decided that it wasn’t worth their fifty bucks. He, at least, had some skills. If I were to guess, he had wrestled when he was younger because he wrapped both his arms and legs around the orangutan’s torso, trapping his arms to his body.
“The orangutan looked around like it didn’t have a care in the world until the carny noted that they’d gone forty seconds. I honestly thought the man was going to make it. Then the ape started squirming as if trying to wiggle free. At the fifty-second mark, everyone began to count it down.
“Ten, nine, eight. That was when the orangutan reached down and shat in its hand. We watched in horror as it slapped it across the guy’s face. He might have been okay if he’d kept his mouth shut. The idiot tapped out with only three seconds left.
“After that, no one wanted to get into the cage,” David said.
“I was done after I saw the guy all but get his nuts ripped off,” Tim conceded.
When they got to the condo, no one wanted to hit the slopes. They all decided to kick back and relax. The building had a hot tub, which a few of them decided to try out. Others played some pool or jumped onto the gaming consoles to play some racing game. Lexi and Joey made margaritas and got some snacks out. When the music was turned on, they had a party started.
David kicked back. This was what he needed. Let the vacation begin.
Developmental Editors: XofDallas and Bud Ugly
Line / Copy Editors: Bud Ugly, TheMikeBomb, Zom, and Old Rotorhead
Last One Through: Bud Ugly
Chapter 48
Joey
Joey was the first one up and shuffled to the kitchen to make coffee. She was still trying to wrap her mind around the condo. David had shown everyone before and after pictures, and they all agreed that his friend Cindy had transformed the place. It was a four-bedroom unit, and originally each bedroom had its own bath. Cindy had combined the baths for the two that were now called ‘the six-packs’ into one huge bathroom. The new layout had three showers, three toilet stalls, and a large sink area. With doors on the stalls and showers, it could be used coed.
The six-packs each had two bunk beds with a trundle bed underneath. Joey and Greg’s bedroom had a queen-size bed, while David’s had a California King.
David had spent a nontrivial sum remodeling the kitchen. There used to be an eat-in area, but it had been eliminated to make room for commercial-sized appliances that could accommodate a larger crowd. Where the eat-in area had been, there was now an island with a sink and two dishwashers. There was also room for six stools on the end and on the back side of the island for extra seating.
Cindy had removed the wall between the living and dining rooms to give the place a vast open-plan look. David had explained that there was no need for a formal dining area for a vacation spot.
Their was a walk-in closet by the front door where all the ski gear was stored. Along one wall was a bar with a table that could be converted into a poker table. Where the dining table had been, there was now a pool table. At the other end was a home theater.
The layout was only half the story; the finishes were what made the place. It was all done in woods and stone to give it a rustic ski-lodge look and feel. Joey understood why David was able to command top dollar when renting this condo. His friend Cindy had wanted it to blow away any suite you could book at a hotel. In Joey’s opinion, she’d succeeded.
Just like his home in Malibu and his dorm room, this was a stark reminder that David had both money and good taste. Or that he at least hired people with good taste and let them do their jobs.
She’d noticed that David was comfortable in upscale surroundings. When they all boarded the luxury chartered jet, everyone except David and Lexi had gawked at how nice it was. Drinks were served in lead crystal glasses. That sure beat the heck out of the plastic ones you received on a commercial flight.
Speaking of the differences from commercial, instead of a bag of peanuts, they’d served an honest-to-goodness meal. It included fine china with genuine silverware service. The food was as good as she’d have expected at a quality restaurant. It included terrific appetizers, a choice of chicken marsala or filet mignon, and a chocolate brownie with ice cream for dessert. Lexi told her they’d initially planned for something fancier than the brownie, but she knew that was what David would want.