Week 5: We Name the Guilty Man!

Years ago, just after I had graduated high school if memory serves, I was hanging out at my friend Kevin's (whom from this point on be known as Kevin L.) apartment with a group of mutual friends. This motly crew considered of course myself, the rather tall and overly athleatic Kevin (whom from this point on shall be known as Kevin M.), also rather tall but not very athletic Corey, our ever strange and constantly dressed in black Gerrete, and of course our gracious if block like (in a solid sort of way) host Kevin L. and for this evenings night of mischife we had aquired the living room from Kevin L.'s room mate Jim. Mind you this is before I had actually gotten to know Jim so all I realy knew of him at the time was that he was ex military and favored a combat gripped shotgun he nicknamed 'Satan', so I was a bit releaved when he decided to opt out of our little indoor excersion.

But I digress.

The livingroom itself was fairly large and seemed to have a perminant haze hanging about it from cigirette smoke. The battered old hard wood floors that had seen better days since this place had become a bachelors pad, the matching smoke blue sofa and arm chair were well worn from constant use as well as sporting tufts of hair from Jim's Russian Blue, Baloo. The white trim that ran about the bottom of the room and along the window frames had chipped and faded, presumably by simple hard use and a lack of upkeep. It was a dark enough place, the over head lamps bulb having blown who knows how long ago and the only light coming from the kitchen the next room over along with the soft glow of the television. As for the occupants of the room...we of course were mostly dressed in dark colors with the obligitory metal band T shirt or trench coat, kind of an odd choice of attire for a get together to play card/boar/video games. Of course with such a gather one must have...snacks! Having pushed the two coffee tables to one side of the room they now served as a Domino's Pizza buffete.

I remember I was seated on the couch, munching on a slice of pizza and waiting my turn at the Playstation The current game of choice was a fighter that pitted two combattants that could shape shift into different animal forms, like a werewolf or weretiger. Pretty intense stuff for the time and like most guys our age during that time we would spend hours beating the virtual snot out of one another and laugh about it. It was at the conclusion of one such bout that Kevin L. glared at Corey and shook the controler at him, wide eyed in mock fury.

"Cheater! CHEATER! CHEEET-EERR!" Kevin L. raised his arms and shook them in protest at his latest loss, to which Corey simply wrinkled his nose and laughed.

"You just suck Kev."

"Bah!"

"Hey guys, you wanna take a smoke break?" Gerret's voice cuts through the budding argument as Kevin M. sits up from his place on the couch and cracks his knuckles.

"Sure, you guys smoke....then I take on winner. That means your 'Mexistach.'" Kevin M. fixed a level, if joking look at Corey who only smirked and rolled his eyes and stood up. "You comin' Dray?" I shook my head at Kevin's question and stood up.

"Nah I think I'm gonna treat myself to some more pizza. You guys go on." With that the majority of the group wandered off to the smoking area: The Kitchen. I knew that this would be quite a pause between games, smoking usually brought about chatting, joking, idle boasts and gossip from the group and normally I'd join in but....I was honestly near starving having not eaten at all the prvious day. So as the idle chatter and smoke started to filter into the room I picked up a slice of pie..then another...then another. I glanced out into the kitchen for a moment as I contemplated my fourth.

"Guys...you want any more of this?"

No response.

"Guys? You had enough pizza or what?"

Still no response. After a short moment of contemplation influanced mostly by my teen age ability to consume stupid amounts of food, I decided to finish off what was left of the pizzas (which was no small quantity) then retake my seat and wait for the rest of the gang to return from their smoking adventures. One by one they filed back in and settled back down into thier previous places and I sat quietly, for all intents the perfect picture of innocents.

"Hey! Where'd the pizza go?!? Dray!!"