Chapter 07 – Youngblood

What was I doing out here?

What was the meaning of this trip?

Was I simply just roaming around on a drug bender of some kind... or had I truly come out to Las Vegas of all places to do some homework? The elevator dinged. I stepped out looking around on the casino floors. The car was parked. Just killing time now.

Who are these people? These faces? Where do they come from? They look like caricatures of Middle American townspeople all stricken with jaundice, and sweet Jesus, there were a hell of a lot of them at four-thirty on a Sunday morning... Still humping the American Dream... that vision of hitting the jackpot and winning the funds to return to stardom; to relevancy. The Big Winner in the last minute pre-dawn chaos of a stale Vegas casino emerging from mere nostalgia.

Why not? Give it a go. Maybe bring home something for my parents to notice. Two dollars is all it takes to turn it all around.

Nope. Just another two bucks down the drain... eh! Big deal! It was only two dollars, hehehe...

By the time I got back, the door had been blocked from the inside. I shoved my way in and saw the place was entirely turned over. My roommate was in the bathtub floating in powdery water, jawbreakers floating with him. The radio was blasting some sort of death metal, the words "Awaken! Awaken!" were constantly being repeated. I turned it off and pulled it away from Eddy. He had his eyes closed and was clamping down his ears. I wasn't even sure if he had noticed me yet.

Finally he looked over when he noticed a shift in the vibrations, but he didn't say anything. Then I noticed the chewed-up white paper...

"Oh God... did you eat the rest of the acid?"

"Damn right... t-turn it on..."

"Turn what on?"

"The radio! The CD! I bought it in the gift shop! Last track!"

I picked up the CD. "'They Might Be Giants'? Why do you want to listen to these guys?"

"Just shut the fuck up and put it in the CD player! Mind your own damn business!"

"Do you have any idea of half the crap you pulled? They're gonna come looking for you after this!"

"I'll welcome it... now turn that music on..." he still had the knife in his hands. Here he was. My roommate. Wearing an old yellow shirt with a red stripe, jeans and all soaking in the tub, head full of acid and a knife in his hands. He was ready.

"Just... one more favor, man... just one more favor... give me a few hours. One or two at least, before tomorrow. God knows what I'm gonna have to deal with..."

"Yeah... yeah, sure... I'll give you all the time you need... just play the CD..."

I turned it on and started to back out of the bathroom. I left the radio far away from him before shutting the door. The bathroom had become a whirlpool. Water splashed everywhere, markings of hats in shaving cream, and the sound from the song vibrated through the walls. I tried shutting into a comfortable position, but not seconds later he was yelling from the bathroom crying for help.

I ran back into the bathroom thinking he had gutted himself open with the knife. Instead, he was reaching over for the radio with a soggy jawbreaker. I smacked the jawbreaker away from him and moved the radio out of reach. He continued to cry out:

"PLAY IT AGAIN! PLAY IT AGAIN! Go back and play it again! Give me the radio!"

I remembered the song. We had heard it on the drive over here, so I knew what was getting to him... the peak had come and gone. He had started to get out of the tub when I grabbed the nearest thing I could find. Turned out is was the shower curtain rod. Holding it out like a lance I kept Eddy at bay in the tub. He looked up at me.

"Listen... just play the end of the song... and... and when it finishes... throw the radio into the tub with me... got it?"

I stared back in shock. I didn't know what to make of it. "Are you out of your mind? Any given day I'd gladly stick you in the ass with a cattle prod, but this radio will fucking kill you! I'm not even kidding! Blasted right through the wall! And worst of all, they'll make ME explain it! Get the facts of what we were up to! The hell am I supposed to do then?"

"You could bitch to them the way your bitching to me, hahaha, now shut the hell up and help me out, or so help me Timmy, doon't make me uuuse thiis..." He brandished the knife and held it close. He started to get out again, but I told him I'd plunge this metal into his throat. Knowing no other alternative, I thought for a moment and set the pole down.

"Alright... I can see where you're going... let me just make sure I have it straight. You want me to throw the radio into the tub with you when the song ends?"

"Yeah... thanks Tim... I was beginning to think... I was gonna have to get... Ed to do it..."

"Eddy, Ed's not here..." but he had sunk down into the water before he had heard me. I could hear him muttering something about seeing Double D again as he sunk. Using this moment of blindness, I snagged the soggiest jawbreaker I could find, casually holding it to my side.

"Are you ready? Ok..." Forwarding the CD player, the song began to play out it's last verse. Eddy started frantically tossing around. Calming him down, he demanded I blast it. Volume nearing max, he sunk once more as I counted down the moment, the song ending in the background and Eddy singing along with it...

"NOT COMIIING IN... NO, NO, NO... NOOOO MOOORREE..."

Finishing the count and the song, I chucked the Jawbreaker at his head. He had flailed about on contact and couldn't make heads or tails of what was happening. I yanked the cord out of the socket and shut the door running out of there. He was jabbering from the bathroom but was calming down nonetheless. Suddenly, a pink Mace can. I can't recall who packed it, but it was serendipity... and none too soon as Eddy kicked the door open. He lobbed one of the chairs at me, but it missed badly.

"Mace! Mace, motherfucker! You want this? Ya like Bear Mace, brah?"

"You buck-toothed pink hatted bastard... you WOULD do that, wouldn't you!"

"Why the hell not... you just tried to kill yourself and now your gunning for me... what I should do is CALL THE DAMN COPS!"

"The COPS! Jesus, are you upset..." he fell over then, rendering him mostly harmless. I held the can outward nonetheless. "You'd get expelled for sure if you called the cops..."

"Listen you midget bastard... I'm not going to sleep with you wandering around, psyched out on LSD and constantly threatening to slice me up with that fucking knife!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! The knife was for the jawbreakers, I told you that..." he said as he tossed the knife aside.

"Look... eat some jujubes. Slice up some jawbreakers. Smoke some grass. Shit, dude, do whatever you have to to calm down..." he couldn't stop laughing at this point. "I need to sleep... I need to write that report and sleep... GET UP, YOU SONUVABITCH! UP, DAMN YOU! UP!"

He took a minute to breathe in before responding. "Oh... right... you've got that... right, that paper... shit, man, that blows... heheh, ok then... ok then, I'll uh... um... don't let me keep you up..."

I guided him back to the bathroom. I'm not sure what this much acid could do to a person. I'd never done it before two days ago, but there was nothing left in the bathroom that could seriously hurt him, and I knew he'd be too whacked out of his mind to let roam for now...

Sitting back down on the couch, the room was quiet again. Grabbing the nearest piece, I took a hit, tossed the mace can onto one of the beds and slunk back into my seat.

Ignore the nightmare in the bathroom. Just another refugee from the Renaissance Age of Animation... my roommate has never been able to accept the notion, often espoused by former toon celebrities, that you can do lot better without kids than with them, and neither have I for that matter...

I thought back to last week, to the nightclub I had taken Tootie to. The place reminded me of something out of The Matrix. I kept thinking about how much I wish I could go back there again, murmuring it over and over. It was after midnight, and the place was jumping to Chip Skylark. We were sitting in the back by the corner, and there I was...

Wait a minute... there I am! I can see myself exactly where I was sitting! Did the acid dissolve into my leg? Either way, I was... clearly just another pothead, going through the motions and enjoying the company. Seriously, I'm getting a serious visual on a clone or something... then I felt a tap on the shoulder.

"Hiiiiiiii Tiiiimmmmyyyyy, teeellllllllll Edddyyyy IIII fiiiniiished maaakiiing thaaat speeeciaaal paaapeeerrr heee waaanteed meee tooo maaake..."

"Ed... why are you talking like that?"

"I saw it in a movie once! Ha ha ha ha! Could you give this to Eddy when you see him, good chum? THANKS TIMMY! Oh, excuse me Timmy, but I see you are over there! Heeeeeeyyyyy Tiiiimmmyyyyy!"

"Ed... why are you talking like that?" I heard as I blended into the crowd. I had to seek out answers, so I went to the restroom to seclude myself. I knew that Ed had been Eddy's source for a long time, something even Ed didn't know, but I'd never heard of him peddling acid. I figured I'd get rid of it before Eddy could do more damage to himself, but pulling it out I had spilled it on the bottom of my shirt.

"What's the trouble?" I looked up to see a pair of braces I hadn't seen in a long while. It was Chester... I didn't even know he was at this party. "Timmy?"

"Chester! It's nothing! All this stuff on my shirt, it's just... it's just LSD..." I said nervously. Chester was one of my oldest friends, but to have him catch me like this I'd figured I'd be honest with the guy. Apparently, honesty gets me a friend on his knees as he began to lick the acid off of my shirt. I couldn't move, I wasn't sure what to make of the situation. Then I heard a voice...

"Timmy! Are you in there? You said you were going to the bathroom, but you never said which one and I-"

She walked in and instantly fixed her eyes on us, Chester licking away as I tried to pull him off. The look in her eyes was heart-wrenching... on the verge of tears, Tootie turned and ran away. I knocked Chester off as I later learned he had been slipped ecstasy and was curious about LCD, but there was no way to catch up with her. Then I remembered something else about that night... it was the night Tootie left me. We had gotten into an argument later on and I wasn't sure what she was talking about then... but now...

I opened my eyes. I was in the hotel room again. A dream? A drug addled hallucination through memory lane? Perhaps, a reflection on what had actually happened that night... a realization... through the purple frames I could tell... her life was ruined forever. Always thinking that just behind some narrow door in all her favorite hangouts, future boyfriends are getting incredible kicks from things she'll never know...

I could hear Eddy crying in the bathroom now. I knew damn well why. Today marks the six-year anniversary of Double D's death... We had all been in high school together, meeting each other for the first time then... I got to know the Ed's better over the following four years. Over time, we became very close. I remember Double D as always being the voice of reason in the group. Intelligent, close friend to A.J., and just a good human being sporting a black beanie. Never would've hurt a soul... not even the driver who had hit him... it had been our Senior year...

Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Has it really been six years? Thirteen? It feels like a lifetime... the kind of peak that never comes again. Nickelodeon in the late 90's was a very special time and place to be a part of... but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant...

There were toons in any direction, at any hour... you could splat gak anywhere... There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that kids were winning...

And that, I think, was the handle... that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Grown-Up. Not in any mean or mature sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave...

So now, less than ten years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Burbank, CA... and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the Nicktoons Studio... that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.