Miscommunication



On a rainy Tuesday afternoon, my friend Ed & I, lacking the creativity or inclination to do anything else, decided to get a 5 liter box of Peter Vella Burgundy. Horrible stuff. We were at his parent's summer house in Fairfield, CT, a few steps from the beach of the Long Island Sound. The day was grey, windy and miserable. We started drinking the wine in teacups, with a little ice, pouring refills from the box in the refrig.
After a few glasses he put on some music and we went downstairs into his basement to play a drinking game. It involved tossing a quarter across a long table into the opposing player's cup, and fielding the rebounds and misses. He was better at it to start off, but after a while were equally shit-faced and our skills evened out. The phone rang, and it was Mike saying he was coming over with some beers.

Mike came down into the basement and joined in the game, rapidly consuming his beers and moving on to the wine. The music got a little louder and pretty soon we were all caught up in the antics and screwing around that accompanies heavy drinking, ripping on each other and getting loud. The phone rang again, and Ed turned the music down a bit to hear better. It was some girl, who had the wrong number, and I think she or Ed had an attitude because he kind of slammed the phone down.
Whatever. Back to the loosely held together game. A few seconds later the phone rang again. He looked agitated so I went over to hear the conversation.

"Sure. Yeah. You're my Mother. Right." Slam.

He said the girl was pranking him again. We went back to the table and it rang again.

"Yeah, right, MOM, love you too MOM, Stop fucking calling here !"

Mike and I were liberally yelling obscenities in the background. Again, slam, the phone goes down.

We go back to the game, finishing off the Peter Vella and moving on (down) to an old bottle of Port that was lying around the basement. Even worse than the burgundy, but down it went. Suddenly, if any motion when you're that bombed can be called sudden, Ed turns down the radio and shushes us.

"Stay down here, I think I hear a noise".

Ed goes up to inspect. It turn's out to be one of his neighbors, banging on the door.

"Is everything OK, Ed? Your mom called and asked me to check on you. She keeps calling and someone is hanging up on her."

Oh shit. Mike and I are rolling, literally on the basement floor, overcome with hysterical laughter, to the point where I am puking in the basinette in the basement, holding my guts.

Then Ed, on the phone with MOM, apologizing, trying to explain that he had been pranked several times before she called and thought it was the same person (though it had only been one wrong number, really)

    Ed describes the conversation to me afterwards:

"But Ed, you sound like you're in outer space. Are you just drunk?"

"MOM, I just couldn't hear you with the music on."

"Are you having a party?"

"MOM, it's 7 PM on a Tuesday. There's no party, just Ray and Mike"

"Ed, I don't like this. I don't think you should drink in the house, anymore"

"It's OK MOM, I just won't answer the phone"

© Raymond Abruzzi


P · H · E index