One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories(50)

“Don’t make me drink all four of these,” he said.

I did what seemed like the less irresponsible action and picked up the tequila shot.

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

I downed the shot and immediately felt better.

So that’s how that worked.

“If you ran for president,” said Willie, “and I knew you’d be a terrible president, and you were running against the best president ever—a pro-legalization, pro-gay-rights Reagan—I would vote for you. You know why? Because you support your people. You just do. That’s more important than having a good president—having a country where everyone is going to stand by their people, just because they do. Do you know what I mean?”

Two more tequila shots arrived. I dutifully took one and swallowed it. “I’m good for now,” said Willie to the bartender.

He turned back to me. “You made a mistake with Sarah. There are no two sides. There is no justification for something like that.” I know, I said. “And the fact that we all make mistakes—all of us—doesn’t make this one okay.” I know, I said. He pushed the other tequila shot in front of me. “Here,” he said. That’s okay, I’m good, I said.

“No, you really need to drink this,” he said. “I need you to drink this before I tell you this.”

Willie stared right at me.

I felt sick again. I stared at the drink in front of me.

“Hey. Look at me.”

I stared at Willie’s forehead.

“I can’t let you make a decision without knowing everything. I can’t have you thinking everyone’s perfect but you. Hey. Look at me.”

When I looked him in the eyes, he stared back for a while and either saw something he was looking for or didn’t.

“I love you guys. I really do,” he finally said. “It’s been a really hard first year out. I know it’s all going to be worth it, but it’s been hard. I know it seems like maybe I have it all together, like I’ve got it all perfectly figured out, and it’s just guys like Dave who are kind of a mess.”

We both laughed.

“But yeah, it’s hard for me, too. For all of us. The best thing ever is being here with everybody. We really have to do this more often.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

He bumped his forehead into mine, hard. When his head hit my head, I noticed that my headache had gone away completely.

“Now where the f*ck is everybody?!”


As soon as the room key beeped, Josh started shouting from inside the room.

“Did you get Advil or Tylenol?”

I opened the door. The room looked like an absolute mess, the most complicated possible version of pathetic. So did everyone, and everything, except for Willie.

“WHAT’S THE DINKY-DONK, MOTHERFUCKERS?!”

Willie lunged for Dave, torpedoing Dave’s stomach with his skull and forcing him onto the bed, coughing. Dave started instinctively defending himself with wrestling moves, which made Willie laugh and break out his own high school wrestling moves.

Josh looked at me, opening his arms, and mouthed, So?

I walked to the minibar and opened a beer. Josh stared while I downed the whole thing and threw the empty bottle on the floor.

Then he shrugged.


We got wasted in the room. Then we went to XS at the Wynn, Ghostbar at the Palms, and waited in line at Hakkasan at the MGM until we gave up. Willie won $800 at roulette. Josh hooked up. We got back to the rooms at five a.m., slept till ten, pulled the curtain open, turned up some music, smoked a bowl, and went to the Paris buffet for what we all agreed was the best breakfast, lunch, and dinner of our lives in a single sitting.

“We have to do this more often,” said Willie, in a crisp and brilliant benediction over a bottomless bottle of anonymous champagne.

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”

“To health, wealth, and the beauty of our children.”


The four of us shared a taxi to the airport together, still drunk from the breakfast. My plane was the last to take off. I played slots until my plane was ready to board. I won, then I lost, then I won, then I lost, all at random. I didn’t understand anything, but at least now it was a relief that I wasn’t supposed to. Then the plane boarded, and I went back home.

It was the happiest weekend the four of us spent together since college, as well as the last. A few weeks afterward, Willie changed his profile photo to a picture of him surrounded by smiling kids at an inner-city after-school program in a T-shirt with the unexplained acronym H.E.L.P. across it in cursive, and things seemed to get a lot better for him after that. Dave committed suicide six months later.





Wikipedia Brown and the Case of the Missing Bicycle





It was a quiet Sunday. Wikipedia Brown was sipping lemonade with his friend Sally, when all of a sudden their classmate Joey ran in, out of breath.

“Help!” said Joey. “Someone stole my bike! I left it outside the library this morning. Who stole it?”