Part 5
Startled by the sudden touch, I turned my heads to find Tez standing behind me. It was obvious that he has consumed too much alcohol - he was giggling hysterically and was unsteady on his feet, leaning into my side for support. Ryan and 'the clan' were accompanying him, each man more intoxicated than the next. While i'd had a few drinks, I was the closest to sober of the group. The thick scent of alcohol on their breaths gave me a good indication that the coming of the New Year had influenced them to do everything in excess, including drinking.
"Rich! It's about time you materialised, mate!" Tez exclaimed, flopping an arm limply over my shoulders. "Things are wild down at the club!"
"Tez, how did you manage to come all this way on foot?" I asked. "You can barely stand upright!"
"We came here with a bunch of others who were just a wee bit more sober than us!" the eldest of the group, Darren, replied - the only person in the group besides Tez capable of forming legible words, let alone a sentence. "We clung to them!"
Feeling embarrassed by the state my friends were in, I led Tez to a vacant chair and sat him down, fumbling through his coat pockets in search of his car keys.
"That's it, i'm taking you home," I said. My friends groaned and attempted to voice their protests, but in the condition they were in their vocabulary was limited to what could only be described as slurring. I ignored their objections and continued searching for Tez's car keys, surfacing victoriously just as Paul's song ended. The audience broke into appreciative applause and whistling, and I turned and joined them while Paul jokingly curtsied. Placing the microphone back into its stand, he jumped off the stage and rejoined me on the floor, the smile on his face clearly expressing the exhilaration and happiness he was feeling from being onstage and letting himself go.
"Well, it ain't The Domain, but I had fun all the same!" he summed up his performance, flicking his head left and right to acknowledge the admirers passing on their verdicts on his song. The response was very positive, but I expected nothing less than praise. When the surge of people offering their acclaim died down, Paul's eyes fell on Tez, who was petting his coat as though it were a furry animal. "Oh, man, this has got to be Tez!"
"Yeah, that's him," I confirmed, unable to suppress a chuckle at Tez's actions. "Unfortunately, you're meeting him at his worst. I was just about to take him and the other boys home."
"You're leaving already?" Paul's smile fell, looking disappointed. "But it's still early! Your friends can stay here if we keep them away from the bar."
I shook my head apologetically. "It's not that I want to leave - I have to. I can't let them roam around in this state. It's best that I get them back safe in their own homes - and the only person they'll throw up on is themselves," I concluded, nodding my head towards the disgorging Tez nearby. I honestly didn't want to leave - I felt incredibly comfortable with Paul and was genuinely having a good time. But I was concerned for my friends' welfare, and didn't want to imagine the potential disasters that could occur if they were let loose into the streets. The phrase 'it's better to be safe than sorry' was corny but all too true. They may never forgive me for it, but i'd feel as though i'd done the right thing in the end.
Sensing Paul's disappointment, I realised that I wasn't in a hurry to leave him either. Fame and fortune didn't necessarily eliminate loneliness - no matter how many friends you had before you stepped into the spotlight, when you needed them most, the majority of them wouldn't be there. I was thoroughly enjoying Paul's company and didn't want our night to end so soon.
"Would you like to come with us?" I invited him. "I'll just be dropping each of them off at their houses then going back to my place - but you're most welcome to join me."
This seemed to bring back Paul's cheer, and he nodded with his smile returning. "Sure, if you don't mind me hanging around. I'll just go and pay our bill."
"Well, hang on," I stopped him, retrieving my wallet from my back pocket. As I pulled some dollar bills from my wallet and held them out to him so he could pay for my share of the bill, he gently took them from me and put them back into their compartment.
"Don't worry about that - it's on me," he said before walking away in the direction of the bar. As I watched him pay for our bill, I thought that I didn't feel right, in a way, letting him shout the bill for both of us. As kind a gesture as it was, I made a mental note to slip my share of the bill into his wallet when we reached my house.
Once he returned from the bar, he assisted me in lifting the two of my friends who were the most legless, Tez and Chris, out of the bar while Ryan and Darren stumbled behind us. To our collective relief, it was only a short walk to the carpark where we'd parked Tez's car - I remembered Tez parking a few blocks away from the park when we'd first arrived earlier that evening, because the streets were filling up quickly and we had to take what we could get. Luckily his car could seat six - if it had been any less, then I would've had to make two trips out of Sydney and back to get everyone home. Paul and I loaded Tez and Chris into the back seats, and Darren and Ryan crawled into the middle row, holding empty plastic shopping bags i'd left in the back seat the day before. They'd be useful in the event that one of them began to hurl. Paul and I sat in the front seats, and once we were sure that everyone was buckled in, I pulled out of the parking space and headed towards the back streets - I knew they'd be considerably less crowded than what the highways would be. One of the last things we needed to deal with on occasions like these was a traffic jam.
The first stop was Ryan's house, then after Chris and Darren had left there were only three remaining - Paul, Tez and I. By the time we'd dragged Tez through the front door he was an absolute mess and had to be lifted by his arms and legs to get him into his bedroom. Once inside, we dumped him onto his bed and removed his coat, switching on the ceiling fan. He'd been struggling to keep his eyes open upon arrival, but once he saw me walking out of his bedroom door he rolled over and grabbed my arm, keeping me in place.
"Nah, Rich, don't go!" he objected, pulling me closer towards him, patting my arm rhythmically as he spoke. "The night has just begun!"
"Tez, I think you've had enough for one night." I began to pull myself out of Tez's grasp, but his fingers were firmly coiled around my forearm with no intention of letting go just yet. He lifted his free hand and pulled my head down lower, moulding his mouth over mine in a drunken kiss. While this wasn't the first occasion that he'd kissed me, it surprised and repulsed me. I jerked my head away and wrapped my fingers over his, removing his fingers from my forearm.
"Terence, cut it out, you're absolutely pissed," I snapped, switching off the light in his room. I only ever called him by his full name when I was annoyed, and he had full awareness of this even when drunk. "Call me later, preferably when you're sober."
He opened his mouth to say something, but his head began to throb violently and he fell back onto the bed, clutching the sides of his head and closing his eyes as he rolled onto his side. Paul had been observing the scene from the door and pulled it closed behind us as we left to park Tez's car in the garage. Paul didn't say a word about what he'd seen until we left Tez's house and were walking briskly along the footpath towards my own house.
"Was that the first time he's done that?" he asked. I was clearly annoyed, though only with Tez, but Paul remained careful not to make me any more irritated.
I shook my head, shoving my hands into the depths of my jeans. "No, he's done it a few times before. It doesn't bother me when he's sober - they're just pecks on the cheeks then, he's being friendly - but when he's drunk, he turns into a slob. He disgusts me like that."
"Maybe he's interested," he said softly, more to himself than to me.
"Oh, he is," I confirmed, tossing my house keys into the air and catching them with one hand. "Everyone knows he is. But i've made it more than clear to him that I don't and couldn't think of him like that. He's not what I want."
"Then what do you want?" Paul asked.
I took a beat before answering, keeping my eyes on the pavement as I gathered my thoughts. "I just want someone who knows how to have a good time, but also knows when and how to wind things down. Someone kind, fairly knowledgeable, someone who can make me laugh and basically bring out the best in me." I looked beside me at Paul. "I don't think i'm being too picky, am I?"
"No, of course not. It's just a matter of finding that one person."
I kicked a stone off the pavement. "The thing is, i've met a lot of people like that, but none of them have made me feel like I think I should. You know the way you see someone and you get that special feeling?" Paul nodded, encouraging me to continue. "How am I supposed to recognise the feeling when it comes?"
Paul shrugged. "I suppose you'll just know. Like a gut instinct. Millions of romance novels can't be wrong, can they?"
"You see, that's the problem. The majority of people who write romance novels are or have been in love. I've never been in love before."
"Never? Not once?"
"I don't think so. I have this idea that falling in love should be incredibly powerful and gut-wrenching. You won't be able to think of anything else but them, you'll want to be with them as much as you can, that sort of thing. Or maybe love's not all they say it is. Maybe it is just a fantasy you only read about in those bloody romance novels."
"Don't go doubting the power of love, Rich," Paul advised. "You may not recognise it straight away when it happens, but once it sinks in, you'll know it, that's definite. For some people, the feeling builds over time. For others, it hits them straight away. I suppose it's different for each person. It can be frustrating, I know - I feel the same way sometimes - but it'll come to you eventually. And once it happens, you'll wonder how you ever lived without it."
I didn't answer immediately, but took in every word. What he said was making sense, and it was almost as though he could read my thoughts and understand exactly what I was talking about. His words were also reassuring, and reinstated some of my faith in the theory of love.
"Yeah, you're right," I finally said, giving him a grateful smile. "Maybe i'm just being impatient. They say that with each person, there's an exact equal, someone who you could say is made for that person. It's finding that person that's hard."
"But the trek, they say, is always worth it," Paul concluded, taking the words right out of my mouth.
"Mmmm." I looked ahead and saw that we were approaching my house, the porch lights i'd switched on before leaving that evening feeling very welcoming. I motioned my hand towards it. "Well, that's my house."
"That's the one?" He squinted in the darkness to see what he could of the house. "Oh, that's lovely," he complimented. "So you live on your own?"
"Yeah, for now, anyway," I replied, fumbling through my keyring for the front door key. "I used to have a room mate, but he moved out to get married. I don't mind living on my own much. At least I know that i'll come home to find the house exactly how I left it."
As I unlocked the front door, I pushed it open and outstretched my arm to invite him to go inside before me. The doorway was not very wide, and Paul brushed lightly against me as he went inside. The feeling sent a tingle through my body. After a moment it disappeared, leaving my heart beating a little faster than usual. Almost every time we made contact, the same thing happened. The tingle wasn't unpleasant, but it was a feeling I hadn't experienced before. What the hell was wrong with me?
Part 6