Justin

When I get back to the hotel room Justin stops me the moment I enter the door.

“She called.”

At first I am thinking it is Daisy in need of more solace. Then my thoughts immediately revert to Rita.

“Who called?”

Justin is beginning to sounds Iowan granfatheresque again. He says who do you think?

The room smells like my hairspray.  Justin is wearing a tie. He is wearing a dressed shirt and no pants. He still seems enraptured with the Waco tragedy perennially playing on BBC like a round.  

“Your girl. Harmony. Ebony or Ivory or whatever her name is. The one you got upset over and slammed the door and felt the need to leave.  She called fifteen minutes ago.”

Justin says, as if he is reciting the Boy scout Oath of honesty. I head for the phone 

"Well where did you go?" Justin Stammers, holding his finger in the British version of Aqua Net like a gun as it farts out ozone-butchering fumes.

I tell my roommate it is none of his goddamn business. He tells me that I don't need to curse Gosh durn it. I tell him sorry. I tell him it is none of his God fucking business."

"Leave God out of it."

Without thinking I go for his neck. I push him against the wall. Instead of saying what the Hell my devotion-doting Midwestern you-ever-cry-when-old yeller-died roommate says something about a Hill.

"If you want to fucking know I just kicked Jim's Baker's ass and before that I just saved the life of a thirteen year. And quite candidly your insouciance towards all things human is really starting to fuck with me. 

Justin shrugs. He says what do you mean inn-sous-chance. I get up and walk again to the phone.

" Your indifference. Your apathetic.Your problem is that you are a motherufucking follower. I mean, Jim is pretty much making money selling hardcore porn to 12 years olds. Daisy is about ready to Jump off of London bridge because everyone in the BIG TEN taunts her and all you and Chris do is sit behind and laugh and agree with everything Baker and Spencer says as if Baker was the second coming of Jesus Christ or, in Spencer's case, Goddamn Joseph Smith."

Justin says he told me again to leave God and Jesus his own personal savior out of it.

He says Gosh durn it.

I am cursing I don't care.

"Hell, your fucking whole state of Nebraska man is prosaic. There was a girl outside who seriously just couldn't take it any more. Time and time again you and Chris and even Bryan Alaska and even, god-knows mute Banky could have stepped off the Daisy train and put Baker and Spencer in their place but instead you like the view from the side car.  This whole trip has been one elongated misery for Daisy and your inability to stand up and just say enough is enough is truncating your manhood--"

Justin shrugs.

"Just stand up and have a voice for something you know is right in your life for once."

There is a knock on the door. I am telling Justin off. In a way I wish Justin and I could be closer. In a way I wish we would have what I always yearned for with Nat Pflederer. 

When I open it up it is Sir Charles and Trevor

"Hair man you okay?"

I say yeah. I say why.

"Well I mean, people were saying that Daisy ran off and ran away and that you either went or chased after her."


For a second I am going to be a hero. For a second I want to be known as the avatar who saved the trip. 

"Everyone was really concerned. Even Liz Madigan held an impromptu emergency meting because Daisy's roommate found some sort of ambiguous half-scribbled note and the no-one could locate Daisy and everyone was on high alert and concerned,"

I brush my arm in front of my face as if commenting on personal body odor.

Again for a second I want to be a hero. Again for a second I want to be the one who saved tbhe 1993 Young Columbus trip from toppling into the peril of infamy.

Instead I tell him no. We just had to run an errand for Vivian.

Justin is behind me rubbing his Adam's apple.

"It was all a misunderstanding. I mean, we went outside to retrieve a suitcase from Vivian. I spoke with both Vivian and Liz. Daisy was with me the entire time. It's all good."

Sir Charles nods. There is a look on his face that he is still gravely concerned. Trevor looks like he has been sweating. 

I want to tell them again all about Jim Baker and his shenanigans but in this juncture of the trip I fear it would not do any good.

I think about Vivian coming up and taking the chaff for us. 

I wonder if Daisy was ever able to retrieve her over-surfeited suitcase.

"It's all good. Like I said, I already spoke with Liz Madigan. Both myself and Daisy have. We were just doing Vivian a favor."

Trevor's shoulders look like they are visibly deflating as he exhales. SIr Charles is smiling.

"You know Hair, just as long as you are alright, man."

"Yeah, nothing to be alarmed about. I don't know where the rumor of her running away stems from."

Trevor says okay.  Sir Charles slaps the side of my left shoulder with his right open palm.

Justin is still not wearing any pants.

"Alright guys. Meet in the lobby in five minutes. One more night. One more night and everything is over.

I close the door.. I head back to the room. Justin is still graffiting his skull with my over-priced hairspray.

"You lied."

I tell Justin to put some pants on,

"You lied to Trevor and Charles about running after Daisy."

 I tell Justin yeah, I lied. Justin tells me that lying is a sin. He says that the wages of sin is death.

I look on my pillow. He placed the Gideon bible I hurled at the wall during out last conversation like a flower on a tomb. 

I'm through with Justin. I reach for the phone. The Hairspray nozzle emanated a gaseous squirt.

"You don't have to call her back. She left a message."

I almost say who and then I realize he is talking about Harmony.
"Yes, what did she say?"

"She said that she was sorry that she missed you today but that she was hungup with that Lynn Minton interview crap that you seem so pissed off about all the time."

I nod. 

"She also said that she will see you at the Banquet thing tonight."

I nod again.

"Oh, and she apologized. She wanted me to apologize to you for her roommate. She said that her roommate was just messing around and didn't mean anything by her affronts that you can't take a joke, which I assured her that half-the-time you can't."

I nod again. 

Harmony didn't forget about me. 

She hasn't forgotten about me at all.

Just attacks the knot in the middle of his tie again.

He says that frankly he doesn't know what he sees in that girl.

He then tells me that we need to meet in the group in the lobby I nod.

"Oh, and you are out of hairspray."

Justin says rattling the empty cylinder in my direction as if panhandling for loose change.

He tells me that he sorry but says that I kind of owe him.