Mark’s lecture: The sequel to women and their monsters

I grabbed my office keys and took a quick glance at the digital clock on my desk.It reads 11:14pm; 11:00pm onwards is the perfect time to have a beer in Eastwood City on a Saturday night— the bars aren’t chock-full of Hip-hop wannabes, cliques of giggly 16 year old girls or dreadlock-sporting poser emo kids who are the denizens of the Friday Eastwood City scene.Man, I hate Fridays; all you want is a fucking beer and you can’t find a place to get a cold one without making your way through hordes and hordes of idiots who just stand around and try to look cool.Saturdays, on the other hand, are sort of relaxing considering that the cool hangout places aren’t brimming and the crowd is generally limpid for some reason.

I looked around the office and notice that everybody’s going around doing their usual drudgeries.Some guy’s talking to this girl about some stupid waste of time suggestions on how to keep employee absenteeism low.One manager’s over at the photocopier making copies of boring productivity reports.I head back to my office and look at the message on my computer screen again…

From: Garcia, Mark
Sent: Saturday, July 9, 2005 9:52 PM
To: Villar, Michael
Subject: Just fucking DO it you wuss

I am going to be at Eastwood at exactly 11:00pm and you are going to meet me in the usual place.The reason why I did not call you instead is that knowing you, you’d probably come up with a lame ass work-related excuse not to go and I didn’t want to give you room to negotiate.I’d like to emphasize that this is NOT negotiable.

At exactly 11:00pm, I am going to ring your cellular phone and you’re gonna answer it and pretend that you have an emergency you have to attend to and you’re gonna go down, meet me, get drunk and return to work to log out.I have contacted Nisha and she’s down.I hope you find your balls this time you little wuss.Just DO IT.

-
Mark Garcia
Senior Marketing Executive
XXXXXX
XXXX
Makati City, Philippines
Telephone: XXXXXXX

The bad thing about Mark’s invitations is that when he says it’s not negotiable, he means it’s NOT negotiable.The guy would bust your balls for a decade if you bail out on him with things like these and I wouldn’t want that; I can’t imagine anybody wanting Mark to bust their balls because the guy’s a complete psychopath.I’m having second thoughts on going though as I know exactly what we’re gonna talk about—my date last Friday; which is something that I’d rather not talk about right now; I mean I tried talking about it and images of bra hooks and wedding rings terrifyingly permeate my consciousness every time I do.On the bright side of things, there’s Nisha—Nisha is a hottie Law student I got “improperly intimateâ€? with several months ago.She’s a very good friend though; and a very good cock tease at that.She’s a riot and I’m not gonna miss out on that…

So I grab my office keys but leave my jacket and my ID on the desk for everyone to see.Being the Overachieving Underperformer (OU) that I am, I have mastered the art of stealthily sneaking out of the office to attend to other, more important things.When you leave your jacket or a bunch of other stuff on your desk, you make people believe that you’re just somewhere around the office and when for some reason, the boss finds out that you’re not in your office, you’d have a prefabricated excuse of just being by the photocopier, making copies of stuff or at Human Resources filing a complaint on the last paycheck you received.

I’m so good at this shit it’s not even funny.I’m starting to think that it’s the salesman in me.All the sales/marketing people I know are sneaky little rats who are just a tad smarter than everybody else.I mean we’re the elite for Chrissakes, the rules NEVER apply to us.

So I made my way out of the office holding a heap of important looking papers which, in actuality, are just random movie scripts I got off the internet.The lady guard is eyeing me suspiciously as I go past the reception area; damn it, I hate the fact that my notoriety precedes me in this company.

“Manang, I’m just going upstairs to submit these to [Insert name of intimidating, senior management person here], she’s been waiting for it the whole week.�

“Okay se-er Mike.� She said lazily, jotting down something in her logbook.I hate it when guards write something down in their logbooks.I swear, every time I go in or out the freaking door, she logs it.I wonder how her entries look like—is it like a blog entry where she goes:

“Se-er Mike went out the door, he has that look on his face like he needs to go.I’m assuming that he’s going to the comfort room to take a crap. But of course I could be wrong.

Currently listening to: Nina – Lab mubs
Mood: Pensive.�

I hate the elevator here in the IBM plaza.If there’s one thing I’m not looking forward to besides work it has to be the harrowing experience presented by an elevator ride in this building. For one, my trash can looks cleaner than the elevators here which looks like a piñata that got run over by a Mack truck—Candy wrappers and empty soda cans decorate the elevator floor plus the whole thing smells like a damp shoe with onions.

Miraculously, I made it to the ground floor without a gasmask and I started to walk to the joint where I’m supposed to meet Mark and Nisha.I walk past the friendly neighborhood Starbucks where I see a couple of Call center agents who work for our company.This whole Starbucks thing really amuses me, it really does.In my opinion, this entire Starbucks hullabaloo is a status thing more than anything.Theyserve overpriced, over hyped, finely ground bullshit if you ask me.The economics of it all baffles me too—I mean you’re a rank and file employee who earns $13 a day and here you are spending $3 on a fucking cup of fancy coffee?Their salary is not commensurate to this lifestyle I daresay.The only thing commensurate to the price of the coffee these oafs are sipping on is the time they actually spend drinking it.Doesn’t it make sense? You spend one and a half hours earning $3 so you might as well spend 4 hours drinking it and be seen and envied by the people lucky enough to see you.Oh joy.

I finally reach the place where I’m supposed to meet Mark and I see him alone seated in a far corner of the bar.I made my way to him and almost made the waiter spill the drinks he’s carrying on a tray in the process.

“How are you doing Mikey?Good to see you found your balls!What would you have? First round’s on me.� Mark said as we touched knuckles.

“I’d have light beer please.� I told the waiter I pulled as he was passing by.

“I’m trying to get rid of this multi-tiered belly I got going on here� I added to Mark as I lit a cigarette.

“Man put that out, I just put on cologne.� Mark starts to gag.

“What difference does it make Mark? We’re in a bar.You’re gonna end up smelling like an ashtray anyway.And what’s up with the cologne?Is it your turn to put the moves on Nisha this time?�I know he’s just trying to annoy me.

“Fuck you.� He gave me the finger.

I popped my 4^th bottle of light beer and I realized that alcohol affects everyone uniquely.But you can always tell when it’s starting to affect MarkHe doesn’t get rowdy nor does he slur or stutter but he starts condensing his sentences to the extent that nobody can extract logical meaning from them anymore.“Fuck it up Friday?� he says.

“What?!�

“You had a date yesterday, did you fuck it up?� So that’s what he meant.

“No, to tell you honestly, I didn’t fuck it up.Everything was swell, she was really cool and things were even heating up in my car—until she told me she’s married.� I told Mark.

“She’s married!?!?!?� He repeated louder than necessary.

Some old geezers seated at the other table turned around to see who mentioned the dreaded word.

“Yes, unfortunately.She was very beautiful, kind of looked like Meg Ryan in some angles.To be honest, better looking than the types of women I usually get to take out.She’s really intelligent too; one of the few girls I get to talk to about philosophy.�

“Is that so important to you?I mean you getting to talk to her about philosophy?�

“I’m a guy dude, the most important thing for me is whether or not she’ll jump to bed with me.� I said playing with my napkin, ripping it into itsy-bitsy shreds, rolling them into balls and trying to shoot them into a glass of water.

“So did you or did you not go to bed with the married girl?�

“No we went at it in my car and that’s about it.I might be the male sexual Sahara but I’m not gonna hump some other guy’s wife!�

“Didn’t it ever occur to you that she might be brushing you off?�

“I don’t think so.Her reactions didn’t come off that way.�

I can see it coming—A lecture from Mark.This fool has this superiority complex and always fancies himself wiser than me.Well sometimes he is.But for years that I’ve been friends with this bloke, I learned that when it comes to women and relationships, we’re in the same boat.

“Mike, Mike, Mike; where did it ever say that you can’t have sex with another man’s girlfriend, let alone his wife?� he says.“I mean your ex girlfriend ran off with some Arab motherfucker didn’t she?� the idiot’s so drunk he can’t even get his facts straight.“I mean she’s married, sure, but when you’re making out and she reveals something like this to you, do the math in your head brother.Put two and two together.� He’s barely making sense.“She’s married and probably enjoys good sex unless she’s celibate.You have to look at it as a challenge, a conquest if you may.�

“I don’t think so.� I replied.“When a girl tells you she’s married while you’re making out or that she has HIV, you chalk it up as a loss, move on and don’t bother spending more time on it than what’s necessary.Trust me, I’ve met enough of women and their monsters to know what they’re about.� I said.

“Mike, you’re my friend, but can I just say that you don’t know jack shit about women?�

“Fuck you. I’d look at my own dysfunctional relationship first before I go on dropping comments like that if I were you.�I’m starting to get irritated and I can’t help throwing a jab.

Our friend, the waiter passes by and drops off more beer.What a strategy these guys have, keep bringing the beer until the customers get piss drunk and leave you excessively large tips or until they make you stop.It works on us.

“Mike!I can’t take this anymore! You say you love me but you never call me!� A familiar perky voice calls out from behind us.

It’s Nisha, and now the spotlight is trained on me with everybody else in the bar turning to look at me.Be still my heart!

“You’re in my dreams Mike, you’re in my thoughts every waking hour.This feeling is so wrong and Sergio would kill me if he finds out what’s going on between us.But I’ve been dreaming of you and I want your body!� She said in an oh so cheesy way I almost failed to stifle my laugh.

She walks towards me.She really enjoys this shit; the perplexed gaze of people in the bar following her every step.She stands right in front of me and jumps unto my lap and sort of straddles my leg and gives me intense tongue action amid the collective wooting of the crowd.

“I need to breathe!� I said as I pulled away and gasped for air.Me, Mark and Nisha burst into laughter and a few clapping hands echo through the bar as people realize we’re just playing.

This girl’s an absolute riot.Shit I need another drink.