Evil Origins: A Horror & Dark Fantasy Collection (113 page)

In
this frame we get a distant, lonely, forlorn shot of the owner of “The Beast”
as he fills one of the final orders of the night from the front grill. That is
not a Halloweeen costume. That was the employee uniform. I know.

I
found these name tags at the bottom of an old box. When I left a job, I usually
set the uniform on fire, so I was shocked to find these. The Bonanza name tag
garnered me an official reprimand on numerious occasions, which did not stop me
from wearing it. The Camelot name tag has the coveted “1 Year” golden CD on it.
You’re thinking that one year is nothing. Big fucking deal, right? The truth is
that one year in any retail position is like dog years. It is a big deal, you
asshole. Out of the many jobs I had during my teenage and young adult life,
these two represented my longest tenures, the source of my best friendships,
and where I met my wife.

Teenage
Wasteland

Working
in a record store did have certain perks that my peers at the gas station did
not. For instance, at some point in the early 1990s, the Bulletboys did an
in-store performance/autograph-signing at Camelot Music in Pittsburgh. Being a
huge fan of hair metal, I was able to get into the stockroom with several
managers (jerks with ties) and the band prior to the performance. I’m in the
bottom right corner wearing acid-washed jeans, the beginnings of a mullet, and
a Great White T under a semi-buttoned white shirt. I believed my fashion
statement said, “I don’t have a Bulletboys shirt, but I am a fan of hair metal,
so please except this Great White shirt as a token of my sincerity.” On the
left, you may notice a fine spread of cheese, crackers, bottled water, and
Pepsi, which I am sure the Bulletboys appreciated. No doubt they had become
sick of backstage booze, pussy, and blow.

The
two gentlemen flanking my disembodied head (I’m buried in the sand and did not
decapitate myself for this picture, in case you were wondering) usually sat in
the backseat of “The Beast” during Chase. After our junior year of high school,
seven of us convinced my old man to rent us a condo in Ocean City, Maryland, with
his ID and security deposit. In return, we promised no parties, no noise, no
women, and absolutely no drinking.

Here
is our beer pyramid, constructed from two empty cases of Natty Boh—shout out to
my Baltimore peeps, “From the Land of Pleasant Living.” I cannot legally
include any other photographs from this week.  This was the one and only trip
we made to Ocean City, and I hope to go back there someday when the statute of
limitations runs out.

The
bitch who taught psychology hated me, and math was clearly not my thing.
However, I’d like to draw your attention to the bottom right corner, where you
will notice a cumulative grade point average of 3.4 (rounding up) and 9.5 days
absent with 6 tardies. I graduated from high school with a 3.5 GPA (rounding up
the rounding; you already know I suck at math) after getting a low D and two
low Cs in my senior year while enjoying Senior Skip Day every single Friday in
April and May of 1989. Those days were spent drinking warm beer in the wooded
areas of Billings Park and sleeping off the buzz until I was sober enough to
come home at the normal time school would have ended. Blame the number of
tardies on Eat'n Park and their delightfully delicious breakfast menu followed
by a free smiley cookie.

The
C in Advanced Composition was probably put there by the assholes giving me one-star
reviews on Amazon. Dicks.

I
have no idea why these two senior pictures were in a box with the rest of my
photos. They’re both female, which does explain something, but neither are old
girlfriends.  I have not spoken to either girl since the day I left high
school.  I had a slight crush on the white girl and a slightly bigger crush on
the black girl.  I hope putting the black eye bar on the white girl and the
white eye bar on the black girl doesn’t make me racist.  Or reverse racist.

Somehow
I have managed to insult and ridicule everyone in my immediate family except my
kid sister. She was the accident and arrived when I was nine years old, which
means I did not have the opportunity to battle her the way I did General
Wrecker. In lieu of an embarrassing anecdote, I have decided to include this
picture of her in MARCHING BAND!

Influential
People in My Life