For those just jumping in, read part one first.
Okay, I was drunk. Not falling over drunk, but I was having a good time. The party was two hours old, the fifth I had brought had been consumed and now I was staggering around on my hurt right leg, trying to find a good place to lean. And then Luke came up, angry as Luke typically is.
I asked him what happened and he explained he’d gotten into a quick argument with a short dude who’d spilled his beer. Seeing as how this was a mostly Asian party and we were two of four white guys and easily the tallest there, I asked who.
Oh, some little Charlie dude, he muttered, obviously drunk and obviously riled up. Charlie. Great. He calls some (Vietnamese, as I would later find out) guy Charlie. While drunk at a party with lots of other Asian people. Grrrrrreat.
I tell him to come outside with me to smoke and just as I made it to the deck, I hear the unintelligible yelling of someone who’s REALLY pissed off. Luke hurried outside, waiting somewhat anxiously.
As I sat down, painfully favoring my aircast encased ankle, I ask him what EXACTLY happened. No big deal, he says. Charlie bumped into him, spilled his beer and didn’t say sorry. Luke took offense, called him some names and walked away. No big deal.
That’s when Charlie came out on the porch, YELLING, nay, SCREAMING. In the rather inebriated state I was in, I couldn’t make out quite what he was saying, but judging by the fact 15 other people just appeared on the porch to diffuse a likely fight and escort the guy back out the front door, I’m betting it wasn’t friendly.
Time to leave. Seriously. I didn’t care that Luke’s girlfriend had just pulled up at the bottom of the cul-de-sac or that my sister was on her way over, it was time for Luke, my brother Bryan, my ride Kevin and me to leave. Things weren’t going to get better.
Leave we did. We walked past the friendly, IKEA security guards (yep, real ones, it was a company party, kinda) who had just booted Charlie out and headed to our cars. Luke and Bryan went down the hill to get into Luke’s girlfriend’s ride, Kevin and I get into mine at the end of the driveway.
Then, and JUST then, did I notice that quite a few more people had recently appeared at this tame house party. Easily three times as many cars were in the cul-de-sac and many, many more people were milling around. I remember thinking to myself that they looked like gang wannabes with their bandannas.
Kevin got into the driver’s seat of my car, I rode shotgun. But something wasn’t quite right. Who were these people? Why were they all outside? Why were they standing behind my car?
Then it dawned on me. Charlie. There he was, smug smile on his face, standing just a few feet from my window. I saw him point down the hill, toward my brother, Luke and his girlfriend. I looked back, saw my brother walking up the hill after waving Luke home and felt a knot in my stomach.
Charlie and his ganging were pointing at him. Oh shit.
So I got out of the car. I never felt the first punch.
