It Had All Turned Golden

"i will be at your place around noon if that's good"

I stared at the text for a few seconds before remembering that today was the day Charles and I were driving to my girlfriend Linda's house in Rhinebeck for the weekend. Our girlfriends were meeting us there. I texted Charles, "okay sounds good". 

I went into the kitchen and started making coffee while scrolling through Twitter on my phone. I tweeted "my muscles feel like they are covered in ~15lb weights, help". I turned the coffee pot on and opened the refrigerator. 

The only things in the refrigerator that were definitely food were three eggs that were probably safe and half a package of shredded cheese. There was also mayonnaise, butter, hot sauce, ketchup and four beers. I considered drinking a beer but remembered the coffee. I considered pouring some of the whiskey I had into the coffee but decided not to, remembering that I was twenty three years old. 

I cracked the eggs into a large bowl and whisked them with a fork. I remembered reading an article on Huffington Post titled "9 Mistakes You're Making With Scrambled Eggs". One of the mistakes was adding milk to your eggs ("2. Don't Add Milk To Your Eggs"), but I didn't have any milk. Another mistake was seasoning the eggs too early, so I made sure not to add salt or pepper, and transferred the eggs to a pan on low heat ("1. Don't Cook On High") and stirred them occasionally while looking for my shoes ("4. Don't Forget To Stir"). I poured the entire bag of shredded cheese into the pan and stirred. I thought to myself, "This is very daring", and tweeted "i am being very daring with my breakfast rn". I poured myself a cup of coffee and took a sip. Then I looked at the eggs, which looked like scrambled eggs and, feeling satisfied, spooned them onto a plate.

The eggs tasted good. I decided to wear a white tee shirt, tight blue jeans, black boots, and a faded denim jacket. I thought to myself, "This is my spring look. This is my look for riding in a convertible in the spring." I decided I would wear sunglasses as well. I felt pleased while imagining myself in a convertible while wearing this outfit and black Ray Ban sunglasses. 

I shaved quickly and smoked my last two cigarettes. I went to the corner and bought four packs of cigarettes. I took my flask out of the dish rack, (it said "What Wouldn't Jesus Do", I found it at a party), and filled it carefully with the whiskey from the cabinet. I didn't spill too much. I filled a backpack with a couple changes of clothes, my toothbrush, the novel I was reading and three of the packs of cigarettes. I put the flask in the inside pocket of my denim jacket, and put one pack of cigarettes in the outside pocket. Charles called to say he was downstairs.

I dropped my bag in the backseat and grinned at Charles. He was wearing a denim jacket and sunglasses too. Charles and are about the same height and weight, but he has green eyes where I have brown, and his hair is short and curly where mine is long and straight. 

"You wanna smoke?" Charles asked.

I nodded. He started the car and I turned on the radio. The Intruders were playing as we passed the joint back and forth. 

"I was thinking about King Midas," Charles said.

"Yeah?"

"I was thinking, the Midas Touch, all that. He touches a table or a chair or whatever shit and it turns to gold, right?"

"Yeah," I said.

"So why just the chair? How is it that only the one thing turns gold? If King Midas touches one potato chip in a whole bowl of potato chips, are you really gonna tell me that only that one chip turns to gold?"

"Shit," I said, "I don't know. You're right, I guess. It doesn't make too much sense."

"I don't know," Charles said, shaking his head. "I'm really not sure."

I thought about it for a second. "Isn't gold normally liquid? Damn, I don't really know too much about gold. Do you know anything about gold?"

Charles laughed and said, "Lord fucking knows I don't know shit about gold."

I said, "Do you think King Midas could touch his own body?"

Charles was silent for a second. Then he said, "I don't know."

"If I was given the Midas touch I would kill myself immediately," I said, laughing.

"I would touch a bunch of shit so that my family and friends could have some gold. Then I would kill myself," Charles said.

I grinned. "You're a kind and loving King."

I tweeted "imagining king midas staring wistfully at a bag of doritos, laughing". There wasn't too much traffic, and we made good time.

There was a private road to get to the house. About a mile before the house itself there was a gate that I had to get out of the car to unlock. I got back in the car and we pulled up right in front of the house. Linda and Sara weren't there yet, or at least their car wasn't.

We walked in and Charles found all the light switches while I looked to see if there was any food in the kitchen. Linda had said that we could eat whatever was there. I found a loaf of multi-grain bread and a block of sharp white cheddar cheese and I ate some of that. Charles turned all the lights on and ate some of the cheese also. I had some Adderall, and we ate some of that too.

We got the case of beer out of the trunk and put most of them in the refrigerator. We each opened one for ourselves. I lit a couple of cigarettes and handed one to Charles. We went outside and sat by the pool. Charles lit another joint and passed it to me.

"There's a pool and a pond right next to each other. Why put the pool here?" I said.

Charles shrugged. "I don't think you're supposed to swim in the pond. Pond scum or whatever."

I said, "What is pond scum, anyway?"

Charles laughed and said he didn't know. We smoked in silence for a minute.

Charles asked me, "Have you ever smoked weed with your parents?" 

I shook my head. "No, I think me and my Dad would both be too uncomfortable. Why, did you?"

"Yeah, a couple of days ago when I went to visit them," Charles said, laughing. "I'm never going to do that shit again, though," he said, and took a sip of his beer. "They started talking about gardening, and I didn't know what to say. I started thinking that they were talking about gardening just so I wouldn't have anything to say."

I laughed. "Shit," I said, "I bet they were just as uncomfortable as you."

Charles nodded. "I'm sure they were. I'm not doing it again."

It was about six at that point. Charles said he was going to call Sara. I figured I would take a swim. I swam ten laps while he was on the phone. The water was warm. It felt like I was in a giant warm bath. I had my pack of cigarettes and my lighter next to the rim of the pool, and I leaned against the wall of the shallow end and lit one. The filter got a little wet. 

Charles called from the chair, "How's the water?"

"Good," I said, "You should get in. Where are they?"

"Sara said they got a late start and now they're stuck in traffic. They're going to be at least another hour."

I nodded.

"I don't wanna get in," Charles said, "I'm too stoned."

"I'm going to get out," I said.

I got out of the pool and toweled off before putting on my shirt. Charles passed me a beer.

"How are you and Sara, anyway?" I said.

Charles shrugged. "I don't know, good. I love her. We fight sometimes, but it's not too bad.  She's probably too good for me," he said, grinning, "But she's nice to me. She gives me books to read but she isn't too pushy about it. Does that make sense?"

It did make sense, and I said so. 

"Do you like Linda?" Charles asked.

"Yeah, I think so," I said. "I don't really know her that well yet. It's only been a month."

Charles nodded. "Sara is really happy that you guys have gotten together. I think she's hoping that you guys stay together for a while so that we can do shit like this more often."

We both laughed.

It was about one in the morning and the women weren't answering their phones. Charles and I were pretty drunk.

"I'm worried," Charles said.

I nodded. I was worried too.

"I'm going to make some coffee," I said. "I'm going to make some coffee and we're going to sober up and then we should go look for them."

Charles said he thought that was a good idea. I went into the kitchen and fumbled around for a bit. I wasn't used to the coffee machine, but I figured it out. While the coffee machine rumbled, I crushed up some Adderall and cut it into six thin lines. Charles made some toast. We snorted the Adderall and ate the toast. We each drank three cups of coffee, too. It had been about an hour since either of us had drank any beer, and we figured it would probably be okay to drive.

The radio was playing Miles Davis. I liked jazz a lot, and Charles did too. I turned the volume down a little and we rode along like that, in silence. After forty five minutes or so, Charles looked at me. 

"What the fuck are we doing? This doesn't make any sense, just driving around aimlessly like this."

"What else are we supposed to do?" I said.

"I don't know," Charles said. He kept driving.

"No streetlights," Charles said. I didn't say anything.

"Maybe we should call around to some hospitals," Charles said.

I took out my phone and googled "Rhinebeck hospitals". I called the number. The nurse said no one had come in all night. I called three more hospitals, but Sara and Linda weren't in any of them.

"Maybe their car broke down and they had to stay at a motel," I said.

"They would have called," Charles said quietly.

We drove in silence. After an hour we decided to go back to the house, hoping they had shown up while we were gone.

We pulled up to the gate. It was open. Charles and I looked at each other, startled. 

"Maybe they're here," Charles said.

"They must be here," I said happily. We both grinned and drove the final mile to the house.

There were no other cars to be seen. The house was empty. Charles and I double checked every room. We called the hospitals again. We called Sara and Linda again. Nothing.

I said, "Now that I think about it, I don't think I remembered to close the gate before."

He didn't say anything. I filled two glasses with whiskey from my flask and handed one to him. We drank slowly, quietly. His hands stopped shaking as he drank. I filled up the glasses again.

Charles and I sat on the front steps of the house. I took out two cigarettes and lit them. I passed one to Charles. It was so dark that I could only see the embers of our cigarettes, and it was so quiet that I could only hear the sound of our two hearts beating.