Rob Azevedo returns to his childhood playground, and experiences an interesting turn of events.
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All I wanted now was an ice coffee.
I’d been to the Dollar Tree in Manchester, NH with my boy, loading up on spices, belated birthday cardS and chap sticks for the week. The sun was blazing and I had the whole day off. Sweet Friday.
Now, all I had left to do was wander back and forth from my basement to living room, sipping my one and one, wondering what to do with myself.
Then the cell phone rang. It was the Eggman, my oldest and best friend from home. Well, sometimes.
Eggman was shouting, as he tends to do. “Guy! You won’t believe what I got myself into! Oh, man. I am screwed!”
“Who is this? “ I asked, knowing the real answer. “T-Bone?”
“No. It’s me.” Eggman said in a panic. “Are you in Melrose? Come by the pool. I’ll buy you a tuna melt.”
“Come by the pool,” he says, as if we spend every Friday soaking up rays at the country club where we both vacationed as kids in Melrose. I hadn’t stepped foot in the pool area for over 30 years.
A steady itch ran down my arms.
As children, our parents afforded us both a pretty sweet lifestyle, growing up as country clubbers. Playing tennis, golf, games of Marco Polo, eating the best cheeseburgers on earth. Like a page out of a Ray Bradbury book, life was spacious back then, and layered in contradictions.
At night there was Continental dinners and playing hide and seek on the golf course. And of course stealing kisses at the bleachers on the sixth hole, making friends along the way.
What can I say. It was Candyland.
I don’t go home to Melrose, Mass, a small town just outside Boston, nearly enough, so when the Eggman called in such a state, I decide there was no better time to get a taste of home. Random visits always trump a planned occasion. Plus, I hadn’t had a tuna melt in years.
Fifty minutes later, me and the boy are rolling around the streets where I grew up on the East Side of Melrose. Nice homes, trees, cars. Nice everything.
I’m pointing my old life out to my son:
“I used to cut that lawn.”
“My buddy Mike lived right there. Wonder whatever happened to him.”
“Split my lip open against that mailbox.”
Suddenly, the sound of chopper blades were rushing over my car. Not two but four running side-by-side, circling the high priced homes surrounding the golf course.
Were they descending on the Eggman? What could he have done now?
Then, I pull into the backside of the club and I see him charging out the pool entrance, waving me down as if invisible. He was wearing the tightest and brightest blue shorts I have ever seen on a man.
I almost kept driving.
Eggman signed us into the club pool as guests, then rushed us to a table before ordered me a tuna melt and my boy a giant ice cream. He hadn’t even said hello.
Eggman started twitching as he explained how he took advantage of his guest privileges at the club recently and that everyone was mad at him and that he might have to go before the disciplinary committee in a few days.
Red eyed, the Eggman was horrified, frantic almost. His bald head was covered in beads of sweat.
Of course, I found his situation to be hilarious. Here we were, thirty years later, sitting at virtually the same table we had as kids, stealing glances with other members, feeding our faces, fingering through yet another Crisis in Candyland.
It was beautiful.
Meanwhile, come to find out, two towns over in Revere, a couple of mad men carjacked a vehicle with a 15 year old kid in it. They drove to Melrose after leaving the kid safely behind and were presumably hiding out somewhere on the East Side.
Still, back at the pool, Eggman raged on, not noticing the choppers, not caring that my tuna melt was a little too tuna. He was focused on his possible suspension, his faults and his good name.
Four hours later, about the time the police called off the manhunt for the carjackers, Eggman finally sat in silence, his blue shorts hiked high on his white thighs.
Panting, he said. “So how much trouble you think I’m in, big guy? Give it to me straight.”
With tuna breath I answered back. “Just kiss the ring and say you’re sorry. These are Candyland problems, buddy. Consider yourself blessed.”
Because I sure do. Thanks for the call, Eggman.
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This post is republished on Medium.
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