Spammer by Anel Viz

“Spammer”

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(Author’s note: In keeping with the theme of Internet spam, I have not given the main character of this story a name.)

5. Setting up House

They agreed that Norm would spend one last Christmas with his family and move in two day’s before New Year’s. That would give him a few days to get his stuff moved over and set up the room.

“That’s two days rent free.”

“Wow! Thanks!”

Norm didn’t have that much to buy – towels, bedding, a bookshelf since the one already there got moved into the living room. Fifty dollars more than covered it. Buying a bed would have been an expense, but the room came with a futon, a couch that folded down into a bed but had never been used for one. Norm tried it out and declared it reasonably comfortable.

“If you develop a backache you can get yourself a bed out of next month’s paycheck at the used furniture store. Oughta get a new mattress for it though.”

“I don’t think I’ll be sleeping on it that much. If I get a backache it’ll be from going along with one of those nutty positions you dream up.”

“You know you like ’em more than I do. I’m not that limber anymore.”

“I dunno about that. Nobody’s that limber! We won’t have sex every night, will we?”

“Hardly, but we will sleep together. Do you realize we’ve never slept together for the whole night?”

“I’ve never slept in the same bed with anyone before. Have you?”

“No, but I’ve always wanted to.”

“Do you think it’ll work?”

“Other people do it.”

“Do you snore?”

“Hasn’t been anyone to find out and tell me.”

“Well, you better not.”

On the morning of the 31st Norm was able to tell him he didn’t. They woke up a tangle of arms, legs and sheets.

“You kick a little.”

“Did I hurt you?”

“It’s better than getting punched in the face. How’d you like sleeping naked.”

“With you I do.”

They threw a little New Year’s Eve housewarming party for their lunch hour crowd. It was a crowd in that apartment with their wives and husbands there as well. Norm arranged to have a date there, Cindy, a girl he hadn’t slept with and who seemed unsure whether he was going to ask her to stay the night and whether or not she’d accept. She hung back when the other guests took the tour of Norm’s new room, and when everyone began hugging and kissing at kissing at midnight she said, “Do you think we should kiss on the first date?”

Norm took that as a hint not to expect her put out. “New Year’s is different. And we’re not alone. This is a party!”

It was quite the party – champagne, the works, but strictly vegetarian, a Hormel employees’ party without Spam . He’d made a couple of mushroom quiches, and Norm pigged out on them. “I’ll convert him to veggies yet,” he thought.

One would have found animal protein other than milk and eggs hidden away in the selection of goodies set out for his guests. He was not a strict vegetarian. The morality of killing animals for food did not concern him, no more than it stood in the way of his working for Hormel. His aversion to meat was purely psychological. He would eat something as long as it didn’t look like an animal or like anything that could have come from an animal. He ate Jell-o, for example, and pie crusts made with lard, and if anyone had thought up a way to make Spam look like sautéed spinach he’d have eaten that too. On the other hand, the sight of a tofu steak made his gorge rise. But Hormel does make Spam, so his list of inedibles included many items whose animal origins would not be visible to most people.

Norm wasn’t supposed to drink, but of course he did anyway. Cindy, a year younger than him, was looking pretty buzzed.

“Who’s gonna drive me home?”

“Me, of course.”

“Then no more to drink!”

“Just this last toast. Hey, it’s next year!”

“We’ll get you home if Norm’s in no condition,” Gus said. “The wife doesn’t drink.”

“I had a glass of champagne.”

“One glass doesn’t count.”

He had to make a lot of coffee before he’d let any of them drive home. Cindy especially needed sobering up. Her parents knew where she was going and he was afraid they’d raise a stink if their eighteen-year-old daughter came home drunk, if she was that old. Norm was in much better condition, but still nothing you’d call sober.

He decided he’d better see to driving her home and explain himself to her parents if they were still up and got all bent out of shape when they saw the state she was in. “Just a glass or two of champagne. How was I to know she wasn’t used to it?” But they were still out partying somewhere.

“Will you need help getting upstairs?”

“I think I can manage it.”

“And you’ll go right to bed? I don’t want your folks to see you like this.”

“God! That’s the last thing I want!”

He had to clean up after the party himself. Norm was fast asleep, in their bed, dead to the world. Norm had seen to putting the furniture back in place, so it wasn’t much – scrape the plates into the garbage, load the dishwasher, empty a few ashtrays and wipe down the tabletops. Finding room for himself in bed was more of a challenge, with Norm sprawled out naked on top of the covers and snoring up a storm, the result, no doubt, of too much alcohol. He wondered if maybe he should not turn off the heat that night for a change.

He stood there a few minutes contemplating the scene before he turned out the light, trying to figure out exactly where in the bed he could fit, but mostly looking over every beautiful inch of his naked lover and listening to his not so gentle breathing.

“No sex tonight,” he thought, “and not tomorrow morning either. He’ll be too hung over. I’ll tell him which of us is the snorer, though.”

Posted: 09/26/08