EVERYONE GETS THAT SOMETHING is wrong practically the moment Kyle plunks himself down on the couch with a beer to join them. Who knows what Adam and Rank have been talking about up until this point. They’ve been drinking for hours, playing Century, downing shots, except Adam’s shots have all been beer whereas Rank has at some point switched to rye. Rank has mostly been trying to get Adam to talk about himself for a change. Rank wants to know about Adam’s family, his parents, his sisters. He has learned that Adam has only sisters, two of them, which Rank finds puzzling considering his friend’s ineptitude with women. Rank always figured guys who had sisters totally got the dirt, entered the world of sexual gamesmanship packing a distinct advantage. Rank also learns that Adam’s parents are divorced, which, as a Catholic, he finds very cosmopolitan and a little shocking. Not only divorced, but still friends, says Adam. Not only still friends but planning on getting together with Adam and his sisters for a big two-parent family Christmas. Rank is impressed. Divorce, he thinks dimly. If only. You get a lock, if you’re not Catholic, but at least you get the key as well. They don’t make you throw away the key. You’re not meant to kneel on the goose until it’s dead.
“Goose?” says Adam.
“What?” says Rank.
“Statistics,” says Kyle, plunking himself down on the couch beside Adam. “Is a bullshit course. That’s what I’ve decided. Why does a humanities major have to do Statistics?”
This is Kyle in a nutshell. He doesn’t wait to be included in a conversation that’s already taking place without him. This whole “without Kyle” phenomenon is of no interest whatsoever. He simply sits down, interrupts, and starts a new one with himself comfortably at the centre.
“Are Stats some kind of pre-Law requirement?” asks Adam.
“You know what else is bullshit?” Rank mumbles from his chair. “Hitting women in the face.”
The other guys laugh, because Rank is so drunk they assume he’s approaching incoherence.
“Yeah,” says Kyle. “Umm I’d say that’s bullshit, Rank. It’s a little beside the point, but it’s bullshit, sure. What else do we think is bullshit? Adam, care to contribute?”
But Adam does not care to contribute because, as always, he is quicker on the uptake than Kyle, even with multiple shots of beer inside him. He gives Rank a wary look, sensing the change of atmosphere, as if the temperature in the room just dropped several abrupt and inexplicable degrees.
“Compact discs,” says Kyle, turning it into a game. “Digital music — all your albums are obsolete overnight, and you have to rebuild your entire collection. Total marketing scam. What else?”
Rank is just looking at Kyle and Adam is looking at Rank.
“Hot chicks who get fat,” continues Kyle around a swig. Adam suddenly leans forward. “You fuck em when they’re thin, and then they still expect you to wanna fuck em after they’re fat.”
“You know what, Kyle?” says Adam carefully.
“Like you’re not supposed to notice. Like our friend Tiny,” adds Kyle.
“Stand up,” says Rank.
“Rank,” says Adam.
“What?” says Kyle.
“Stand the fuck up,” says Rank, standing up himself.
Kyle takes Rank in for a moment.
“You,” he says, “are wasted, my friend.”
“Stand. Up,” says Rank.
Kyle jumps to his feet with a sudden, simian instinct, indignation taking shape on its heels. This is the Temple, after all — love, brotherhood, and so forth. This is his Temple, more to the point.
Press pause. Let’s compare. Needless to say Kyle, in terms of size, is not a grotesque like Rank. But he’s doing okay. He plays rugby. He works out, lifts weights; is broad-shouldered and muscularly compact at an even six feet.
Still, Rank looms over him rather nicely. Or, weaves over him, might be the more honest description. Looms and weaves.
Press play. Adam doesn’t exactly jump between them. He doesn’t have the physical presence to pull that one off. He stands off to the side exactly like a referee.
“Guys,” he says.
“What’s your problem, Rank?”
Oh and here it gets embarrassing. It just gets so cliché, so guy. Did Rank respond: You’re my fuckin problem? Yes he did. Did he give his buddy Kyle a shove by way of punctuation? Maybe a little one.
Kyle just stands there once he has regained his balance like he cannot freaking believe what is happening. This is Kyle Jarvis we’re talking about, founder and overseer