Trouble Triangle (Tyler's Trouble Trilogy) (23 page)

I opened my first can and did the same. We both reached for our second can and chugged those down. Finishing at the same time, we looked at each other and laughed. My head spun.

Mark and Shelly declined our offer of giving them the last two beers, and Jill and I decided to drink those at a reasonable pace.

Jill took my wrist and looked at my watch. "It's only five o'clock, boys. By Tyler's timetable, we should have two hours before you have to leave. Shall we go back to our hotel?"

I looked at Jill as she continued to play
footsie
with me. Her light complexion carried a warmth about it. Passion seemed to emit from her body and I wondered if she was a true red-head. She had a wonderful smile; I could just imagine those perfect lips wrapped around my—

"Tyler!" Mark's call broke me out of a beautiful moment.

"No need to shout," I snapped.

"I've called you four times already." He flicked his head to let me know he wanted the conversation away from the girls. "Can I speak to you for a moment?"

We walked about ten feet away and stood under a palm tree. "I know it doesn't matter to you, but I really like Lori. I'm not going to cheat on her for a quick jump in the sack with some bimbo. Sorry if I wreck your chances, but I'm not going to screw Shelly just to keep your hopes alive with Jill. Besides, they're not my type and that Shelly's giving me a headache."

"Man, they got 'fuck me' stamped on their foreheads."

"What happened? A few hours ago you were telling me how much you liked Holly." He placed both hands on each of my shoulders and leaned in. "Look, Tyler, you're drunk. You've been downing beers all afternoon on an empty stomach."

I waved my hand around. "Fuck that. You heard '
em
. They're leaving tomorrow. This would be the first time in months I could have sex with a woman who wasn't blackmailing me into it. Come on, it's only for a couple of hours, anyway. I
gotta
meet Otto at seven. Holly and Lori will never find out."

"Sorry, bud. I'm going back to base." He shook his head. "You're
gonna
regret this. Bring my towel back when you come, will
ya
? Good luck." He walked off.

I went
back to the girls.

"Where's he going?" Shelly asked.

"He gets really bad headaches. One hit him, and he forgot his medication, so he has to go back to base to take it. He offers his apologies."

"Oh, poor thing." Shelly couldn't hide her disappointment. "I'll go see if there's anything I can do for him." She got up and raced after Mark.

"Well," Jill said, "that just leaves you and me then." She pushed her mouth to one side and raised her eyebrows. If there was ever a naughty smile, that was it. "You ready to come back to the room for that drink now?"

"I
dunno
. I shouldn't really."

"Hmm…" She put her finger under her chin and looked skyward. "Give me a minute, I'm pretty buzzed."

I lit a
cigarette and handed it to her.

She took a drag. "Okay, okay. Here goes. How 'bout this?

Tyler and Jill,

went up a hill,

to fetch a bottle of Jack.

Tyler got lucky,

'
cause Jill said
fuckie
,

and then she lay on her back."

We both fell into loud laughter. She laughed so hard I thought she might wet herself.

After the drunken laughter died down, Jill leaned back on the towel and fluttered her eyelashes. "So, that's a maybe then?"

I pulled a cigarette out of the pack and lit up. "I'm really sorry, Jill. I can't. I
gotta
meet this guy and I'm already walking a thin line with my girlfriend. It's tempting, but I better not."

She shrugged. "Your loss. It would've been fun."

"I'm sure it would have. Sorry, I
gotta
go." I gathered my things and heade
d off to the Pinnacle building.

As the sand squished through my toes as I walked away, a great sense of accomplishment came over me. I stayed true to Holly when I had the golden opportunity to stray. She would have never known if I corked Jill, but I would have. Unbeknownst to her, I had just deepened our relationship.

#

I stopped by a liquor store and picked up a bottle of Jack Daniel's on my way to meet Otto. JD was his favorite, and it would be cheaper than taking him to a ba
r and having to pay for shots.

Sitting on the hard concrete in the doorway of the Pinnacle building, I waited for Otto. The doorway had a musty smell with cigarette butts littered all around. I couldn't imagi
ne sitting here as a lifestyle.

Seven o'clock and no sign of Otto, so I got tucked into the Jack myself. I figured I deserved a few belts of whiskey as a congratulatory pat on the back for not screwing Jill. If only that was the kind of thing you could brag to your girlfriend about. The last thing I remembered was looking at an empty Jack Daniel's
bottle at about eleven o'clock.

#

I woke up in a haze. A very dark, unpleasant, 'I must have fallen down the stairs, hitting my head on every step on the way down' kind of haze. It was like coming out of a coma. I needed to regroup. I looked my watch. 5:20. Right, an hour forty before I had to be at work. Next question, where was I?

I patted the hard surface surrounding me, then felt a beach towel under my head and another one covering my body. It dawned on me that I had just spent a night as a homeless person. My stomach growled and I tried to recount the past fifteen hours. I guessed I had about ten beers, a bottle of Jack Daniel's and no food. I got on all fours and puked. I mentally apologized to Otto for soiling his sleeping quarters.

I pulled myself together, staggered to the curb and hailed a taxi. The ride back to base rattled my delicate condition. I arrived back in the room with slightly more agility than a zombie. Another Sunday would have been good to help me part company with Jack and get over the stinking hangover.
I am never, ever drinking again,
I
vowed.

The shower did nothing to help me recover from my pain and suffering. Neither did shaving, brushing my teeth or slapping on the Skin Bracer, hard, just like they did in the commercial. Nothing. I would have to endure the pain on my own.

Each step forward on the way to work felt like a sledgehammer hitting the side of my head. I made it there and sat alone in a corner of the shop, waiting for Watkins to call us for quarters. Eyes closed, hoping another sixty seconds of sleep would help relieve the hangover.

"What happened to you last night?"

My eyes opened
to find Mark standing over me.

"You look like shit," he said.

I groaned and grimaced. "Jack."

He held up his hand. "Say no more."

"What about you and Shelly? You score?" I asked.

"No, she rode the bus all the way back to base with me. I got off and told her I wasn't interested. I figured she mu
st have gone back to the hotel.

"Fall in," Petty Officer Watkins shouted, breaking up our conversation.

The ten members of the shop stood at attention in the middle of the shop in one row. Watkins went down the line, giving each of us the once over. When he got to me he stopped and frowned. "Looks like you had a good night, Chambers. A bit gentle this morning, are we?"

I had to fake it. No doubt Lieutenant Johnson would send me off to drunk school if Watkins ratted me out for being unfit for duty. "No, I'm fine. Never better.
"

"Good. That's what I like to hear." His voice was kind and calm. He never did shout much, which was of particular relief considering my condition. "Since you're fine, I need you to go down to the
Miami
. They want someone from the shop to conduct a visual inspection to a flex hose to make sure it looks okay. They're getting underway in an hour, and just want confirmation. You can handle that, right?"

"No problem, boss."

I headed off to the
Miami,
but my focus was on the fact that I just wanted the next eight hours to pass quickly so I could go back to my room and jump into bed. The hangover had to be in the
top ten, maybe even a top five.

I got to the boat and the bubblehead on watch checked my ID and was granted permission to come aboard. I crawled down the narrow hatch and found the Chief that I ne
eded to see in the engine room.

"Hey, Chief." I held up my hand in a half-wave and half 'I'm here' gesture. "Fireman Chambers from the flex hose shop. Heard you need my expert eye."

Chief looked at me sarcastically. "Yeah. Right. Follow me."

We weaved our way through to the Main Machinery Space. Chief pointed to some hoses located well below the deck toward the bilge in the bottom of the sub. "You need to crawl down there. Check out the hose labeled '
HYD
589'. We think it might be leaking, but we're not quite sure. Hop down and have a look. Okay?"

"Sure thing, Chief." The lazy bastards. There was a better chance of a rich man getting into heaven then there was of me getting my skinny ass through the narrow openings to get to hose
HYD
589. A gnat's ass looked gigantic compared to the slivers of daylight l
eading to the hose in question.

I wiggled and wormed my way down, buttons being ripped from my shirt by protruding valve handles and my crotch finding solid contact with various pipes along the way, but I made it to my intended target. I examined the hose closely and saw no signs of leakage. Although my mission was complete, I discovered that I was now comfortable and settled in. My eyelids
grew heavy, so I closed them.

"Chambers!" A voice shouted. "You've been down there ten minutes. Everything okay?"

Chief's shout interrupted my way to a comatose sleep. Bastard. "Yeah, Chief. Looks good."

"Then get your ass up here. We're getting underway in half an hour."

I lost a few more buttons on my struggle to dislodge myself from the bowels of the submarine, but eventually made it back onto the deck with Chief.

"Can you find your way topside?" Chief asked.

"No probs. Chief."  I left to go back to the shop.

As I walked through a berthing compartment on the way out, the urge to vomit nearly crippled me. I held my stomach, bent over and battled the heaves, choking back regurgitation. My head spun, and I nearly fell over. Definitely a top five. Maybe even a top two.

Luckily, no one else seemed to be around. I pulled the curtain back to a bottom bunk. Empty. I needed to lay down for a moment until the nausea passed. I'd be okay in a few minutes,
but needed a moment to collect myself. I crawled into the bunk, closed the curtain, and curled up in the fetal position. What a relief
.

#

"Dive, dive, dive."

What a strange dream.

A funny sounding siren echoed. I tried to place my whereabouts and expected to find myself down with the flex hose I inspected. My hands patted around and felt a pillow under my head. I lay on something soft.
Shit
. That 'dive' announcement could only mean one thing. My heart sank when I realized I didn't get off the sub and they'd gone to sea. I had to think. I couldn't just sneak off, especially if we were already underwater. There was no place to hide and they would find me sooner or later. Every excuse or lie I thought of had a flaw in it. I would definitely be up on charges for something on this one: dereliction of duty, unauthorized absence, drunk on duty. Lieutenant Johnson would bust my ass, e
specially with my track record.

My only option was to take the painful way out.

Slowly, I pulled the curtain back and peeked down both ways of the passageway. The coast was clear. I laid on my stomach and leaned my upper body out of the rack. I looked at the steel deck, a mere eight inches below my head. This was going to fucking hurt.

I lifted my head and smashed it into the deck. SLAM! I lay stunned for several moments looking toward the deck which was nothing more than a massive blur. When I regained focus, I noticed a patch of blood stained the deck. I pulled myself back into the rack, and burrowed my head into the pillow. My head was ready to explode with the combination of Jack Daniel's and head banging. Now I just had to la
y there until I was discovered.

A hand rocked my shoulder, bringing me out of unconsciousness. "What the hell are you doing here?" a voice asked.

I rolled over to find a bubblehead kneeling next to the rack.

He jumped back when he saw my face. "Egad," he shrieked. "What the hell happened to you?"

"Where am I?"

"You're on the
USS Miami,
and you're in my bunk. Stay there a minute, I'll get the Corpsman. You look pretty bad."

He left and after looking at the blood-stained pillow for a minute I rolled onto my back. I did a self-assessment of my condition. My head still pounded, more from the whack than the Jack. My watch read eleven-thirty. I'd been on the boat four hours, and sleeping most of that. Must have slept off some of the alcohol, which was a good thing if I was about to be hauled off to sickbay for an examination.