Juan's House #2 What's Her Name?

It was a late Friday afternoon at Juan’s house. I would say that it was a Friday like any other, but it wasn’t. This Friday was special! The new Super Smash Bros. video game had just been released the night before, and that my friends, is a cause for celebration! It should be noted that when I write, “is a cause for celebration,” what I really mean, is that it is a cause for all of Juan’s friends to come over and play video games nonstop. With that being said, there were a total of five men sitting in front of that obnoxiously large tv screen. There was Pete, Ben, Larry, Jack and Juan. They all had a look of intense focus upon their faces, with an occasional bead of sweat moving from forehead to chin, moving the same way a tear might move, if men had feelings that could create tears. It was at that moment Larry howled in anger as he got knocked out of the match.

“Juan, you have to stop ledge guarding! It’s impossible for me to get back on stage when you do that!” Larry complained.

“Ben doesn’t seem to have that problem,” Juan replied casually.

“Yeah Larry,” said Ben, “you just need to work on your recovery.” Ben’s eyes began to widen with the realization that he was about to be defeated. And then he was. “I’m the second one out. Beat the crap out of him Pete!”

“What about me?” Jack protested.

“Beat the crap out of Jack as well. He’s always spamming his side special,” said Ben. Pete’s phone began to ring face up on the ground next to him. He glanced to see the caller id on the screen. After he recognized who was calling him, he hastily grabbed his phone and committed the one cardinal sin of Smash; he paused the game.

For those of you that don’t play Super Smash Bros., it’s a truly egregious act to pause the game during the middle of a match. Someone pressing pause can create all sorts of variables, resulting in the victory or demise of anyone playing the game. It’s kinda like Michael Phelps winning a gold medal by beating another swimmer within a fraction of a second. A fraction of a second in Smash can change everything. The only difference is that Super Smash Bros. is far more important than the Olympics. So, as you can see, hitting the pause button is just wrong. It’s on par with the Pope deciding to teach from the Quran. I think I made my point.

“Hello?” Pete said as he answered his phone.

“What the hell Pete?” Jack yelled. Pete motioned for Jack to be quiet.

“Yeah, I can talk…I haven’t been up to much,” Pete said into his phone.

“He always has to do this right when we’re doing something important,” Juan complained. Pete turned back towards his friends in an effort to ignore them.

“Yeah, it was good to see you last weekend…” Pete continued his phone conversation. Larry slowly moved closer to Pete in an attempt to eavesdrop on the conversation. A wave of realization crossed Larry’s face and he backed away from Pete, now moving towards Jack.

“Dude,” Larry said now sitting next to Ben, “he’s talkin to a girl!”

“What’s her name?” asked Ben.

“How the hell should I know Ben? No one can know just by a girl’s voice,” Larry said rolling his eyes.

“Juan could know,” Ben said while turning towards Juan.

“No,” Juan said shaking his head, “I can tell you a girl’s name by her picture, but not by her voice. Not unless I’ve heard her speak before.”

“I’m sick and tired of this,” said Jack as he stood up. He went over to Pete and snatched the phone from Pete’s hand. Pete attempted to take the phone back, but Jack was roughly a foot taller than him, and was easily able to hold the phone out of Pete’s reach. Larry and Ben ran over and pinned Pete to the ground. With Pete now subdued, Jack began speaking on the phone.

“Hi, I’m sorry but Pete just left the room…I know, right? He told me to tell you that he loves you, and that the next time he sees you he’ll give you a big kiss on the mouth…I agree, that doesn’t sound like something Pete would say. I suppose love can do strange things to a man…You have a lovely voice by the way…” Jack looked at Pete. “She hung up.” Jack tossed Pete’s phone to Juan. “Can you find out who she is by her phone number?”

“Can Elton John play the piano?” Juan answered as he typed the girl’s number into an app on his tablet. He then tossed Pete’s phone few inches in front of Pete.

“That’s not necessary Juan,” Pete said as Larry and Ben released him, “it was just my cousin. She’s been having a tough time lately.”

“Nice try Pete!” said Jack.

“Dude, her parents just got divorced,” Pete exhaled as he picked up his phone, “I told her she could call me whenever she needed to talk.”

“Here we go,” Juan said looking at a profile picture on his tablet, “Pete’s telling the truth guys. He was talking to his cousin Shannon. I believe she’s the daughter of his dad’s sister.”

“Yeah, that’s correct,” said Pete.

"Well that's anticlimactic," said Larry.

“It looks like Bill just got here,” Juan said looking at his phone. A moment later Bill walked into the room.

“I’m sorry I’m late guys! I had to draw my manager a picture showing him how…” Bill stopped and took stock of everything in the room. And then looking at the tv screen he asked “who paused the game?”

“I did,” said Pete, “I had to answer my phone.” Bill rolled his eyes, took a deep breath and said one sentence.

“So, what’s her name?”

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Story by Tom Klingenfuss