Life of the Party: Stories of a Perpetual Man-Child (13 page)

My wife was pregnant when we got married. We hadn’t planned on it, but upon hearing the news we were both elated. We were in our thirties and well past the time where something like that was truly an accident. I knew LeeAnn was who I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, and now she had to. We found out she was pregnant the day after we moved in together—the same day, coincidentally, that I had convinced her to take a Xanax and down a pitcher of margaritas with me while we painted the living room.

We told the doctor on our first prenatal visit and she smiled at us. “As long as that’s not a lifestyle type of thing your baby is going to be fine.”

For who?
was my first thought. That was
exactly
my lifestyle at the time. But my wife, who rarely drinks and hasn’t taken a Xanax since, heard that as a mandate, and thankfully so. What I heard was that I had a designated driver. We told our friends that night, she told the girls, and I told the boys who responded by handing me a glass of absinthe.

I took no part in planning our wedding, not because I didn’t care, but because I am suspicious of any man that does. Weddings are a woman’s dream, honeymoons are a man’s. She wanted to get married in her hometown so we were getting married in her hometown, which was so small and so Southern that question four of our marriage license application was, “Are you blood relatives?”

The only time I did step in on planning was when my wife asked me whether we wanted to dance or to drink at the wedding.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“We can’t have both because in my hometown they believe that the two together lead to sin.”

“What is this,
Footloose
?”

“We gotta pick one.”

My answer came quickly. “I pick booze, ’cause I’m dying to see them stop me from dancing.”

Like I said, my focus was the honeymoon and considering I was already partying for three, I paid great attention to the planning. I didn’t want to fly—I knew a flight would cause more anxiety than necessary, on one of the most anxious days of my life. Our wedding was in her hometown of Bowdon, Georgia, which meant our options were even more limited.

There was also the fact that I was close to broke. LeeAnn didn’t quite know it yet—that was information I’d share after our commitment ceremony—but all the TV money I had been gifted as a youth was running close to dry. I scoured the Internet looking for honeymoon options and came up with nothing. But my concerns were lifted at the eleventh hour when my dad called.

“Buddy, I got the place for your honeymoon.”

He had been talking about my honeymoon situation with a friend, and this friend said he had just been to the most amazing, quaint resort. It had blown his mind. We could get a discounted rate, he added. My dad told me he had already taken the liberty of booking us a place at the resort, so as not to lose out on the opportunity. We were locked in. I asked him what the price per night was, and he said it was around thirteen hundred a night regularly, but with the deal he was getting for us, it was going to be a steal.

Once we heard the details, we were sold. There were only thirteen rooms on the island, and every room was a treetop bungalow with its own outdoor shower. Everything, he told me, was included—booze, food, activities. All you had to do was show up and you would be taken care of every step of the way. It sounded too good to be true.

I told LeeAnn, who was shocked at the thought of paying $1,300 a night. She had already paid for our entire wedding, which cost $5,000. So a honeymoon that outspent that amount was no small thing. But I assured her with my dad’s hookup, which was almost half off (I was guessing), and not having to buy plane tickets, it was a totally affordable plan. She conceded, I called my dad, and it was done.

Our wedding was beautiful, a true testament to redneck ingenuity. It was like CMT and TLC had teamed up. We were married at the church across from her grandparents’ house the day after Christmas. It was catered by everyone who loved her. LeeAnn’s grandfather smoked several hams for pulled pork. Her granny and aunts put in at least eighty hours in the kitchen, making potato salad, Brunswick stew, and cole slaw. We had two wedding cakes, one made by her cousin and another made of Krispy Kreme donuts and Moon Pies. My dad ate himself sick and my mom danced like it was
her
wedding (LeeAnn’s dad got special permission from her small Baptist town for us to both drink and dance).

The next morning we said good-bye to our families, hopped in my mom’s car and drove south toward the Florida Keys, hauling ass and excited, like we were picking up a kilo of coke. Our destination was a place called Little Palm Island.

Many hours later we pulled up to the valet at Little Palm. As a joke, I asked the valet if he had ever met a famous person before, thinking he might be curious or even stunned by my question. He was not.

“Yes, they come here all the time,” he said as he reached for the keys to my mom’s car.

“But who is like the biggest, though? Because, you know, I’m on TV. I don’t want this stay to be awkward.”

“Evander Holyfield was here last week.”

“The prizefighter?”

“Yeah, the prizefighter. And you just missed Debra Messing.”

My wife laughed as he took my keys. “We’ll keep your car on the mainland,” he said. He left us at check-in holding our bags with me holding my dick in my hand.

We both suddenly felt out of place. If what the valet had told us was true, then this place was obviously a five-star place, and here we were in shorts, flip-flops, T-shirts, and sunglasses we had gotten at a gas station earlier that day. Our bags didn’t match. To top things off I was holding a case of Budweiser under one arm like Uncle Eddie from
Vacation
.

But as we approached the front desk from the valet, I still beamed with excitement. There’s nothing I love more than starting a vacation and this was a big one, the kind prizefighters and movie stars took, and I was getting it for half off.

I lowered my sunglasses and like a true sophisticate announced to the man behind the counter that this was our honeymoon. He forced a smile, congratulated us, and offered us the island’s signature cocktail, called a Gumby Slumber. I’m not sure exactly what was in it—rum, juice, bean shavings, coconut, perhaps. I grabbed both, gesturing toward LeeAnn. “She’s pregnant but I’ll take hers.”

Within moments we were checked in. But I was confused. Where we had pulled in was just off the main highway that takes you from Miami to Key West, and all around I saw nothing that resembled a five-star hotel. No treetop bungalows in sight. That is when the clerk motioned us to a dock.

“The boat out there will take you to the hotel.”

“The hotel isn’t here?”

“The hotel is on a private island, sir.”

“A private island.”

“It’s very nice. You won’t be let down, sir.”

We left our four mismatched suitcases at the front desk and walked out to the dock, where we found a boat straight out of the 1920s waiting for us. I secured the Budweiser under my arm, grabbed LeeAnn’s backpack, and we hopped on.

Just as we were about to take off we heard someone from the check-in area call out to hold the boat. The captain obliged, and we waited until on the dock appeared two of the most uptight, upscale, white-bread New York socialite-yuppie types I had ever seen. They had matching pastel sweaters tied around their necks, brand-new Birkenstocks and Revo sunglasses, and both held armfuls of designer bags from what looked to be an extensive, recent shopping spree.

They literally did a double take when they saw LeeAnn and me. They actually turned their noses. This was a couple we would never hang out with. They were the complete and total opposite of everything we stood for.

The two sat directly across from us. Short introductions were made before they took great pleasure in telling us everything we needed to know—that he was an investment banker, she was an art dealer, that they
badly
needed this vacation because things were absolutely
hectic
for them. It was
so hard
, they said, to really take time for themselves these days. They had, in fact, been shopping in Key West and spent way more than they expected, but why do you make the money if not to spend it? It’s a
vacation
, right? After listening to their résumés for half the boat ride, the woman asked us about ourselves. I took the bull by the horns.

“I’m a comedian and she manages the apartment building we live in. Which is great because we don’t have to pay rent. We just got married. Oh, and she’s pregnant.”

That was the end of that. They looked at us as if we were a couple of Somali pirates who had just hopped on the boat, then went through the spoils of their shopping spree, always keeping a careful eye on us. I cracked open a Budweiser and we all enjoyed the silence.

When the boat pulled up to Little Palm Island, I nearly tripped over LeeAnn’s jaw. A new concierge had come to greet us at the dock and give us a tour of the island. It was amazing, possibly the nicest place I have ever been. Manicured lawns, treetop bungalows, a gorgeous pool, a private beach, a top-notch fitness center and spa, a library, and a restaurant. Everything was private and everything was over-the-top. The tour couldn’t have taken more than twenty minutes—the whole island was only five acres—but with every turn you took, something new impressed you. I kept waiting to see a prince or a president.

The concierge directed us to our bungalow, which overlooked the ocean and was set twenty feet up in the trees.

When we got to the door LeeAnn grabbed me and whispered, “They’ve carved our name in the door.”

She was right. These rooms didn’t have numbers, they carved your names into the fucking door. He let us in and it was absolutely gorgeous. Dark teak wood floors, white, plump couches, and a huge California king bed set upon a frame made out of reclaimed lumber from a shipyard, with a mosquito net draped over it. Big, slow ceiling fans spun in every room, but I didn’t listen to a word the concierge said after I passed the outdoor shower. There is something absolutely magical about bathing yourself outside, and to me the idea of hot water in the cold morning air was something you only read about in books. I was naked before he even left the room, singing in the treetops as I cleaned every inch of my body. I cracked another Budweiser and walked in from the shower to find LeeAnn inspecting the room.

“This is going to be expensive.”

“Don’t worry,” I told her. “My dad got it hooked up. We’re paying next to nothing for this. Zilch. Zero.”

“The guy that showed us around said that khakis and collared shirts are mandatory for the men at dinner along with close-toed shoes. Did you bring those?”

“Yes, of course.”

“He said the menu is set by the chef and you eat what everyone else eats. He also said if we’d like he can set a table up in the ocean.”

“What?”

“That’s what he said, but you have to pay for it.”

“I’ll pass,” I said.

It was getting close to dinner time so I threw on my khakis, a collared shirt, a pair of shoes, and walked with LeeAnn over to the restaurant. As we made our way to our table and I sized up the other guests, I could tell beyond a doubt that we didn’t belong. We were not only younger than the average guest, but I assumed from the fact that some of them were in suits and evening wear that we were in a considerably lower income bracket. I remember being obsessed with the fact that it looked like they had all just showered. It seemed odd to me, this must have been some kind of rich-person behavior, considering I don’t usually shower when I’m on vacation. As I saw it, the beach was a shower, as was the pool. Maybe they were as obsessed with their outdoor showers as I was. Anyway, I may not have been like them, but I sure as hell could smell like them. My only saving grace as a broke comic walking around a room of upper crusters was that my new wife was banging hot. I dumped all my insecurities into that fact.

We saw the two dorks that had taken the boat to the island with us and matched their fake hellos with fake hellos of our own. He was dressed in a suit with a bow tie and she was in a dress just shy of an evening gown. I played a little mental game that I often play called What Do They Look Like When They Masturbate. It’s a fun game to play, especially in a room like that. And for him I envisioned it perfectly. His masturbation was something he succumbed to and didn’t delight in. It was fast and necessary, filled with guilt. His secretary had a slip of the nip and he couldn’t control it, and when he was done there was a harrumph, as if he’d let himself down. She on the other hand didn’t masturbate at all, as she was averse to pleasure, thus explaining her marriage to him.

We were seated outside and as soon as we arrived at our table, a Key deer walked up to greet us, as if it had been cued by the hotel staff. But it wasn’t. LeeAnn lost her fucking mind and started feeding it, which apparently was something everyone had already been briefed on. They stared as if LeeAnn had started shoving the cutlery up her asshole. An older woman quickly reprimanded us, saying that we were not to feed the deer under any circumstances. What other circumstance would there be, I thought to myself, other than one just walking up to us.

“How can anyone not think that a small deer coming up to your table and wanting a snack isn’t an absolutely amazing life experience?” LeeAnn said to me.

I ordered a bottle of wine—with one glass—and we did what most couples do on dates: We eavesdropped on everyone else’s conversations. Our food arrived and shortly after, we heard the woman who had reprimanded us ask to speak to the chef. The waiter obliged, and LeeAnn leaned in. “This can’t be good.”

“You think she saw him feed a deer?”

When he came out, she said five words while pointing at her plate.

“You are better than this.”

I’m sure the chef had a bunch of words himself that he’d like to share with that lady, but he apologized and promised a better meal the next day. LeeAnn and I were appalled but were too busy wolfing down our meals to be bothered with whatever small detail in the recipe that had pissed her off. So when the waiter asked what we thought of dinner, we told him that the woman was out of her fucking mind, and the meal was possibly the best meal we’d ever had. And it was. Everything there was mind-blowing. The wine, the views, the service, the privacy.