Ian McFarland : Picklewiches

ian m c farl and

It was a friday ni ght, which probably meant we were watching Die Hard in Dave’s basement. “We’re not watching Die Hard again,” I said. The three of us were lounging around as if tossed from above into our seats—recliner, beanbag, whatever. After sitting in the dark for several hours, we’d destroyed an impressive number of Mountain Dew cans crumpled on the floor, and when we ran out of those we moved to orange juice concentrate. Spencer, a stout guy who had been trying to grow a beard ever since he lost that bet, had a few pretzels on his t-shirt. All seventy-five inches Dave sprang up from the floor next to him, no longer clapping at the television.

“Yes, we are. It’s the greatest movie ever in ever,” argued Dave, quite factually.

“No, it is, but we seriously just watched it.” “You’re exaggerating,” screamed Spencer. “Am I? Really?” I asked, desperately, pointing to the television playing the end credits of Die Hard. This was nothing new for us. We’d been hanging out together since the beginning of High School, and had pretty much locked the whole routine down since Sophomore year, when we made a blood oath over our first beers—to “Memorize every single fucking line in the greatest movie of all time that doesn’t have Samuel L. Jackson in it.”

You’re probably wondering how we hadn’t gotten tired of the movie yet. Well, first of all, it’s not like we gave it all our attention —we would usually shoot shit with the movie on in the background, only paying attention at the best moments, like when they told Carl his brother was dead. And secondly, I mean, it is Die Hard. It could legitimately be the best movie of a decade that gave us both Bloodsport and Ordinary People. And somehow, the movie kept getting better each time we’d watched it for a while. But though I hate to admit it, it’s lost some of its effect on me recently. In fact, I’m kind of tired of the damn movie.

“Listen, all I know is that not wanting to watch Die Hard means you’re probably gay. And, while I have nothing against my homosexuals, I am not gay. Spencer, are you gay?”

does having sex with jeff gol dblum m a k e y o u gay?

n o , b e c au s e h e wa s i n jurassic park.

h av i n g s e x w i t h j e f f g o l d b l u m j u s t m a k e s you the luc kiest p erson on eart h .

“Does having sex with Jeff Goldblum make you gay?”

“No, because he was in Jurassic Park. Having sex with Jeff Goldblum just makes you the luckiest person on Earth.”

“Then I’m just lucky.”

“Alright, then it’s clear. We have two handsome, manly straight men that want to watch Die Hard. Chris, are you gay?”

“Let’s see if I get you here—wanting to watch a movie about a man who would rather handcuff dudes in New York than sleep with his Wife makes you straight?”

Spencer and Dave were eager to come back, their mouths eager to spit up more pop culture bacchanalia. But just as they were about to speak, they realized they couldn’t think of anything to one-up me this time.

“And— ” I rushed, realizing I had struck gold, “The bad guy is played the dude that looks like a chick in the Harry Potter movies.”

They tried hard as they could to think of something to retort with, but nothing came. Bitter, Spencer swore:

“Someday, I’m going to kill you for that.”

“Alright, so what are we going to do?” asked Dave.

“We could try to meet some girls,” I suggested. “You know, go to Aaron’s concert at the Bronze.” Neither Dave nor Spencer were on board with this idea, judging from the unison of “Meeehhh” that fell from their mouths.

“I’m probably more man than any of those girls would be able to handle. I mean, you’re talking to a guy who watched an entire season of The Simpsons without any bathroom breaks on a dare,” suggested Dave. Added Spencer, “Once you’ve been with Jeff Goldblum, you don’t really need to be with anyone else.”

“Hey, we should go get sandwiches,” suggested Dave. Spencer apparently agreed, using his outside voice as his eyes widened, “We should get sandwiches.”

a n o t h e r Friday lost down the drain

I wasn’t very hungry, but it sounded better than another two hours in the basement. “Yeah, alright, let’s—” but before I could finish, I was cut off by the guys, who needed to make shout— “Sandwiches!”—as they stood and stampeded for the stairs.

Dave didn’t want to pay for the gas to drive, so we walked instead, passing the neighborhood uneventfully. I’d walked this street everyday for a good chunk of my life to get to Dave’s, and it only bored me now. All I could think about was how this was looking like another Friday lost down the drain, spent with Dave and Spencer quoting Arrested Development and watching torrents of Doogie Howser, M.D. Fuck, couldn’t we do something interesting once?

“I’m just going to throw this out there. If either of you order a sandwich with nothing but pickles in it—and you eat it all— I will pay for it,” offered Dave.

“That’s an intriguing offer, but there are some finer points that I would like to iron out before accepting it,” queried Spencer.

“Shoot.”

“Well, first of all, I think we can assume that you mean the sandwich is nothing but pickles, in addition to the bun of bread.”

“Yes. Thank you for clearing that up.”

“And what size are we talking about here?”

We all three agreed, shouting so loud it probably woke someone up. “Twelve inches!” For reasons that didn’t need to be explained, we all thrust our crotches forward as well.

“Also,” I added, “I think there has to be an incentive

thrown in, to encourage the challenge. Perhaps chips and a drink.”

“I would certainly throw in a soda, but I might be willing to consider purchasing chips as well if you were to finish the picklewich in under three minutes.” We collapsed into the door of the Sub Shop. Without realizing it, we had broke into a sprint for the counter, trying to be first in line. I was the last to make it there.

“Your finest picklewich, milady” requested Spencer. As he went on to explain just what exactly he was requesting to the girl behind the cash register, I spotted Jimmy and Mark in the corner. I saw a lot of these guys in High School, but hadn’t seen either of them since. I headed over to say hello.

“Hey man, what’s up? You headed to the Bronze tonight?”

“Maybe, I was thinking about it.”

“We’re headed there, wanna come with?” asked Jimmy.

To tell the truth, I was kind of hoping they’d ask me this. “Yeah man, you should totally come,” seconded Mark.

“Yeah, you could probably use an excuse to get away from those guys,” Jimmy said as he nodded towards Spencer and Dave, who were haggling with the cashier over how much they should have to pay for their theoretical sandwich. “Come on. You must be getting tired of them.”

MAYBE ANOTHER TIME . SAY HI TO EVE RYO NE FOR ME , THOUGH .

“Yeah,” Mark agreed, “They’re pretty fun, but I could only take so much of them.”

I almost accepted right away. But then, I don’t know. At the last second, it seemed wrong. Like, I wanted to go, but it felt like I never could ditch Dave and Spencer, no matter how tired I got of them. I didn’t understand why, but as Dave took his first bite into the picklewich, I regretfully responded,

“Maybe another time. Say hi to everyone else for me, though.”

“Totally. See you around.”

I walked up to Dave and Spencer’s table. “You know what we should do when we get back? We should watch Die Hard!” suggested Dave, after finishing his entrée in an impressive 2:34. Spencer exploded, “Ah man, Die Hard! I love that movie!”

Matt Cook The Battle of Mount Oread Digital matte painting