Great Box-spectations

While I wait to go to Buenos Aires, living in Birmingham, Ala., I’ve decided to set down… While I wait to go to Buenos Aires, living in Birmingham, Ala., I’ve decided to set down a serial: My best stories, told poorly.

I submit this story first, titled “The Affair with the Box In the Nighttime.”

Sophomore year, I lived in Forbes-Craig on the fifth floor. My life was happy and easy. Then, one day, my roommate looked out our window and beheld a sight that would change everything forever. It was 9 p.m., the middle of February and deeply cold outside.

“Mary!” exclaimed my roommate Tim Andromedon – name changed for privacy, dialogue changed for explicit content – adding, “That is something unnatural.”

I asked him what provoked such an explicit outburst, because in real life, man, was it explicit. Andromedon explained he’d just beheld a sight not of this world: A boy sprinted across the parking lot behind Forbes-Craig, wearing nothing but gym shorts and a T-shirt, carrying nothing but a giant box.

The young runner stopped behind a garbage bin and dropped the box on the iced asphalt, and then he ran away, into the ill-lit night.

“What we need to do,” I said, “is look into this box affair.”

As he could curtail neither excitement nor curiosity, Andromedon nodded eagerly to signal agreement.

I said earlier that it was cold outside. Even inside we knew about that, so we put several jackets on each, because we needed to go outside for our plan to unfold as our bold minds envisioned. We descended in the elevator, then walked out of Forbes-Craig to the parking lot behind, into the ill-lit night.

Andromedon and I looked at each other gleefully. This was it.

Our frosty breaths cut deep in our lungs and told us that we were, for once, alive – alive living the life our souls and instincts and Jack Kerouac said we should live. Crunk, crunk, spake – our hustled steps on the frosted asphalt.

All of a sudden, as we neared the Dumpster, the kid stepped out from behind. He was back, spilling conspicuous everywhere!

“Evening to you, gentlemen,” he said, cocking his head coolly. The kid was about 12 years old, wearing basketball shorts, a T-shirt and shadows.

Acne and glasses covered most of his face. He seemed nonchalant, as if his situation and acne were perfectly normal. Andromedon muttered, “Thunder,” and stopped, startled, but I answered, “Evening, fellow,” strolling past. Andromedon caught up shortly.

“Speak not a word,” I whispered. We kept walking, until I heard the kid start messing with boxes again. Then I grabbed Andromedon’s arm, and we ducked behind an old Oldsmobile. Crouching, hearts pounding, we wiped gloved hands across the car’s window and peered through.

All of a sudden, the kid emerged from behind the Dumpster. He paused, watching, then sprinted away.

“There, but for I, escapes the quarry,” quoth Andromedon. He sped off while I stayed back. I’m slow.

I walked over to the Dumpster. There were about 10 boxes, and upon kicking them I found all were empty except one.

That one was the last box I kicked, and I thought this dramatic and appropriate. Here was the vessel of such dubious cargo, the thrust behind a dreary midnight errand. Having heard hippies blabber about life force, I pondered this box might host a death force.

Pulling off the cardboard top, I found a 30-pack of Coors Light.

My mind raced, and I could think of nothing that I wanted in the box more than a 30-pack of Coors Light, save a 30-pack of PBR or platinum ingots.

Ready to steal the case, I considered it might be the owner’s last, best hope for friendship.

I pictured him darting by later to grab the beers, bearing them to the first party of his generation, without introduction, without invitation, heaving himself on the judgment of his clawing peer group.

He is a desperate young man, with a bonfire inside that renders him callous to propriety and climate.

At the party, the popular kids at last accept the boy thermos formerly derided as Pizzaface, as 30 seventh graders get historically drunk on 30 beers.

So, I only stole two beers. Andromedon showed up, his pursuit exhausted, and we agreed this was a very surreal experience. We wanted to give Pizzaface a surreal experience of his own.

Andromedon grabbed a dirty paper plate. I reached deep into my unconscious and tried to grab something real bizarre, real dreamlike: I wrote on the plate, “Jack be nimble – Jack be quick – Jack jumped over the camel’s penis,” then signed, “The Red Ribbon Killer.”

Andromedon packed the plate in the beer case and replaced the box top. I opened my Coors Light and tasted the best beer ever – so sweet and so cold.

That night, I dreamed easily, secure that somewhere out there, in Pittsburgh, Pa., a place I never thought I would ever visit, some kid’s mind was getting blown because of me.

Stay tuned for Lewis’ next best story. Until then, e-mail him at ljl10@pitt.edu.