The Big Tip-Off

Morgan Logan

“Hutch,” I said, and it’s possible it came out more like “Hutsch” at that point, because I think I had put down a couple of pitchers of beer by then. I’d been in and out of the bathroom so many times I was thinking of just moving the party to the john. “The jukebox has stopped . . . juking,” I told him. “Needs—”

“More quarters,” Hutch muttered, and his hair fell over his face as he went digging through his pockets again, but I could’ve told him he wouldn’t find any more in there. Sure enough, all he pulled out was some Juicy Fruit gum, the pop-tops off of some soda cans (he collects them when he finds them on the beach and then takes them down to a recycling place. I swear to God). And, for some weird, known only to the Blintz reason, he then pulled out a green and white tube of Tester’s airplane glue and what looked like the knob off of some appliance. He stared down at the collection on the table for a second and then shook his head mournfully.

“No quarters, no music,” Hutch said, all apologetic. He had obviously reached that state of complete drunkenness where he only bothers using the really important words in a sentence.

“Yes, music,” I said, and I waved at Huggy, who came over to join us escorting a tall, redheaded fox by the name of Sheila. Huggy had introduced her early in the evening but had kept a proprietary hand around her waist the entire night. I saw Hutch look up. His head was on a direct level with her boobs, and his eyes widened before he dropped his head again. I could swear he was blushing.

“Hug, the music’s stopped.” I waved at the jukebox.

“And just what, my friend, do you expect the Bear to do about that?” Huggy asked, his voice slow and sloppy, and I realized that Huggy was just a little noodled. I don’t think I’d ever seen him in that state before. I looked over at our captain playing some pool with Linda Baylor, thinking I could get him to come over and help me rib Huggy, when I saw Dobey make the world’s most terrible shot, almost scratching the felt. And as he laughed and said something too loud, I suddenly figured out that he was drunk, too. In fact, all of my closest friends were plastered to the eyeballs. I was the soberest person in the room.

I think that’s when I finally realized just how damned worried everyone had been that I wouldn’t make it back.

They hadn’t given the first sign, of course. Everyone had acted like it was a done deal that I would re-qualify—even Hutch, although I know him well enough to know what it means when that divot between his eyebrows looks like someone has taken a chisel to his forehead.

I loved ’em all so much in that second, and the Blintz most of all, because he was gazing at me like he had been all night, as if I was some surprise birthday present he’d been staring at through a store window for months.

“Quarters,” Hutch said real slowly, and he turned his head to look up at Huggy, almost bumping into Sheila’s prodigious bust. “Round, metal objects with which we might coax the jukebox into playing more music for my buddy, here.”

The sentence seemed to exhaust him and his head dropped back against the seat top, his eyes half-closing to slits. Huggy laughed and dropped his arm from around Sheila to dig into his pockets. All he came up with was a roll of Wint-o-green lifesavers and a couple of condoms, which he hastily stuffed back into his pocket. I think I detected a blush, although with Huggy it’s awfully hard to tell.

“No quarters, no music,” Hutch repeated in a dire voice, and then his eyes slid all the way shut.