Akilah is 21!

What do you get when you mix booze, co-workers, and red-neck assholes? Akilah's 21st birthday party.

On the 19th after getting off work me, the boss lady, and one of the supervisors went out to meet Akilah (of Lyon Rouge fame) in Federal Way. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Fed-Way it is like the inside of a Wal-Mart. Only an entire city.

So, setting my own prejudices aside I agreed to go and we ventured down south (insert various cunnilingus jokes here). We met Akilah at a bar and pizza joint called "The Rock." It reminded me of a U-District bar, but filled with hillbillies. After the initial culture shock I settled down and bought some booze.

At last call (which at this place is 11:40 p.m.) I bought a Long Island and two shots of Tequila. I figured the birthday girl needed a drink that rhymed with her name. Having sucked down our respective drinks it was time for another bar.

We headed down the street to the only bar in Federal Way to be open until 2:00 and proceded to drink some more. The bar was mediocre, but cheap, and there was some semblance of Karaoke, so I made the best out of it and had a good time.

As I walked up the stairs to the Karaoke stage I saw none-other than A-ron Thompson, of Federal Way and his room-mate Joey (not to be confused with another Joe who will be mentioned shortly). We exchanged some male greetings along the lines of "What the fuck are you doing here!?" and shared a man embrace.

After singing "Touch Me" by the Doors, and nailing it, I decided to go have a smoke with the birthday girl. As we were chatting one of her friends friends decided to get a little fresh with Akilah. Normally, when I see a woman "fondled" against her will, I react rather rashly. Akilah, however, handled the situation and all seemed well.

Pulling me aside she said "Don't worry about it, I told him to stop, you can let it go." And I did. We continued to drink, and I even had a chat about classic rock with the White-Trash offender, whose name for blog purposes will be "Joe-py Grope-y."

After a fairly sociable chat with the Groper-ton Akilah and I sang a bit of Al Green and went to have another smoke.

That is when our cheese-ass white-trash friend decided to have another go at "showing Akilah a good time." Having already been more polite than any woman should be in said situation Akilah asked me to kindly "save her."

I put my body in betwixt the offender and offendee and calmly said "Look man, she's already asked you not to touch her, and she already has a boyfriend, so why don't you leave her alone." Our good friend Joe-py replied "You tryin' ta touch me son? I will fuck you up."

I wanted to punch this skinny dweeb in the nuts and stomp on his chest, but my therapist says I should try to resolve disputes with words. So I did. "Look, dude, I don't want to fight you, I just want you to leave my friend Akilah alone."

"I will fuck you up son!" he said to me with a vile stench on his breath "I will beat your mother fucking ass." At this point Akilah grabbed me by the arm and led me away. "Thanks," I said to Akilah, "I was about to punch that guy in the dick."

Meanwhile, my two compatriots A-ron and Joey had seen this unpleasant gentleman get into my face and did not like it one bit. Joey walked up to Mr. Grope-y and explained to him that he should not treat either Akilah or me in such a manner. Grope-y had another idea. A fist to Joey's face.

I used to fight. A lot. I would fight anyone who pissed me off. I fought my friends, sometimes for fun, but also sometimes out of anger. I have won, and lost, many fights, but I have been trying my best to stay "fight free" as violence only begets violence. Another nugget of wisdom from my therapist, which was in this case, true.

This rather unpleasant hillbilly had the audacity to start a fight with not only one of my friends, but a friend of the birthday girl. As he grappled with Joey I moved at his back and started to pummel him with my fists. While this was happening A-ron also came into the fight, with his own swings.

The bouncer was in there fairly quickly, and I immediately got back in the bar. After a long discussion with the bouncer Joey, Grope-y, and A-ron where officially bounced. When the rather large bouncer, J-Rock, came back in he said to me "You got out of there quick and listened to me, thats why you can stay."

"Really?" I said with astonishment. "Yeah. You was just helping out your boy. I'd a let him stay too but he was runnin' his mouth at me. You was calm." So, with a mixture of adrenaline, awe, and booze I closed out my tab and finished my beer.

"Preebz." Akilah said, "I didn't want a fight on my birthday, but that was gangster." I smiled and thought about the end of "It's A Wonderful Life" I felt like Clarence had gotten his wings.

In hindsight I realized that, my own desire to not get in a fight does not always pan out. Sometimes, you see your friend get hit, and you react. It's an instinct thing. I stayed out of a fight, because I knew that there would be no good coming from it, and then that fight found a way to wrangle me in.

Was it the right thing to do? If I hadn't jumped in how would I feel about it? I would feel bad. Whether that is a good thing or not, I don't know. I know that as a male of the species there are certain things that we have a drive to do. We have a drive to hunt and kill to provide food. We have a drive to keep our mates safe. We have a drive to fight each other, for dominance or what ever other bullshit evolution wanted us to fight for. Not in our sweet, art loving, philosophical outer cortex, but in that iddy biddy reptile brain. The brain that is all fight or flight. Sometimes, we can't fight off 100,000 years of evolution. Then again. . . sometimes I don't want to.