Paul
My best friend is getting married.
And I get to plan an epic as shit bachelor party.
There are two requirements for a great bachelor party. The first one is getting shit-faced with your buddies while surrounded by naked chicks. The other is humiliating the guy. Women do the same thing where they make the bride wear penis attire and go on a stupid scavenger hunt where they make some pussy buy them a shot or have the bride kiss some ugly fucker. I’ve seen it happen far too many times.
Guys have a different way of embarrassing the groom, though. We’re dudes, so we shit talk and roughhouse. We take things to the extreme, and we do it with force. We do it with bodily harm.
Gabe used to be a gigolo, and a damn good one at that before a woman changed everything and he quit the game. Normally, I would tell him that he’s letting a woman drag him around by the balls, but the woman in question is Autumn, and I love her. She’s like a sister to me, and he couldn’t have found a better woman.
So how do you plan a bachelor party for an ex-gigolo who has seen more titties than he can count and already lives in Vegas, the city where most guys come to enjoy their last night of freedom?
This needs to be a night Gabe won’t forget.
I called our buddies from Saddles & Racks and asked them to meet me for a few drinks so we can come up with a plan. We’re at a place I found on one of my dates called Gold Spike. It has a full bar and has games like beer pong, pool, cornhole, and life-size Jenga.
After we get our drinks from the bar, we grab a high-top table, but I see the guys eyeing the pool table. We can’t have that. We won’t get anything done. One thing would lead to another, and we’ll be betting money and not coming up with a plan for Gabe. After we’ve discussed the bachelor party, we can play games and I can take these fuckers’ money in a few games of beer pong.
“I can’t believe Gabe’s getting married,” Nick says, sliding onto a bar stool.
“We know the thought of one woman’s pussy for the rest of your life makes your dick want to run and hide.” Vinny shakes his head, grabbing a seat, too. If anyone in our group is next to get out of the game, it’s Vinny. He stopped seeing a chick from out of town who couldn’t handle what we do. He didn’t want to leave S&R for her. He wasn’t like Gabe.
“Fuck,” Nick groans. “Just the thought of that scares me.” He shivers and then takes a long sip of his grapefruit juice and vodka with a salted rim—which is also known as a salty dog—appropriate for him in my opinion. Out of all the guys, Nick is my go to friend when it comes to shit, but he’s a real I’m-never-getting-married-dude. Hell, I’m never getting married either, but if this motherfucker fucks up Gabe’s happiness by putting any kind of doubt in his head, I will personally beat his ass. After what Gabe went through with Cochran, he deserves to be happy, and if Auttie is that person, then I’m not going to try and change his mind. Like I said, I love Autumn like a sister.
“You better not fuck this up,” I warn, pointing my finger at his face and narrowing my eyes.
Nick rolls his eyes. “I’m only going to get Gabe shit-faced.”
“I don’t want to only get him hammered. I want this to be something cool as shit.”
He laughs. “It will be. He just won’t remember it.”
“And how do you know what will happen?” I ask.
He shrugs and looks to Vinny and Bradley. They look to me, waiting.
“That’s why I asked you all here.” I shake my head in frustration before taking a sip of my tequila and Coke. “We need to plan something fun. We can’t just bring him to a strip club. We see tits and ass all day.”
“Not Gabe. I bet he has to jack off twice a day now just to keep his sack from exploding.” Nick chuckles.
I groan at his smart ass remark. “Trust me, I’m sure they’re still fuckin’. They lived with me, remember? I’m pretty sure shit hasn’t changed that much in only a few weeks.”
“What do you have in mind?” Bradley asks, getting back to the task at hand.
“I’m not sure. He can go to a casino anytime, so that’s lame.”
Bradley takes a sip of his gin and tonic before he speaks again. “Have you seen that place where you can drive bulldozers?”
I shake my head. “No.”
“I’ve never been, but a buddy of mine told me about it. You can drive a bulldozer or an excavator. You build huge mounds of dirt, push gigantic tires around, build trenches, and stack two thousand pound tires. You can even play bucket basketball—whatever the hell that is.”
“Dude, that sounds cool,” Vinny exclaims with a huge grin.
I watch Vinny take a sip of his rum and Coke while I consider the bulldozer idea. Playing with heavy machinery does sound fun, but it doesn’t sound epic and I want something he’d never expect. I want something that we can’t go do any given day. “I’ve never heard of that, and we definitely need to go do it one day, but I want something that’s going to be the shit, not something that’s just going to be fun.”
They nod and then we sit in silence. We sit and think for what feels like forever. My drink is almost empty when, out of nowhere, Bradley slaps the table, causing us all to jump.
He turns to me, a big ass grin on his face, and asks, “How good are you at lying?”
I told Autumn that I was stealing Gabe for the weekend and to have his bag packed. She, of course, questioned me, but if I wasn’t going to tell him what we were doing, I wasn’t going to tell her. I did, however, promise her there would be no girls involved.
That was partially true.
Knowing that Gabe was at the range teaching, I stopped by his house to grab his bag from Autumn.
“Are you sure that’s all the clothes he’s going to need?”
I look at the small duffel bag and then back at her. “Yeah,” I chuckle. “We’re guys. We don’t need a lot of clothes.”
“I know, but all I packed was two pairs of boxers, two T-shirts, swim shorts, a sweatshirt and a pair of sweats.”
“That sounds right.”
“What if something gets dirty? You’ll be gone for two nights and I didn’t pack extra pants.”
“Auttie, trust me. We can wear the same clothes two days in a row.” Her eyes grew huge. Laughing, I add, “Guys don’t care.”
Shaking her head, she closes her eyes and then turns and walks to the kitchen as she mutters something I can’t hear. I don’t understand the big deal.
“I’m going to grab some stuff from the garage.”
“Whatever,” she calls back.
After grabbing what I need, I throw everything into my Jeep and then walk back to the kitchen. “Bye, Auttie. We’ll pick him up at nine.” I kiss her cheek and try to step away to leave, but she grabs my wrist before I can move and gets in my face, pointing her index finger at me.
“Just because I’m pregnant doesn’t mean I can’t kick your ass, PJ. If I find out there are women all over him this weekend …” Her eyes narrow and I swallow hard.
“There won’t be women all over him this weekend, I promise. Plus, this is Gabe we’re talking about. You can trust him. You can trust me.”
She stares at me for a few beats and I feel my heart rate kick up. I’ve never been scared of her. I knew she was a badass by the way she’d handled her ex-husband, but Jesus, I never expected to be on her bad side.
“Autumn,” I say, using her given name because I need to let her know I’m serious and she can trust me. “I promise it’s just a bunch of guys getting together. You packed him sweats for Christ’s sake. You think chicks are going to be all over him in sweats?”
“Paul Jackson, I know how all you boys operate. It doesn’t matter what you wear. Hell, you all work naked for a living, so don’t give me that bullshit.”
All right, she got me there.
I release her death grip from my wrist and bring her in for a hug. “Auttie, I promise it’s not that type of party. We all fuck everyday—literally.” I snicker.
“Not helping,” she mumbles.
“We’re going to go blow off some steam and do guy shit. Just drink and have a good time, I swear.”
She pulls back and looks me square in the eyes. “Promise?”
“I cross my heart.”