A Kate Weekend
I was kind of surprised when Kate showed up for the Eye-Opener at the Brattle this morning; after last night, I kind of wouldn't have been surprised if she'd been nursing a hangover, or just didn't want to talk to anybody. But, I guess that's not really Kate. She just lets the ol' anger out, and gets on with it.

Like, last night - I met up with Carter, Kate and George in Somerville; the plan was to see The General with a new score performed live by the Alloy Orchestra. I was a little worried about running late, since I didn't get out of the apartment until six, but I got there in time - just in time to see George come away from the ticket booth saying they were sold out. At which point Kate's mouth dropped open and stayed that way for a bit, before she was able to get what was on all our minds out.

"You didn't get them in advance?"

"Of course not. It's just a movie."

"But it's also a concert! One of, like, five times this will be performed, and the only time around here! Didn't it register when I told you there was only one show, so we'd have to get tickets early? You work just down the street from here, and you said you'd handle it!"

"Come on, it's a movie, and we're here an hour before the show. Who could expect--"

Kate screamed, causing some folks to turn and look at us. "I warned you about this. I said it sold out last year. But, no, you couldn't be bothered! Now I'm not going to see it, ever, and I've let down my friends!"

This put an end to Carter and I trying to slowly back away. I bit my lip and tried my best to defuse the situation. "Look, Kate, it's okay, we'll just do something else."

This, of course, made it worse. "Oh! Right! Something else! Like the concert with all the original Motown musicians that's going on down at the Berklee Center, that I hated to pass up on but I've been to the Alloy Orchestra show the past three years! The one we probably could have gotten tickets to if you'd just admitted you didn't want to go instead of sabotaging it!"

Sometime, I'm going to have to tell Kate that guys like to think of themselves as straightforward and really hate being accused of doing some sort of passive-aggressive or convoluted scheme when they just screw up, because that was just the sort of thing to get George ticked off. "Look, I'm sorry, but it's just a movie. I don't see what the big deal is!"

"The big deal is that it's a big deal to me! It's something I love! I didn't see what the big deal about hauling our asses out to fucking Foxboro four hours before the start of your fucking football game so we could hang out with a bunch of idiots getting fucking drunk even before we actually sat down in the fucking cold for three fucking hours watching THE most boring sport in the world, but I did it because it was important to you! Hell, I even enjoyed that stupid game because you were having a good time and, damn it, when you love someone, that rubs off on you! But, apparently, things that make me happy are just not important to you!"

"That's not true--"

"Well, you won't have to worry about making me happy again! God, Michelle was right about you!" And then she stormed off, leaving us with George.

"'Michelle was right about you?'" George started moving toward me, but Carter crossed his arms and George sort of decided against coming any farther.

"It was just a joke; that anyone who would prefer the Ford/Ormand Sabrina to the Bogart/Hepburn one just isn't going to be compatible with her."

Carter chuckled at that. "She's right, you know - anyone who has a problem with Katherine Hepburn is going to have a problem with Katherine Jensen."

I managed a feeble grin. At least Carter was trying.

Kate was real apolagetic when we went out for lunch after the movie, saying she hoped Carter and I had a good time. I told her that we did - we found a nice restaurant, ordered some seafood, and I spent the next couple hours finding creative ways to avoid his questions about my childhood. Not quite how I put it to Kate, but he just seemed extra-curious last night.

"And then..."

"And then we went back to his place and had some of the most intense sex I've had in my life."

Kate perked right up. "Remember, I'm going to going without for a while. Spill."

"I keep telling you, there's millions of guys--"

"Yeah, right, whatever. Spill."

"It was... I don't know. I can't remember ever getting it on with someone who was more excited to be doing it. Sometimes guys are like that, they see someone else's relationship fall apart and realize how easy they can screw it up, so they work extra-hard at pleasing their girl. But it was more than that, it was like this was something he needed, too.

"And he spent the whole night sort of cataloguing what I liked and what I didn't like so much. It was fun to be catered to like that. Though he was disappointed when he found out he wasn't ever getting oral from me."

"You don't... Um, sorry. I just sort of assumed, what with you being kind of, uh--"

"Easy?"

"I didn't say it."

"I can be, though, under the right circumstances." I changed some pronouns around in my explanation of how, in my life, I've washed my hands many a time after taking a leak, but never washed, well, down there. "It's just revolting to think about."

Fortunately, the topic got off sex, and boyfriends, and back to movies. The documentary we'd seen in the morning was pretty good, and Kate had gotten into the discussion of other political docus afterward. It's not a genre I'm much interested in. We took out a copy of the Sunday paper and a Brattle schedule and tried to map our Oscar-party preparation strategy. It's going to be tough, since the Brattle has a LOT of good stuff through February and the awards are being handed out early this year.

But, I get the impression that this breakup is hurting Kate more than she wants to admit, so we'll probably wind up fitting a bunch in. There's worse ways to cheer up a friend.

-Michelle
- posted 9:21 PM - - (archive use only)