bobby finger

Two of my best friends in college lived in an apartment in West Campus across the street from that girl who was brutally murdered and partially dismembered when I was a freshman and in their courtyard was a large and well maintained pool that people rarely swam in.

(Though one time I was leaving the apartment and saw a girl I barely knew having sex in the water and she said, “Oh hey Bobby!” while it was happening as if it wasn’t actually happening but I assure you it was certainly happening.) Hanging on a nearby wall was one of those hooks attached to a long, maybe 8-foot, rod meant for pulling a drowning person out of the water. The hook was used a few times a week by one of the apartment’s residents. Her name has since drifted away as the names of all those college acquaintances I treasured knowing just so I could wave to them on the south lawn and feel like college was as exciting as it was in the movies have, but the two things I do remember about her are:

1. She was allegedly an honor student
2. She invited my friends and I to drink with her and her roommates most weeknights

I’d enter the courtyard through the creaky gate that I always considered putting WD-40 on and pass her first floor patio where she sat the the table she and her roommates stole from a nearby Taco Cabana and she’d say, in her Dallas drawl, “Bobby, it’s Monday night drinkin’ night. Want a shot?” If alone, I’d decline it. If with others, there was a 30% chance we’d go inside, take a shot of Jack Daniels, and walk out. The next day I’d hear the creak and then, suddenly, “Hey Bobby, it’s Tuesday night drinkin’ night. Want a shot?” 

“Hey Bobby, it’s Wednesday night drinkin’ night. Want a shot?” 

“Hey Bobby, it’s Thursday night drinkin’ night. Want a shot?” 

Now, I should make it clear that she was not getting shithoused every weeknight, she was merely drinking socially with her roommates before, I presume, taking care of schoolwork. Again, I heard she was an honor student, so she was obviously TCB’ing somehow. But every other Thursday night or so (that apartment complex was my second home for two years), my friends and I would hear a noise coming from their courtyard. It was her. And she had the lifeguard hook in her hand.

Generally she was alone, but the amount of guttural laughter made it apparent that she was having the time of her life with herself. She walked around the courtyard tapping on all the windows with her lifeguard hook while screaming things like, “Let’s drink!” or “It’s Thursday night drinkin’ night!” or “Shots! Shots!” or “Hahahahaahahahaaahahhahahhahahhahahhaha.” Every few months she’s pound too hard and shatter a window and run back into her apartment, but for the most part she tapped until her arms got tired and toss the hook aside. The next morning it would be at the bottom of the pool. By the afternoon, it would be hanging on the wall again.