Love on Wheelz

The one non-family member who’s always been there for me, no matter what, has been Rodrigo. Actually, calling him non-family is an insult. He is family. He’s my brother. He only lived nearby for about a year, but the bond we formed turned out to be unbreakable. He moved thousands of miles away, but still visits and stays with us for at least one month out of the year. He will come during the summer, for the new year, or both.
We met in religion class while rehearsing for a play. Our entire kindergarten class was sitting on the floor and he was sitting next to me, legs crossed and hands dutifully intertwined on top of his legs.
He leaned over, looking to make sure the teacher wasn’t watching and whispered, “Hey, I’m Rodrigo.”
“Rodrigo, how many times have I told you? Be quiet and pay attention!” The teacher said as he went over Noah and the Flood again, doing his best job to pretend that knowing the details of how an 800 year old man built a huge boat in a few months was serious business.
Rodrigo snapped back to attention, waited a few moments and whispered again, “What’s your name?”
“I’m Raul”
“Cool”
We met at recess that day and practically every day after that. We quickly became friends and we were completely inseparable before long. That was, until his dad got offered a great job in Mexico City. He went away thousands of miles, but it didn’t hurt our relationship. It only made it stronger.
Our friendship may have reached its highest point last summer when we took a road trip to LA. He wanted to take me to school, but when we got there I suggested something more fun.
“Let’s go to LA instead. Your uncle is there and you wanted to see him, right?”
“Yeah, but we’d have to let your mom know. And we’d have to take a nurse and we’d have to plan all the other details. Let’s just do it on the weekend.”
“No, man. Let’s go now. We’ll pick up some of my food from home and head out.”
“But your mom will get mad.”
“Nah.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, we’ll call her on the way.”
He thought about it, and he knew I had him. “Fine, okay.” he said.
I’m a bad influence. Everyone thinks that my friends are bad influences on me, but I’m the one doing the corrupting. I’m the one with the bad ideas that get everyone in trouble. It’s a power I enjoy and exploit often.
So we stopped by my house and picked up my food. Before anyone knew, we were barreling down the I-5 and well on our way to Los Angeles. Then the phone rang. It was my mom, he put her on speaker.
“Hey, what’s up?” he said non-chalantly.
“Where are you guys going?”
“Los Angeles,” he winced.
“Oh, okay. Have fun!”
“Uh… okay. Bye.”
“See? I told you. No problem.” A triumphant smile spread over my face.
“Uh… I guess.”
“No, seriously. Where are you guys going?” the phone chirped right before Rodrigo hung up.
“Oh, shit.” I whispered.
“LA, seriously, mom.” He calls her mom. After years and years of knowing her she’s become a second mom to him.
“Come on, don’t play with me.” There was a hint of annoyance in her voice.
“We’re not playing. We’re going to see my uncle.” he said, half-pleading, half-scared.
“WHAT?! NO YOU ARE NOT! TURN AROUND RIGHT NOW!”
“But, we’ll be fine!” I yelled loud enough for her to hear.
“No! You need a nurse and proper planning and you don’t have either! Rodrigo can’t drive all the way there and take care of you at the same time!”
I turned to him and whispered, “Can you?” He nodded.
“Yes I can. I’ll be fine”
“B-b-but you have to plan!”
“Mom, we’ll be fine.” We both reassured her. And she cracked
“Fine, but I’m not happy about this. And be back early.”
Rodrigo kept on driving and I napped on the way. We got lost looking for his uncle’s house and ended up wandering all over Ventura. Eventually we found it and Rodrigo had a conversation with his uncle about whether he should obey his parents and go straight to college or whether he should take a year off to go to London. Afterwards we went to have dinner. He ate his fries, burger and milkshake while we talked about music. Then I got hungry. I ate my food and drank too much water.
There were no nurses, no authority figures and no one worrying about what time I had to take my medicine. Just two guys on a roadtrip. I felt normal for once.
Afterwards we dropped off his uncle back at his house. It was all well and good until that water came back to bite me.
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah, I really need to pee.”
“Can’t you hold it ’till we get back home?” he pleaded.
“I’ve been holding it for half an hour. There’s no way I can hold it through LA rush hour.”
“What am I supposed to do?!”
“I would appreciate it if you put my penis in the urinal… please?”
“B-b-but… I… it’s…” I looked at him and started bouncing up and down like when little kids need to pee. He sighed, “You will owe me big for this.”
“I know.”
“I hate you.”
I think you really haven’t experienced true friendship until your friend has touched you in the special place. It really fosters an unbreakable bond between the two people. Some would argue that the situation had clear homosexual undertones, I would respond maybe so, but I really needed to fucking pee, and I didn’t fucking care.
We drove back home. He was scared that my mom would freak out on us, but she saw that we were okay and just told us to ask for permission next time.
Since then he decided to backpack through Europe and then live in London for a year. He found a job as a waiter and rented an apartment with a roommate with very little help from his parents. That’s where he is today.
Across the pond, 3000 miles away. He gives us updates and calls us drunk often. Here’s to you, you soccer loving drunken bastard. I’d have it no other way.

This entry was posted on May 4, 2009 at 4:23 pm and is filed under Blog. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.