I knew this kid, once. I'll say his name was Squirrel. It wasn't, really, but he did call himself by the name of a particular kind of
rodent, so what's the difference? My girl Beagan knew this other kid, let's say his name was Kit, and he was Squirrel's best good
friend. They lived in the same house, Kit invited Beagan to come hang out at their pad, and when Squirrel found out she had a
cute friend, she was instructed to bring me along. We drove north through the January afternoon, it was one of those wretched
midwestern winter days, doldrums-like, not in the bitter below-zero temperatures, but no snow, either, just overcast and
everything tinted with a gloomy graybrown shroud.
Kit and Squirrel lived in a fallingdown old house in Brewer's Hill, right near the Beerline traintracks, the house had once
been blue but was by then the same color gray as the January sky, paint peeling and a rotting porch. The yard was mostly dirt,
with patches of overgrown dead grass and weeds, dotted with empty cans of Blatz and Schlitz, and bedraggled cigarette butts, and
rusty bits of who-knows-what. I was nineteen, keep that in mind, and very easily charmed by the most ridiculous things – so,
yes, I found their brokendown house and complete disregard for keeping things nice very, very charming. I was even more
smitten when we entered the house and found it strewn with more empty beer cans, guitars with missing strings, sofas puking up
springs and stuffing, tables scratched into with the tags of people who'd passed through, and walls papered in tattered, badly
photocopied fliers for punk shows; and the house was without heat at the time, damp and shivery, Beagan and I could see our
breath escaping us in small puffs. And when I went to the bathroom – which looked like it hadn't been cleaned since the house
was built – I saw a stack of back issues of Cometbus next to the toilet.
Kit and Beagan, Squirrel and I, hung out in the attic. The boys were a couple years older, and they provided us with booze,
and we all smoked GPCs (Gutter Punks' Choice!) and sat around getting drunk and doing nothing much at all. It was fucking
perfect. At one point, Kit picked up his bass, plucked a few out-of-tune notes, then handed it to me and taught me the basslines to
a couple Operation Ivy songs. Then, we splintered off into couples. Beagan was all swoony about Kit, that was fine, they tucked
themselves into a grimy cobwebbed corner and talked about anarchism, and anyway I was so into Squirrel. Check this – he had
a stupid punkrock nickname (so did I!, this is when I was known by the pseudonym Disobedience); he had poorly-done tattoos,
most of them of the stick and poke "jailhouse" variety (so did I!, I showed him the safety pin tattoo on my ankle), and he had one
tattoo that'd been inked with a tattoo gun, a goddamn Spiderman tattoo, and even that one was all splotchy and faded; his hair
was growing out from being shaved, a patchy two-week stubble; he had a Drug Problem (so did I!, though I was at the tail-end of
mine, we compared trackmarks); we'd both run away from home frequently when we were sixteen, seventeen. When we ran out
of things to talk about, we cuddled on his beer-stained mattress and felt the foundation of the house sway – though that could've
just been cos we were shitfaced.
I didn't see him again for months. He sent me random, drunken e-mails, such as – You are so awesome. I should've kissed you the
night we met, but I was too shy. Or, when he'd been kicked out of the house I'd met him in (or maybe he had a fight with one of
the roommates and left, I can't remember) – I'm living on the streets in Milwaukee. Come visit, soon.
I kept trying to put off the visit. I had a boyfriend, and I was trying to be good, and I had the feeling that if I saw Squirrel,
something of a sexual nature would happen. Shit, I was having fantasies about the two of us fucking in a dumpster, and other
sleazy stuff I knew my boyfriend would never be up for – I'd had to beg said boyfriend for months to even get him to fuck me in
the backseat of my car, and he also complained on a regular basis that I wanted to have sex too often. Finally, swampy summer
come to southeastern Wisconsin, and me ready to explode like a Fourth of July firework, I couldn't put it off any longer. I got in
my rattletrap '96 Grand Am, and went to meet Squirrel at Fuel Cafe.
I arrived a little early, sat and read zines and observed the clientele. Squirrel arrived, I'd figured we'd hang there for a few
hours, drink coffee 'til we were jittery, talk about everything, until it was dusk and time to start drinking liquor. But he wasn't
talkative at all, every question I asked him he responded to with one or two words and a grunt, and I babbled to fill the silence,
tried to impress him with tales of tattoos and scamming copies of my zine. He seemed mildly impressed by the zine thing, but he
laughed at my anarchy tattoo. And when he did open his mouth, all he did was talk shit about Fuel – This place sucks. I hate this
place. Why am I even here? (I don't know, man, maybe cos you're on a coffee date with a smart-yet-fucked up punkrock girl, who
is totally ready and willing to lift her plaid skirt and take off her fishnet stockings for you if you'll stop being such a grumpy
asshole?)
I thought Fuel was hella cool – this was back in the day when it was, y'know – a photobooth, cheap strong coffee, you could still
smoke inside, they played loud growly music and had a glass case near the counter stocked with zines and cigarettes for sale – but
he continued with his bitching and I said fuck it and we headed back to Brewer's Hill, he'd reconciled with whoever he'd fought
with and was living his hardscrabble rodent life in the attic once again. We sat on the same stained mattress we'd cuddled on
before, but this time we didn't touch, didn't talk, didn't even look at one another. We chainsmoked and listened to Crimpshrine
and tried to breathe in the stuffy-hot air, and it was insanely hot in that attic, hotter than a June bride in a feather bed.
Let's go see a movie, he said, and I said, Okay. Then there was the small problem of deciding what movie we should see...I had
no idea what the options were. He suggested Pearl Harbor. I balked at that. I was, and I still am, an incredible snob about films; I
generally hate any mainstream blockbuster type film, and I'm unlikely to even want to see a movie unless it's indie or has one of
my favorite actors in it. But he said he'd been really looking forward to seeing Pearl Harbor – and then told me that his favorite
films included such crap as Castaway and Gladiator, I should've bolted right then – and I gave in, figuring at least the theater
would be air-conditioned and we wouldn't have to attempt to make conversation. So we got in my car, headed toward the
cinema, and then he asked – Do you need to stop at an ATM so you have enough cash to pay for our tickets? Uh, hold on – Our
tickets? I wasn't going to pay for two overpriced movie tickets for a movie I didn't even want to see, for a guy who'd been a
complete dick to me all day. I turned the car around and took him back to his place. And he got pissed off at me because I
wouldn't pay for his ticket – he got pissed off at me, even though I'd dressed up cute for him, had driven all the way to Milwaukee,
had bought him coffee, let him bum smokes off me...
I think that was when I learned – bad tattoos and too much booze, street livin' and Pabst Blue Ribbon, do not a true punk make.
Squirrel had all the superficial appearance of being a rebel, he had all the cred of living that lifestyle, but he was just a fratboy in
a punk boy's body, he was just what his name purported him to be – dirty, mooching, annoying vermin.