Last night I found this true story about the worst Christmas party I ever attended. In the end I triumphed. Sort of. It was dated December 2003 and I’ve no idea if I ever posted it or not. Reflecting back on those days, a case could certainly be made that I was an asshole.

The Christmas Party

I was in my early twenties at the time. Still wild and chasing skirt. My friend Eddy and I were invited to a Christmas party at a mutual friend’s house. Our friend had recently gotten married, but they were still in the habit of throwing wild parties—live bands, catered food and tons of single people hooking up.

Upon arrival we noticed something was amiss. There weren’t enough cars parked on the street and we couldn’t hear any blaring music. We went inside and realized that we didn’t know a lot of these people. A lot of them were older. Most had on Christmas sweaters.

I spotted the host alone in the kitchen.

“What’s going on? Are those your parents in the other room?” I asked.

“Hey! Glad you could make it. They’re not my parents; these are people I work with.”

Suddenly his wife was standing there giving me the evil eye and a phony smile.

“Listen,” she said, “Tommy works with these people. You guys have to behave yourselves tonight.”

“Okay, no problem.” I said.

“You two aren’t going to start any shot contests or anything, right?”

“No, don’t worry. We’ll be on our best behavior,” I said.

Eddy said nothing during this exchange. He just kept nodding at my responses.

She took our coats and was off.

Eddy and I got ourselves some drinks and started to mingle. The place was getting crowded but no one seemed very interesting. Lots of introductions and cheek kissing.

I was riffling through the cabinets looking for a shot glass when Eddy joined me.

“She told me not to touch the food,” he said.

“Who?”

“Sharon. She said for me to get away from the food until everybody got there.”

“Maybe we should get the hell out of here,” I said.

We were contemplating what to do when Tommy turned up at my side with some doofus wearing a tie and a corduroy sport coat.

“Paul, I’d like you to meet James.”

James shook my hand. He was a two hander, one of those people that takes your hand in both of his and hangs on too long.

We made some small talk until James walked away to glad hand someone else.

“That guy,” Tommy said, “is the fucking president of the company I work for.”

“He looks like an idiot.” I said.

“He’s the president of multi-million dollar company!”

“I call them like I see them.”

Tommy walked away shaking his head. Eddy didn’t warrant an introduction. He just stood there rolling a lime on the counter. He wasn’t happy.

Later, after most people had eaten, we decided it was safe to approach the food table. I was making a sandwich when James, the president, strolled up and grabbed a square of fudge. His cologne was overpowering.

Just as he was about to eat it, Eddy spoke up.

“Don’t eat that!”

James looked at Eddy, puzzled. After an uncomfortable pause Eddy spoke.

“I had it in my mouth...,” Eddy said softly. He mimicked spitting something into his hand. James stared at Eddy for a few moments and then he put down the fudge and walked away.

“What the fuck was that? Did you really have it in your mouth?”

“No.”

“Then why the fuck did you say that?”

“I don’t know,” Eddy said. “It just came out. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“Amen.”

We walked into one of the back bedrooms where all the coats were piled on a bed. I began rummaging around looking for mine when Eddy dashed out of the room. He was back a minute later with a napkin full of fudge squares.

“You know what Sharon fucking said to me?” Eddy asked. “She said not to use the fancy Christmas towels in the bathroom.”

“Why, did you use them?”

“I wiped down the counter. There was fucking puddle of water on the counter!”

“Let’s just hit the road.”

Eddie tapped me on the shoulder and held up his napkin full of fudge squares. I watched as he took one and carefully stuffed it into the pocket of someone’s coat.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I asked him.

“I’m stuffing people’s coat pockets with this shit. We’ve been treated like assholes.”

He was right. We had been treated like assholes. I went out and got a big napkin full of fudge. I started rolling the pieces around in my hands like Silly Putty and putting fudge balls into people’s coat pockets. It escalated quickly. I started putting the fudge into people’s gloves that were in the pockets. Eddy was running back and forth from the food table and was stuffing everything he could find with desserts.

By the time we left the pile of coats was covered with cake crumbs. All the pockets were full of cake and fudge. It would not go unnoticed.

We marched out into the living room where a guy with a guitar was banging his way through Christmas songs begging people to sing along. We said goodbye and got the hell out of there.

Eddy and I never heard mention of the incident. Maybe people didn’t know what to say about finding their pockets full of cake and fudge so they didn’t say anything. I’ll tell you one thing. When I’m at a party and I go get my coat from the bedroom, I always check the pockets now.