Free Getting Higher by Robert T. Jeschonek

more whiskey and looked out into the living room.
    In the middle of the burgeoning crowd, he spotted Rocky. Perched on the good old reliable dance chair, he was still head and shoulders above everyone else. He was still singing and dancing to the blaring jetplane stereo, louder and wilder than before. His eyes were no longer closed, though, and had a glazed, feral look that read half-smashed and half-crazy. In each hand, he clutched a bottle of beer, and alternately drank from them both.
    "Hey, bud," laughed Joe. "I guess Rocky's doin' all right tonight."
    "Yeah, Joey. Stop worryin' about him already. Worry about havin' a good time yourself. "
    "Man, I don't need to worry about that shit," Joe assured him boastfully. "Good times are all the time for me!"
    "It's, like, we ran around all day gettin' ready for this thing, and now you should just loosen up and get into it."
    "Man, I've been fuckin' loose since th' day I was born!" Joe slugged back more whiskey and belched blissfully.
    Suddenly, out in the living room, the music stopped. Surprised at the abrupt silence, Joe and Crank both jumped, gaping out the open door to see what was going on.
    In the living room, everything had gotten relatively quiet; all the noise and commotion had petered out along with the music. Everyone was standing around anticipating, nursing their drinks and watching Rocky at his post in the center of the room. The big man was no longer dancing, but held his precious bottles of beer in the air and spoke.
    "I wanna' propose a toast!" he shouted, revealing formica-white teeth in a hippo grin. "A toast! I propose a toast!"
    "To what, Rocky?" shouted someone from the peanut gallery.
    "Yeah, man, to what?" chimed somebody else.
    For a moment, Rocky was silent; his face was intent and contemplative, or at least as intent and contemplative as all the beer inside him would allow.
    "I propose a toast," he finally announced, "to me! I propose a toast to Rocky...the toughest, meanest, mightiest son of a bitch here tonight!" Everybody laughed and jammed their cups together. There were lots of groans and wisecracks, but Rocky ignored them in his moment of glory. He just clinked his bottles of beer like chisels, jammed both their necks between his lips and drained them simultaneously.
    After a minute, Rocky thrust his beers in the air again and held them there, smiling. "I would like to propose another toast!" he spouted, his blunt face shining with trickles of sweat and beer. "I propose a toast...to Wanda!"
    A chorus of hoots and whistles rang out, mixed with raunchy jibes and applause. Two beefy guys lifted Wanda onto their shoulders and toted her to the middle of the arena.
    "I second that toast!" cried Wanda, drinking something sinister from a styrofoam cup. "Here, here!!!" Stretching nimbly out to Rocky, she bopped her cup against one of his beers, and drank some more.
    Everyone repeated the toast, including Crank and Joe. In the bathroom, the two men collided their beverages, spilling half of the stuff on the floor tiles.
    "All right!" cheered Joe, dribbling punch down his stringy dark beard.
    "Wan-da!" Crank chanted gregariously. "Wan-da!"
    All was quiet then as the crowd drank more; but Rocky was a rocket man tonight, hurtling in orbit and not about to come down. Insistently, he shoved the beers in the air once more.
    "I propose a toast!" he bellowed commandingly. "One final toast!"
    "Aw, enough already," somebody griped.
    "Yeah, we want music!" blurted somebody else.
    "Hey, folks, this...is it!" Rocky waved his beer bottles to invoke silence. "All right! I propose a toast...one last toast...to the good life! This is the way to party!"
    Again, everybody yelled, toasted, and inhaled their drinks. At last, somebody turned the stereo on and the party resumed its full pulse.
    In the bathroom, Crank and Joe were suddenly very busy. After all the toasting, a lot of drinks had been emptied, and everyone wanted a refill at once. The cramped cupboard latrine was