Episode 29 Street Dreams The Party

Tony Barrows arrived at a house party on Beliveau Road the St. Vital area of Winnipeg. He had received an email from one of his buddies telling him about the party. Tony could be described as having a crash and burn type of personality. He possessed very low self-esteem, was filled with self-hatred and really didn’t care if he lived or died. He really only had one aspiration in life that was to get drunk, stoned and party hard. The email that Tony received promised him lots of booze, drugs and young girls. He invited Whisper to come along with him almost as an afterthought. Tony had known Whisper for approximately a year and she had developed areputation as a party girl. Tony was not in love with her, but he occasionally enjoyed her company. He had little if any respect for her, but then again Tony really didn’t have any respect for himself. He couldn’t envision any purpose for his life. He was miserable most of the time but often found some reprieve from his personal angst by getting totally wasted.

Tony was a physically strong young man and for a short period of time had been an amateur boxer. It didn’t bother him if a party that he attended a became a little violent. Tony felt that he could take care of himself in any physical altercation and he had yet to lose a brawl in his life. He didn’t fear anyone no matter how big they were and actually welcomed a good, hard, knock- down, drag out fight. Tony didn’t usually initiate fights, but he had a very short fuse and it didn’t take too much to trigger him.

As soon as Tony and Whisper entered the house, they were immediately enveloped by both the smell of smoke and the smell of cannabis. The music was at such a high volume that it would be very difficult to listen to anyone speak. A large silver boombox with flashing colours was playing the Guns N Roses greatest hits album. The sound of Sweet Child of Mine gave Whisper a bit of a buzz as she was a huge fan of Guns N Roses and had a crush on their lead singer Axl Rose.

There must’ve been at least twenty people at the house party that Tony and Whisper could see. The house itself was an older type of three bedroom residence that was in bad need repair and cleaning. Corners of the ceiling had yellow tobacco smoke stains. The light orange carpet looked like it had not been cleaned in years and was spotted by large dark stains. This was the type of house that no one cared about. The young people present in the house appeared to be oblivious to the decrepit, dilapidated condition of the place. Why should they care? Nobody seemed to know whose house it was and no one cared enough to ask. Whisper observed a scraggly looking couple alternately taking hoots from a large orange coloured bong. The male on the couch looked like he had not eaten any food in at least a week and smelled like he hadn’t taken a shower or changed his clothes for several days. The girl was short in stature and was probably between fifteen to seventeen years of age. It was difficult to tell as she was wearing very heavy mascara. Her arms were covered from wrist to shoulders with body art. She had a small picture of Aleister Crowley tattooed on her left forearm . She too reeked of stale body odour.

These were Tony’s kind of people and he felt right at home admist this house of squalor.