The Perfect Crime

The night began at my apartment with me and my two (American) friends Eytan and Matt (not from Krakow) polishing off a 1L bottle of Perlova. This, to most, may sound excessive. And in any ordinary place, I'd tend to agree with you. However in Ukraine, this is commonplace, encouraged, and even lauded.

One of the many things Lviv is lacking, is a decent pre-game lounge to get things started. Sure, there are bars, and plenty of them. But unless you feel like bumping elbows with a slouched old war veteran that smells like a sulfur leak (who insists on spitting slurred Ukrainian at you no matter how many shrugs and English words you respond with), then you may as well drink at home.

So Eytan, as is his custom, went home afterwards, as he gets all the stimulation he needs in an evening by questioning the merits of religion and retelling the same stories over and over again. Plus, he's the most self-assured cheap fuck I've ever met in my life. I've never met someone who takes so much pleasure in being the cheapest motherfucker in the room. And yet, somehow, I don't mind buying him a meal and a few drinks here and there. I don't know how he did it, but now that I'm thinking about it, I'm beginning to get pretty fucking pissed. Since when am I in the business of rewarding people with a free meal in lieu of torturing me with itemizing a bill? I clearly need to revisit the drawing board on this one.

Where was I? Oh yea, Eytan and his air-tight fucking wallet go home, as Matt and I head out to the best club in town: Millennium. It's a Thursday night, so it's ladies night. Presumably, that means it'll be OUR night, if yaknowwhatimsayin (wink wink, nudge nudge). Once inside, Matt and I order a bottle of Perlova and some mixers (cost: $14US) while trying to avoid slipping a disc as we swivel our heads to eyefuck each prancing pinup.

Before I continue, I need to tell you about this adorable little kitten that plays in my neighbor's yard. Irrelevant!!!!! It's black and white, and can't weight more than a pound. It's always hanging out by their fence and meows each time I walk by. I could swear it knows I want to pet it, but it insists on sitting inside the fence, where I can't get at it. Fucking ball tease!!!! Actually, I guess luring it with a ball isn't such a bad idea. I'll try that tomorrow. I hope kittens love puns as much as I do.

I've given it a name. It's Cunt. I liked it as an allusion to pussy(cat), plus it captures not only it's bad fucking attitude, but my teeth-gritting frustration. Fuck that cat. I tell it to fuck off every time I try to get it to join me on my side of the fence and fail. Although I'll quickly forgive it if I ever get to rub it's tiny head. "That's a good Cunt. Goooooooood Cuuuuunt..."

Speaking of cunt, I have to say that the women of Ukraine are far and away the most amazing women (by nation) I've ever seen. Millennium, on a typical night, would look like any Las Vegas strip club if you inserted vertical stainless steel poles, and charged about $600 more per bottle of vodka.

Getting back to the story (by the way, the last few paragraphs are probably very close to the conversation Matt and I were having at the time), we are borderline mental by around 2:30am. At this point, the only thing standing between us and a full-on disorder is a prescription for Lithium. Matt in fact, clearly is in need of 24 hour surveillance.

But that doesn't stop him from storming the dance floor, with me shortly behind. We see a couple of strong candidates fend off a drooling and frighteningly aggressive Ukrainian guy, after which Matt moves in for arguably, an equally creepy swoop. The four of us engage in small-talk, and somehow I'm dancing with one of the girls, and Matt disappears with the other. It seems our night is only improving.

My girl is laughing a bunch (duh!! I'm fuckin' funny!), and I assume Matt is having as much luck as I am. Things are definitely looking promising, when Matt comes up and tells me that his girl isn't giving him any love. My girl (no, I don't remember anyone's name) collects her friend, and I see her talking to a sizable crew of guys. This strikes me as odd, because I hadn't previously gotten any indication that they were with anyone there. Then again, Lviv is a very small city, and everyone here seems to know one another. Plus, I bring my decision making into question because the only thing I'm entirely sure of is that my last five cocktails were completely unnecessary.

As the lights come on, after the customary closing prom dance slow numbers (clubs here INSIST on slow dances to close a night down), Matt and I head outside. Given my excessive inebriation, I am only looking forward to passing out. My girl types her number into my phone, and the subject of continuing the evening fails to come up (to my relief). Somehow, I lose Matt, and consciously wait patiently outside for him to reappear (the buddy system is rather important in this country, even for guys). Don't ever leave me!!!!

After some time, he shows up out of nowhere and informs me that the girls want to come back to my apartment. Mildly disappointed, I call my pseudo-roommate, who frequently crashes on my couch, to see if he is interested in A) waking the fuck up and B) entertaining guests, from whom he will absolutely derive no value. He wisely declines, as he'd been sick for much of the week, and I find that perfectly acceptable.

The girls, however, are decidedly less accepting of this development. My explanation for their overt disappointment is that my game really is that damn tight. I'm also looking for explanation as to how Matt has managed to turn his girl around so successfully. Being the team player I am, I suggest we go to another bar, and the girls suggest some restaurant/bar thing nearby. Food, at this point, is the only thing that can possibly keep me standing upright.

The bar of choice is a rather dingy, well-lit pub with worn wooden tables and chairs, with exactly the type of clientele you'd expect in a Ukrainian pub at 5am on a Friday morning. We choose a table upstairs, and as the waitress approaches, my girl orders some things in Ukrainian. I sputter something, and she stops me and says "I order for all our group." Perfect. One less thing to try and accomplish with my awful Ukrainian. After all, it's hard enough just trying to decipher my date's English.

What arrives at our table is a 1L bottle of some kind of vodka I'd never seen before, and four plates of awful schnitzel and chips. If I had one wish granted that night, it would have been a picture of the look on the faces of Matt and I as this fallic death cock was placed on our table along with four shot glasses. I don't think I've ever been so terrified.

Well, that's not true. But recognize that AT THE TIME, I'd never felt so terrified. And thank you very much for not invalidating my feelings (asshole).

Amid "budmo" chants (which is a toast that symbolizes a shot of vodka is quickly approaching), I am feverishly inhaling cold chicken schnitzel in the hopes that it will keep me from achieving liver failure. My girl, seemingly sensing my ability to only focus on one thing at a time, that being eating, is instead matchmaking her friend and Matt. She's asking such things as "why don't you kiss her," which I learned in high school, always proves to be nothing short of paralyzingly irritating to the question receiver. Matt goes in for a kiss, and is met with a cheek. He instead dives in for the back of the neck, and as a result my food is beginning to sneak back up my esophagus and tickle my uvula.

Drunken mauling-out is the leading cause of gag reflex activation. It's true. Look it up.

Next, I am waking up in my bed, on top of the covers, fully clothed with jacket and shoes on at 11am. I strip my clothes off, drunkenly brush the taste of cigarettes and salmonella from my mouth, and go back to sleep. I don't A) know how I got home, B) know where Matt is or how he got home, C) know who took that bite out of the raw potato on the kitchen counter or D) care about A, B, or C.

My phone rings at 3pm. Apparently, Matt got robbed the night before (or more accurately, early that morning). He wound up being ushered into a car by four rough-looking dudes, who took him for about $200US and who kept going through his pockets in search of his passport. Luckily, he didn't have it on him (I never carry mine). His next memory was waking up in a restaurant bathroom (in town center) with a black eye and a chipped tooth.

He doesn't know how he got there, and his memory of the night is about as good as mine is, but after a quick check, I realize I have no money either. Although to be fair, I don't remember having much on me to start the night, so for all I knew, I had spent it all. Who knows how much a shit schnitzel costs at 6am anyway?

We devise a plan to at least make a police report of the incident, but to do that, we need to know where the fuck we were that morning. I call the girl I was with and find that her number doesn't work. In Ukraine, no one pays for voicemail, and if you're underground, or your phone is turned off, an automated message typically tells you to try again later. This was good for me, because I needed about nine more days of sleep anyway.

When I wake up three hours later however, the phone number still doesn't work. Odd. With my head a bit clearer, I recalled seeing a table of undesirables on my way to the bathroom in the late-night joint, and thinking to myself "don't speak English" while simultaneously writing that thought off to my drunken paranoia. I'm oscillating like Mozart's pendulum on quaaludes.

Now, it's two weeks later, and the phone number STILL doesn't work. I'm even more thankful that I wasn't more persistent in needling my friend to wake up and help me entertain. I'm now sure that if they had come to my apartment, they not only would have stolen my money, they'd have taken my passport, my computer, my kidney, and my rapidly depreciating dignity.

I still have no idea how Matt and I got separated. You know, saying that kind of reminds me of an ex-girlfriend, actually. Speaking of cunts!!! Heeeey!!!!!

Later in the week, Matt went to a dentist and got a cap on his tooth and a cleaning for $62US. Total bill for the story: $262. I told Matt that his story is worth at least twice that much. I'd trade places with him for $500 easy.

Eytan has this bad habit of telling stories in the third person, and I told him that if he wants to retain my interest in his banal tales, he'll have to supplant himself in the place of the protagonist. Not surprisingly, I feel similarly about this story. Imagine how much more you'd enjoy this story if I was the one with the black eye and backseat narrative. It's not even close. Schadenfreude, evidently, is most effective when the unfortunate loser is someone you know.

It does bear mentioning that the two broads obviously set us up. I guess my game wasn't quite that tight after all. Of course, It also bears mentioning that choosing us as victims isn't even sport considering our states of imbibed stupidity. You'd think any self-respecting thief would at least have a fistful of roofies and their cross-hairs squared on some douchey drunken Brit or something. Definitely not on two nice, affable, open-hearted dudes like Matt and me. That's like hunting kittens in a pet store, for christ sake.