SellingMannysGrill.com

Eric already thought I was partially psychotic, and I’m sure heating our place up to a Hell on Earth didn’t do much to cool down that sentiment. His college sweetheart divorced him after a run-in with a prostitute fully-equipped with cocaine and big mouth. Thousands of hookers walking the streets of New York City and he has to pick the one with some sort of epiphany the night he calls her. I never got the full story, but apparently the girl lost her cool and became totally disgusted with all men at the sight of Eric’s penis, took his cell phone into the bathroom of their hotel suite and called his wife. Two weeks later, I no longer had a guest room.

I suppose that’s why Eric never really bitched about the ridiculous temperatures. He was grateful to have somewhere to go. It took him two months just to get the nerve to sneak out of his room in the middle of the night to turn it down. I’d be sprawled out full-eagle on the sofa, eyes closed, ears fully functioning, listening to him tip-toe along the perimeter of the coffee table. Every now and then he’d stub a toe or knock his phony-bone on the entertainment center, trying to hold down obscenities as if they were burritos that just weren’t sitting right. The wounded, sweating warrior would then feel his way back into his bedroom, and I’d soon follow suit when it cooled down to the point where I needed my blankets.

The months passed, Eric continued to pay his half of the rent, and he soon found himself comfortable enough to make the changes he needed to feel at home. Bare spots on the walls were eventually covered with signed New York Yankee photographs, jerseys and old Yankee newspaper headlines. As a very casual Met fan I didn’t really give a shit. He changed our cable subscription so that it included packages for every sport you could imagine. You’ve never seen pathetic until you’ve seen the two of us fighting over the remote at midnight on a Saturday — him fighting for Bass Fishing, me for Animal Planet.

One evening, after spending God knows how many hours at the University, I walked in on a drunken Eric struggling with the microwave. It was the night of “the bug game” — some pitcher on the Yankees was swarmed by a bunch of flies in the 8th inning and couldn’t throw strikes, causing the Yankees to lose a playoff game. He decided the best way to handle this was to kill a case of beer and a bottle of Jack. Keep in mind we’re talking about a 38 year old Penn State grad and an immensely successful trial lawyer. The same man who got rape charges dropped on a client who’s DNA stained his accuser’s thighs couldn’t navigate his fingers on our microwave. Maybe it was the wing sauce.

Eric liked things his way, and the place continued to tailor itself to the ways of my best friend and my favorite alcoholic. That being said, the guy understood that the only thing I cared about was staying warm. Yeah, he’d turn down the thermostat as soon as he got in — no healthy human couldn’t — but he never once complained about the way the place was on fire upon his arrival. I wasn’t the type who’d converse about the things I was passionate about. I rarely brought up Kate, and I referred to my students like an infestation I’d rid myself of at the end of every semester. Really, all I ever talked about with any emotion was how much I despised frigid temperatures. He respected that, and to be honest that’s all I could ask for out of a roommate.

My obsession with staying warm makes the current predicament so exceptionally ironic. Eric hasn’t said anything for about six hours. Neither have I. It was cold this time yesterday, but right now I can feel nothing in any of my extremities. I know I’m conscious because every now and then a stiff breeze rolls through and my cheeks tingle from the chill. I opened my eyes a few minutes ago to see Eric’s open as well, although totally lifeless. They’re glassed over solid, almost frozen. The tips of his ears and nose are rotted dark green from the frostbite, and inch long icicles dangle from the edge of his lips. A pool of blood stains the snow along the side of his torso. Eric’s dead — probably has been for hours. I think I’ve been awake for quite some time, but for all I know I may have been out until the moment I opened my eyes. I’d cry but the tears would freeze on my cheeks and I don’t want to lose feeling the one place I still have it.

Hope is a strange thing. Even the most negative, diabolically depressed people have faith in their passion — paranoia, hatred, jealousy — they’ll keep these passions alive, clinging to the idea that they’ll be able to rectify their demons. There’s hope, even the worst sense. I sat there along the side of the west mountains trying to remember what it felt like to love somebody. To hate somebody. To believe in the idea that love and hate were real to begin with. Three days on a mountain destroyed thirty-six years of hope.

The evergreens were coated with meandering, sporadic snow, clinging to the places where the gravity was weak. I felt conflicted. Lost and hidden from anyone who could help. Confined. Almost peaceful that my helplessness went unjudged. The sun was setting behind the evergreens and rays streamed through the branches like a 3D film. Visible. Consistent. Alive to the eye. Worthless to the body. It’s warmth was a myth. It’s power a cruel joke. Never before had the sunset felt so much like dawn.

When we first fell to the mercy of the avalanche my hope was very real. I thought of this heroic fight for survival, skiing like never before with death quite literally pushing at our heels. Eric would be parallel with me, stride for stride, completing the dynamic duo that thrived under the worst possible circumstances. We’d tell the story with close friends and strange women scattered around our coffee table, rain flowing down our perfectly insulated windows, thunder rumbling harmlessly in the distance. Animal Planet could be on the television.