ok, so the concluding act of this play comes from chad's point of view. i know more than a few of you wanted to know what happened between when we left chad and when he came back to nitin's (he returned around 7am it turned out). so, chad told me the story, but then he also wrote it out in email form. without any permission whatsoever, i'm going to reprint those two emails here.

-begin chad-

so we drank. a lot. at a fun, but not overly crowded bar, which was perfect for our evening plans of drinking and talking. conversations throughout the night included such things as niv and i complaining that drew and nitin talk too much about poker and them replying immediately that we talk too much about sports. this was followed by us looking at each other and me saying "poker is a sport." we also discussed krypto and my always hating finishing behind drew, b-beck, and kevin in everything math related ever. perfect conversation to impress any lady.

as we leave the bar (at 1:45 or, after boston's stupidly early last call) i am saying goodbye to blair, the girl i had met the night before and who had met us out at the bar earlier. i asked if she would make it home ok, and she replied by saying, "i think your friends are leaving." i turn around just in time to see a cab pull away with nitin, niv, and drew in the back. assholes.

so, not knowing where i needed to be, and having been invited back to blair's place, i figured i would just go with the flow. this, of course, was after nitin and drew (and maybe niv) all didn't answer my phone calls asking them to have the cab not leave me. so i get back to blair's place and she starts going on and on about how "i've never had a one-night stand before, so you may not be getting what you want." which confused me, cause what the hell was i doing there?? i just said, "ok." cause what was i supposed to say. so we go upstairs and hook up. and in that post-hookup moment of clarity i realized, "nitin, niv and drew don't know where i am, i don't know where i am, i only vaguely know where they are and i have to find them soon. plus my phone is low on batteries and so i will be in some serious trouble if i DON'T find them soon."

so i tell blair i have to leave, but that i am not leaving cause i am an asshole, i am leaving cause i am lost in a city i haven't been to since i was 12. she is really sarcastic, which i think contributed to her getting along with us, but also contributed to her being very very confusing when i tried to explain this need to leave to her. after trying for a while to make sure she didnt think i was an asshole, i realized, "who cares if she thinks im an asshole?" and so i left.

there was, as she told me there would be, a cab waiting outside her building. but the guy was sleeping. and it took forever to wake him up. and when i did. i couldn't remember where nitin lived, except on newbury and by one of the alphabetical streets. so the guy lists the streets. he gets to e (Exeter) and i yell (really loud) "THAT'S IT!" so he takes me to newbury and exeter.

i wave to nitin's doorman, who lets me in and i head up to the fourth floor, which is where the REAL fun (and my second email, to be sent a bit later today) begins.


part two:

so it's now shortly before 4 a.m., and i am now outside nitin's door and have decided to do the most logical thing i can think of: knock. so i knock. loudly. no answer.

so i grab my dying cell phone and call nitin's phone. no answer.

i call niv's phone. direct to voicemail (so it is probably turned off).

i call drew's phone. i can hear it ring. not through my phone, i mean, but through the door. his phone was ringing so loud, i could hear it outside of the apartment. so i call it again. and again. and again. for about twenty minutes i am doing nothing but call and knocking. i just stand there. knock, knock, hit send, knock, hear ring, knock, hear ring, knock, hit end, knock, hit send, knock, hear ring, etc. etc .etc. then i stop knocking and just call. somehow this alarm sounding thing combined with the thudding noise of alternately my fist or my knee hitting the door fails to rouse ANYONE from their sleep. all three people drank so much that they can't wake up.

so i go downstairs to talk to the doorman, but the doorman's cube is locked and deserted, so i go back upstairs and do some more knocking and calling. then my phone dies. and not one of these, it shuts off, but you can still get a solid minute of time out of it every time you turn it back on. no no. my phone just plain flat out dies.

so i go back downstairs and the doorman is now in his little cube. so i, naturally, ask if he has a back up key for 407. well, he tells me, many tenants do leave a second key with the doorman, but he can't find one for 407. nitin obviously hasn't left his key with the doorman yet (side note: the next day, nitin asked the day shift doorman about this extra key, and he was able to find it within about 12 seconds. understand that this 12 seconds could have saved me about 3 hours)

it is about 4:30 now (which means i have been knocking and calling for about 45 minutes) and the doorman suggests that, since he doesnt have a key, i try calling nitin's phone. smart doorman, eh? i tell him my phone is dead, and he says he can't call nitin cause nitin's number is long distance (you really should get a boston cell phone number, don't you think?). so he suggests i go down to the store 24 a couple doors down and call from there. feeling very much like some criminal who needs to make a call from an unknown number that won't lead the police to being able to find me, i ask the store 24 guy if i can use his phone. he says it will cost a dollar. i wanted to say something about terry bradshaw promising me 20 minutes for less than a dollar, but figured the lack of discernable english language skills from the store 24 manager might make this joke hard to understand. so i call twice, no answer, offer the guy a dollar, which he refuses. i say i made two long distance calls from his phone, he stares blankly at me, and so i leave. i am still not positive that our conversation meant anything to him, other than he recognized the words "phone call."

so now i go back to nitin's building, and again ask the doorman for help. he responds by asking how i know nitin. and what nitin does for a living. and what field i am in. and where i live. and everything else. swear to god, this guy could easily write my biography today, no problem. it is shortly after 5 by the time he is done grilling me about my life. so now i have spent about 45 minutes knocking, 10 minutes going to store 24, calling, coming back, and 20 minutes telling my life story to a doorman.

he then says he will come upstairs with me to see if i can get in. we both try knocking, and (shockingly) there is no answer. so he pulls out a T card (i dont know if that is actually what it is, but it looks suspiciously like an El card, so it makes sense, right?) and begins to attempt to BREAK INTO NITIN'S APARTMENT. yes, that's right. the doorman is attempting to slip the card into the lock and pop open nitin's door to get me in. this, of course, doesn't work. but while trying, the doorman tells me about his [criminal] friend (criminal is my interpretation) who "does this all the time, and could definitely get you in."

having given up the knocking, calling, and breaking in options, i tell the doorman that i am simply going to fall asleep outside of nitin's door. the doorman says i can't do that and says he has a solution.

he takes me upstairs to apartment 904. the following things are running through my mind: am i about to be sexually assaulted? am i about to be murdered? why the hell did my friends leave me by myself on a street corner in the middle of a city i dont know my way around with a girl none of us know or have any reason to trust? and why am i trusting a doorman to take me up to a stange apartment?

as it turns out, the doorman is neither a rapist nor a murderer, although i am not convinced that i would not have been raped/murdered had i stayed in 904 longer than i did. 904 is empty. no one lives there. and since they use it to show prospective tenants, the carpets are regularly cleaned and vacuumed daily. the place is spotless. and the doorman is offering it to me for the night. he even tells me where the bedroom is. not that i need a bedroom, since there is no freaking bed or furniture of any other kind. so the doorman leaves, i lay down.

i am now alone, in a deserted apartment, in a strange city, with no way to contact my friends and where the only person in the entire world who knows where i am is a doorman who knows where i work, live, went to college and high school but does not know my name. i am realizing that if i actually fall asleep, and sleep through the night (its about 5:30 now, i am sobering up a bit, but still ready to legitimately pass out) i am not waking up until 1:30, and i need to leave for the airport by 2:30. and, of course, i can't set an alarm and since my phone is dead, nitin, niv, and drew have no way of finding me.

needless to say, i didn't sleep to well. after sleeping for about 15 three minute increments, i wander downstairs around 7. i am about to lay against nitin's door and go back to sleep, but decide, just for shits and giggles, to knock one last time.

and niv answers

-end chad-

so in case you couldn't figure it out, the damn smoke alarm was actually andrew's phone. beeping. a lot. because chad called it at least 20 times. it was apparently right on the table next to where i was sleeping.

so that's it. it was a great weekend, and i can only hope that our future attempts come close to this one. maybe next time i'll take my camera out... hmm... maybe