The Party’s Over

Two cases of Soju (original daw), at 20 bottles per case, check. 30 shot glasses, 15 blue and 15 clear, check. Three bottles of wine from Gibbs, presents given to him but he can’t consume by himself, so he donated them for the party, check. Six thousand plus pesos for the apartment suite, check.

At Saturday 4pm, I had the venue and drinks covered for the Fabcasters Summer Party. But I also had work that afternoon, so with much reluctance I left the party venue to go to a boxing match.

There were 6 undercards plus the main event. We started at 5:45pm; by the time the main card was about to start, it was already close to 10pm. Tired and quite hungry, I asked my boss if I could leave once the main event (which was also the last fight for that night) started; she nodded her approval. I passed by Yellow Cab to get me some hot wings. So by the time I had arrived at the party, I was hungry, tired and… aghast at the number of people inside the suite.

Okay, so in the official Facebook invite there were 41 “attending” and 22 “maybe.” Still, I’m so used to people backing out at the last minute. But even outside the hallway, I could hear the noise of more than 5 dozen gay men talking, chatting, laughing and being animated, thanks to the spirit of the glassful of Soju.

Inside I went from kitchen area to living room to the small bedroom then finally the master bedroom—which was plunged in darkness. Hmmm, okaaay. There was a group of people squatting on the floor and whispering in low voices; had there been chanting, I would have wondered if I had stumbled upon a séance.

A little past midnight, a few guests who had stepped out for a bit came back with bad news: the management had received complaints from other guests about our noise level. A few minutes later I stepped out of our room to appease two ladies from the front desk who personally had to appeal to us to keep the noise level low; furthermore, they said that they never allowed parties to go on after midnight. I promised them I’d do something about the noise.

When I stepped back into the room, I was weighing the options: continue and just let the people have fun, or risk being asked to halt the party? In the end I chose to play bad-cop and kept going from group to group, shushing people and reminding them to keep the noise level at a tolerable level. Moving around and barely stopping, keeping people quiet—major stress plus major tiredness plus I wasn’t enjoying the people’s company plus people were parading shots of Soju in front of me and me just chugging them all in plus when the Soju was gone they started serving vodka—in short, around 3pm I don’t remember anymore what triggered it, but I found myself hugging the toilet bowl and throwing up. I remember TBR and AJ helping me and taking care of me. I think Tony also lent a helping hand. Someone slipped a bottle of Gatorade onto my hand and I chugged it down. Jusko! Parang balik-high school ang feeling ko! Yung pakiramdam mong tatanga-tanga ka pa sa pag-inom at hindi mo pa matancha kung saan ang kaya mo.

They helped me to bed and I blacked out.

The next morning I woke up with my head throbbing and the half-finished bottle of Gatorade still on my hand. The rest of the guys ate the free breakfast for four, but I couldn’t bear the thought of putting anything in my mouth—I had a feeling I’d throw it up immediately. True enough, after a few minutes, I had to go back to the toilet and throw up the remaining Gatorade that I drank upon waking up.

If there’s one thing I really hate, it’s that feeling when you still need to throw up, but there’s nothing in your stomach so what’s coming out is really stomach acid? Ugh. It’s the best feeling in the world; it’s the best feeling to make me swear to myself that, “Never again! Never mix Soju and vodka—never!”

Still I heard that people had a great time. Thank you to my fellow Fabcasters for a wonderful party. Pardon my being killjoy and shushing everyone the whole night, and our apologies to the guests who couldn’t sleep because of our noise. Oh well. That’s the last time we’ll ever book that place for a party.

God, I still feel a slight throbbing pain in my forehead.