Walls

Rating: PG-13
Author's Note: This makes me laugh whole-heartedly.


Mary walked into Andy’s New York hotel room to find him on his knees with his ear pressed to the left-hand wall.
“What are you doing?”
Andy touched a finger to his lips and waved her over. She crouched down beside him.
“Stewart and Kelsi just got back from a date and I think…” Andy paused, listening intently to the wall, then continued in a soft, conspiratorial voice, “I think he’s going to make his move.”
Mary gasped, and then frowned.
“And you’re going to listen in?”
“Yes,” answered Andy, innocently.
“Andy,” said Mary, disapprovingly.
“I just want to make sure my mate gets his piece, don’t you want the same for your mate? And these walls are paper-thin; I would have heard everything anyway.”
“You’re a sick man”
Suddenly, Andy perked up.
“Oh! Listen, listen!” he said in an excited whisper.
Mary cupped her ear to the wall. On the other side she could hear Stewart’s voice; he was speaking in a language that was unfamiliar to her; graceful and lilting. When he finished, she heard Kelsi say something low in an appreciative tone. Mary turned to Andy, who was trying hard not to laugh.
“Was that…”
“Arabic?” he finished for her, “Yes. He does that every time.”
"Every time? What do you…”
Suddenly, the door to Andy’s room opened and Sting walked in. He paused for a moment to take in the sight of Andy and Mary crouching on the floor by the wall, and then joined them.
“You missed the Arabic bit,” said Andy.
“Damn. That’s my favorite part,” Sting bemoaned.
Mary stared at the two men, nonplussed.
“Do you two… do this often?” Mary ventured.
“Well, sometimes Stewart gets a room across the hall from us. Those nights we just, you know, watch the telly or something,” answered Sting, getting into a comfortable position.
“Do you do this to each other?”
“No, just Stewart,” said Andy, “It’s pretty fascinating, really.”
“Like watching giant pandas in the wild,” mused Sting.
“Slow night, though,” Andy said, checking his watch, “They’ve barely said a word to each other. I think its nerves.”
“Know what I think?” said Sting solemnly, “I think he’s going to strike out.”
“No!” Andy said, disgusted, “He’s crazy for that girl.”
“That’s just it. She’s not some tart of the road, he likes her so he’s psyching himself out. He’s going to say or do something stupid and scare her off.”
“No way, that boy’s a right catch,” argued Andy, “And I know for a fact that Kelsi fancies him quite a bit.”
“I will bet you money that nothing happens.”
“How much?”
Sting pulled out some change from his back pocket and counted it quickly.
“Eighty-four cents.”
“Done! And you have to tell me where you hid my demo tape.”
“Fine.”
“And Stewart has no idea that you two do this?” Mary asked as Andy and Sting shook hands.
“Stewart is surprisingly unobservant,” answered Andy.
“Yeah. Kelsi, too,” Mary said after a moment’s thought.
“And he’ll sleep though anything,’ added Sting, “But that’s a different story.”
Andy snorted.
The three potential voyeurs crouched in silence for several seconds. Finally, they heard Stewart ask Kelsi if she’d like a drink.
“No! She wants sex!” Andy snarled through gritted teeth, “Fuck her stupid, Stewart!”
“No, Stewart!” whispered Sting, “She wants to learn about the embalming methods used during Middle Kingdom Egypt!”
“Sex!”
“Death!”
“There’s something profoundly wrong with you two,” Mary observed.
“Hey,” said Andy, cheekily, “You’re the one listening in on your girlfriend about to be taken advantage of by our drummer. What’s up with that?”

On the other side of the wall, Stewart examined his drink. Too much ice, he thought. He turned to watch Kelsi nurse her own beverage. He edged a bit closer to her on the couch. He tried to think of something to say. He’d already exhausted ancient Egyptian embalming practices at dinner, a topic she was well versed in, unbeknownst to him. He scanned the quiet hotel room. Was it too early to rip a phonebook in half? Perhaps it was already too late. What do we have in common? He watched her chew thoughtfully on a cherry stem. We’re both left-handed, that’s rather interesting. Then he remembered something that she’d mentioned a few days ago.
“You said you were in drum corp. during college?”
Kelsi turned to him and smiled.
“Yes, I was. And marching band in high school.”
“I’d love to hear about.”
Kelsi immediately launched into marching techniques, show themes, practicing in college parking lots during the summer, performing at football games during the fall, traveling to competitions all along the east coast, learning and helping to teach tonal bass parts (she’d had been a bass drummer), uniforms, the strange fraternal qualities that marching percussion lines often exhibited, and so on.



Andy and Sting looked quizzically at Mary.
“Marching band?” asked Sting.
“Yeah,” said Mary. “We both did it, I was in color guard.”
Before Sting had chance to reply, the happy chatter on the other side of the wall was abruptly cut off. For several long seconds there was silence. Mary, Andy and Sting stared blankly at the wall and then at each other, not sure what to think.


Stewart carefully parted lips with Kelsi. He watched as she took a deep breath, mouth still open with surprise. She focused her eyes on him. He grinned sheepishly. Perhaps I shouldn’t have interrupted her mid-sentence. But, after a moment of uncertainty on his part, she began to smile broadly. She leaned foreword and kissed him back, with gusto.


Mary jumped at the sound of Stewart’s couch bumping against the wall. Then, silence. All three strained their ears. Faintly, they heard a girlish gasp which was followed, even more so faintly, by a girlish giggle. Another loud thud as the couch bumped the wall.
“I think we’re done here,” Said Mary, blushing.
The three straightened and began to move about the room. Andy smiled up at Sting.
“You owe me some pocket change.”
Sting sighed and handed Andy the coinage.
“Your tape is in the A &M Records studio garden…”
Sting gave a sly grin.
“In London.” He finished.
“Damn it,” said Andy, defeated. “Oh, well.”
He looked at the change in his hand.
“I’m going to buy some Junior Mints,” he announced.
Andy turned to Mary, giving her a “join me?” look. She rolled her eyes and sighed good-naturedly. They left the room together.