In my second year of teaching, I was offered an assistant coaching position of the Junior Varsity Girls Basketball team. Though my preference was boys—which I eventually switched to and would go on to coach in the two years that followed—I accepted the position because coaching was always something I wanted to try. To be able to mold a team through hard practices and strategize to beat an opponent at a higher skill level intrigued me. My coaching career only lasted three years because the time commitment was year round, and I didn’t love it enough for that kind of investment.

Coaching high school basketball for three years has taught me many things. I have a better understanding about basketball; I can yell and make it sound natural. It has taught me the importance of commitment and the payoff of working harder than my competitors. Perhaps nothing I have learned is more important than these basic tenets:

1)      Aggressive people are more successful

2)      People who can communicate are more successful

3)      People who can make adjustments are more successful

A good coach, a good basketball player, and a good team know and apply all three of these tenets. These are the teams that will win. More importantly, people who can find a way to make this a part of their life habits will ultimately find themselves on top. Sometimes it helps them get to the top of a company, sometimes on top of the money tree, or sometimes on top of a woman that their friend wanted.

In the summer of ’04, Baba, Kaygee, Punchline, and I flew to Florida for vacation and to visit Etienne, a fellow friend. Etienne and I had never really seen eye to eye. I had nothing against him; he was a cool guy and a good person, but when it came to the majority of things having to do with "life," we were on completely opposite ends of the spectrum. He always dressed up; I wore board shorts with black socks. He knew cars; I knew sports. He had money; I was struggling to make the minimum payment on my four credit cards. He had the latest cell phone; I had a Zack Morris five-pound "Mitsubishi" phone. He had the new BMW; I had a 1993 gray Toyota Camry. He sported the latest trends; I thought they were lame.

Etienne was kind enough to let us all stay at his brother's million-dollar lake house just outside of Daytona for the first three nights of our ten-day excursion. On the fourth night, Etienne and his older brother planned a massive Fourth of July party; since the rooms were going to be occupied, we stayed at a hotel. Everlasting amounts of alcohol were purchased for this event. The party began at 7 p.m. and there was an open bar all night long.

The variety of people who came to this party was unlike any house party I had ever attended. My experience of partying in a fraternity house all through college didn’t prepare me for the first 50-year-old couple who showed up ready to get hammered. In contrast, there were 18-year-old couples, dudes with Texas accents, a mysterious guy from Virginia who was trying to scalp a ticket to a punk rock concert, gangsters, hicks, punks, children, a baby. I think all fifty states had a representative. There were perhaps eighty people in total, about forty of them female. Of the forty females, five were cute. I had my work cut out for me.  

The sun went down close to nine. As we lit firecrackers on the boat deck, one noteworthy hick yelled in excitement, "It's the Fourth of Fuckin' July!" with a heavy emphasis on the “Ju” of July. KayGee, Baba, Punchline, and I repeated this exclamation all night long, and for the rest of the trip, and for every July 4^th that followed. Often it’s excited hicks who utter the most memorable quotes. 

After the firecrackers were finished, we went back inside. I had just begun to feel a pleasant buzz. One of the five cute chicks in attendance was a girl who resembled actress Denise Richards. Her name was Donna. She was no superstar but her sexy face and amazing breasts made her at least an 8. Shortly after Denise and I made eye contact, Etienne introduced me to her. That was the last time all night that I saw Etienne in communication with her. It was also the last time I saw Etienne that night. Only later did I discover Etienne had taken this chick on a serious "wine and dine" date and was pursuing her. Since he had never said anything to me, she was fair game. Etienne had only informed Punchline—whose Top-Gun-Ice-Man look is globally considered “hot” by most women’s standards—that she was “off limits.” Punchline hadn’t shared the information but stayed true to his friend; he fucked a cute bubble butt brunette in "the bathroom with all the mirrors."

I suspected something may have been going on between Etienne and Donna considering that he actually introduced me to her. Over the course of the next three hours, Etienne fell completely off the map and was rumored to have gone upstairs to his room to smoke pot and watch TV. I wasn’t concerned about what he was doing or thinking. He should have been all over this girl.

I approached Donna shortly after being introduced. We talked about the DJ's choice in music. We both were into punk rock, and a slew of tangents materialized as we sipped on our drinks and had a lengthy fifteen-minute conversation at the edge of the dance floor. I found out she was a twenty-two-year-old Hooter's girl and was runner up in some bikini contest. She bragged that she was all over some website with the word “taildraggers” in its URL, which sounded classy, but when I checked it out found nothing. Her body language was positive, flirty, and inviting. I had instantly made this girl my primary objective for the night. In my mind, there was no way Etienne was pursuing this girl if he hadn't talked to her in over an hour.

         
For the remainder of the party, I flirted on and off with Hooters’ girl, while also spending time with my friends. Sometime during all the back and forth, I was smart enough to get the girl's phone number. The party ended a little after midnight. Donna told me she was going to drop off her friend and go home. Where in the hell was Etienne?

My friends and I made the eight-minute drive to our hotel and were about ready to call it a night when I realized I’d be jerking off at this time on a normal party night. Without privacy or a computer, I was frustrated. Being enterprising and clever enough to have gotten her number, I decided to call Hooters’ girl. It was my only opportunity to ever call this number before it was rendered completely useless. Hopefully she was as horny as I was. When I called, she picked up on the second ring. “What are you doing?” I asked. “nothing,” she replied—exactly what I wanted to hear. If she didn't want to talk to me, she 1) probably wouldn't have picked up a 949 area code number and 2) probably would have replied with something like “I'm going to bed” instead of “nothing.” 

“Are you ready to party?”

She responded in a slow sexy voice, “I'm ready to rock and roll.” Where was Etienne? What an idiot. After getting directions, KayGee, Baba, and Punchline, being the true friends that they are, dropped me off at her place. They came up for a few minutes just in case she had any roommates. Nothing. The attention was all on her; she was used to it. She showed us the tattoo on her pussy and then showed us her bikini pictures on her fridge. She lived above a run-down toy store and was roommates with some guy who apparently was still at the party. My friends left us alone and headed back to the hotel.

         
We cuddled on the couch and watched “Ace Ventura.” Twenty minutes into the movie, I heard several sets of footsteps coming up the stairs: my friends. Evidently, Donna's nutty-guy roommate had gotten lost in the woods after trying to walk seven miles home. My friends had recognized him from the party and picked him up, not knowing he lived with Hooters’ girl. The guy went straight to his room and shut the door, probably to masturbate. My friends hung out a bit and asked if I wanted to leave with them. I told them that I was going to stay and find a ride in the morning. Denise didn't react to my proposal in any way, so I assumed it was cool.

She sat down next to me, and I asked, “Should I go home with my friends.”

“If you want. I mean, you can stay, but don't expect anything to happen.”

I took this as a colossal bluff. If she was willing to let me stay, she almost certainly wanted something to happen. On a trip to the fridge she told my friends, "You have to take him with you. There is no way we're doing anything tonight." My friends didn't see this girl's bluff and tried to pry me out of there thinking I was wasting my time. But I was ON that night. My three-pointers were swishing. I saw all the angles. In my mind, there was an eighty-percent chance this chick was bluffing. There was no way I could pass up such great odds.

         
My friends took off, and we returned to cuddling while watching the movie. Lying down sideways, I spooned her from behind. Five minutes in, I had to get a better angle so I could kiss her. I propped myself up on my elbow with my cheek in my palm and let my head hover slightly above hers and waited for her head to tilt. When her head finally tilted, I went in for the kiss to collect my winnings.

          
Donna was one of those sensual kissers—super slow, soft tongue movement. I’ve learned to always go at the pace of the girl; otherwise they get mad and whine. After about ten minutes of extra slow mouth touching, I took her pants off. For a Hooters’ girl she was oddly stingy with her breasts. I later learned that her rack only looked good before because she had on a push-up bra. Without the bra’s support, her breasts were quite ordinary—saggy, borderline C-cups.

As the activity progressed, I discovered she was freakier than I had originally thought. Aside from having a tattoo just above her twat, she also had some female sex toy known as a "Sybian" (an erotic shaking penis machine that leaves girls in a wet'n'wild orgasmic mess). I never saw it with my own eyes, but she had been telling me about it earlier. She used it all the time, she said, so when we finally had sex I had to lie down and play the role of the Sybian. My penis couldn't quite vibrate like her toy. Although she had a few shudders here and there, she never was an orgasmic mess. She had clearly been spoiling herself.

          
After finishing, we cuddle-slept for an hour until I realized the sun was coming out. I told her I had to go back to my hotel because we were leaving early. It was light outside when we left, and she took me back to the hotel wearing nothing but a white extra large "Big Johnson" T-shirt. I crept into our room and went straight to bed for a deep two-hour sleep.

         
The next morning, my friends were heavy doubters. They thought they had the "low down" of what was really going through her mind since she had told them "nothing was going to happen." As I explained, she was bluffing with that statement, the consensual truth had surfaced. A few moments later, Punchline's phone rang. It was Etienne.

Punchline waited until the last ring to answer, which was enough time to get an “Oh Fuck” from Baba, an “Ah Shit” from Kaygee, and an “Oh no” from me.

For some inexplicable reason, Hooters’ girl had blabbed about our hook-up to Etienne's brother's girlfriend. I had never heard of a girl blabbing about hooking up that quickly to their friends. Not even five hours had passed since she dropped me off at the motel. The news, however, made its way to Etienne, who was now investigating possible culprits. He instantly suspected it was Punchline. Punchline denied the allegations. Etienne's loud angry voice was audible to the entire car. He asked, “Then who hooked up with her?” Punchline replied, “Well, I think saw Dave talking to her.” The line went silent for three seconds. “Well whatever, she's a stupid whore, and I'm over it,” he said and ended the call.

        
Etienne met up with us a few days later when we took a three-day cruise through the Caribbean. He jokingly punched me when he saw me. Ten minutes later, he asked me the inevitable question: What had happened between Donna and me. I told him exactly what he wanted to hear: “We just kissed, and she wouldn't let me bone.”

          
I didn't feel good about “stealing” Etienne's girl. At the same time, I wouldn't have had it any other way. No one discussed that night the remainder of our trip. The mild tension that lingered went unspoken. But sometimes I would look at Etienne and smile, a Tortoise secretly mocking the Hare.