40s, 15s, and 9s
The much sought after sequel to Tales From the Apartment
by Shane D.
version 0.2


........ Things usually sound better when you're drunk. Then again, getting drunk usually sounds like a good idea. It's that kind of vicious circle of thinking that leads to people smiling when they think back to all the stupid things they've seen or done when there was alcohol around. You guessed it, this book is all about our many drinking capers.

........ Anyone who's read Tales From The Apartment knows about Courtney. Anyone who knows Courtney knows of Danuta. Danuta is his adopted mother. She adopted him, not vice versa. I don't know which one got the worst part of the bargain really. She's downright evil, and he's the worst son in the world. Literally, a son of a bitch. I should know. I lived with them for a short while using an alias. I first met Courtney at a Melro event and we told him all about Solar. He wanted to go really bad and promised us all sorts of riches and favors in return for taking him. We didn't know him well enough back then to know better. I became the guy to pick him up on the way to Solar. He went to Marion Military Academy in Georgia. Picking him up was no problem. I'd been there before to get another friend of ours on the way to Solar. Taking him back on time that Sunday was a much different story. We didn't make it. Instead, I dropped him off at his Mom's house. As soon as she opened the door to let him in, I was on my way home. School was in a few hours.

........ Courtney and I went over to his house one afternoon because we were going to make spell packets or something. We stood on the front porch and had to wait for Danuta to open the door to let us in because she didn't trust Courtney enough to give him a key. Right after we rang the doorbell, Courtney mentions some important information to me.

"Shane, you have to tell my mom you're someone else."
"What? No way, I don't want to lie to your mom."
"You have to. She hates Shane Depew."
"Your mom has never even met me. How can she hate me?"
"Never mind that, I told her that you wouldn't take me back to military school."
"That's a lie, the gates were closed and you were AWOL before we even left the site."
"Just make up a name and you'll be fine. Don't make her mad. Her mom was a nazi in world war two and she's still got the Luger somewhere. It's been used to kill people!"
........ I was about to continue voicing my steadfast objection to lying to his mom when the door opened. I found myself staring at the ugliest looking red head in curlers and face creme that I've ever seen. Thoughts of 'fight' and 'ugly stick' passed through my mind but my thought was shattered when she started yelling at Courtney and myself for waking her up so late at night.

"Courtney! Do you know what time it is? How dare you wake me up at this hour and demand to be let into my house! You don't love me. You've never loved me. All you ever do is destroy my house, abuse me, eat my food, and steal from my purse. I hate you."
........ I was shocked at how mean she was and the thick accent was enough to scare people who aren't used to it. I was used to such accents, but I was still scared. She turned to look at me through her mask at that moment.

"Who is this?"
"Hi, I'm Karl Gruber. It's a pleasure to meet you."
........ That's right. I lied to her. The pressure of her hating gaze made me keep thinking of that Luger and not knowing if she was crazy enough to use it, I decided to take the lesser of two evils. That's how I came to be known as Karl Gruber in that house for a couple of months and Danuta liked Karl so much that she even wrote him into her will. Whenever he got mad, Courtney would try to convince me that we should get my name legally changed and then kill her. A piece of cheese in his coffee would usually calm him down.

........ Anyway, one day she told him that she was going to visit her family in Canada for a while and was too cheap to take him with her. This was ok because he probably didn't want to go anyway. We both looked at each other and acknowledged that we were on the same page. He said fine and off she went. No sooner had she started her car than we were on the phone inviting the known universe to the party that started in fifteen minutes. BYOB of course. A few hours later and the whole house was filled with dozens of idiots who just wanted to get drunk and have a good time. It ended a week later. I met several new people at that party including Erika. She is a beautiful Swedish woman with huge... tracks of land. LaMount enjoys referring to them as the binary stars. Something having to do with the light of his life I think.