The clock in the PipeCo break room flipped to 11:45am, and the yard foreman had just started a pot of coffee. Fifteen more minutes and the horn out in the yard would sound, alerting the crew that it was time to break for lunch.
This daily routine at the little pipe supply company ran like clockwork. Earl would come into the office just before lunch to brew a thick dark pot of what he simply called mud. He'd been making coffee that way since he was in the Marines, and wasn't about to let a girl like Gina screw it up. She had only been working there a year, and was all of 20... if even that old. What could a chubby young soda pop drinking girl like her possibly know how to make good coffee?
Then like every other day, Earl would stand there jiggling the pot trying to coax the coffee machine into working a little faster. He wanted to grab the first cup before the yard horn beckoned the rest of of the crew in for lunch, and the closer it got to noon the more the pot got jiggled.
Nothing Earl did had any effect on that grungy old machine, and inevitably the yard horn would sound before the coffee was done. Then Earl would yank the pot out to pour a cup as fast as he could. Of course coffee spilled all over the machine, and Gina would snicker. A couple of minutes later the crew would wander in and paw through the fridge to find their lunches.
Then the guys would sit around the little makeshift break room jokingly taking jabs at each other, arguing about sports, calling bullshit on one another's stories, and telling lies about the women they'd had. All the while Earl would bitch about the sandwich his wife had packed, claiming it was made from a horse's reproductive parts.
This was the lunchtime routine at PipeCo nearly every day of the week, but not this day. This was Friday, and for the last several months the crew had been cheating the time clock and taking a long lunch break to go out somewhere. Even Vinny and Frankie, the truck drivers, had been stopping in on Fridays, talking like wanna be wise guys as they joined in on the verbal fray.
Indeed this was Friday and the men were already taking their verbal shots at each other while they tried to decide where to go eat. That's when PipeCo's owner, a hard working straight shooter named Matt Mathews, walked out of his office scratching his head looking at the clock. It seemed he thought that bit of extra scalp stimulation might help him figure out what was wrong with that clock.
The guys instantly stiffened up and tried to look innocent... well as innocent as a bunch of rough necks could anyway. They could only wonder if this would finally be the day that Matt would come down on them for knocking off early for lunch, but Matt had a much bigger problem on his mind.
"Hey guys." Matt looked around the room to make sure he had everyone's attention. "What are you all getting your wives and girlfriends for Valentine's this year?"
"Fuck that!" Earl grumped from over by the coffee machine. "I ain't never gotten laid on Valentine's Day, so I don't buy none of that shit."
"No shit Earl." Carl, the new equipment operator grinned. "Who would want to fuck an old wrinkle wagon like you?"
"Keep it up Young Bastard." Young bastard... that's what Earl always called Carl. "I wasn't always like this. I used to be young just like you, but when I was young I was actually good lookin'."
"Yeah Right. As if you were ever actually good looking." Carl half mumbled.
"Yup, had so many women I after me I had to swat 'em away with a big old stick. But take it from me, even back then I never got laid on no Valentine's Day."
"Yeah Carl." Frankie chimed in. "Listen to old Earl over there. He might even give you that magic stick of his to beat off with. Lord knows he can't do it anymore. He's too old to swing a stick."
"That's right Young Bastard, and you too Frankie. Just wait. Age caught up with me, and it'll catch up with every one of you. You'll see."
"What about you Robert?" Matt directed his attention to the one guy in the shop who actually seemed to be happily married. "You got any ideas about what I should get Carol for Valentine's?"
"Shit no. It's not even a real holiday." Robert complained. "It's one of those god damned Hallmark holidays. To me Valentine's Day is just an excuse companies use to pollute the airways with ads for the worthless shit they want us guys to buy."
"You got that shit right." Carl chips in. "Valentines ads are the worst. You know, like that nasal sounding jewelry store guy that makes you feel like a giant fucking turd if you don't drop three months' salary on some bracelet he claims he had to blow a guy in Antwerp for."
"No shit. That jewelry guy blows big time." Vinny agrees with Carl. "How about that place that wants you to drop some serious coin on some fucking spa certificate, just so some young stud can feel your wife up for an hour... and don't try to convince me they don't do happy endings at those places either. Why else would women go for that shit?"
"That's no fucking joke Vinnster." Frankie piles on. "What's even worse are those fucking steak and lobster places that say you are lower than whale shit if you don't drop a couple hundred bucks on a half-full plate of food and a fucking cupcake. Hey Earl, you ever tried that one? Maybe a steak dinner and a bucket of flowers would get your old lady to put out."
"You mean bouquet, don't you Frankie? Carl corrects Frankie trying to sound superior. "You mean that Earl should try steak and lobster with a bouquet if he wants to get laid."
"Fuck that." Earl grumbled. "I ain't about to spend no two hundred dollars on some hunk of old dead cow and a sea bug. And don't get me started on flowers. How can anyone charge that much for something that grows in fucking dirt? Not only that, how the hell does the god damn price go up four times just because it's the middle of February?"
"You know, there's always the old stand by." Robert adds, sounding as if he is trying to be helpful. "You guys know what I'm talking about. Those expensive fucking chocolates that just sit on the counter until they go bad because the old fat ass wants you to think she is watching her figure."
"Yous guys got it all wrong." Vinny pipes up using a voice like he's the spawn of Al Capone. "It ain't those shitty overpriced gifts that's the problem here fellas. What we got here is a bunch of outfits that got nothing to sell but some worthless V-Day crap, and they have somehow convinced every woman on earth that she is entitled to that shit. God forbid a man don't buy his gal exactly the right brand of bullshit every February 14th.
"That's no joke." Carl admits. "And, god forbid you make plans that somehow aren't what she's been told counts as romance that fucking week."
"Tell me about it." Matt finally gets into the anti-Valentine's fray. "Last year I made a reservation at Morten's Steak House a week in advance, and got this bag of candy hearts with erotic sayings. On my way home, I dropped a hundred bucks on a really nice bouquet."
"Holy shit boss, you dropped a hundy on fucking flowers?" Frankie teased, acting as if that made Matt some kind of an idiot.
"Sure enough Frankie, and when I got home my wife told me to go change my clothes because I was taking her and the kids to Chucky fucking Cheese... and get this, it was because it's now their Valentine's Day too. I love my kids to death, but they damn sure aren't my Valentines. Last thing I can imagine is anyone getting all romantic with my little ones."
"Yeah, you know they'll throw you in jail for that shit." Earl grumbles as he tries to coax the coffee machine to work a little faster.
"You knuckled under and went to Chuck E Cheese anyway didn't you?" Vinny snickered.
"Yup, had to. The wife wouldn't have it any other way. So my big romantic evening consisted of watching the kids run around screaming until my son barfed up half a bag of erotic candy hearts. It took me days to find those erotic candies, and it took less than five minutes for my wife to give them to the kids. She barely even looked at them. All I can say is it's a good thing the kids can't read yet."
"And what about their periods." Carl laments. "I don't know what the fuck they spray on those god damned overpriced flowers, but whatever it is, it makes a woman get her period in the blink of an eye."
"Yeah, and those Valentines periods always come with a splitting headache too." Robert adds.
"Like I said to start with." Earl grumps as he self-righteously points to everyone. "I ain't never been laid on Valentine's Day, and I'll bet none of you have either."
"Speak for yourself Earl." Vinny points back at Earl. "Me and Frankie... we get laid all the time. Maybe you should hit the night clubs on Valentine's like we do."
"Yeah." Frankie puffs out his chest. "Those bitches all flock to us after their worthless husbands and boyfriends don't treat them right."
"Gawd, you two clowns really do think you are god's gift to women, don't you?" Earl drips with sarcasm.
"Yeah them bitches ain't never the same after they've had the Vinny treatment." Vinny adds, trying extra hard to sound like a player.
"To hell with that." Earl chides. "You two chumps couldn't get laid in a whorehouse on free samples day. You two guidos out pickin' up women?... Hmpf. Those gold necklaces and that two-bit cologne you two douche bags wear belong down at Packard's.
"Are you talking about The Packer?" Carl chimes in. "That's a gay bar Earl."
"Yeah, that's the place I'm talkin' about. You two guys are headed down to The Packer tonight aren't ya?"
"That's right Pisano." Frankie says in a voice that he seems to have stolen from an old gangster movie. "That's where we are going to meet your mother."
