The Lowest Jink

We were known as the Lone Wolf Tribe, and many thought it to be an oxymoron. Lone Wolves belong to no tribe, they said. Lone Wolves are, by definition, lone.

But Lone Wolves we were, and together we made a sort of tribe-- we were screenwriting students at a prestigious yet useless university which shall remain nameless. On the whole, we were true to our reputation, and could often be found nowhere, for we were a solitary bunch indeed, but on rare occassions we did gather. Of course, a Christmas celebration was obligatory; we were not so set on isolation as to pass up that merry holiday.

In our last two years, Lone Wolf Tribe parties were always held at the same little house off campus, hosted by the sole happy couple in our class: Curly and Nate King Cole (perhaps the Cole was not legally part of his name, but as it was Christmas, we all agreed to liken Nate King to that legendary singer of THE Christmas Song).

I was especially excited for Nate King Cole's party in our senior year, for we had all drawn out of a "Secret Santa" hat to see who we'd be buying gifts for. The gift was agreed by all to be in the range of ten dollars, but of course I had a surplus of cash from my job delivering pizzas, and felt that if I spent upwards of twenty dollars, then somewhere out there in the broad realm of Winston-Salem, my Secret Santa would be shopping me a gift at a value upwards of thirty.

Also, it helped that I had drawn Gurt Kam from the hat.

I had always admired Gurt, in a reverent sort of way, maybe just because the other nine or so students in our screenwriting class were folks I tended to avoid out of necessity. Whereas most of them were wholly unremarkable, Gurt had shown a sustained humor, wit, and calm sarcasm all throughout our four years of manic writing classes. I had even given him gifts before-- namely peaches, for his sweat, in our very first year of college, before we even entered into the screenwriting major.

So, in the hours before Nate King Cole's final Christmas party, I searched for the perfect gift for dear Mr. Kam. I scoured every aisle, both of the department store and of our minds. I knew I had to get him something related to cinema, for what kind of screenwriting student wouldn't? But I couldn't settle on a DVD, so I got him several. And then threw some plastic animals in with it, namely a bear and an ass. And when that seemed to be too little, I stopped by my apartment and sacrificed another DVD which I found to be abysmal and would not be missed.

Thus I arrived to Nate King Cole's with a confident air about me. My gifts were wondrous, and sure to bring a smile to both Gurt Kam and another proper man of our company: a tall and mild fellow with a charming laugh who I always referred to as Lord Albin. I passed my gift over their way with a smile.

"What'd you get, Gurt?!" shouted out the comical boy called Davis as Gurt opened up my gift.

I took a breath... and all was as expected. He loved the gift. And Lord Albin approved too. So did jolly Nate Nickle, who was by that point rivaling the jollity of Nate King Cole in his own home.

"I even threw in Chronicle from my own collection, because I watched it and hated it so much, and I never want to see it again," I said as he came to the last DVD in the box.

"I believe you," said Gurt in his signature smirk, which was always genuine.

And then he pulled out the bear. It was clear that he had never before been gifted a thing more grand. And in future years, that same bear would adorn his desk, and he would send me photos so I would know that he still held it dear.

Yes, that was a moment of glory. The final Christmas party of the Lone Wolf Tribe was passing on tremendously... but if it finished as so, this story would have never been written. For only the parties which end in tragedy are those worth writing about in later years.

So now is the time when we must set aside the happy image of Gurt, playing with his bear and the Borat DVD I bought for him, and move on to darker things... concerning Hix.

Hix and I had been involved.

Hix had offered me shelter in times when I was driven out of my mind by former roommates, and I in turn had offered her brief bouts of companionship. Perhaps (or certainly) she had wanted our days of companionship to flourish into something like what Curly and Nate King Cole had grown into: lovers with their own house off campus and the stability to be able to host parties and put their hot romance on display for all the Lone Wolf Tribe to see.

I positively denied Hix in all those things, but we still talked on occasion. I still made her laugh, for that was what our friendship had been based on-- a mutual sense of humor which I enjoyed, and for me that's all it ever had been.

So when Hix spoke up and revealed herself as my Secret Santa, I felt... good? After all, she was the one who knew me best out of all the others in the room. Out of all the others, I had spent the most of my time at college with her and she with me, so if anyone was to get me a deep, expensive, and personal gift out of that bunch... it was her.

"You're really going to enjoy it," she said as she passed over my present, and I believed her. I had poured all my generosity into Gurt's gift, and now my skills in giving were to be reciprocated. Yes, this was to be the culmination to four years of friendship... if anything, I was nervous that the gift would be absurdly priced and make everyone else jealous.

But no. This was not be.

For she had gotten me a Yen.

Yes, in the box (it was a big box too) lay one single Japanese coin, worth approximately seven tenths of an American penny. So, where I had more than doubled the expected value of Gurt's gift, Hix had devalued mine by over a hundred times.

"Get it?" she asked, and sadly, I did.

For I am one of the founders of the English Asslandic Dialect, wherein certain words such as "me" and "you" are rendered as "men" and "yen." Perhaps I had used men and yen too often around Hix... perhaps I was the crafter of my own demise, but I never in a thousand years (or yars, as it is said in Asslandic) would have imagined she would get me a single Yen for Christmas based on my frequent use of the word yen.

Thankfully, Hix left the party early, and I scooted over to Lord Albin on the couch. He, like all other happy Lone Wolfers in that house, were joyous in their Christmas bliss, gleefully playing with what toys they had gifted each other.

"I feel like I kind of got ripped off," I said to Lord Albin as I fidgeted with the Japanese coin in my hand.

There was not a moment of hesitation in Lord Albin's voice-- "Yes, you got jipped. You did," was his immediate comforting response.

After the party, I cast the Yen of Hix aside in the snow, for some squirrel to retrieve so that he might torment one of his own enemies with its pitiful monetary value.

Down to this day, never has any form of currency haunted me more than the Japanese Yen. And as I drove the long road home to my little lonely apartment that night, on winding roads through affluent estates of high decor, I listened to the sad sounds of a saxophone playing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." But it was hard, when I had given the likes of Gurt such high and noble jinks... and all I received in return were jinks of the lowest kind.