Footwear is, in fact, one of the first things I happen to involuntarily assess when I meet someone (anyone - not just Billys), and Billy Blue-Suede's kicks were pretty impressive, in a "this guy is somehow pulling that off... or is he?" sort of way.
Let me explain: you know how some people are so fashionable it hurts? Billy Blue-Suede's shoes took that level up a notch. They were all showy seams and strange tread-nubs and Italian-looking logos and alligator straps and faux buckles and shit, when everyone else at this lawn concert was in flip-flops or barefoot. In bizarre incongruity, the rest of Billy Blue-Suede's attire was event-appropriately relaxed to somewhere well below "casual Friday" standards. It was a little bit like if he'd rolled into the local Dullfield, Kansas drive-in movies in a Lamborghini... and work overalls.
(Built-in moves right there.)
But, I made the mental allowance that perhaps they were his Dancing Shoes (we all know how I love Billys who can dance), and we ended up organically chatting a few times between songs. Via the small snippets exchanged, I gathered that he was kind of interesting and was some sort of CFO for an investment firm downtown and had an adorable southern drawl and also, beer, so by the end of the show, Billy Blue-Suede and I were arms-over-shoulders yelling together along to songs that definitely do not need to be yelled along to, and I put my number in his phone when our two packs split ways.
We went out for drinks a few days later. If I was afraid I might not be able to pick him out at the bar with 100% certainty, due to aforementioned beer the night we met, I needn't have been: the one thing I could have recalled for a precise eyewitness police artist sketch was the shoes, and you better believe Billy Blue-Suede was sporting them again - despite the fact we were out on a rooftop tiki-themed patio on an 85-degree day and nobody who wasn't forced to by health codes was wearing closed-toed shoes. But, I guess if you've spent as much as I cringe to guess Billy Blue-Suede had spent on a pair of sneaks that hip, you get your damned money out of them, which at $3 a day, would maybe have required wearing them about 400 days a year.
The next time we talked, Billy Blue-Suede offered to make me dinner at his place. Some things I already knew about Billy Blue-Suede going into it:
a) He was from New Orleans
b) He was a Saints fan
c) He was a hobbyist home-brewer
It will be handy to reference this list, as well as my corresponding responses:
a) neutral
b) neutral on football in general, though NFL-sound in the background when nobody's watching is a distinct un-favorite thing of mine
c) positive, duh.)
So I show up and at the door is a shoe basket into which I add my own sandals. I notice two things immediately: I can hear a football game on, and Billy Blue-Suede is still strapped and buckled and cinched and lashed into his beloved shoes. In his own home. Where there's a shoe-basket at the door.
He greets me, gets me a beer, and we talk about the whole brewing craft for a minute before he excuses himself, saying something like "I hope it doesn't bother you but I'm gonna have to peek at the game every now and then while I cook... sorry, it's my team!"
I let it slide. I mean, if there was a good gymnastics meet on TV or something, I'd probably do the same. What I probably wouldn't do would be yell at the top of my lungs at the TV, which is where Billy Blue-Suede and I apparently differed. Turned out, "peek at the game" meant something a little more like "offer so much loud ref-heckling and through-the-screen coaching for pretty much the whole game that I literally make myself hoarse, while you, my date, have your beer in the kitchen and sort of involuntarily take over the whole cooking operation."
I find TV-yelling to be a particularly painful phenomenon. So, being a resourceful Susie, I made a little game out of it: Every time he yelled, I drank. Every time he called out to request that I stir this pot or check that burner temperature (so that he didn't miss a play), I cracked open another homebrew. Dinner could not happen fast enough.
(The Saints, you say? Saint Pauli Girl is my favorite!)
When I was probably 4 bottles deep, after the game was over, we finally ate, after which I made moves to get going. Sensing his closing window of opportunity, Billy Blue-Suede told me to hold on and dashed, still in his dashing shoes, to his bedroom. "I have something I'd really like to share with you!"
He came out with a Bible, from which he proceeded to read to me.
You know one thing more futile than yelling at an image on a plasma screen? Reading the fucking Bible to me.
(What do you mean, "Thou shalt be skeptical of nonsense" isn't a commandment?)
After about the fifth verse, I suddenly found myself staring at Billy Blue-Suede's decked-out feet and doing math. Four beers. Unknown ABV, but I was feeling pretty tipsy. After all the shouting at the Saints, how many Bible verses could he read before he lost his voice altogether? How long would it take me to get my sandals back on on my way out the door? What were the odds of getting pulled over driving across-town with my currently questionable BAC?
I looked up, as Billy Blue-Suede had stopped reading and asked me what I thought. It was really kind of a sad scene - him expectantly waiting for me to agree or freestyle my own favorite verse or praise Jesus or break into a Creed song or something (hey, I don't know what these sorts of people want!); me in a state of mild flight-mode panic. I had to get out of there.
I think I stammered something along the lines of "That's... nice?" and backed quickly toward the door, fishing my sandals out of the basket while realizing, as I stumbled trying to put one on, that there was no way in hell I could make the drive at this point. But what could I do? The time for exodus was clearly nigh.
After twice-failing to strap my sandal correctly, I stood, one shoe in-hand, and bade Billy Blue-Suede, still holding his Bible, thanks and good night. And then I bailed out the door faster than any semi-drunk person has business to be moving. I almost fell down his steps in my one-shoed Cinderella flight, sure he was going to come out after me to insist I sober up and listen to more Holy scripture, and I think it was at this point that I dropped the unworn sandal, which fell into the dark beneath his porch steps.
(This is why I can't have nice things.)
No time for that. I booked toward my car, expecting to hear more of the Good Book behind me at any moment, got in, fired it up, and drove around the block. And there, summer crickets singing and moths wheeling under the streetlamp down the road, I sat in my car, in the dark, and waited to be sober enough to drive my ass back across god's creation and into my own goddamn bed.
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