One Last Party (Raging Ronny) Final Draft
One Last Party
Today will be remembered as the worst day ever for now 78 year old, Raging Ronny. Back in his heyday he was known for being the craziest dude at any party. Unfortunately, today Ronald “Raging Ronny” Smith will be checking into a retirement home. Ron’s daughter, Roxane, has been suggesting he lives in a home for quite some time. She always tells him about the great things retirement homes have to offer. Ronny never says much in response but he knew that eventually it would be time. Ron has been dreading this day since his college graduation roughly 55 years ago.
As old man Ronald Smith was slowly making his way into Roxane’s car on the way to the retirement home in his hometown, he suddenly got a flashback. The slam of the rundown 1945 Station Wagon door made the same sound it did over 60 years ago when Ronny was only at age 14. Ron’s memory runs all the way back to the first day of freshman year of high school. This was also the first day young Ronny ever experienced the wonders of chiefing the ganja. He remembers the exact moment quite clearly.
He was in his first period art class with Mrs. Mundane. Art was an easy elective so ninth grade Ronny had four seniors sitting at his work table. Party Peter, Crazy Cathy, Festive Freddy, and Hilarious Hilary. Seeing how it was the first class in the morning, Mrs. Mundane allowed the students a 15 minute free draw and left the room to go make her coffee.
“Hey, new kid,” said Festive Freddy.
“Hi, my name’s Ron,” replied Ron nervously.
“Have you ever been zooted before?” asked Freddy confidently.
Even though Ron had never heard that expression before, he immediately knew what Freddy was referring to. He was asking Ron if he’d ever smoked weed before.
“N-No,” Ron answered timidly.
“Come with us,” commanded Crazy Cathy. Ronny scaredly followed the group into the bathroom down the hall from the art room. Party Peter pulled out the marijuana cigarette from his left pocket and a red lighter from his right pocket. Next thing you know, Ron had taken the rolled up reefer from Peter and started puffing on it. A few harsh coughs followed his tokes.
“How do feel, buddy?” Hilarious Hilary laughingly asked. And for some strange reason, the weed didn’t make Ronny relaxed. The reefer made Ronny rage! Ron was suddenly super hyper and had a frenzy in the bathroom. From that moment on, young Ronny was now known as “Raging Ronny.”
“Dad. Dad!” said Roxane bringing her father back to present time, “Do you want to bring snacks for the ride?”
“No, that’s alright, I’m sure they have ‘a bunch of healthy snacks at the home,’” Ron replied mocking what Roxane would say to try and get him on board with moving.
Roxanne jokingly said back, “it won’t be so bad once you have a party.” She knew her father wasn’t trying to be mean, she knew he felt as if he was giving his life away by living in a home. She’s the only other person in the world who knew about Ronny’s life threatening diarrheal disease.
As they’re on the way to the new home, Ronny has to use the bathroom due to his doomed condition. “Can we stop at this gas station up here?” he asks, pointing to a small gas station in the distance.
“Sure,” replies Roxane, “my tank is almost empty anyway.”
Roxane pulls into the gas station and Ronny goes inside the mini-mart to use the restroom. As Ronny comes out of the bathroom, his attention is taken away by something going on in the corner of his eye. It was Roxane outside. Ron watched from the mini-mart as his only child was unable to grab ahold of the pump, it was flinging Roxane all around the gas station. Even the owner of the place couldn’t control the wild pump. It looked like Roxane was stealing the pump from the owner and running away like a child that stole candy from a sibling.
While laughing, Ronny swiftly got hit with another flash back, this time he was back at a party in his freshman year of college. It was late at night and the house was packed with intoxicated students. Ronny was with his friends from high school who are now seniors in college.
Hilarious Hilary hadn’t laughed in a good ten minutes, quite unusual for her. Crazy Cathy whispers in Raging Ronny’s ear what to do in order to make Hilary start laughing again, “Go steal Martin’s drink and run around the room.” Martin is not the type of person you want to steal from. Tall, bulky dude who hates when people steal his party drinks.
Ronny doesn’t hesitate for a second. Confidently walks right up to Martin with a plan in his mind. “Hey Martin!”
“What’s up Raging Ronny, my guy?”
Ronny starts to say something, “I just had to ask wh-” and mid sentence he swipes Martin’s red solo cup right out of his hand while making sure not to spill any.
“Get your ass back here!” shouts Martin, now extremely mad. Ronny was running all around the house, in and out of bedrooms, up and down stairs. All the while being chased by Martin who was prepared to take Ron’s head off. Attempting to finish Martin’s drink, beer goes all over Ronny’s face and the rest of the house. Finally, Ron ran straight to the backyard where the most people were and was able to lose Martin. He looked up to the windows of the house and saw Hilary laughing hysterically. Just another rage to add to Ron’s reputation.
***
Finally arriving at the retirement home, Ronny appears to be calm but in his head he’s screaming, “Get me out of here!” The first few minutes weren’t so bad because Roxane was touring the living space with Ronny. But once she left, Ron was all by himself in his room. This didn’t feel like a home to Ron, it felt like a prison cell to him.
During dinner, Ronny got his food, he got his beverage, grabbed some napkins, but didn’t know where he was going to sit because he still didn’t know anybody. Right before he was about to go eat alone in this room, he heard someone say his name with a weak voice, “Ronald!” He turned around, looking at a circle table of five with an open seat.
Ronald almost had a heart attack when he realized who it was. Party Peter was waving at Raging Ronny staring back at him, Festive Freddy, Hilarious Hilary, and Crazy Cathy. “I haven’t seen you guys in ages, I can’t believe this!” said Ronny.
Cathy says, “I can’t believe you’re still alive.”
Freddy says, “I can’t believe you can still walk.”
Hilary says, “I can’t believe you can still talk.”
“Ha. Ha. Ha.” Ronny laughs at their jokes sarcastically. It had been at least 20 years since the five of them had been together. They all sit around the table reminiscing their funniest, saddest, best, and worst memories. Then they started talking about the time they spent apart from each other.
Cathy mentioned how her daughters, Janet and Wendy, aren’t as crazy as her, both graduated from Harvard, and now they’re successful nurses. Peter brought up how his self-owned auto-shop was doing pretty well until the second divorce but on the bright side, he got prescribed medical marijuana. Hilary spoke on her father passing away and giving her the position of Stop & Shop manager. Freddy said he tried to get into showbiz but it didn’t work out and instead became a cop. All Ronny could say was that he got diagnosed with diarrheal disease in his mid-forties and ever since Roxane had to quit her full-time job and had to go part-time so she could help him out with his treatments because the doctors weren’t sure of how much longer he had to live.
The table got silent for a couple of minutes after that. Cathy broke the silence by stating, “I miss the old days of partying all the time.”
Then Freddy replies, “Yeah, imagine we threw one last party.”
“That’d be a real fun time. Until people start dying left and right,” Hilary says in response.
“Yeah, I mean no offense buddy,” Peter says to Ron then adds, “but Ronny doesn’t have enough left in the tank.”
Ronny snaps back, “What’s that supposed to mean, Peter?”
Freddy comes in now, “Guys, guys relax! It wasn’t anything serious!”
“No!” shouts Ronny, “You don’t think I still have what it takes? Fine! We’re throwing one last party. Tonight!”
Ronny storms off back to his own room. Determined to make this retirement home a fun house.
