Relationship Questions? Solved.
So it's six o'clock at the Finale desserterie and the theatre crowds aren't due for another three hours. Forks scrape plates and some inoffensive jazz dresses up the last of the day's full sunlight. The wait staff are leaning against the host stand and shooting the shit in between water pitchers and check-ups, and somewhere along the line a game of Flames gets started.
Do you remember Flames? It was a middle school thing you did with peoples' names. You picked two people and spelled out their names and crossed off all of the letters in common and then took the remainder and counted down the acrynom: Friends - Lovers - Acquaintances - Marriage - Enemies - Sexual.
That's right, kids: Sexual. What you landed on determined your relationship with the person you were paired with.
We're doing this for a little bit in between intravenous injections of molten chocolate cake and the ocassional customer, and after a while I start to get bored with the options. Everyone's just friends. The girls keep getting paired up sexual. I get married to my manager. B-o-ring. I want more. Those middle school kids didn't have a handle on what relationships were like in the real world, I think to myself. And so I decide then and there I'm making my own version of Flames. Same system. Take the number of letters you don't have in common and count down the list. Middle names may help. And there it is: your future. It's not done or anything, but this is what I got written down on a wait sheet before the tables started filling up:
FLAMES OR SOMETHING: FFBBTGDBFMGF
Friends
Friends With Benefits
BFF
Bit On The Side
Trapped In A Loveless Marriage
Drinking Buddies
Growing Old In A Non-Loveless Marriage, On Golden Pond Style
Blood Feud
Friends Until You Come Home From College And Realize That You've "Grown Apart" i.e. They've Become Shallow Fucks, Or Maybe Always Were
Gay Boyfriend
Friends As In We Roll Together, Like Fucking Buddy Cops Or Some Shit. I Mean, I Would Take A Bullet For You, Man. Totally.
I may be going out on a limb here, but I'm betting on my version sweeping the American Seventh Grade. Keep your eyes out.
1 comment:
Here in American we played MASH in middle school. Basically the same concept as FLAMES but with different meanings. I'm not sure if you ever played MASH, but it stands for Mansion, Apartment, Shack, House. When you play you find out who you are going to marry, what kind of car you'll drive, what color you're wedding will be, the number of kids you will have, the location you'll live in, the job you will have, and whether or not you'll live in a mansion, apartment, shack, or house. More or less works the same way as FLAMES though.
By the way, I found your site through Blog Advance.
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