One More Michael Story
We were walking along a street in Taiwan, window-shopping, helping my mom buy gifts for her coworkers. I was bored as hell so I started pretending that I had an invisible dog on a leash. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m Method with this stuff so in my mind, I really did have a golden retriever on a leash (even though I would have preferred a labrador, but you work with what you’re given). It was an inside joke between my brother and I, made funnier because it embarrassed my mom (she’s a great sport) and it confused the hell out of the people around us. My mom, who had gone into a store, waved at me and said she needed help. So I asked the owner, “Can dogs come in?” He said, “No.” So I tied the “leash” to a metal sign and left my “dog” sitting at the street corner. I said to Michael, “Make sure no one steals my dog.” I was joking. But he takes it REALLY seriously and stood at the door of the store, keeping an eye on my “dog.” Some guy stood right next to where my dog was and lit a cigarette and Michael comes running up to me and whispers, “That guy is smoking RIGHT NEXT TO your dog.” I laugh and say, “That’s okay.” So he goes back to standing by the door, staring at where my dog is and I’m at the counter helping my mom, when we suddenly hear Michael yell, quite ferociously, “WATCH OUT FOR MY SISTER’S DOG!”, scaring the fuck out of some extremely confused old lady who had unwittingly stepped into the space where my imaginary dog was sitting.
Michael Guarding My Imaginary Dog
I’m a Bad Person
One morning while we were in Taiwan, I was going to the gym and my (lazy) brother happily couldn’t go because he had hurt his foot. I asked him if he wanted to go with me just to keep me company and we could get lunch afterwards, and he said yes because he wanted to be with me. I told him he had to buy me coffee first (there’s a cafe next door and he buys me an iced coffee every morning along with an iced tea for himself). Well, he took his sweet time getting ready and I kept telling him I was leaving but he wouldn’t answer me. I thought he was a little too confident in knowing that I wouldn’t really leave without him so I pretended to leave, opening and shutting the front door so he could hear, then hid in the living room. He left the apartment a few minutes later, in no hurry, taking the elevator down. I took the stairs and followed him into the street hiding behind pillars, staying about 10 feet behind him. He went into the cafe to look for me, then came out and walked to the end of the block where he stood looking around for a long time with a stricken look on his face. It was apparent that he couldn’t remember which way the gym was. I watched him walk back inside the cafe and I hid and waited for him to come out. After a while, he came out and instead of looking for the gym or going back upstairs, he came towards me and sat at a bench really close to where I was hiding. I thought he saw me but he hadn’t so I ducked behind a wall. I could see his reflection in a store front. He had a paper bag with him and he took out an ice tea and just sat there drinking it, looking really sad. I started to feel awful so went up to the bench and stood RIGHT behind him, hovering over him until he noticed me. He didn’t jump in surprise like I thought he would. He just kind of looked at me sadly and said, “I thought you left without me.” Then he handed me an iced coffee that he had bought for me anyway, even though as far as he knew, I had already left without him. I felt like such an ASSHOLE.