Dinah the Christmas Whore by David Sedaris
...rogram.” David recalled that day when they were celebrating Lisa’s eighteenth birthday, she received a phone call from an old friend. When David asked who was calling, she said that she’s a “goddamned friend.” Lisa talked to her outside the door. Since David hated Lisa, he was trying to get her in trouble with his dad. When his father heard David, he got up out of the chair, his mother interfered and said “leave her alone, for god’s sake, it’s her birthday. If the phone breaks, I’ll buy you another one for Christmas.” She looked at him and said “You always have to stir the story, don’t you?” After Lisa talked to her friend, she returned to the table and asked her parents if she could use the station wagon. Without asking David, she said that he would be going with her. He was in disagreement, but after she offered him “three dollars and unlimited use of her new hair dryer,” he agreed to join her. They went to a dangerous neighborhood where people got knifed. Lisa parked in the dark place and walked kicking aside the cans and bottles in the street. His sister acted “dangerously stupid,” and David was scared so he kept following her in the dark. Lisa seemed to know where she was going and without bothering to knock, she slammed the unlocked door and entered the dirty room. Inside the house was a drunken man who called his sister a “fucking bitch.” He was surprised that his sister knew this person. The man charged in our direction and Lisa rushed to meet him and “caught him by the neck throwing him down against the coffee table.” Lisa instructed David to guard the man while she looked for her friend. She went upstairs and took the lady with us. We left the house and Lisa introduced her friend Dinah to David. She was a full grown woman with a dirty mouth. They worked together at the cafeteria. David remembers when Lisa introduced Dinah to his mother. His mother was very kind, helping her to remove her jacket. She apologized for not preparing herself for a visitor. David took his mother aside to tell her that Dinah was a “whore,” but she didn’t care. Instead, she offered her a drink and apologized again when Dinah spilled her drink on the table. She blamed herself for filling the glass too high. Mother said, “I tend to do that sometimes. Here, let me get you another.” When his brother and sister heard a different voice in the kitchen they rushed to check Lisa’s friend, “who clearly cherished their attention.” His sister Amy started asking questions such as, “Which do you like better, spending the night with the strange guys or working in a cafeteria?” She continued asking, “What were the prisons guards really like? Do you ever carry a weapon?” His mother told her to ask questions...