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"Buddy, you've got to get over here fast and help me clean up, something terrible has happened." So said my pal Gus when he called me a million years ago.
 
I wasn't entirely surprised by this call. I was fully aware that drama followed Gus like a row of baby ducks follow their mom; one drama duck after another, all an instant away from getting squashed when crossing the road.
 
Such was the life of Gus, a beautiful guy who lived by few rules. A guy who was married to a stunning stripper. A guy who sold cocaine as a side hustle. A guy with a heart as big as an ocean, which meant that he opened his world to complex characters — his world was full of them.
 
I didn't necessarily imagine that Gus's circumstance was catastrophic. "Something terrible" may have meant that his nasty fish tank had leaked, or his bong tipped over. Maybe his plea was simply practical. I was, after all, the go-to guy for any, and all, cleaning —my friends knew (and know), I'm deeply committed to tidiness.
 
I'm also a solid buddy, and in short order, I was at Gus's apartment.
 
WHOA!
 
I'd seen plenty of messes. I'd helped friends clean up ghastly garages and hell-scape basements. I put Mr. Clean's kids through college. Never had I seen a mess like this.
 
When I walked into his pad, the first thing I said to Gus was, "Did you get ripped off?". Tables were over turned, drawers were pulled out, stuff was strewn everywhere. It looked like cops, or coke-seeking crooks, had ransacked the place.
 
"No", said Gus, "I've got some shit to tell you."
 
Boy, did he!

x

Cops and crooks had nothing to do with the condition of Gus's place. It was Ellen, his dancer wife, who'd torn their home to bits as she packed what she was taking, including their infant son, and left.
 
The night before, she'd caught Gus in her bed with another woman. A young women my age; ten years Gus's junior. A young woman who'd recently become my girlfriend. And so I found myself picking through the wreckage of Gus's calamity and my own.
 
Why, you might wonder, would I help a friend who ought to no longer be my friend?
 
Maybe I can't fully answer, even though a million years have passed and I've had plenty of time for reflection. Maybe my new, young lover and I hadn't fully hammered out our arrangement, monogamy wise. Maybe because Gus was there for me when my first dear friend died and I was so lost. Maybe since I've never encountered a mess that I didn't want to clean up.
 
Maybe/shmaybe.

I listened to Gus's tearful admission as he and I sized up the devastation around us. Then, we had a little bump and a draw off his bong, which hadn't spilled, and got busy cleaning.
 
Gus was lost in minutia. He sobbed as he picked through the detritus; showing me objects like photos under cracked glass in broken frames, or silly knickknacks that to him were now holy relics.
 
I was in bump-&-bong hyper drive, straightening and cleaning everything in sight as is my OCD specialty. Eventually, I found myself in the kitchen and I took notice of the fridge door. Held, magnetically, on that door was a day-at-a-glance calendar that I’d seen before. Each day featured a word with its definition.
 
The word on the day that Ellen trashed her home and left, which I pointed out to Gus, prompting more tears, his and mine, was BEDLAM.
 
BEDLAM: a place, scene, or state of uproar and confusion

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