Some nights you wake up and go to the freezer and find that the ice cream you’re looking for has gone missing, and while you know the culprit, you wonder if you are too proud to say something. Other nights you wake up to a venmo request for $9. You look in your wallet, you check your venmo balance, nothing. Look in your wallet even though you know you don’t carry cash anymore. Then you check your bank account, and realize the money transfer hasn’t gone through yet. Now it’s morning. And there was no chance to dream, no chance to fall back aslumber, because someone who was once a friend is now a social criminal.
It’s been the controversy of the summer. An act that tears at the social fabric of a friend group, leaving both sides butchered, shredded, and unrecognizable. No visible mending sewing project can reconcile the utter destruction of a friendship once as strong as a pair of raw denim jeans. Raw denim you can hardly call jorts now.
But more than anything this is a story with an ethical question at its heart. Only each person who’s heard it so far has come away with something different to ask, and something different as an answer.
Big Couver1 was a fan of ice cream. Everyone knew this. And for the most part, everyone respected this. It was one of the simple pleasures in this crazy thing we call life. And the thing with Big Couver was he didn’t drink alcohol. When he went to the bar to watch sports with his friends, he would order himself a water, ask for a menu, assure the bartender that he was not the DD because he cannot drive, and yes, sometimes he’d bring in an ice cream if it wasn’t on the menu. No matter what, Big Couver would eat his treasured treat, even if it meant on the curb in protest when the bartender kicked him out for having “outside food.”
Sleepy was an architect living in a vintage apartment in the heart of inner Southeast Portland: a beautiful old home split up into three units. Their upstairs apartment was a young professional’s dream. It had an extra bedroom, a clawfoot tub, and a view of Mt. Hood; walkable to many hip bars, restaurants, grocery stores, and socialist meeting spaces. Growing up with hippie parents in rural New England before becoming a bike town urbanist in the Democratic Socialists of America, this was a dream Sleepy took pride in.
When Sleepy went on vacation for five days, Big Couver was the first to call to house sit. Widely regarded for his pet watching services and photography, Big Couver offered the boutique service of taking professional photos of your pets free of charge. While he may have had some issues with losing things every now and again; the pet watching, house sitting, glamour shots combo was quite the steal.
For all sides it seemed like a win. Sleepy could go on his carefree family vacation and expect some beautiful photos you couldn’t even get at the mall anymore. As for Big Couver, well, he got alone time in the heart of Portland for a long weekend instead of making the long bus trek out and back from his home in unincorporated southern Washington.2 But more importantly for the starving artist,3 it was a good gig. Two cats and a dog—simple enough. Sleepy and his roommate laid out some directions to follow: how much to feed them, when to go for walks, enrichment time. And Big Couver had handled way more in the past, like when he watched two cats AND two dogs for his favorite bartender a few weekends before. These pet owners even added a little sweetener. Full access to Sleepy’s DVD collection, and with food sitting in the fridge for five days on the verge of going bad, they offered the pet sitter “whatever’s in the fridge.”
Before all this, Sleepy and Big Couver had ice cream history. Once, when they met with a group of friends at the neighborhood worker-owned watering hole, Big Couv was nursing a Peach Kombucha at the far end bar stool he always claimed right when the bar opened. Sleepy came in, noticing Big Couver was the only one there, and ordered a Rainer before grabbing the leather stool right next to him.
“Will anyone go with me to get some ice cream,” Big Couv said, as if his appeal were to everyone in the room, bartender included. “I could really go for some ice cream. I’m fun.”
Sleepy quickly sent off a text.
“My roommate told me she is coming with some ice cream later tonight if you hang around,” Sleepy replied with his cherubic smile. “Just wait.”
Big Couver let out a melodramatic groan as if he were asked to do the dishes right when he got up at 6am after dreaming of saving Zelda on the back of a skeleton horse. But ultimately he was excited by this prospect—how much were they charging for pints these days anyways?
An hour or so passed by and Sleepy’s roommate arrived to raucous applause. For a brief moment to Big Couver she was a frosty treat hero.
“Sleepy says you have something for me,” Big Couver said with his hand out.
She gave him a high-five, for that was all she had.
Big Couver noticed immediately that the cattle dog was a psycho. He’d met Mouse before. Seen her start shit with other dogs on occasion, but it wasn’t until he was alone with the blue heeler cattle dog that he fully understood her neurosis. He knew that there was a toddler gate separating the living room and kitchen for a reason, but it offered little reprieve for a dog with an anxious obsession for one thing—hearding these fucking feline freaks. All Mouse’s idle moments were spent sitting cross legged, her gray and black fur slightly unkempt from rolling on the carpet and grass earlier in the day. A lesser pet sitter could be fooled into thinking this pup was calm. But, Big Couver knew the second she saw one of the cats she was on the move to nip at their heels, chase them down into a corner, protect them like Lenny protected the rabbits. The elderly and elegant black cat, Grace, knew of the protections that the toddler gate brought and any instance she felt danger, it was only a quick dash and a jump to safety. But Sleepy’s goofy tabby familiar, Rainer wasn’t going to let a gate divide where he was allowed to be in his house.
“Mouse is driving me fucking crazy,” Big Couver said for the third time to a new friend who arrived at the bar on his usual Thursday night on the town. “I took these photos and it’s all a ruse. She looks pensive like a poet, a philosophy professor, a dainty well-read lady, but she’s fucking insane. She can’t even be in the same room as Rainer.”
“I told you, Mouse would be a handful,” the bartender answered for the newest patron, who offered no interest in Big Couver’s story. “You’re just going to have to keep them separate.”
“I know! I have to lock them in separate rooms.”
Nonetheless, Big Couver found a rhythm to the balancing act. He wrote in his favorite tea shop, played video games during the day, came home to take on the pet sitting chores, hungout with friends, and returned to the apartment in the evening. For a Jenga tower on the brink of collapse, Big Couver seemed resigned that complaining about the pets to his friends could exorcize his own neurosis about the impending fall.
One evening he even found himself comfortable. He settled in with the fog locked away in the roommates bedroom, Rainer sat calmly on top of their blue sectional above Big Couver’s head. It was time to pop in Bull Durham and watch Susan Sarandan cook. And there could be no better pairing for an 80s minor league baseball romantic romp than the pint of B&J’s Phish Food Big Couver had eyed in the freezer earlier. Next to it was a pint of Chocolate Fudge Brownie.4 It was a long weekend to be left alone with that much ice cream.
The following Thursday Big Couver was back at the bar. He sat in his corner, kombucha in hand with his legs spread. He was recounting the crazy Lyft ride he’d shared with his other two friends Trucker and Calum that weekend. It was a warm evening in early summer, and the golden hour combined with a tender breeze to create a perfect reprieve to a hot day. Sleepy and his roommate were back in town, it was the day of the last softball practice before the season started, and everyone who was anyone was going to be at Irving Park later to play or watch from the bleachers. Then the notification came.
Venmo: Sleepy is requesting $9 — ice cream
“What the fuck is this!” Big Couver interrupted his own story to show his friends and the bartender the notification. “Sleepy didn’t even text me about the ice cream?”
“Just asked for money?” Trucker asked. “That’s really weird man. You were getting paid to watch them right?”
“Yea, they paid me.”
“How much ice cream did you eat?”
“I’m gonna be honest, I did eat it all, but they weren’t full.”
“I mean, who venmo requests for ice cream? No way that’s $9.”
The bartender wiped down a pint glass with a dish rag and looked over at Big Couver, but didn’t say anything.
“Okay, when I was watching the bartender’s pets he left the fridge empty,” Big Couver said while fidgeting with the ends of his long red mane. “He knows the score.”
The bartender nodded. “I’ve learned the score for sure,” he said. “I’m not leaving anything Big Couver wants, just beer and frozen meat.”
“But are you going to accept the request?” Trucker asked.
“At the very least give me a chance to buy you a pint of ice cream,” Big Couver was almost tugging at his curls then. “He didn’t give me a chance! God!”
“Are you going to send him the money?” Trucker asked again.
“Could he have been more passive aggressive about this?” Big Couver continued. “I guess if they hadn’t already paid me he could have taken $9 out of my pay. Did I tell you this dog is really hard to watch?”
Couver stared at his phone with disgust and paused his tirade.
“Okay. I paid him the nine dollars because I'm being the bigger man, but that doesn’t mean I want you two to be the bigger men.”
The group arrived at softball practice, though Trucker and Big Couver were not on the team and were planning to watch from the stands. They watched while Calum met Sleepy, the player coach, who came ready to whip his team into shape before the season opened the following Tuesday, on the field..
“Sleepy, what’s up with the Venmo request, man?” Calum said, playing catch as the rest of the team trickled in.
“He ate all of the ice cream,” Sleepy said. “And it’s not just that my flights were delayed and it’s what I wanted when I got back. It’s also how he left the house.”
“How’d he leave the house?”
“There was a bowl of half-eaten oatmeal in the sink—the whole kitchen, really, was a mess,” Sleepy started to throw the big green ball harder with each grievance. “Not only that but Rainer pooped in my closet, and Mouse pooped in my roommate’s room. How did he not smell that and clean it up?5 We weren’t paying to come home to a mess.”
By the time practice had begun Sleepy had settled into his usual happy-go-lucky groove. He was ready to teach these adults how to hit their cut offs and who’s covering which base on a double play ball. While everyone else enjoyed fielding ground balls and chatting up their friends in the outfield, Sleepy was alone at the plate with his fungo bat. When a softball was thrown astray he would have to chase them down and pick them up to get another grounder out to the team. He really needed someone to help him out.
“Trucker! Big Couver!” Sleepy shouted with the bat resting on his shoulder. “Could ya help me out catching these balls?”
No response. The softball fans were in the depths of a conversation about warhammer and could not be bothered by such a request. After all, he wasn’t their coach. Another ball was thrown out of the field and rolled towards the playground where some children propelled themselves across the monkey bars.
“Truck! Couv! Little Help?”
One of the softball players ended up running off and grabbing the ball from the jungle gym, then Calum moved in to catch the remaining balls for Coach. The sun was on its last legs for the day. Mosquitos moved in fast to terrorize players and fans indiscriminately, and the park wasn’t about to turn the lights on for an unofficial practice. It was time to wrap up.
As the rest of the team left, Sleepy and Calum lingered behind gathering the balls and talking about Sleepy’s family reunion and the fires that delayed his trip home. Sleepy was more tired than usual, already beaten down by his trip before practice started.
“Hey Sleepy!” Trucker shouted. “There’s no way two half eaten pints are worth $9. Come on.”
“They were more than half full!” Sleepy shouted back. “And really the ice cream is the least of my worries.”
“I can find you a better deal on Ben & Jerry’s. Full pint is $4.50 at Winco. You can’t be charging a full pint for opened ice cream.”
Big Couver and Trucker were at the other side of the fence talking down onto the field.
“Did he tell you about the Oatmeal? About the Cat poop in the closet? The dog poop?” Sleepy stopped picking up the balls and met them right at the fence seconds away from snapping. “We didn’t pay to come back to the house a mess.”
Big Couver sucked in a deep breath, winding up as if about to deliver a monologue to a skull. But Sleepy didn’t wait.
“I can tell you what, that’s the last time you’ll watch the pets at our apartment,” Sleepy said before chuckling in a half hearted effort to deflate the tension.
Couver exhaled and Trucker looked on at his two friends before looking over pleadingly at Calum who dropped the bag of balls.
“Are you firing me?” Big Couver asked softly in disbelief before sucking in another big breath ready for more. The chainlink fence between them was about 15 feet tall but suddenly didn’t seem tall enough anymore.
“I wouldn’t have brought it up again,” Sleepy said. “My roommate was just as mad about it and now we’re hardly talking anymore.”
Sleepy left before anything more could be said. There would be no grand finale, just a fizzling out with his three friends left to discern if there was any real anger to be had or if this was all just a bit. Dudes being bros. Mosquitos nipping through their clothes. Another night was upon them.
“Hey I feel like we might have gone too hard on Sleepy,” Calum said, breaking the silence. “Just cause he usually takes it doesn’t mean he should.”
“I know, boy I know it,” Big Couvs said with an almost solemn yell. “He just makes it so hard sometimes!”
Calum stared at Trucker, whose fingers peaked through the chainlink fence as he seemed deep in thought looking into the middle distance at the empty pitcher's mound. Calum turned around and saw beyond the pitcher’s mound a group of friends wearing bright orange construction worker colored mesh jerseys playing ultimate frisbee despite the low light of dusk.
“And whatever is happening between him and his roommate, that has nothing to do with me, I’ll tell you that for free.”
All names have been changed for anonymity
Hazel Dell is serviced by Vancouver, WA’s school district and post office but is technically not incorporated into the city.
Freelance culture writer and photographer
Both were opened and independently confirmed by both parties to be three-quarters full since Sleepy liked to sample both products instead of finishing an entire pint and moving onto the next.
Big Couver says he cleaned up the dog poop and attempted to air out the room, but Sleepy says that the smell lingered.