Bro’s Day

Three fraternity brothers sat on a couch, staring at their phones, a football game playing in the background, when one of them uttered two words, “bro who.”

The man in the middle with a light pink shirt and black hat on asked, “bro who?”

The third brother dropped his phone, “bro who.”

“Bro Who!” the three brothers huddled together and jumped in the air.

“Do you think a lot of others are going to be entering?”  The bro in pink asked.

Their other brother, wearing a white tank top with slick black hair, stroked his dogged jaw line. “Who cares, it won’t matter when you compare their work against a real artist.”

“Yeah we’ve got this,” the last brother agreed awkwardly aware of the fact that they were still hugging. They jumped together a few more times before suddenly unhooking and looking around awkwardly.

“Okay guys, but if we are going to do this, let’s make sure we do it right.”

“True, we need to properly brainstorm this,” the bro in pink suggested as he pulled out a pen and journal from his back pocket. “Okay, I guess we should probably start by throwing ideas out there.”

“Oh how about a car wash?”

“Bro! Mountain Who is sooo much better than a car wash, and their next Million dollar commercial needs more than hot babes in slut harnesses.” The bro in white pointed out this fact and fell to the couch where he crossed his arms.

“Hm…” It was silent for a moment as the three bros strived to understand. The three bros had been bros all their life, and that’s all they knew. Fortunately or not, they were also mega fans of Mountain Who.

“We love babes, and I do want to include some hot babes in this, is it possible to at least include a wet t-shirt contest?”

“I see,” the bro in pink stepped forward, “we need to tell a story.”

“Yeah..” they all drifted off. It was silent for a few minutes, their brains appearing to shut down for a moment.

The bro in white was the first to break the silence. “You know I was on my way here today, and I was just minding my business at the intersection when I was scared half to death by someone knocking on the window. It was some homeless people, and I didn’t give them any money, but I thought this could make a good spokesperson for something.”

“That is so true, people always cry when they see homeless people,” the bro in pink uttered on vehement breathe.

“Ha that’s true, and if they are cryin they are buyin.” The bro offered while wiping his sweaty palms against his board shorts.

“That is the simple fact in life Tucker, I’m so glad I taught you that.” The bro in white explained.

“Okay great, but what are they going to do?” The bro in pink conjectured.

Tucker exclaimed, “Quick hop on Twitter.”

The bro in pink pulled out his phone, “Whoa, the Mountain Who competition is trending, and right below it is the hit thriller, Survive in Siberia: Extreme Travel Competition Game show.

“That’s it Ronny!” The bro wearing white cries out. “We have to make it a competition show.”

“Okay, I’m ready, let’s grab the gear!” Tucker incited.

In a mad dash they scrambled to collect bags, cameras, microphones, and pounds more of film gear they needed, cramming everything they could in the car. Within five minutes they were packed, ready, and sitting in a beat up old Chevy. They cruised at low speeds down the driveway and through the neighborhood.

Ronny spread himself out in the back seat, reclining against the torn up polyester. An unusual funk seeping from the material didn’t seem to bother him.

“Man we had some good times in this car didn’t we bros?”

“That is an understatement Ronny.”

“Okay Bros!” Tucker announced, “We have to focus now, eyes on the prize. This million dollars from Mountain Who is gonna change our lives forever and if we don’t win I’m literally going to find a Russian MILF Online and sell myself to her.”

“Woah Bro, do you think we can come?” The bro in white asked.

“Of course you can, you’re my bro.”

Together the group chanted, “Bros! Bros! Bros for life! Bros!”

‘Hurraaawww” the group was caught cheering with overwhelming glee as they spotted a group of homeless youth standing around an intersection with signs. They frowned. “Pull over here and park,” Ronny shouted, pointing towards a street off to the left.

Hot black rubber stained the road as they came screeching to a hault. Crippled the car shook and turned down the road coming to a slow rolling stop. “Bro, let’s just focus on getting the best quality product for Mountain Who.”

“Okay, so let’s get this set up.”

They walked over to the group and began setting up their tripods, screwing in this piece and fastening that connector, they began to put together a decent professional set up. The homeless youth looked confused and impressed.

“Who are you?” the youngest one asked, a boy who could have just started elementary, walking up to the bros. When they didn’t respond he repeated himself, “what are you doing here?”

“We’re here, because we wanted to ask you to be in our…” the bro hesitated for a moment, “student film.”

“Listen we’re not interested in anything like that,” an unshaven man with dirty hair, and a red handkerchief around his neck stepped in between them.

Ronny’s voice became whiney as he rebutted. “Oh but, this is gonna be cool, you get to be in a competition, and you’ll get paid.”

“You will pay us?”

The bro nodded his head.

“Okay, that should be fine,” the man announced turning around he addressed the kid and a short young woman behind him. “You know competition is the spirit of success in this great country, let’s do our best and get lots of money so we can eat a lot of dinner tonight.”

“Exactly,” Ronny came charging forward fist in the air, “It’s the great American tradition, this is about rising above! Isn’t that right James?”

The bro in the white tank top answered him, “that’s right, okay, so we’ll come around and do some individual interviews, we probably want this to feel as real as possible.”

“Okay great now action!” Tucker burst out of nowhere.

The group meandered off crossing the street to their different posts. For a few hours they stood there, holding out their cups, shaking them to get noticed.

“No, no way, none of this is working,” James announced quietly to Ronny, “I need you to do something about the kid.”

Ronny looked over at the kid and the conspicuous smile he had on his face. “Oh,” Ronny acknowledged the request by hiking over to the boy and taking a knee next to him. “Hey there bud, um,” he paused for a moment, “great work so far! I wanted to tell you something is both good and bad.” He shook his head, “Mhm, and,” he looked over at James and Tucker and gulped, “we need you to look a little more pathetic, can you just try to um,” pointing to his mouth he illustrated.

The boy looked around confused for a moment and then agreed, “you know it’s the acting business, I’m so sorry to do this, it’s just part of the business.”

Rolling continued smoothly, and about an hour before they planned to stop counting they began the individual interviews.

Each of them took some close up B-roll of the actors and then set up for the question and answer portion. The homeless were exposed and given a script..the final line being.. “because I did it for Mountain Who.”

As they continued the process they picked up their gear and began moving it across the street to approach the young woman. “Okay great, let’s wrap it up with the girl’s story. What do you think should we make her addicted to crack or dope?” James inquired.

“Crack is definitely trending online,” Ronny mused with a smirk.

The woman turned towards them as they approached her.  Setting up the tripod, they asked her a few soft ball questions to make her comfortable. “So is that your kid?”

“Um, actually no, It’s my little brother.”

“Oh okay great, so let’s get started.”

“Hey dear, you can just tell us your name.”

Looking into the camera with blinking wide eyes she was sure to annunciate each word as she spoke. “My name is Eliza.”

“Great, can you just hold this Mountain Who, and talk about how it makes you feel for a few minutes.”

They set the Mountain Who in her hand and she stood there dumbstruck. The bros waited for a few minutes, before James jumped in, “okay, so it’s green and smooth, does that make you feel anything?”

“Um, well I like the way it tastes when it’s hot out.” She said, uncapping the tiny jug and taking a big swig of the lemony sweet beverage. The cold fizz tickled down her throat as she leaned her head back and emptied the bottle.

“Ahh,” she exclaimed with relief throwing the bottle into a plastic bag. “I can create lava lamps with these.”

“Okay, and what do you think is going to help you win this competition?”

“That’s an easy one,” she boasted grabbing her bicep and flexing, “I haven’t even used my secret weapon.”

“Haha,” Ronny laughed and signaled to cut. “Well there is a 30 minutes left, let’s see how it goes.”

To their surprise in the last minutes the woman wrapped her head up and pulled out a secret weapon, crutches. The sign flipped around to suddenly read disabled vet down on her luck. Anything Helps.

The cash became a river of dollar bills, change, and sympathetic faces. Eventually she ended up pulling it out big time earning almost $75 in the last hour alone.

“Alright, we’ll take everything from you to be counted,” the bros insisted to everyone. With a flick they snatched the cash out of each of their hands.

“Hm,” they seemed uncertain, looking it over and flipping it through.

Then they had the final count, and on camera they declared the little kid the winner. “And what was his secret power?” they prompted. “Mountain Who,” the group answered back. Congratulations went back and forth between the bros, patting each other on the back. The cameras were quickly packed away after that, and in an instant the sidewalk was empty. The homeless youth looked around in confusion, “wait, are they taking our money?” The question assaulted her with a wave of exhaustion. Just as quickly they were across the street, surrounding the bros car.

“Oh hey guys,” James greeted them looking up with his hand outstretched on the handle of the door.

“Hey, what happened to our money?”

“Oh right, did I forget to pay you?”

“Yeah we are supposed to get paid.”

“Whoa I’m so sorry about that, I had no idea, it was an accident,”he announced reaching into his pocket. A slimy wad of cash slipped out of his pocket, “here is your cut,” and got slapped into the homeless man’s hand. He continued, “a word of advice, I wouldn’t give people that kind of attitude in the future it really makes people not wanna work with you.”

“Okay,” he said clutching the wrinkled green bills in his palm. Before he even had a chance to look up the group of bros was skidding past the corner.  It wasn’t but a few moments later and sirens appeared around the same turn. A loud voice commanded through the loudspeakers, “stay where you are. Hands in the air.”

As she was pushed into the back of a cop car, the homeless woman began to laugh hysterically. Her cackle and gasps becoming such a discomfort for the men around that the little kid pulled at her shirt pleading, “what is so funny, you’re starting to scare me.”

“I’m sorry,” she said readjusting herself and pulling out a small black disk.

“Where did you get that?” the kid asked.

“I just can’t stop thinking of their dumb faces, when they find out.” She giggled and tossed the card on the floor, where it was crushed by the soles of her feet. “It came from their camera.”

“oh,” the boy smirked.

“Funny how blind ambition leaves men blind,” she mused as the cop car pulled onto the street into traffic.