Andy was a piercer on the East coast; I always forget if he was from Philadelphia or somewhere else. Anyway, he was legally licensed to do piercings somewhere that wasn’t Los Angeles. Considering that I got my first tattoo in my uncle’s back yard, the idea of getting a piercing in someones kitchen didn’t seem that bad to me.
I wanted to get my eyebrow done and Sonia wanted to get her lip pierced, and Andy kindly volunteered to do them for us for the low price of bringing him something to eat, which beats the hell out of $40/each.
After being rescheduled a few times, getting lost, and having Andy not be home when we showed up, we eventually got all 3 of us in the same place with the proper equipment and said meal. I got my eyebrow done first, as Sonia had never gotten a piercing and was kind of nervous. It was pretty straightforward and weird-feeling. It didn’t hurt that much but didn’t stop me from saying “OW Andy I hate you!” even though I didn’t mean it.
So then we sat Sonia down to get her lip pierced. She said it didn’t hurt that much and then got up and went to look at it in the bathroom, and all seemed well… until she got this glazed look in her eyes. Andy got up and got her some bread, which she nibbled, the wobbled…
Then fell forward, hit her head on the table and fell out of her chair.
I freaked out. Not even kidding. She was laying on the ground, kind of twitching. “OMFG ANDY YOU KILLED SONIA!” He casually sauntered over and commented that that had never happened before and he wasn’t quite sure what to do. That didn’t calm me down any. “OMG OMG OMG ANDY!!!!!!! What am I going to tell her parents?!”
A moment later, Sonia sat up and looked around, with a clear “why the hell am I on the floor?” look on her face and said “Oh, hi guys” like NOTHING HAPPENED. I was still freaking out. “OMG SONIA YOU WERE DEAD AND ANDY DIDN’T KNOW WHAT TO DO AND OMG OMG OMG!” I had never seen anybody go into shock; I’m surprised I didn’t pass out watching.
Afterward we went to her house, got in trouble and watched Butterfly Effect. Sonia actually still has that piercing. I had to take mine out at one point, but I got it redone because I missed it.