The Two-Way

This bar is dingy. I can handle dive bars, hell I frequent them, but this place isn't filled with attractive, well-dressed, hip music listening 20-something year olds...it's filled with absolute filth. These people are from some sort of garbage underworld and all of them are drinking piss colored beverages.

The middle aged bartender asks me what I want to drink. I take one more glance around the bar and order a whiskey coke. She slides it to me.

So, I stay for a drink. My gal friend is meeting me, so I don't really have a choice. "Why this dump?" I contemplate for a breif moment until the television catches my eye. Some new drama that I've never heard of is playing on abc. It's better than nothing... I indulge.

She ends up walking in the front door five minutes later; some guy in a red cap follows her in. They don't appear to know each other, but she sits at the empty seat next to me and he pulls out the empty stool next to her. I find this unsettling, but decide to quell any brewing thoughts of the situation .

"How was your day?" she asks casually.
My head is buried in my arms. I look up and complacently respond "I woke up weird."
"Well, what else is new?" she says sort of annoyed "today was long. i'm exhausted and am feeling mildly brain dead."

The bartender hubbles over and takes my friend's drink order. She also decides on a whiskey. Red hat man orders a lite beer. I see him instantly gulp half of it down and I shudder. I've never felt so repulsed by a stranger before. My friend doesn't seem to be bothered, yet. We continue to talk mindlessly about our day while sipping on our drinks and every so often glancing at the tv.

"So, wheres you from?" i hear a surprisingly high voice for someone of the male gender ask. It's Red Hat. He's turned to my friend and attempting to make conversation with her. I want to die. She responds hesitantly, but out of politeness "Here." That's a lie.
"What about your friend, eh? Is she from around these parts too?"
My friends knows to respond for me "Yes." Another lie.
"What do you guys do? Are you both students? I work the 3rd shift out in the airport kitchens...mostly prepping things, you know how that goes..."

Actually, I don't know how that goes and if I find out I might just vomit. my mind races. I end up telling him that we are both English majors so that the common denominators between us become more distant. I also tell him that I hate food. Burning bridges before they're built...I'm good at that.

Now, I'm not doing this out of pure hatered for society. I adore having new conversations with people, however, can there ever be a night where two girls can go out for a drink with out being bothered by one single person? It's not possible. All men are savages.

"Soooo, what do you girls...like?"

I don't answer and look at my friend. I can tell that her comfort level has gone askew. I tell her to down her fucking drink. She complies and we grab our things faster than a jack rabbit. We tell him we're going out for a smoke. He says he'll join us. We respond in unison with a dissatisfied "ok."

As we all make our way out the door Red Hat realizes that he left something inside. He steps back in after telling us "he'll be right back". We see this window of opportunity and after peering into the bar through the glass window and locking eye contact of understanding we're thinking the exact same thing....we both start running. I'm ahead of my friend and I hear her yell "TAKE A RIGHT! HURRY!" It's not even a block and I'm already out of breath. I'm wondering if this is what adrenalin rushes are like, it's been a while.I take a quick turn down some alley and start to slow down. My friend follows suit and we find a nice part of the brick wall to lean against. Out of breath, we both light a cigarette.

"Did we really just do that?" she asks bewildered and almost laughing.
"Yep. Today was just not the day to conform to social norms." I say.