I sat, perched upon my stool, and swiveled back to the rail of the bar. The bartender went by the name of Mex. He was a good man, considering he worked a bar on a boat for a man named Arnie with a crowd of crooks. He wasn’t a talker, but that was because he was missing his tongue. It had been cut out of his mouth years ago. He was a damn good listener though, and it was a safe bet he’d never say anything unkind about you to your face or behind your back.
Mex handed me a glass and two ounces of decent quality bourbon to go with it. I took a whiff and then a sip, setting the glass on the counter in front of me.
Arnie was having a conversation with Rusty. Rusty might not have been aware of that though, because he just argued everything that came through Arnie’s lips. Pink and I were just sitting at the bar, listening and drinking.
“You don’t like the way I fight?’
Arnie shook his head calmly. “You misunderstand me.” “Do I?”
Arnie had very limited patience for direct disobedience. His was a unique society, with certain rules and doctrines, and he required that no one question these orders. In fact, after you were spoon-fed his lies with coercive manipulation, he would nonchalantly ask you to forget what you had just talked about in the first place. It was beautiful in its simplicity. Get someone to believe what you want him or her to believe then make that person think you were just making idle conversation.
Once you’ve learned something, it is almost impossible to unlearn it. Even in school, they teach you that there are only five human senses: touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound. Whatever happened to that other one we call common sense? Why is this the sense that every government, military, and form of media want you to forget exists? Maybe it’s because it’s the only sense that requires actual thought to use it, and therefore a dangerous thing; a single individual can undo the work of a thousand drones.
Arnie was getting irritated. “Yes, you heard me.” I could see his temper flare.
“I won the fight, didn’t I? Got this sweet chain made last night to celebrate.” Rusty was referring to a necklace he wore that had Stentinowksi’s tooth hanging from it. He had someone make a two-inch silver shaft with the tooth hilted on the end. He had the tooth lightly beveled so he could use it to snort cocaine with.
“I wanted seven rounds and you gave me five.”
“I gave you a victory, that’s what you said you wanted! Go fuck yourself!”
Arnie ran his hand through his thin dark hair once slowly, then two more times quickly. Pink and I swiveled in our chairs to face the action that was about to take place.
Arnie went over to the end of the bar. He tapped his index finger twice on the edge of the counter and Mex handed him a 9 mm and a full clip. Arnie put the clip in and pulled a bullet into the chamber. He walked over to Rusty.
“This is not a democracy. You do as I say or your useless brain gets renovated. Do you follow?”
Rusty stood up with the nozzle of the pistol pressed firmly against his forehead and looked Arnie directly in the eyes.
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
This was an unexpected move from Rusty. As it turns out, he wasn’t dumb as much as he was mentally ill. It’s truly strange when you think about it: a man beats another man to a bloody pulp, enjoys killing him, and extracts a tooth from his mouth as a souvenir and we don’t think to ourselves, hey, this guy might just be unbalanced. But in the world we were living in, this was the new normal.
Arnie pulled the gun from his head. He knew Rusty had him, but only for a moment. Crazy people had necessities too and Arnie only needed a split second to find Rusty’s weakness.
“Pink, take this piece of shit and get him off my boat.”
Pink shot back the rest of his drink and stood up off the stool. Rusty looked at Arnie. Then he realized what was happening. Arnie wasn’t going to kill him, no, that wouldn’t work. He was going to take away the thing he loved the most, the fights.
“So I can’t fight for you anymore?”
“I can always find good fighters. Dime a dozen.”
Rusty rubbed his head and then sighed.
“Okay, fine. You’re the boss. You want seven rounds, I’ll give you seven rounds.”
Arnie turned back to face Rusty.
“You don’t want to know what will happen to you if you question me again. Understood?”
“Yeah, fine. Can we eat now?”
Arnie looked over at Pink, who shrugged at Rusty’s seemingly random suggestion.
“I could eat.” Pink looked over at me. “You hungry?”
“Whatever.”
Sometimes, ambivalence is the only emotion worth having.