David
You learn a lot about psychology as a bartender. But like, really a lot. I guess movies always portraying us in the role of confidants isn’t completely unwarranted. We hear a lot of stories; more than we’d like, to be honest. Sometimes you’re not in the mood for first-world problems, and other times, you’re not ready for the drama some people lug around with them. We all carry our pain on our shoulders, and it’s not always what we think it is.
That was the vibe I got from that girl. She was lost even in her own body, like a foal still figuring out how to work her limbs. Clumsy. Frightened. Lonely.
Judging by her manicure, the state of her hair, and the gloss of her clothes, this girl didn’t have the same problems as me. She had plenty of money left at the end of the month; she had a beautiful home and a good job. She was fashionable—discreet, but fashionable; her wardrobe was full of clothes to flaunt on occasions I couldn’t even imagine. And yet…she was alone. Lonely, really lonely. Lonely in a way you can only be when you don’t even have yourself. Like me. We both must have given off some kind of sonar signal that makes you feel comfortable with someone you’ve just met. The DJ continued to remix one hot song with another, and although reggaeton dominated all of them with its relentless beat, “Sola con la Luna” by Anni B Sweet was playing in my head. Idoia told me once that she liked it, and I was hooked as soon as I heard it; one afternoon, lying in bed, naked, she asked me to change the music.
“I’m sick of this broken record.”
“I thought you liked it.”
“I did.”
That’s how she was. Whatever was good today would be the butt of her jokes tomorrow. Is that what I was becoming right now? Maybe she was in bed with some other guy, one with a good job, a car, an apartment, and plans for the future, who she was telling that her ex was a poor devil who served drinks in some hole-in-the-wall club in Huertas.
Ivan and I switched ends of the bar at two thirty. We always did this so we could see different people and not keep serving the same faces the whole night. We took turns restocking too because the one closer to the storeroom was always in charge of this. As I served two Jäger bombs (that shit is going to kill someone one of these days) from my new lookout post, I saw them. The two blonds were dancing more or less in rhythm, clearly drunk, while the girl with the sad eyes was moving timidly, looking all around her, as if she was really worried that someone might think she wasn’t dancing the right way and give her a citation. It reminded me, somehow, of the way I loved Idoia. I took payment, grabbed my phone from my bag, and glanced at it: no notifications.
I bit my cheek. If I wanted to get Idoia back, I had to do something. It was clear waiting for her to regret her decision wasn’t going to have any effect.
“What’s up?” Ivan asked me.
“Nothing. Why?”
“You’re making a weird face.”
“We don’t have enough fifty-cent pieces or euros.”
“Want me to go see if the girls have any?”
“Sure.”
I would’ve told him we didn’t have any glasses if that would get rid of him. I love Ivan, but sometimes he doesn’t understand the way I see the world. I’ve never been good with words. I never really known how to express how I feel or what I want, mostly because I never really have it very clear myself. Like when I left school in my final year and I just told my parents, “It’s not my thing.” There was much more behind it, like the panic about being swallowed by routine and not finding a job in the field I was studying.
I saw the three girls go to refill their drinks a bunch of times, but always at the other bar. I kind of felt like the girl with the sad eyes was avoiding me, but finally the other girls nagged her into coming back. The truth is, my end of the bar always had the shortest line at this time of night because it was way in the back.
“What can I get you?” I smiled.
“Three gin and tonics and three tequila shots.”
The sad girl turned around like a shot. Her hair was shoulder-length, straight and shiny, brunette, and flew around her face. “No, eh? I can’t handle any more.”
“One more, please!” the prettiest one begged.
I ducked down and looked for something behind the counter. When I popped up, the sad girl was leaning over with a furrowed brow, like she was looking for me.
“Ah, there you are,” she said.
“Of course. Where’d you think I went?”
“I don’t know. Narnia? My sister’s a pain. She thought maybe you had escaped through a trapdoor.”
“Your sister?” I asked, grabbing a bottle of gin from behind me.
“My sisters.” She pointed at the two blond girls, who were waving at me enthusiastically. “I know we don’t look alike. They must have found me in a cabbage patch.”
“That’s a nice story. The girl who came out of a cabbage.”
“I don’t like how that sounds. Listen…” She tucked her hair behind her ear. “Don’t give me tequila.”
“Why not? You still sound pretty sober.”
“It’s not getting me drunk today, but it is making me nauseous.”
“Give us three, hey!” her sister insisted, as if she could hear her.
“Here, this one’s on me.” I tried to help her out. “And I’ll drink hers for her. Okay? Your sister doesn’t look like she can handle her tequila very well, and we don’t want puke on the bar. It kills the vibe.”
The other two started to cackle, and I glanced sideways at her for her thanks. The girl with the sad eyes pressed her lips together and smiled with her mouth twisted like a knot.
“Listen…what time do you get off? You should come party with us!” proposed the one who I thought was the oldest.
“Me? No way! I’m beat. When I get out of here, all I want is a hot shower and to fall into my bed.”
My couch, I corrected myself silently.
“Ignore her, please.”
The girl with the sad eyes, besides being humiliated, seemed to be miles away from the music playing. On the one hand, her voice reached me more clearly than the others, and on the other, it was as if only ten percent of her was there.
“You wanted a gin and tonic, right?” I asked her.
“Yeah, but…”
I pushed three rocks glasses over to her and raised my eyebrows so she’d notice the change in glassware.
“You didn’t like the highball glasses, so, look, I went and found other ones. They’re not wineglasses, but it’s better than nothing.”
She threw me a look of disbelief that was funny and tender; I liked it.
“Let’s see…” I took out three tonics and poured a little of each into its corresponding glass. “That’ll be thirty-six.”
“I’m paying,” she offered.
“No, no. Get out of here.”
“I’m paying!” the older one yelled.
“Quit it.”
“Don’t take your wallet out, you’ll lose something,” the one with the sad eyes insisted.
“You want to leave me?”
“Jesus, you’re a nut… You’re sleeping at my house, right?”
“No, no. I’m going to my house.”
“Great, your kids are gonna love hearing you vomit in the garden.”
“You’re obsessed with vomit,” added the other blond, the one with the clever eyes.
“You sure you don’t want a bottle of water instead?”
“I want to find my fucking phone to pay!”
There was the typical scuffle between siblings that’s pretty fun to watch. I remembered my brother, my sister, and me fighting over a can of condensed milk last Christmas. And the time my friends from the village walloped each other over a kebab.
I smiled. I missed them. Maybe Cris, one of my lifelong friends, would give me the perfect excuse on his birthday to get a night off from the bar and go home to catch my breath.
The commotion of the sisters fighting next to the bar brought me crashing back to the club, which must have disappeared completely for them because thanks to being so full of drinks, they were tussling and yanking each other’s purses. Unsurprisingly, the fight ended with the older one’s purse flying over the bar, smashing into the liquor shelf and spilling everything inside it all over the floor.
“Ah, fuck your meowing mother!”
I bent down to gather up her stuff and also so they wouldn’t see me laughing. They were characters.
“Little one…”
“Don’t call me little one! That’s so cringe. Hey, sorry, okay?”
“No worries.” I leaned against the bar and handed over a designer purse, a wallet, a lipstick, and a few tampons. “Did you have anything else in there?”
“The keys to your house?”
I let out a chuckle. One of the sisters started to laugh while the youngest one laid into her.
“You’re both so corny! I swear I’d almost prefer the kombucha.”
I took out a little flashlight from the back pocket of my jeans I used whenever something like this happened and looked around my feet. I found a few crumpled bills, a business card, and the keys I assumed were for her house. I slid them across the bar, but they were already on their way out.
“I swear I knew it. I knew it! ‘Let’s go out partying, Margot, that’s what you need!’ And it’s total bullshit! Piano-sized bullshit,” the sad girl was ranting.
“Hey!” I yelled. They kept getting farther away. I couldn’t hear what they were saying anymore, but it looked like they were still sniping at each other. “Hey!”
I came out from behind the bar and skirted around a few couples grinding on each other to get to them.
“Girls.” I showed them what I had in my hands.
The older one opened her bag so I could drop it all in and came over to give me a kiss on the cheek. The other blond couldn’t stop laughing, and the youngest looked like smoke was about to come out of her ears.
She put a cold hand on my arm, and I looked at her. She seemed smaller than she was. She was medium height, normal build. But…she seemed so helpless. She leaned over so I could hear her without having to yell.
“Hey, sorry for making a scene, okay? I’m really sorry.”
I shook my head, stepping back. She smiled and grabbed her sister’s arm, the one who was dragging them outside, glass in hand, with the excuse of getting some air. Excuse because…they never came back in.
No. The girl with the sad eyes didn’t stay stuck in my head because of a crush. Nothing to do with that. It was just…a glimmer. Of what? I don’t know. Maybe of the promise that trying to steer life in one direction meant it was going to drive you crazy by going the opposite way.
At six in the morning, when the lights came on and the few customers left headed toward the exit, Ivan slid a phone with a small crack in the screen across the bar.
“Is this yours?”
“No.”
“I’ll put it in lost and found, okay?”
“No, no. Give it to me. I know whose it is.”
Twirl, twirl, sad girl. Twirl faster.