October 4 - Three things my father told me

Beer glasses, she decided, looked taller when they were full than when they were empty. Perhaps it was the misleading lighting in the bar, low-amber colored sconces that hid the flaws on the women’s faces where their makeup had run thin, and that masked the stubble on the chins of the hipster men who had wound their way into the establishment. Perhaps it was only this illusory trick of the light, but she noticed it anyway, when the couple next to her was served, how tall and full and brimming their beer glasses were. And once the liquid had been sucked down – actually, that was wrong; it was savored along with a heavy side dish of flirtation that made her nauseated – once the liquid was gone, at whatever pace, the glasses looked small and sad. Pitiful little things, really. She gave a start, wondering if perhaps, somehow, the glasses had been switched while she wasn’t looking. But no; those were the originals, and it was only the illusion that made the difference seem so apparent.

“We’ll have two more,” said the male of the pair, walking up to the bar because the bartender had been too slow to amble back over to their table. Two more beers, another half hour gained, so the flirtation could continue, and suddenly the glasses looked huge and hopeful once more. She smiled into her cup, reassured by this.

Only then did the bartender turn to her. “A glass while you wait?” he asked her, and suddenly she understood why she had been thumbing through the pages of a magazine for the past thirty minutes without being served. He assumed she couldn’t be alone and she had been too polite to look up and demand his attention.

“Oh!” she exclaimed in apology. This was always her way. Effusive. Apologetic. She had learned from a young age not to attract notice. “It’s just me.”

The bartender went so red in the face you could see it even in the deceptive lighting that tried to hide such realities.

“Oh!” he exclaimed in turn. “I’m so sorry. I assumed…” He left his assumption unsaid. They always assumed.

“A glass of pinot noir,” she ordered without skipping a beat. It had been thirty minutes wait already, after all. Outwardly she was patient, but her throat itched for a sip.

The bartender watched her carefully, as the night went on, intrigued at her ease at being alone. Or was that a façade? If it was, it was perfectly practiced; he’d give her an Oscar on the spot. When the crowds thinned a bit, he leaned his hands on the counter in front of her and tried a smile.

“You like the wine?”

It was trite, but it was something.

She gave a half smile.

“It’s quite good.”

She had turned away already, back to the book that she wasn’t really reading, he could tell, because the lights were too dim in here for reading anyway, and her eyes kept flickering up to the other people in the bar. Or maybe she was reading, so practiced at doing so and not doing so at once that the two activities were intertwined. Unsure which to believe, he moved to the other side of the bar so he could watch her more circumspectly. She was the only one alone tonight, he couldn’t help noting, on a Thursday night. Couples, friends, groups. Hell, that even looked like a mother and daughter team in the corner. She was the only one who had shown up alone, and it made him so uncomfortable he wanted to throw aside his role of bartender and sidle up on the stool next to her own.

The crowd thinned further. He tried again.

“And what’s a pretty lady like yourself doing out and about all alone on a Thursday night?”

Instantly he knew it was the wrong opener. Her lips thinned, her expression went slack. She took a long deliberate sip.

“My father always told me never to listen to men with poor pick-up lines,” was what she finally said.

The bartender coughed nervously. “A wise man, your father,” he allowed.

She laughed, a low sound, and extracted a slim, silver-plated cigarette case from her purse. “May I? It’s late enough and there’s hardly anyone left around.”

It was true, he saw. Despite the laws, he waved a hand. Only one couple was left, and their lips were locked. They wouldn’t notice cigarette smoke if it choked them. She hardly waited for the cue, lifted the thin roll of paper to her lips and flicked the lighter twice before the flame caught. She inhaled, exhaled a puff slowly into his face so he deliberately abstained from turning away, from coughing. She removed the cigarette, ruby red left around the rim now from her lipstick.

“What else did your father say?” he asked, angling differently now. Women usually loved talking about their fathers. Another thin smile. Another long, deliberate puff.

“My father taught me three things,” she said finally. She held up a finger, the cigarette dangling forgotten, the smoke trailing off towards the ceiling lamps hungry for company.

“One,” she said. “Big people don’t hit little people.”

Another finger joined the first.

“Two. Don’t ever get addicted to cigarettes.”

A third.

“Three. Don’t ever get addicted to alcohol.”

He was about to ask if she had taken her father’s advice, but the empty glass in front of her, the butt in her hand, made him change his question.

“And did your father practice what he preached?”

She snorted. “My father was a chain-smoking alcoholic who beat my mother until the day he died of a heart attack at fifty-one.”

He tried to discern if she was telling the truth this time, but still couldn’t see, so he pushed himself away from the bar top and moved to towel dry glasses that were already dry. An illusion of purpose. He knew she saw it; she smiled at his farce.

“I’ll have another, when you get a chance,” she called, tapping her glass and he nodded.