The weighty glass of the snifter was shattered across the counter. The man had, until now, been sitting in front of it sipping cognac pensively. Now he was eating the face off of a clock, that hung over the doorway, from atop a barstool carried over for the occasion. As he licked his lips, pulling the number eight from between them and spitting it dismissively onto the stained tile, he looked at me directly in the chest and said in a shockingly steady voice,
"By the tongue of Mary, I've found it! Pour me another drink Lydia, this feeling can't last forever! I feel like a new man. You know, this reminds me of a quote from the Bible. 'Don't despair, not even over the fact that you don't despair.' "
He was the only one in the bar, the time being approximately 2:15 PM, and I had no reason not to oblige. I reached for a clean snifter but he ran towards me from across the room, his eyes suddenly distraught and puerile. His gait accelerated into a barrel which ended in a full body collision with one of the torn bar stools. He stood up laughing, shaking his bloody brow to and fro, and heaving himself on top of the counter.
"Lydia, you don't understand. It's gotta be this one. This one, you see?" He had gathered the glass of the snifter he had shattered earlier with his briefcase and had proceeded to stack the pieces on top each other in a kind of vague mockery of Chihuly. "Fill 'er up?" he implored, looking up at me expectantly. "Please? Come on, it's your job, barmaid!" he added, widening his eyes until they resembled frogs'.
"Valentine, you know that's not gonna happen," I replied, stealing a glance at the tower of broken glass. "And I prefer the title 'Mixologist', " I added, licking my lips impatiently and tapping on the counter. My eyes wandered to the clock, but I quickly remembered that a devoured clock was rather obsolete.
"Fine. You're right. Enough cognac for tonight. You're a good person, ya know that, Lydia? No matter what..." He took a deep breath before continuing, "You've got my back. So...uh...how about a White Russian? Wait, make it a Kournikova since I'm on a diet, remember?"
There was a silence between us and I heard the faucet drip, awkwardly and unaware that it was imposing itself on such a delicate situation. Then, the man tumbled to the ground and broke into pieces. The sharp edges left deep scratches on the floor and some of the smaller bits fell in between cracks.
"Valentine!" I hurried from behind the counter and picked up his head from the floor. I hastily brushed bigger pieces of him into a pile, making a mental note to collect them later. I set his head in front of me on a dishtowel and bent down to meet his eyes, which were freely dripping tears. "What's wrong Valentine? You've gone to pieces."
"You're hilarious, Lydia," he groaned, gargling a mouthful of tears that had slipped from his eyes to his tongue. "I can't stand it, I'm torn. This stress is making me brittle."
"Quite so. Well, you may as well tell me about it. It seems we both have eternity." I began tidying up and preparing for the 5:00 rush.
"Well you chose that for yourself. I'm just stuck here," he muttered disparagingly, catching another mouthful of tears and snot that ran freely down his stranded face. He spewed it rather aggressively onto my glassware, coating it with phlegm and saltwater. "But I may as well tell you, might be good to get it off my back. At least it will pass the time while I collect myself," he relented, revelling in my look of disgust. "I cry like a candle, you know? Every tear makes me squishy until I just dissolve into a pool of my own despair. Leave me to harden."
"Take your time," I replied. I fixed my hair in the reflection of a highball. I wiped the mascara that had left tracks under my eyes like errant lashes and wondered what I was doing here. Twenty-two and contractually bound to mixing cocktails for the rest of my life. If only I had -
"It's my wife," he started started suddenly, jolting me out of my thoughts.
"Magye?" I asked.
"No, Bozena," he corrected, with a gesture that told me I should abandon the idea of Magye at once.
"Ah, the one you got in the mail," I shrugged, indicating my disapproval with a sideways glance.
"Now if you would kindly and delicately shut up, my charming Lydia, I want to tell you this without you dripping a steady stream of logorrhoea. It's as bad as its putrid counterpart and has a worse texture."
Without waiting for me to respond, he began his story, indicating its commencement with as flourishing a gesture as he could muster.
Really though, it's a great piece with just a few slip-ups, here and there, but nothing too major to complain about form me!
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