Coral
Bar
"I
have absolutely nothing more to say to you. Zippo, you are more
broke than a gambler on the day after payday, who has chased
several royal flushes without avail."
"You have such a common outlook, you know, like, like it
would kill you to put some, like, thinking muscle into the matter."
"Would you have preferred I dug deep into that shallow
well? Is that it? Instead of searching for other new ideas,
we just steal those on the surface? Or do you really believe
new ideas can be bought at the corner store?"
"You know, like, open your mind."
"No, you mean, I should open my wallet, there is a BIG
difference. Embracing the ideas of someone who has dug shallow,
but says it was deep is common logic. I reject it."
"You, like, reject it as, like, fake because you cannot,
like, see. Your eyes, like, fail you."
"Or perhaps you have mistaken the mumbles as fact, when
in fact it is simply muddy ground water."
***
"She said that?"
"Yeah, she thinks his belly button lint is as valuable
as diamonds."
"He spends his days wielding a deflated pen at a pseudo
defunct newspaper and at night, he is an amazing Vaudevillian
with his pet monkey, Oscar."
"And to think I felt like a plastic spork when I discovered
Dean trained snapping turtles and dressed as a Ninja for birthday
parties."
"Dating is an insane festival of highs and lows. Mostly
lows."
"Yes but it beats the alternative. We could just be standing
in the yard, like half dead daisies."
"Hell of a trade off. Guys with half dead daisies or clinging
to the dirt, like half dead daises."
"Yeah, that is why I am here tonight with you, babe."
***
“And then, of course, it jams.”
“Well,
you know, for this very reason I like to know what I am getting
into.”
“I know, but man, do I love how she stretches every morning,
lithe, like a sleek cat. I told her from the beginning I was
going to someday disappoint her.”
“I guess she doesn’t believe in that ‘forgive
and forget’ shit, she went straight for wanting you dead.”
“Surprisingly she is amazingly low maintenance, in a classic
sense, anyway.”
“I have heard and seen some amazing shit, man, but this
I’ve gotta to tell you, this... freaks... me... out.”
“You should have seen her. She was so hot. Standing there.
Still as a statue. My breathe caught. I knew in that moment
she was the girl I was going to marry.”
“She wanted you dead.”
“If she really wanted me dead, she would have tested the
gun, before she tried to fire it at me, across a crowded bar.”
“Tested it how? Shoot it into a pillow or a garbage can
in the subway on the way to the bar.”
“She was dressed in a rocking mini skirt, purple fishnets
and her black latex mini trench coat. Legs up to here, in her
knee high black patent boots.”
“So since she was dress like the star of a sci-fi porno,
you think that means she would have tested out the gun, before
she showed up, dressed to the nines to kill you?”
“Yeah, not only is she the sharpest dressed woman I know,
she is the smartest too.”
“I know I’ve said this before, but you really need
to rethink this. You bailed her out, that is enough. No need
to buy her a ring.”
“All ready done.”
“I hope to God this never happens to me.”
"You
haven't lived, man, until you have almost died."
***
The
vile absinthe cocktail tempered the reports fluttering through
the air. Eh, gads, prattle, prattle, prattle on and on. Hunched
shoulders and a surly countenance my shield. Life had a way
of sucking at my soul, one day at a time and one ridiculous
conversation, overheard without fail over the lively juke box
in the corner, at a time. The passion of the senseless and the
glitter of the once shiny. Each with something to say. Clusters
of people, their ideas and their words forming coral around
the bar, so beautiful and yet so very dead, death brings the
beauty. Today, just like every other day, without fail, the
whips of disjointed conversation race the liquor, which will
move me to oblivion first.
You
can go to Elisa Phillips' blog at: www.elisaphilips.blogspot.com