Coming Soon

Hi guys!

Sigh…another pic from a Google image search. I’ve got to stop doing that.

Anyway, Joe’s back this week and he’s in a bad way. If you’ve been paying attention (and trust me, I wouldn’t blame you if you haven’t been), the Brad and Joe stories have been a little more serious than they once were. Don’t worry though. They’ll be back to idiocy in no time, I bet.

Here’s this week’s #FridayFlash, “Coming Soon.”

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COMING SOON

Tommy was looking over his bar one last time, making sure that he hadn’t forgotten anything. The stools were up on the tables, the floor was swept clean and the “OPEN” neon light had been off for a few hours. He sighed resolutely and locked up. He made his way for his car in the now empty parking lot that seemed to drown in the orange sodium light being poured into it. He fiddled with his keys until he found the right one, opened the car door and started her up. For no particular reason, he thought of one of his regulars. “He was in a bad way tonight,” he said to himself. He shook his head and made his way to the IHOP.

He had forgotten about the guy and would have completely if it weren’t for one of the articles he read in the newspaper over his breakfast. He had finished his usual meal of pancakes, sausage and hash browns and was scanning the headlines of the local rag as he blew on the steaming cup of coffee he held to his lips. Near the last page of the “Politics” section, he read, “CITY REP SAYS BUDGET REFORM COMING SOON.” That made him think of Joe.

There were people you had to worry about in bars and then there was Joe. At a glance—an unprofessional glance, a glance that hadn’t be honed to a keen edge from decades of running a bar—Joe might seem like one you might have to worry about. Joe was loud maybe, but it was a good kind of loud. A happy kind of loud. A kind of loud that seemed to say, “Well gosh, isn’t this swell!” and not one that said, “In a few more beers time, you’re going to have to do something about me, Tommy, because I’m about to teeter over the edge and no telling who I’ll take with me when I go.” Joe was a good guy, even if his volume knob and every other knob for that matter had been cranked up to eleven and broken off there. But tonight, he was just another lonely, sullen drunk bellied up to the bar and nursing his drink.

Tommy was not the kind of bartender to take pity on someone’s plight, usually leaving that to the other girls behind the bar fishing for good tips. But there was something wrong with Joe. It wasn’t that there was something bothering him or he had plenty on his mind. Joe seemed wrong like a four-cornered triangle or a cannibal vegan.

“You alright, Joe?” Regardless of what he said next, Tommy would have left it at that. But the way Joe looked up at him, the way his eyes seemed to be somewhere else entirely when he said, “Yeah, I’m fine,” made Tommy keep at him.

Joe looked up and when he saw that Tommy was still there, he realized that he had to say something else. He brought in a breath and exhaled it deeply. “It’s just…I got promoted and—”

“That sounds terrible,” Tommy said. “Some guys have such shitty luck, ya know?”

Joe smiled, but it seemed like a smile that was just there to placate. “Yeah. Anyway, I got promoted and I had to…I had to fire a guy today.”

Tommy gave a sigh, one that might have told him that he empathized with him but sometimes things like this have to happen. To everything: turn, turn, turn and all that. That sigh came across to Joe as meaning nothing, which it basically did, and he went on.

“He was a shitty employee. Couldn’t trust him to find his pecker with a flashlight and road map.” Tommy laughed and Joe did give a reluctant smile. “He…he started drinking pretty heavily. He had been talked to in the past about it, but would he listen? Kept bringing his problems into work with him. He had skipped out of counseling, came to work hungover, wasn’t doin dick while he was there. So…I had to shit-can him.”

“Fucka had it comin from the sound of it.”

Joe looked up at his bartender. “We all got it comin, Tommy. Some of us sooner than later.” Joe took another drink. “The worst part is that he accused me of doin the same thing he did. He threw it in my face that I drink in my off time and wanted to know how what he did was any different. That hit me. That hit me pretty hard, I think. I mean, I’ve had my days, you know? I’ve fucked up every now and then, but…” Joe shook his head. “It makes me wonder…how much longer before I’m in his seat? How much longer before I’m no better than him?”

A group of girls came up to the bar next to Joe and ordered a drink. Tommy smiled and took their order, thinking that they might serve to cheer the morose bastard up. But by the time Tommy got back, Joe was gone.

Tommy put his paper down and drank the rest of his coffee. He had never seen Joe so upset, even when Joe had called it quits with what’s-his-name who was apparently his best friend. Joe never drank because of something work related, which was good, but Tommy thought that might change soon. Tommy didn’t know what to say then, but he sure as hell knew now.

“Never shit in your own mess kit,” Tommy said looking out the IHOP’s window, glimpsing the first wan trances of a sunrise. “Nope. Never do it. Because when you start doing that, it becomes one hell of a mess.”

At that, Tommy folded his paper, left a tip and made tracks for home, bed and sleep. Maybe he’d tell Joe what he just thought of if he saw him tomorrow. “What am I saying? Of course I’ll see him. He’s hooked through the bag, ain’t he?”