I flick my cigarette out of the window and divert my attention from the road for a moment to watch the colorful sunset, purples and oranges so brilliant, surely Monet would weep. It’s a typical Sunday evening and I’m headed to the same hole-in-the-wall bar that I always go to. I jaywalk across the street, stay true to my schedule and take my usual position at the end of the bar…just in time for happy hour.
This routine has become mundane, but it’s the only logical solution I have for how to cope with this town’s and everyone’s mediocrity. I swivel from side to side in my barstool, sipping on my second whiskey sour, while doodling on a napkin. Once again, the bartender misinterprets my flirting. In reality, my forced bedroom eyes and lyrical laughter are simply ploys to get free drinks…and like always, I will pay not a tab, but leave a hefty tip. I guess we will both get something out of this game. Plus, it’s quite apparent I could use, and thoroughly enjoy, the ego boost his not so clever pick up lines give me.
I light up another Camel light (why would you bother smoking anything else but a turkish blend?), and watch puffs of smoke orbit around my skin like fairy dust as I take a long, hard drag. Is this what my life has amounted to? Sitting alone at the bar desperately hoping anything remotely thrilling will occur? Hell, I’d be ecstatic if a wannabe thug wearing an oversized G-unit t-shirt barged in and shot up the place right now, even if he took me out in the process.
I want a change of pace. I need to feel something other than annoyance or apathy again. I crave what I have not experienced in so long, something that I fear I will never have again; genuine happiness.
