2 Drink Minimum

The bar is small, dark, and trite, nestled in a strip mall between a prosperous and garish Korean nail salon and the upscale Gourdough’s Public House. This bar is not upscale. It survives precisely because it’s a hole people can climb into and pull over themselves.

It’s as anonymous as porn theater sex. It has no windows, no sign over the door, no chipped and faded little cigarette-company decal with a penguin proclaiming Come on in, it’s KOOL inside! The metal door is old and rusted, dented here and there, with two punctures that let in rain. It works with a scream of protest, just like most of the bar’s patrons.

The place has weathered barn wood nailed to the wall at the far end, and a few dart players of unreliable skill throw feathered projectiles at a target hung from a nail. A ragged color printout of someone’s ex-wife is taped over the ten-ring, encouraging accuracy. Most of the darts embed into the barn wood anyway.

As a celluloid Nick the Bartender said to the you-never-existed George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life, this too is a place where men, and now women, are hard customers who come to drink hard liquor, and get drunk. If you can’t drink at least two, you are out of your league here. Go next door to Gourdough’s where there is better lighting and you can order your fucking Mojito.

Coincidentally, the bartender here is also named Nick. He hasn’t mixed a White Russian in two years. There was that Manhattan last month, but it was served to a regular who followed up with a triple Lagavulin neat. The woman’s date never showed—married prick, got cold feet. After almost two years on that bar stool, she never came back.

This is a destination bar, where men and women often meet with others not their spouse. Couples huddle in booths around the perimeter of the main room. A few more sit at booths and a few tables in satellite rooms even darker than the main area. There are other regulars, too. You can buy or sell information here, or plan some deal, but don’t get caught with dope or it’s your ass. If someone calls in looking for a customer—a frantic wife, an angry husband—no one is ever there. Sorry, really busy. Take a message?

Detective Inspector Douglas Lee Pavlichek is distinguishable from the other customers only to the bartender. Nick has served the cop booze since he came on the job; through two marriages, three killed partners and six promotions. He does a very passable simulation of a businessman, with his Abboud suits and Burberry trench coat. The homicide cops are well known to be natty dressers, and Pavlichek does his part. You need nice suits when you go to your partners’ funerals. Pavlichek doesn’t have a terrible average, though, for his thirty-two years. That works out to less than one dead partner per decade. But after he lost Mooney, Pavlichek decided he’d rather work solo. He’s on the glide slope to a disappointing retirement anyway, so the bosses agreed.

He also doesn’t care about any two-drink minimum, because Detective Pavlichek hasn’t had two or fewer drinks at a sitting since 12th grade, when he partied so hard that he barely graduated. Only Mrs. Ellsworth had saved that, allowing a retake of the final exam over the angry objections of Mr. Crawford, the so-called “guidance counselor” who hated Pavlichek since he was a southmore. That’s how they say it here, southmore, not sophomore. So he passed with a D-plus—still hadn’t studied—and drew the Logan green cap and gown to make the high school perp walk with almost a thousand other seniors that year.

Here’s a piece of info for that next lull in class reunion conversation: Today, a man named Logan Green is the co-founder and chief executive officer of the ride-sharing service Lyft.

No, that doesn’t mean anything. Nothing does.

Pavlichek doodles on a bar napkin. When he looks up, Nick is already watching him. The detective waves an index finger in airy, imperfect circles, ordering another round. Nick pulls a Stroh’s from an ornate tap and then pours an extra-double Johnny Walker Black while the beer foam settles. By the time Pavlichek survived the summer after high school, he could drink a whole fifth of Johnny Walker Black and still be just walking-around high, could drive and everything. That time he wrecked his car down the street from Griff’s house, where Griff’s mother always bought the party alcohol, the local uniforms didn’t even know he was wasted. That was the first time Pavlichek thought about a career in police work.

Police work is how he describes it, because cops will tell you honestly, in quiet moments, that “law enforcement” isn’t the same thing. Rookies do law enforcement; veterans do police work. Police work maintains order and keeps people safe and free, keeps the jackoffs in their own districts, at least. Those lofty goals are not always the purview of laws, so most cops don’t enforce laws. They do police work.

Pavlichek’s phone buzzes in an inside-left coat pocket, but he doesn’t have to look at it to know who it is. His personal cell is in the inside-right pocket, but it never buzzes. He downs the scotch at once, then powers down the beer.

“Gotta run, Nick. Work,” he says. He leaves a fifty on the bar, because if you tip a bartender well now, he tips a cop well later. Pavlichek gets only two steps away before turning back to Nick.

“Hey, you havin’ a good day, man?”

Nick shrugs. “Yeah. I guess. You know, it is what it is.”

“You are right about that.” Pavlichek waves a two-finger salute and turns to the door. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

“Okay, Inspector,” Nick says. He wipes wet rings from the polished surface of the bar and picks up the napkin. Pavlichek has carefully torn up the business card of the department psychologist and left it in a perfect teepee of matte pasteboard on the bar.

On the napkin, Pavlichek has drawn the crude image of a handgun shooting a bullet through a cartoon badge, and all around it, over and over, he’s written the words Kill me now.



Written by: Daniel Charles Ross
Photograph by: Chris Boyles

Gone Fishing

I remember the night that myself and Blue Louis took some time out with a bottle in the abandoned petrol station before the bad times, after being freaked out of a bar by beefy rednecks, flannel shirts so stiff with sweat they were like insect shells, thin but hard and keeping all their whisky-squished innards in.

Didn’t help that Louis - Gods bless him - was all decked out like he was fresh from the jazz joint in a beat-up snazz suit and green fedora with cigarettes stuck in the band. He always had those damn cigarettes shoved in there like the press photographer in a Bogart noir. Didn’t help that I had ripped jeans and mussed blond hair and was street-skinny, like a cheap angel of the lanes bestowing miracles by the hour.

‘What brings you here, boys?’ That’s what one of the big guys says to him, and let's not forget that Louis is dark dark dark and you can see Mayan pyramids in his cheekbones, and these guys were moonshine brewers like you get out here with their terrible fucking fear of the dark.

‘Uh…I work for a paper.’ Tryin' to keep that cigar-smoke voicebox of his nice and smooth and easy.

‘Oh? There a story in these parts?’ A couple whiskeys slid over the sticky toffee bar to us. Some hulker in a shady corner mutters something as Louis pays up and the others around him chuckle like their mouths are full of gravel, and I start to hear banjo music in my head.

'He gone fishin.' One grizzled guy with a grey beard like a big smokey tongue flopping down from his lips nods at me. 'Caught a pretty one.'

And I hear the word ‘faggot’ and that's when I start praying, Oh sweet and holy Jesus let us get the fuck out of here before we get torn in two down by the river somewhere. I'll give you kind deeds and clothes for the needy and Oh holy mother of God, I'll find you some real gigantic fresh red roses, you know, the ones you like and Oh Saint Jude who watches over lost causes I'll take out that ad in the paper for you, just get us outta here or make us fireproof.

'This?' Louis looks at me like he's never seen me before. 'Stupid kid was tryin' to jump the trains. Like the old hobos.'

'Lose your life that way, son.' One of the werebears says, and the others start nodding and talking, remember when so-and-so stopped off at the railroad shack and when the train pulled up they saw something between the carriages and God above there was a leg caught up in there.

Louis shakes his head like I'm a dumb dog. 'Right? Coulda found himself landing both sides of the state,' and because these lumberdicks are rough and tumble types he looks like he's gonna cuff me round the head for a second but I see him think the better of it because let's not forget in this unbreathable place that Louis is dark dark dark.

'Huh, that's a bunch of starry-eyed crap, hopping the trains these days. You runnin' away from something?' Same guy looks me over intently, like he's trying to figure out if they need to turn me in. This place looks like it still has Wanted posters up on the walls and I'm busy winging sweet nothings up to the vaulted ceiling above this one and its golden inhabitants.

'Nossir, trying to find a job in the city, where's he's goin'.' They look up-and-down at my torn jeans and laugh.

'And you, paperboy?'

Lou shrugs like he isn't sweating blood right now. ‘Just passing through. Gotta be back in the office Monday.'

We downed our gulping whiskeys that could fireball the germs off your lips and backed out of the joint slowly, like it was full of wolves who’d leap if you moved too quick. Soon as we were out the door we whirled our bootheels away down the dust track back to the car, shrieking the banjo duel music at each other. Louis jammed it into first and pulled away from that Ol’ Boy freak circus fast as the wheels would turn. Picked up an amber bottle at some no-hope trailer and blazed out into the desolate desert road.

Hit an old gas station, looming out of the darkness all squat and skeletal. Parked up and rolled a special smoke and sat watching the stars. There’s really no light out there, see, it’s like the nicotine yellow stained sky you know in the city just peels away, and there’s all this universe underneath it. It was like when you see reflections in a lake or a puddle and wonder if you could fall through it into the reflection world. I turned my head to watch Louis all strung out along the sand like a big cat.

I believe I said something nonsensical and beautiful about the universe and the microscope of God out here and the stars being our atom-selves. He shook his head and said:

‘You know, if it had come down to pig-squealing time, I just want you to know that I woulda gone first.’

‘What the fuck, Lou?’

He turned, and in that totally unselfconscious way he had of touching other beings he stroked my hair and my star-stoned face.

‘Because I love you, man, you’re my best friend.’

I thought about this a moment and said:

'But I woulda seen what was coming, I mean, thank you for your consideration and all but...No, no...That wouldn't have helped me at all.'

At some point in that long galaxy gaze we passed out. Comes to something beautiful when you wake up in an old petrol station in the arms of your best friend still wearing his green fedora. The rest of the way we played I Spy and the sand and the scrub and the sky all began with the same S.

Written by: Natty Mancini

Photograph by: Daniel Charles Ross

Penumbra

I like to remember the way Camryn looked when she made creatures in the snow, arms spread wide like the wings of those honey bees she always loved. In those moments she seemed more wild than I could ever be. She seemed free.

“Kane’s party will be so beyond,” Camryn says. Her hand brushes the fabric of my pale pink skirt, which once belonged to a ballerina.

Late spring snow nestles in Camryn’s hair and eyelashes as we climb the steps to Kane’s place.

                                                                                              ***

“Did I make this weird? Did I ruin your perfect last snow day?” Camryn had asked, snow settling around her.

“What about Aislyn? She’s pretty. She goes to parties. She kind of looks like me, you know?” I’d said, because I couldn’t think of anything else to say.

And all Camryn had been able to say was,“That’s so fucked up, Len.” And it was.

I focus on that moment as Kane hands us drinks. He disappears into a group of his party goers. He doesn’t see the way Camryn brushes Aislyn’s hair over her shoulder.

“Why do you drink it like that?” Aislyn asks when I spoon the liquid into my mouth.

I smile and stir a lime around my gin fizz, trying to mask the taste of the gin.

“It’s how she drinks her tea, too,” Camryn says. She nudges Aislyn, but smiles at me, and I wonder if it’s because of all those things I’d said.

I could never love Camryn the way she needed me to.

I knew Camryn loved me before she told me. The months between that moment and today feel so full of what I feared would happen. The knowing ruined everything. It was always so much easier to pretend things didn’t have to change, that we never had to change.

“You know I can’t do change,” I say. It’s not a real response because there was never a real question.

“You’d never try,” Camryn says, between sips of her own drink. The way she says those words sounds wrong, too sharp; too much truth for this moment.

Instead of smiling and nodding my head, I tip my drink back, and swallow the rest in one gulp.

“Len, you don’t have to,” Camryn says when I take another shot of gin from some nameless guy.

“I’m trying,” I say. “Just like you wanted.”

“Don’t,” Camryn says, grabbing my hand.

I think she tries not to hold it like she loves me, but I feel it anyway. She’s gentle, but won’t let go. After everything, I know she doesn’t want me to leave her. Camryn needs us to be together, even if we’re only friends. Even if she wants us to be more.

I wonder if I’d feel different in another time or another place. Sometimes I look at my shadow and wonder if she is in love with Camryn. And if that’s true, I hope our shadow selves are happy. But I know shadows aren’t enough because I can never love Camryn that way.

When I pull away, her hand still reaches for me, but I can’t be here with her.

I grab another drink and make my way to the other side of the living room. I take one shot, and then another. The floor shifts beneath my feet, and I understand why our friends drink. Though I don’t know what weighs them down, I know they must like to feel themselves flutter; their pulse and their limbs and their wings. Maybe they need to feel free, too.

                                                                                              ***

“Are you drunk?” Kane asks. I wrap my arms around his neck and use him to anchor myself to this spot and this moment and this life.

“I know, Kane. And I just need to tell Camy, because she needs to know,” I say.

“Yeah? Why don’t we find Cam then?” he asks, helping me weave through the people as they drink and dance.

For some reason I can’t remember when we became friends with Kane. I wonder if he knows what Camryn said, what Camryn wants; all the things I’ve tried to forget. I open my mouth to tell him, but the words aren’t there because they’re not mine.

I try again, but only one word spills out, Camy. Her name sounds distant even though it leaves my mouth and my lips.

When I use her nickname, Camryn cries, but it’s not drunk crying. I’ve been to enough parties to know the difference between drunk crying and real tears.

“Let’s get you home, Len,” she says. She wraps an arm around my waist and we move through her words so slow like swimming underwater. “I’ve got her,” she says over her shoulder, and I know she does.

We’re out the door and on the street with the sidewalk beneath our feet. It moves in waves as we walk. Camryn asks, and I remember she was never the one to cry.

“I’m sure you want me to say I’m sorry. Maybe I am. Maybe I always will be,” I say.

“Let’s not do this, Len. Not when you’re like this.”

Her words float into lines trying to make themselves into hexagons. They close around us like dwelling walls, like honeycombs ready to keep us together.

“I remember growing up listening to I’m sorry, and it never made anything better. So I’m not sure saying the same thing to you would change anything.”

“And you hate change,” she says. She helps me up one step and then the next. I know we’re at her dwelling place because of the way the door creaks.

“They’ll only make me feel better.”

“You’ll feel better tomorrow,” Camryn says. She tucks her Gram’s quilt beneath my chin, and the flowered squares sway and grow over my shoulders.

“You said, I don’t know how to not be in love with you. Remember?” I ask.

“I’m sorry,” Camryn says.

“Well I don’t know how to be in love with you, can’t pretend everything’s the same anymore.”

“Don’t you know people change?” she asks from the edge of the bed.

All this time I think Camryn’s tried too hard to keep her heart untouched. I don’t think she ever meant to give so much away to me, because when she looks at me, I know she’s not all there anymore. I think we’re both scared of never being whole.

But I don’t tell her this.

I find the outline of my shadow self cast on the wall beyond us. I give my words to her, hoping she’ll know what to do with them.



Written by: Kayla King
Photograph by: Anthony Delanoix

Korean 28

“I’ve been dreaming about planes.” Ellen-Teacher tells me.

“I know it’s stupid...but...I think I want to be a pilot.”

We’re sitting in one of the bars near Lotte Cinema. The dim one with giant teddy bears in glass cases. The teddy bears aren’t for sale. They aren’t for anything.

Maybe it’s the mutual dissatisfaction with our job or maybe it’s the teddy bears in glass cases that make me encourage her.

“You should take flying lessons.”

Ellen-Teacher slides her glass of Hite closer and glances around before taking out her third Dunhill of the night.

No one’s watching. No one notices the female South Korean lighting another red. Everyone is busy watching themselves, taking selfies, texting, or fixing their makeup. But Ellen-Teacher looks as if her father might pop up at any moment.

“I can’t.” She says.

Ellen-Teacher can’t do a lot of things. If I ask her out for a beer, Ellen-Teacher has been directed to tell me “I can’t.” Director Randy, our boss at the English school, forbade her. He didn’t tell her why. This may also be why Jessica-Teacher answers me in small grunts and glares at me from afar.

Director Randy chose his English-speaking name by naming himself after Randy Rhoads. Sometimes he rollerblades around the carpeted office and once a week he asks me to guess how old I think he is. He’s balding. It’s week 17. Every time he asks, I smile uncomfortably and shrug with false uncertainty.

The first time Ellen-Teacher invited me to get a beer, she told me about this rule. The invite was a pity one. She saw me through my classroom window. It’d been hours of speaking in my well-crafted English slow-tongue. I’d emphasized every R and L ad nauseam to my beginners. I’d made sure my intonation was welcoming and bouncy, like the lovechild of a mid-westerner and a Southern Californian. I’d spent the last few hours of my shift trying to teach English to adolescents who only questioned my importance. “Why we need English?” I didn’t correct their questions. Like a real adult, I told them to ask their parents.

Ellen-Teacher saw me through the glass square in my door using my hand to keep my head from falling on the desk in defeat. Outside, out of Director Randy’s view, she invited me to share our first pitcher.

Ellen-Teacher and I are both 28. I lost two years during my 17-hour flight from the States. In Korea, you’re one from the moment you emerge from your mother. Your birthday means nothing. Forget about it. Your birthday is now the New Year. Everyone’s birthday is the New Year. Back in Buffalo, New York, I was a young 26 but Korean Standard Time declared me 28. I’d missed my chance to join the 27 Club entirely and glided into the not-so-golden age of a Korean 28.

Korean 28, for a woman, means marriage with kids on the way. Korean 28 does not mean teaching over-privileged Korean students English. That’s the equivalent of a spinster. I might as well resign to a life of lonely Sundays where I watch infomercials as if they are real television programs and start calling product helplines just to hear another person’s voice.

I learned my status as a spinster from every conversation with every South Korean cabbie ever.

The driver looks in his rearview and asks where I am from.

“Where are you from?”

“New York.”

The driver assumes that “New York” means the city and makes weird shout-outs. He lists the things he knows and thinks about the city, each its own exclamation or statement:

“New York!”

“Big Apple!”

“Time Square!”

“Very many people.”

I nod in agreement as these are also my thoughts on New York. We nod at each other until there are no more nods. When the nod-off ends, the driver asks how old I am.

“26.”

“Married?”

Horizontal nod.

“Boyfriend?”

Another horizontal nod.

I can see his scrunched brow in the rearview. He retires to a disappointed silence. I want to add another detail about New York with an exclamation point at the end.I want to say anything to take us back to when he was excited to know me. But his silence is a strong one, a finite one.

Ellen-Teacher isn’t married either and she doesn’t have a boyfriend. Ellen-Teacher's first name is not Ellen and her last name is not Teacher. Euna chose “Ellen” as her teacher name. My teacher name is Letia because that is my birth name. When Euna is asked why she chose the name “Ellen”, a shrug is the reason. Like me, she is confused as to how she wound up teaching English to the over-privileged kids of her country.

Ellen-Teacher lives with her parents. Ellen-Teacher had a brother. He left Mokpo to live in a bigger city. Their parents disapproved. He bought a motorcycle. Their parents disapproved. Ellen-Teacher’s brother died in a motorcycle accident.

There is little hope of Ellen-Teacher flying anywhere.

And though we both know this, that we’re a couple of Korean 28s and that it feels too late, Ellen-Teacher continues to dream of planes.

“You could take lessons.” I suggest again.

After all, Amelia Earhart’s legacy was of trying.

“Do they have flying lessons here?”

She tells me they do, she explains the expenses a little, and ends her last sentence with a but.

Even Amelia got lost.

After Ellen-Teacher’s pack of Dunhills is lighter and we’ve drained enough pitchers to find our lives laughable-laughable instead of pathetically-laughable, we part ways for the weekend.

Ellen-Teacher goes home. A hallway away from her parents, she lays her head down and dreams the same dream again. The one where she is flying above us all, wearing an Amelia Earhart leather aviator helmet, and watching the world below move on.

Written by: Tia Brown
Photograph by: Emily Blincoe