What surges adrenaline in some, can be dead boring for others.
(set in South Africa)
My name’s Ray Kepler and I don’t drink alone.
On Friday nights I usually go down to The Crocodile Gut with my business partner and drink until we’re plastered. But this one night he was northeast somewhere tracking down an old miner who owed him an inheritance – a long story – and it happened that around the same time my girlfriend was away too, down in the Cape for someone’s wedding. It was left to me to stay and keep things running. I was pretty much on my own in the comrade department since I don’t have too many friends out Lanseria way, or any other way for that matter, and I really don’t like drinking alone.
I had to settle for spending the evening with Cheesehead and Goonchi. A depressing concept when you’re accustomed to boozing it up with the loudest mouthed, biggest knuckled man south of the North Pole. (I recommend having a guy like Donovan around – that’s my partner; Donovan – when the fur starts to fly in a pub frequented by roughneck charter pilots and occasional farmers with too much energy and nothing to do.)
I stepped into the dimly lit room around eight-thirty, and paused in the doorway.
The Crocodile Gut has a long bar facing the entrance. To the right are ten or so wooden tables with chairs. From there the room extends back like the upright of a backward L to accommodate twin pool tables and a dartboard. There is a small bandstand that has probably never seen a musician and currently sported a jukebox, a snack machine and an old television set on a pedestal.
The place was full, busier than usual. At the corner of the bar there was a really huge guy with two not-so-small pals. Farmer-types I didn’t recognise. I followed their gaze to a noisy crowd that had taken up a pair of tables they’d pushed together. They were five men and three women, black folk. And, of course, numbering amongst the regulars was big Sid and his cronies who hated Donovan and me because we always beat the crap out of them.
When he saw me Sid tilted his chair back and dropped his booted feet on the table. He gave me a lingering, dark look, then turned his hairy face to the blonde beside him and showed her the yellow of his teeth.
I approached the bar and glanced over. Sure enough, there in their usual spot, a table beside a window to the right, Cheesehead and Goonchi worshiped some beers. They were aircraft mechanics who sometimes freelanced and helped us out when we needed it. Cheesehead was tall and thin while Goonchi just short and thin. Both wore glasses, had grease-stained hands and never got into brawls.
‘Hey. What’s up?’ I said as I dragged out a chair when I reached them, beer in hand.
‘Hey, Ray,’ they said.
‘Bloody busy tonight.’
‘Yep.’ Cheesehead nodded and looked around.
‘Bloody.’ Goonchi did the same.
‘Who’re those guys?’ I asked. There was another group I didn’t recognise, laughing and making a racket around the pool tables. Manny, the barman, had brought them to my attention with his constant glances in that direction.
‘Dunno.’ Cheesehead wrung a finger in his ear.
They looked reckless, a wild bunch with already a few too many pints in them. A lanky, longhaired, unshaved one kept shouting ‘albatross!’ every couple of minutes in a British accent. The others laughed at the private joke. I couldn’t peg them. They didn’t belong.
I surveyed all the new faces for a while. None of the groups seemed to fit with any other and I cheered inwardly when the giant at the bar snubbed a friendly overture from Sid’s crowd. Maybe tonight wouldn’t be so boring after all, no thanks to Donovan.
‘Hey, Cheesehead,’ I said, ‘why don’t you go get us some dominoes or cards from Manny. Give us something to do while things warm up.’
‘Ray, please, man. I’ve asked you so nicely: don’t call me that.’
I looked at him. His pained expression gave me a vague stab of guilt. Though it really was his own fault, I thought, noting the partly nibbled and inevitable chunk of cheese at his elbow. ‘Sure. Sorry. Pete.’
Goonchi snickered in his beer.
‘I mean, you like flying – I’m just partial to cheese. You know? I mean, how’d you like it if people called you “Flyhead” or something. Please, Ray. I don’t like it, man.’
‘Okay. Said I’m sorry. It’s just that wherever you go there’s always a piece of cheese.’
‘Sometimes you guys call me “Cheese”, you know? That’s okay. I can handle that. But not this “Cheesehead” crap. It makes me seem, like … stupid.’
‘Okay, so … how about it? Pete.’
‘What?’
‘Dominoes,’ I jerked my head toward where Manny was busily serving drinks. ‘Or cards.’
He stood up. ‘Sure, Ray. No problem.’
‘And get us another round while you’re at it,’ said Goonchi hopefully.
‘Do I look a bloody waiter? Come get it yourself.’
‘Go on, Goonchi. Give him a hand,’ I said, and worried for a second he’d get a pained expression over my nickname for him.
Finally, around ten-thirty, there was some vague posturing between the three farmers and the British half dozen. Fifteen minutes later one of the poms accidentally spilled some beer on a pilot at Sid’s table – uneventful except for some growls – and the farmers were making jokes the black crowd started to find suspect. The blacks quietened down a little and I wondered how I was going to get myself involved in the impending action. I liked the big farmer guy. Maybe because of the earlier snub to Sid’s boys and also because he reminded me a bit of Donovan. I thought I’d side with him.
But by midnight a lot of people, mostly regulars, had left, and the barroom had gradually become subdued. Boring, even, though the main groups still remained. On the other hand, I knew that boredom in a crowd like this is about as stable as thirty year-old TNT.
I peered over a bad poker hand at my companions and grimaced. I’d had a lot to drink – half a dozen beers excluding some I’d had for lunch. I stood up, partly to prove I still could and partly to see how the room looked from a different altitude.
‘Hey, Ray, you to bet,’ said Cheesehead. I mean Pete.
‘Nah, I’m out. Need a leak.’
I weaved my way through scattered tables and chairs to the gents in the far corner of the pub. As I pushed the door open a pom was exiting.
‘Need the heads then, mate?’ he grinned with smelly breath and crooked teeth.
I squinted at him, taking a moment to focus. He wore a white T-shirt with sleeves ripped off, revealing pale, sinewy arms. There was a tattoo to “Julie” on a forearm and I noticed he’d left the top button of his brown leather trousers undone. My inspection travelled back to his face. I didn’t like it. There was a crumb of something in a sparse moustache that matched the colour of his dirty blonde fringe. The eyes were heavy-lidded and bloodshot.
I grunted my distaste and pushed past him.
When I came out the Britons were quietly checking me over. I wasn’t too surprised. They knew I was alone besides the two weirdoes at my table, and as I walked I casually went through their faces, trying to get a tag on the leader, but didn’t get beyond the girl.
She must have arrived when I wasn’t watching. Petite, with short blonde hair and the biggest, bluest eyes I’ve ever seen. She had a pert, cherry-lipped little mouth over a dainty chin I wanted to reach out to and touch. I think she almost smiled at me but knew it wouldn’t go down too well with her pals just then. Or maybe it was my imagination, I thought as I bumped into a chair. It brought snickers from my audience. I tried again to locate the leader and once more my gaze hooked on the girl.
‘Wot ya fink ya lookin’ at?’ came a deep, soft-spoken threat from the guy in the centre of the group.
Slouched there, gazing at dark liquid he swirled in a brandy glass, he didn’t seem very tall, but there was no mistaking he was a hard case. His head was a bowling ball jammed onto a thick neck, and he had tree trunk arms with a string of tattoos on each. Must be Popeye, my mind suggested. Or a relative.
I glanced in vain toward my table. Cheesehead and Goonchi gaped at me like a pair of abandoned ventriloquist dolls. I sighed and looked around to the farmers I’d mentally linked myself with. They stared too, disinterestedly. I swung back, put out a foot to keep from toppling over with the momentum, and found Sid’s eyes. I dimly hoped a fellow pilot might... But he looked almost cheerful for the first time that evening.
‘Ah, crap. Wish Donovan was here,’ I mumbled, not meaning to voice that thought aloud.
Did ya say somefin’, mate?’ Popeye slowly raised his bowling ball. ‘Or ya just lickin’ yaself.’
The place got real quiet, even Manny stopped polishing the glass in his hands. A couple of chairs scraped – people wanting a better view. This wasn’t exactly how things were meant to turn out.
The guy next to Popeye flicked a cigarette butt that was meant to hit me but it fell way too short. It landed in a puddle of something that already contained a fleet of cigarette butts. I smirked and hitched up my jeans while my mind sloshed through the beer that flooded it for something smart to say.
‘Hey, Manny,’ I called over my shoulder, my voice sounding too loud in the silence, ‘Did you see that? This bloke’s messing your floor.’
He turned away to wipe more glasses. ‘No breakage, Ray. No breakage.’
I looked at the farmer, thinking I’d draw him in on my side. ‘How’d you like that, pal? These limeys reckon they can just come over here and mess up our place.’ The big guy gave an amused smile and shifted on the barstool to face me squarely. It didn’t look promising but I persisted, ‘No respect. What do you reckon?’
He took a swig of beer, wiped his mouth on the back of a massive paw, his broad forehead frowning in mock contemplation. ‘Well, I reckon it’s your party, sunshine.’ He belched loudly. At me.
A smattering of laughter rippled around the room, the Brit I’d met at the toilet door hooted derisively. My temperature started to rise – this is when Donovan is usually calmest, eerily so, and I don’t know how he does it.
‘Oh, of course. Sorry, man,’ I sneered at the Afrikaner, ‘I just forgot for a moment you don’t have any balls. You can’t dance with big boys like that.’ I jerked a thumb toward the English crew, none of whom came even close to matching his proportions.
His eyes widened. He put his beer on the counter and pointed a finger like a fat cigar at me. ‘Ek sal jou donner, jou klein moer! Watch it!’
‘Who convinced you you’re a white man?’ I snarled. His nostrils were the size of marbles and I watched them flare. ‘You should be sitting at that table, you dumb plank,’ I informed him with a movement of my head toward the black crowd.
‘Bliksem!’ he exclaimed under his breath, got off the barstool and began moving towards me.
‘Hey, hey!’ came a protest from the blacks. A round, angry man shot up from his chair and scowled at me, indignation brandished like a Zulu stabbing spear, ‘You want to fight me? Hey? You want …’ A thin, bespectacled, geeky-looking guy beside him grabbed his arm and persuaded him back into his seat.
‘Yah, that’s right. Sit down and shut up, Porky,’ I said, keeping an eye on the approaching farmer, ‘You don’t want to loose those last few teeth.’
To everyone’s surprise the black geek came to his feet as if he was about to take me on. He was smartly dressed and when he opened his mouth he spoke with eloquence to match: ‘Fisticuffs is a very crass cultural activity, sir. I believe I speak for most of us present when I say I much prefer a peaceful evening of civilised interaction with my friends. So if you would be so kind, I respectfully request that you seek your brand of entertainment elsewhere and refrain from insults of a discriminatory nature.’ He remained standing, pissed-off in a civilised way, and for a change all eyes were on someone else instead of me.
‘Huh?’ blurted an Afrikaner with a bemused chuckle.
‘Jeez-zus!’ breathed Sid.
‘Blimey, mate’,’ came a British voice.
‘Blimey yourself, pal,’ I quipped, a little bewildered but reminded then of the original source of hostility. ‘The average black South African has more class in his little finger than your entire family tree.’ I threw a glance at Sid. ‘That goes double for you and yours, moron.’
‘Christ!’ raged Popeye suddenly, and sent a bottle of beer whirling through the air in my direction, spewing a broken stream of its liquid as it came. It hit the table top in front of me and skidded off into the Afrikaans guy’s gut.
‘Bliksem!’ He raised his hands to his face; beer must have splashed in his eyes.
‘Hey! Blerrie rooinek!’ shouted the farmer’s pals, leaping from their seats to snarl at the poms.
‘Up yours, ya git!’ came a reply.
From a bleary corner of my eye I saw one of Sid’s boys use the opportunity to lob his own bottle at me. I didn’t have the muscular control to duck just then so considered myself fortunate to watch the projectile blur past my nose. I heard it crash into glassware somewhere and a roar of outrage rose from the blacks. ‘Bastard! (and a lot of stuff in Zulu or something)!’ I’m fairly sure it was the round, perpetually angry guy’s voice. I doubted the geek would be able to stop him now.
As Sid’s bunch scrambled up from their table, launching insults and themselves at the black crowd, the big guy before me recovered enough from the beer in his eyes to hurl the offending bottle in the general direction from where it had come. Someone there cried in pained surprise: ‘Ya friggin’ ape!’
Then the farmer glared at me, doing a brief survey of my face for a good spot to plant a fist, when we heard yelling, ‘Jan! Jan!’ We both looked and saw the English boys swarming with boots and fists over his two pals.
‘Bliksem!’ I said it this time, heartily, on his behalf, but the giant was already storming to the rescue, scattering bar furniture from his path.
Nobody even knew I existed anymore.
I went over to my table – Cheesehead and Goonchi had disappeared – and swallowed the dregs in my beer glass. I looked around. Everyone seemed to be having a good time. I suppose I could have joined in but it’s not the same, I decided, without Donovan. Besides, I felt a headache coming on.
I collected the cards from the table, dutifully put them back in their box – to avoid a fine and future criticism from Donovan, who sometimes bitches about “doing the right thing” – and took them over to the bar counter. Manny was nowhere to be seen so I placed them beside the till. He was probably in the back office making his Friday night call to the cops.
I had to pick my way through the skirmish between Sid’s boys and the blacks but I finally made it outside into the cool night air and the disturbing, flickering neon lights of The Crocodile Gut.
There was a murmur of voices and glow of a cigarette in the dark to my left. A male speaking to a laughing female. I approached out of curiosity and was surprised to discover the geeky black guy in deep conversation with the British girl, the blue-eyed beauty. They saw me.
‘That was bleedin’ clever of ya,’ she told me around a mouthful of smoke and gum.
‘Huh?’
‘Ingenious!’ said her new friend.
‘What was?’
‘Why, the masterful manner in which you evaded coming to blows yourself, of course,’ he said.
‘Oh.’ I looked around for my car. ‘That.’
‘Charlie here is an English Professor, you know,’ the girl informed me. ‘Ain’t that somethin’?’
‘Yah, sure.’ I backed away, pretty certain I didn’t want to get into a conversation with these two. Different wavelengths. Different planets, maybe.
‘And Julie is altogether an absolute delight,’ said the professor, beaming at her. ‘How is it that one so dainty can be so … so bountiful?’
‘Oh, prof! Whatever do ya mean?’
I left them giggling and chuckling to themselves, found the correct car on my second attempt and drove out the parking lot. My head was starting to throb.
In my rear-view I saw blue lights flashing in the distance.
Donovan had better get back soon. I couldn’t survive another night like this.
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