Russell Banks - A Permanent Member of the Family

I tell him no problem, and Allyn says the same, and then, as if to reassure him, Allyn invites Enrique to come along with him to the Green Door.

Enrique politely declines.

Allyn turns to me and says, “How about you, bartender? Care to join me at the Green Door and get sweaty wet with whatever or whomever you fancy?”

It strikes me that Allyn’s the one with the disease that makes people say weird shit they don’t mean, except that he means it. “No, thanks, man. I got too much to do here tonight.”

Enrique says, “Yeah? What’re you doing, killing people?”

“Naw, not tonight,” I say. “Actually, my replacement called in sick, so I’m stuck here till closing. Otherwise, yeah, I’d be out killing people.” Two can play at this game.

Allyn says, “Or hanging with me at the Green Door!” He lays a hundred on the bar and says keep the change and wobbles from the bar. I deduct sixty for the register and pocket the rest.

Enrique says, “No fucking way that dude’s going to end up at the Green Door.”

I ask him about this disease he’s got, if it comes and goes, or does he have to fight it all the time in order not to say shit he doesn’t mean.

“Only time I can forget it is when I’m sleeping. Sometimes I get tired of fighting it, like tonight, and just say fuck it, you know?”

I say I know. But what I really want to know, and don’t ask, is how it feels to suddenly blurt out whatever pops into your head. It must be like going behind the green door. It must feel really good to let yourself do that. It must in a way be fun, like being a glittery member of Cher’s chorus line swirling across the stage singing “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down),” which is what they’re singing now at the far end of the bar, one of them on the piano, the six others, arms over shoulders, in an actual chorus line, kicking left, kicking right, having a wonderful time performing that goofball of a song for each other and for anyone else in the bar who cares to watch and listen. The coaches all dig it, and Mutt and Jeff grin and watch, and even Enrique seems to like it. And me — maybe especially me, I like it.

IT’S TWO IN THE MORNING before I finally clear everybody out and get the bar washed and locked down and head for the employees’ parking lot on the other side of Seminole Way. I’m dragging my bony ass, but if I worked for one of the casino bars instead of the Piano I’d be serving drunks till dawn, so I’m not complaining, just saying.

As I cross the lot toward my Corolla, motion detectors automatically turn on the new ecologically correct LED streetlights, and after I’ve passed beneath they switch off behind me, one bright light handing me on to the next and then blinking out, all the way across the enormous, nearly empty lot. Palm trees along the sidewalk click and snap in the breeze. A quickie rain shower has cooled the air and clouds of steam rise from the lot as if the pavement is heated from below by fires in the devil’s workshop. I’ve crossed this lot thousands of times and never given it a nod, but tonight for some reason it’s spooky. Makes me edgy.

In my head I’m listening to Enrique and Allyn, especially Allyn, when I arrive at my car and get in. Over the course of the night I had maybe a dozen conversations with customers, some of them interesting, even a couple of them useful. Despite that, I can’t remember a one of them, except for my exchange with Enrique and Allyn at the start of the evening, which has stayed with me in a slightly irritating way, like a day-old bee sting.

I’m driving across the lot in the direction of the exit at Lucky Street, still running those guys’ words past my inner ears, when my headlights catch three men and a solitary Ford Fusion sedan with its front doors wide open parked at an angle across two adjacent spaces. Caught in the cone of my headlights the three figures are otherwise surrounded by darkness. They act like I’m not there or they don’t give a shit that I am. One of the three is jumping around and making big purposeful punching gestures like he’s reenacting a WWE wrestling match. He appears to be shouting at the other two, who stand off a few feet and watch him warily as if they’re not sure why he’s performing for them. They’re younger and smaller than he is — red-faced, unshaven Raggedy Andys, a fat one with a long braid who looks like a Seminole and a scrawny one who looks Hispanic. Homeless sunburnt junkies or rosy-faced drunks, I figure. South Florida’s largest minority. Next to the sedan they’ve parked a matching pair of grocery carts stacked with garbage bags filled with all their worldly goods.

The one making the wild gestures I suddenly realize is Allyn, my Long Island iced tea guy, who looks like he’s been mugged — bow tie undone, shirt unbuttoned to below his navel, the right sleeve of his jacket half torn off, the suit itself spattered with mud and what looks like spilled red wine or possibly blood, hard to tell in the glare of my headlights. His comb-over is fluffed up like he put his finger in a light socket. He’s got a couple of ugly blue bruises on his forehead and a purplish egg swelling below his left eye.

I’ve stopped my car maybe twenty feet away from him, still inside the parking lot with a high-curbed concrete island between my car and his rental. I reach over to lower the passenger’s-side window so I can talk to Allyn. He doesn’t look quite sane. But not exactly insane, either.

I get the window all the way down and holler, “Hey, man, you okay? You need help?”

He glances in my direction but doesn’t seem to recognize me. “I’ve had enough help for one night, thank you very much! Unless you’re the police and can arrest these two!”

“Allyn, it’s me, the guy who sent you to the Green Door, remember?”

The Indian and the Spanish guy edge slowly toward their carts, still keeping a wary eye on Allyn. He looks like he recognizes me now and takes a step in my direction, then sees the two homeless guys about to escape. “Not so fast!” he shouts at them. “We have some unfinished business to settle!”

The two freeze and switch their gaze from him to me and back again. Up to now they’ve probably been goofing on Allyn, the only guy around who seems crazier than they are. They’re thinking they can handle Allyn — they obviously already have — but not the two of us. And maybe I’m carrying a weapon. This is South Florida, after all, and anybody out this late is likely to be armed and could legally shoot them both and say he felt threatened by them. In fact, I have a loaded Smith & Wesson Bodyguard.38 in the glove compartment and could easily take control of this situation if I wanted to. But I don’t want to. And I don’t feel threatened.

“What’s happening here, Allyn?”

“They put something in my drink.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. At the Green Door! I woke up in my car, and these two were going through my pockets and taking off my watch.”

“What happened at the Green Door?”

“I said, they put something in my drink! Slipped me a mickey! Knockout drops or something!”

“So did you get what you wanted there?”

“I don’t remember anything! All I remember is going through the green door. Then suddenly I’m back here in my car and these two are taking my wallet and my Movado. And now I’m going to beat the shit out of them and take my fucking wallet and watch back!”

The Indian and the Spanish guy look mildly pissed is all, like this crazy dude interrupted a friendly parking lot Thunderbird nightcap. I say, “You guys take his wallet and his watch?”

They shake their heads no. Their eyes are half closed.

I say to Allyn, “Knockout drops? Slipped you a mickey? Give me a break, man. What kinda movies you been watching? You were shitfaced when you left the Piano. You probably never even got out of the parking lot. It’s called a blackout, asshole.”