Michael R. Barrick

Carl Buys Coffee

Carl was criminally short and walked with his fists clenched in compensation for his inability to fill space. He swaggered unnoticed in to the café. His right hand opened just long enough to dive into a pocket and envelop a mutilated one dollar bill. In his mind Carl made a grand gesture and placed the bill on the counter. In the eyes of the well groomed young woman behind the counter Carl jerked his arm in a short circle, hit his fist against the counter with a sweaty thump, and released the one dollar bill with a spasm of his hand.

"Gimme a coffee," Carl demanded in a falsely deep voice.

The well groomed young woman's dark hair moved forward as she lowered her eyes to Carl's level. She expertly disguised her smile of callous amusement at Carl's patheticness as a smile of courteousness and interest, "What kind would you like?"

Carl recoiled visibly from the unexpected challenge, "Whaddaya mean, 'What kind'?"

The well groomed young woman's eyes closed and opened slowly, concealing their roll upwards and away from Carl. "Today's coffees are Kenyan, Ethiopia Sidamo, and Hawaiian Kona."

Carl clenched his fists as tight as he could, extended his shortness as far as it would go, and said, "I don't want none of those fancy, mixed-up, girly-coffees. Just give me a good old fashioned cup of American coffee."

The well groomed young woman smiled wryly and poured Carl a small cup of Hawaiian Kona and offered it to his small body and small mind without explanation and without taking his mutilated dollar.

Carl misread the well groomed young woman's wry smile and swaggered out with one fist closed around his mutilated dollar, the other around his American coffee, and feeling rather tall.

© 1993 Michael René Barrick

So I talked Evilyn into going to Isaac's new night at 23 West (tentatively named "Netherworld") because I wanted to drink, damnit. I had my usual warm-up quadruple Bombay and tonic as she was on her way over and we headed to Gastown. Because she was still sleep-deprived from her camping trip she wanted coffee so we parked and went to the Starbucks by the steam clock. She got a venti frappuccino, which is pretty much a coffee-slurpie - they're huge. I got my usual double tall latté - doubles are so much more efficient... same amount of caffeine as a grande at a fraction of the price. Coffees in hand we wandered back through the gauntlet of beggars that I really don't miss from when I lived down there and went to the club.

It was pretty quiet, there hasn't been much promotion for this night yet. The music was good though so we hung out for a while. I had a double gin and tonic (because doubles are so much more efficient). After a few moments we realized that effectively what we were doing was sitting around, listening to good music and watching some made-for-TV plane-crash movie on the TV and that this was not exactly a happening night out so we bailed. I felt a tad guilty for not supporting the first potentially decent Saturday night thing in a long time, but I figure I paid for my coat check, tipped, drank, and tipped the bartender - we weren't there long but I did drop $10 into the kitty as it were, which is something.

We headed over to Luv-a-Fair. I haven't been there for a while. Luv-a-Fair makes me feel old. I first set foot in there about 14 years ago and pretty much nothing has changed. There was some kind of Baja Rosa promotion thing going on so we got free shooters when we came in, then I went back to the double gin and tonics. I'm not sure how many I had, five I think, maybe six. Other than this interesting cover of 99 Red Balloons that I hadn't heard before the music was awful. but I had fun nonetheless. Some friends of Evilyn's - Chris, Dionderra and Erin showed up with Jesse and Russ was there as well and the room was full of people to watch and make fun of.

(Momentary sidetrack there... I was chatting with Valerian... now back to your regularly scheduled havering drivel..)

So anyway the highlight of my night was a back-rub from Dionderra. I swear I was actually dizzy when she finished and I so needed it after all this stress. To hell with love, sex or any of that - I just need someone who can give me a good backrub!

There is not enough coffee for Monday mornings.