Charlie Brown

It was nothing. When he grabbed the glass Billy set down in front of him, his elbow poked the guy next to him. No, not poked, even. Touched. Barely. He barely even touched this guy, with his thousand dollar suit and his salon haircut, and he thought he even had cufflinks. Here, at Mike's. Cufflinks.

So anyway, Cufflinks is up like lunch, talking about how Now you've done it, and You don’t wanna start something. No, I don't wanna start something, he said, and got back to his beer. I wanna start this beer, that's what I wanna start, he said. Someone had Charlie Brown on the jukebox. Had to be one of those new guys, the guys with brand-new ball caps on. Trying to create the picture-perfect barroom scene. Why didn't Cufflinks go fight them? Or buy them a round or something? Anyway, so the guy's in his face now. The guy puts his hand up, like he's supposed to inspect it or something and tremble at how mighty it is. Yeah, nice hand.

This hand, he goes, is gonna take your head off, you don't get the hell out of this bar. Get out of the bar? Yeah, right. He's gonna get out of his regular Friday night bar he's been coming to every Friday night for maybe, what? A year and a half. No matter what. Snow, he'll walk. Rain, who cares? Donna talking about If you go out that door, don't expect to see me when you come back. Who cares, and Hello, Billy, how about a big beer for Yours Drunkly?

So Cufflinks wasn't chasing him off. Not with that big, soft hand held out like a flabby napkin. Would take a hell of a lot more than that. I just started my beer, okay? I'm real sorry I bruised your delicate arm and all. Cufflinks whispered something to the whore on his right and turned back to him. You and me, he goes, we're having a talk. Outside. So he hopped off his stool and went around back, Charlie Brown still going strong.