At this Sean laughed. “We’ve only been there one time, kook,” he said. “But I wasn’t suggesting the train tracks. I was thinking more of a bar or something.”
Now this took me by surprise. I was twenty-one, just turned it a few months earlier, and hadn’t been to too many bars. No good ones, anyway.
Sean asked Marc if he knew of any. Actually, he asked me first, and I stood there, acting cool, like I had to think about it, and said: “No. Not in this area I don’t think.”
But Marc said he knew of one. In fact, it was the same place he’d pointed out that night at the tracks.
David was in his own zone, watching TV. I know he heard us, but I think he was pretending he hadn’t. Cudd’s music poured loudly as ever from his bedroom.
“Boom, Boom…!”
I think Dusk had had enough of all that ridiculous Booming. It was time for a divorce. A bar did sound like a good idea.
But David was hesitant. He remained glued on the film. He really didn’t want to go to the bar, I could tell by his expression. He never drank. He hadn't any desire to.
“There’s nothing for me there,” he said, over glued onto the television. He sat curled up on the Ed-couch.
“You can drive us,” Marc strongly suggested. He had a way of strongly suggesting things – a cross between a novice hypnotist and a professional bully. “We’ll take Sean’s car. That cool, Sean?”
“All right by me.”
We all looked at David. He still seemed very reluctant, but within a minute we were, all of us, on our way…
Cue’s was the real deal: quite a surprise to my life of, till then, mostly fiction. I stared at the front of the place, out from the back seat of the car, with frightened eyes. It was tucked in the corner of a lonely strip of shops: a laundry mat, a liquor store - and some others I don’t recall. The look of Cue’s, from the outside, said a whole lot about the inside.
Inside it was dark and smoky, the atmosphere sort of how I’d imagine a pirate’s cove to be. There were two pool tables, side to side lengthwise, right as you entered. Behind the last pool table, against the sidewall, was a jukebox. The kind of “real” music Dusk liked filled the place. Next to the juke, over to the left, was a hallway that led to both rest rooms and a backdoor, which led into an outside alleyway. A pinball machine sat unoccupied to the left of the hallway, opposite side of the juke. David, robotically, headed right over in that direction.
(I wanted to join him, but I stuck with Marc and Dusk…)
The bar area stretched out the entire length of the left wall, as if it blanketed out the back of the pinball machine. Along the right wall, opposite the bar area, there was a bunch of stools, where you could sit and watch pool; in the corner, fairly close to the jukebox, was a small, vacant stage. There was a crevice of space, to the first left, at the opposite end of the bar from the pinball, which harbored two electric dartboards. People crowded up that space. And now that David had grabbed the pinball machine, everything in Cue’s was occupied.
Marc headed right for the bar…
The bartender knew him. He shouted Marc’s name - but he said, “Marcus”. He was a stocky guy with gray hair, a gray handlebar mustache, and a thick Irish accent. His name was Jon. Marc shook his hand, introducing Sean and I. He pointed over at David, too, who by now was in his own private universe.
A good number of people at the bar, guys and dolls, all knew Marc Sandoval. These people were characters. They had callused, lit expressions. They’d felt life’s asphalt strike their shins when I complained of rug burn. Unless I was with Marc, I don’t think I’d have the guts to look any of them, male or female, in the eye.
Dusk stayed close to Marc, but was still behind him. He was glancing around the place like a kid who was too old for the zoo, but secretly admired the roaming beasts anyway. I think he feared them deep down, just like I did, although he kept pretty cool about it. He kept cool about it and, as I said, he stayed pretty close to Marc.
Marc - you’d think he was Mayor Marc Sandoval. He didn't even have to bullshit. He wasn’t running - he was already elected. He ordered us three bottles of beer. Irish Jon smiled. “It’ll be my pleasure, kid!!!”
The beer was nice and cold and tasted fittingly perfect. I think Sean paid for them.
After a few I got more used to the place as I sat back on a stool where the three of us headed after ordering the first round. Marc knew some people and had gone back up front. They were all around thirty, all pretty spent and tough like the first batch I’d seen. They kept mentioning “Robert.” I figured Robert was Marc’s older brother. He had mentioned an older brother before so I figured Robert must’ve been him (having forgotten what name he’d mentioned at the tracks), and then I figured these characters were Robert’s old chums.
I don’t know if I detailed all of our ages already: Sean and I were both twenty-one, David also, and Marc, get this - was twenty years old. Twenty and he knew the bartender like a father, all the barflies like old friends, and even the people who didn't know Robert he knew as well. Marc was natural at talking to these people; he was indeed one of the gang.
Besides handshakes, neither Sean nor myself said a word to anyone. I guess Sean did every once or twice, usually just an added quip onto a conversation that Marc had already struck with somebody.
Myself, I sat there amazed, watching Marc – the social butterfly.
After a third beer my head got adjusted to the lights. The dimness became a normal pitch. The pirate cove feel became sort of familiar. The music began sounding as great as Dusk knew it was. This was better than any film. This was a beautiful film-like reality and we were right in the core.
Some guys Marc didn't know were shooting pool at the table near us. Marc had come back from his social rounds and he hit these dudes up for a game. One of the guys didn't look into it. But the older, stronger looking one nodded, and agreed.
Marc watched the game. He noticed the guy who wasn't too into the offer was the worst player of the two. The guy who’d agreed was pretty good. By pretty good I mean good. I hadn't seen too many pool players except in the movies, and once or twice in person. This guy seemed pretty good to me. But Marc stood watching, arms folded, looking quite unimpressed.
I saw the precise detail of scrutiny etched upon his face, his eyes darting around like knowing mice in a familiar maze: he was learning…
Sean glanced around the bar, one foot tapping to the rhythm of the music; he had lackadaisical drinking eyes as he scanned the bar action passively.
I watched Marc mostly. He held the plot this night. He held what was going down…
When you’re drinking what’s “going down” at the moment is not only important, but it’s essential. For you must then become the moment within the moment. Nothing else (at the time) really matters.
The reluctant guy lost and then Marc, without missing a beat, racked them up. He did this with sure-sped quickness. I looked over and saw David still playing the pinball game. I don’t think I ever saw him at the bar getting change. I think he was made of quarters or something.
Out of that distraction I was sent back to the game by the whip crack of the big guy’s break. He then stood erect and serious, his eyes narrowed as the balls scrammed around the table – not one sunk in.
He then slouched back near his buddy and lit up a cigarette as Marc stepped “up to bat”. He paced the table like a predator.
He knocked in three in a row the first time up. I don’t want to bore you with exact details of the rest of the game, let’s just say, Marc beat the guy’s ass. The poor dude made, I don’t know, maybe four the whole game.
What impressed me the most wasn’t the defeat, but in Marc’s naturally polite ability to remain quite cool about his win. Not cool as in smug, but cool as in humble.
The defeated guy offered Marc a beer. All three walked up to the bar. Marc knew more people up there. I don’t think the two guys knew a lot of people but now, since they were with him, they would soon enough.
I glanced over at Dusk. He looked kind of sleepy. He had the same sort of expression Marc had when a real good film came on at the Cavern.
In about an hour we left and headed straight back to the house: I was pretty drunk, but tiredly so…
I vaguely remember laying on the couch, the Ed-couch, and Marc was on the floor sound asleep already, and Sean was, legs up, the best he could, laying on the smaller couch. David had gone home. The TV was on but turned down low.
“Marc ruled that place,” Dusk replied. He did sound kind of impressed, but still pretty mellow. Sort of deflated. He was pretty tired, just like me…
That was the last thing I recall, Sean saying that, until Saturday’s dawn, as the noise of Sissy making himself an early egg breakfast woke us in the morning…
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