Read Online The Sapphire Express by J. Max Cromwell - Free Book Online

and soda after spending a couple of minutes trying to find a barstool that wasn’t wet or filthy, or both. The bartender looked at me incredulously after I placed my order but started slowly pouring the drink in a glass that was surprisingly clean. He was a serious, somber man, a professional dive bar barkeeper who had probably seen so many disgusting things in his life that he had stopped watching violent movies altogether. His reality was ugly and vile, and his lungs full of illegal cigarette smoke and stuffy bar air that the shallow exhalation process of the toothless alcoholics and jumpy addicts kept spewing out night after night. He hated bullshit and pretentious pricks more than anything. His dark hair was greasy and long, his shirt dirty, and his patience nonexistent. He had a round belly full of oily food, and his smoker’s skin was dreaming of a trip to the snowy mountains where the poison that it was forced to absorb every single day was not present. He was a fairly intelligent man, like a hungry predator who knew his place in the world. He had no illusions about anything, and the grimy man had accepted that he was going to work at Johnny D’s until death would claim his tired soul. That was my humble analysis, at least.
    After the whiskey and soda was properly mixed, the bartender handed it to me and asked, “Are you a tattoo?”
    “No,” I said without even thinking about his words.
    “So you think you belong here?”
    “I don’t belong anywhere.”
    “Well, you look like a family man who had a bad day at the office. Did the boss man make you cry? Did he slap you on your ruddy cheeks after you deleted all his important files with your porky fingers?”
    I didn’t say anything.
    “You see, we get a lot of folks here who look like a tribal tattoo on an octogenarian. They just don’t fucking belong, you know, and I try to help them to understand that simple fact of life because I’m a nice guy.”
    I still didn’t say anything.
    “Did you hear what I just said, Mr. Family Man?”
    I looked at him with lifeless eyes and said, “Yes, I heard you loud and clear, Mr. Bartender. I just don’t know what to say because I thought that you were here to sell beer, maybe a fancy drink or two if some of your fine customers really want to splash out. Isn’t that your goddamn job, or were you hired here to just talk bullshit, and some other guy—who I can’t see right now—is doing the bartending?”
    The dirty man looked at me sourly and said, “Look, asshole. This is my bar, and I make the rules, OK?”
    I took a sip of my whiskey and soda and just looked at him.
    The bartender tilted his head slightly sideways and said, “You see, my life is miserable enough as it is. I don’t serve your kind because I want to. I am here simply because this is my life, and sometimes a man has to accept that he is holding the only deck of cards he was given by the good Lord. Dreamers and optimists can go to hell and see if someone listens to them there. You see, the only thing I can do to improve my day is to spend it with people I can at least tolerate. Is that too much to ask?”
    “No.”
    The barkeeper looked at me carefully and picked up the glass that was now empty. He was clearly thinking whether to kick me out or offer me another drink.
    I answered his gaze with my bloodhound’s eyes and sighed deeply because I thought the whole discussion was entirely unnecessary, and in my book, “unnecessary” was equivalent to time wasted. Then I said sharply, “Look, I need you to shut up now and give me another whiskey and soda, OK? Double the scotch, this time.”
    The bartender raised his eyebrows, and he was going to say something, but before he could open his lips, I continued, “Look, man. I am going to get drunk here today, and I will probably come back tomorrow to nurse my hangover. I like this bar, and I have no intention to go anywhere else. Don’t ever again question my place in this world or my decision to