The guys who were trying to f**k her didn't even buy her a drink: there really are useless people in this world.

I ran off to do some errands -- sometimes there is life that needs to be conducted outside of the bar -- and when I returned the girl with the tattoos and the streaked hair from a bottle who just quit her job was still there. She can hold her alcohol, but she now has had more alcohol than she could reasonably hold.

The unseemly part of bar life is now happening: most of the regulars have left, and a few young men are around her, commiserating. That is, they are commiserating with her in the hopes that being the commiserating guy will get her to drunkenly go home with them and fuck. Hyenas.

I usually keep a distance to people's dramas: you can't make everyone make a good decision. But I cannot let this happen. I slide between her and one of the guys and disrupt the path of the conversation. I ask her gently if it is time to go home.

The guys are now upset with me. Upset, and drunk. They make comments, I make comments back. Eventually one guy infers that we should talk outside. Well, not 'infers', exactly: he pretty much says he wants to talk to me outside.

I say "Sure" and now he begins to register doubt. I should not want to go outside with him. He thinks I might have misunderstood what he is saying, and clarifies: he thinks he should kick my ass. Again: I say "Sure".

Experience has taught me that a lot of guys who say they want to fight really don't want to fight. Unless they are absolutely sure they will win. A reasonable doubt stops them. Of course, some of guys who say they want to fight really do want to fight: it is fun for them. Some of them live for it. The key is being able to tell the two kinds apart. I believe the guy is in the first group, and I am right: he drops the subject of fighting, and just calls me an Asshole. Sure, fine.

The girl with the tattoos and the streaked hair from a bottle who just quit her job says she probably should get home. The problem is that she is out of money: after the regulars left she had to buy her own drinks. The guys who were trying to fuck her didn't even buy her a drink: there really are useless people in this world.

I tell her I'll pay for a taxi, and we wait outside and smoke a cigarette until the taxi comes.

- james james

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