The smell of Milwaukee's Best and cigarette smoke coupled with the laughter of Greeks . . . . .. That was the Publican. In this cavern of drunken splendors and loudly loose women, Red, Edwards and I were demigods. A two-dollar cover charge, handed briskly to the skeletal remains of what used to be a man guarding the door against under-age drinkers, were all the dues to be paid in advance. The rest of those dues were paid whenever the remnants of the last chemicals departed your system three days later.
The Publican always gave us a false sense. It was two floors but only one really mattered. However, no one but the help entered on the lower level that really mattered. After shoving two dollars at the skeleton and producing some sort of picture ID, we entered the top floor. The top floor was more of a maze than a bar. It was the mixture of pool tables, college kids, and aging locals that fueled an already chemically addled body to hunt the descending stairs. The mood of the Publican's upstairs was always the same. No matter how boisterous and rocking the lower level became, no matter how many college kids over-powered the pool tables and the bar, the upper level always smelt of town. The town smell that drives a person toward drinking in order to forget the concept that, bubba, you're in amongst the mountain folks with a limited tolerance and an abundance of ignorance.
That upstairs was the first gambit ran that evening. Always ran in utter silence against the brightness. Not a typical brightness of a room but more like the brightness that burns down on you from the eyes of God when you've taken that forbidden cookie from the jar after school. It was a furious gambit of avoiding conversation with acquaintances that would get your party stalled out upstairs. Being stalled out upstairs was quite similar to wandering around outside the Nine Hells. However, we were, as usual, on a quick mission to the basement. Past the pool tables, navigating around the bar, and descending the extraordinarily wide stair case downward. The red wallpaper, spinning disco ball, and socially acceptable darkness perked a smile to each of our faces. Knowing that, in a few seconds, after we pulled out our bar stools, we would, in unison, call the name of "Linda."
"Good evening boys," smiled Linda. "What can I get ya?"
Edwards smiled and said, "Your phone number."
"Ah, you're sweet," smiled Linda. "Beam tonight, honey?"
"No," said Edwards with a sober look on his face. "Linda, I quit drinking."
"Good for you honey. What can I get ya?"
"Linda," smiled Edwards again. "I'll have a Pepsi . . . and two shots of Jim Beam."
"The same," I replied.
"You boys almost had me," laughed Linda as she turned to the sacred bottle of Mr. Beam. "What about you, Red?"
With a clink of metal against laminated wood, Red laid down a pile of change. "Draft, Linda."
Edwards turned to look at Red. I turned to look at Red. Hadn't we done this before? "What," cried Red from over Edwards, "you pussies want some shots?"
"Well, yeah," I replied. "We sort of ordered them when we sat down. Why? What did you have in mind?" Like I didn't already know the answer that was to shoot from his mouth like a slug at my brain.
"Why, Screaming Nazis, of course. Linda," he shouted from his perch at the bar. "Forget about the Beam and bring us some Screaming Nazis."
"Now, you boys don't get too wild tonight," laughed Linda as she placed the dime draft in front of Red. "Remember what happened with the Flaming Assholes."
I vaguely remembered that night. Was it my idea? A night dedicated to drinking what we deemed girl drinks in order to get plastered that strangely back-fired. I can still see the blue flame licking of my fingers as I separated the eight shots laid on the wooden bar surface and the shout of another bartender. We were banned from the stuff. The great Flaming Asshole experiment was indeed a success. Or was it a failure? Either way they were off our radar.
"You have my word, lovely," chimed in Edwards. "Nothing like that will happen tonight. I've got a close eye on these two maniacs"
Linda filled three short glasses with Jagermeister and Rumpleminz right in front of our eyes and changed our drink orders from Pepsi to Michelob at the blink of an eye. She was methodical and mechanical but with the warmth of a grandmother looking out for her children's children. We raised our glasses simultaneously once the pouring ritual ended and gazed at each other through the dim light from the overhead fluorescents tucked neatly over and behind the bar rim.
"To Linda," we cheered in unison as the short glasses were lifted even higher. The three additional bar patrons glanced our way at the spectacle of exuberance.
Red, noting we had their full attention, added, "Ein seig, ein Reich, ein Furher."
I easily mouthed, "Ja voy." Slamming the contents back against my tonsils and then bludgeoning the bar top with the empty glass. The sound of we three banging the laminated wood echoed around the empty bar bringing more than haphazard glances. "I'm going to the head. Give me that pipe," I said lowly to Edwards who slid the bronze pipe from his pocket and into my BDU pocket. "Keep an eye on Red."
I got up slowly and placed my right hand into the pocket with the pipe to cradle it as I walked. My left-hand reached instinctively for the bottle of Michelob. Never leave an unattended beer even with your friends close. All it takes is one rotten bastard with a menacing vibration to ruin your drug catalog for the evening. Being able to identify and intelligently reflect on your dosage is vital to any drug-crazed but responsible American college student.
The downstairs bathroom at the Re-Pub was truly a scene out of some bizarre and feverish nightmare. Depending on the time of the month, the trough that was nestled against the sidewall was sprayed with a variety of food products. At the first Thursday of the month, the scent of stale urine mixed with the colors of an undigested spaghetti from the local monthly dinner circuit at an affordable price. As the month rolled on, the catalog of food littering the trough became a cornucopia of surprises. The solitary stall adjacent to the trough is where I hid myself and locked the fumbling locking mechanism. Pulled the pipe from my BDU pocket and settled the Michelob on the toilet water tank for safety precautions. I lit a filter-less to mask the potent smell of the pungent herb in the bronze pipe. A few deeply inhaled puffs and the pipe cover was slammed shut to prevent any spillage or accidental burning. The warm pipe then slid easily back into my BDU pocket as I grabbed the burning cigarette and emptying Michelob for my return to the bar seat.
On my arrival, I found the bar thoroughly engulfed by drunken college girls and amply inebriated and testosterone filled boys on a quest for the next big thing. The entire surroundings of the dance floor were filled and the sound of dimes clattering interspersed with the conversations typical to drunken quarters assaulted my ears. Maneuvering through heavy sub-human traffic, I found the seat I had vacated still empty and another Michelob just being laid on the bar by Linda almost announcing my triumphant return.
"Took you long enough," screamed Red as I pulled the bar seat away from the edge. "We were about to send out the Air Calvary for your protection, of course."
"Bastards," I yelled back at the direction of Edwards and Red. "Who are all these fools and why are they so damn drunk?"
"The girls aren't here yet," shouted Edwards in denial of my question. "So, speed up the pace. We've got plenty of liquor to drink."
"Liquor," questioned Red? "Damn near killed her."
Screaming Nazis were followed by Hitler's Revenge and finally I saw through the reflection in the mirrored bar column before me the descent of the girls. Seven women who stumbled in unison down the extra-wide staircase looking directly at our backs through the crowd gathered to watch our alcoholic patriotism. I nudged Edwards next to me as we finished another round of Michelobs. How many was the score? Was I truly concerned? "Six o'clock, Edwards."
"It's more like eleven," he smiled knowing full well what I was speaking. At that time, we were rushed by all seven at once in a celebration of a hunt finally at an end. Seductive hugs and mild groping ensued as we mixed happy greetings with an order of drinks for the gathered crowd. Conversations disjointed and I can see we three being pulled from our comfortable positions around Linda to various corners of the bar like some cosmic wind that blew too strongly within the confines of four dark red walls.
The five girls seated around me at the circular table on the far fringes of the elevated seating area only included two from our original following. The other three were foreign to me in the sense that I'd seen them before but their collection into the menagerie was quite unwarranted. I could barely make out the form of Edwards across the way in the stepped down billiards area across the dance floor. He was fenced in by the iron barricade and surrounded by far more women that were both foreign and exotic. Red vanished. He was no longer part of my guided tracking or on any of my radar screens that were now flooded with the scents of perfumed, soft skin and rail-level vodka.
"Let's do one more round of shots and go to My Place," squealed the blonde girl of whom I was barely remembering as a friend of a friend of Amy's. "One more round of Lemon Drops for all of us?"
She was quite a testament to the entire pub scene; a young thing that could only enter a shady bar like the Re-Pub under use of a blatantly false I.D. I vaguely remember her name being a Kerri or Sheri or some other strictly vacuous name ending in an "i" sound. Kerri was equally as vacuous as her name in wanting to tempt me into buying another round of short glasses for her gathered entourage. She was truly their leader but I was calling the shots.
"How about we all do some Mind Erasers and then mosey back to the confines of Lower Console Road," I asked innocently enough to remove any group of young sheep away from their shepherd and into the lion's den. In unison the girls agreed as long as I also partake in the ritual. That condition, of course, was readily obvious. How could I ask these five drunken college girls busting from their tops and squeezed into their tight attire to imbibe a concoction so brutal without personally getting involved?