The bar was dimly lit and the main source of light was a fluorescent source wrapped in red that gave the whole place an ominous reddish glow. Basically all you could see were varying shades of red and black.
Apart from the light, it was an average American bar. The kind you see in movies. There was a bartender at the extreme end. Bottles of cheap liquor stacked behind him in no particular order. A pool table occupied most of the space in the centre and 3 hefty men were standing beside it with cue sticks in their hands. Four or five men were seated at the bar guzzling beer at a rate that kept the sole bartender moderately busy. One of them was a particularly fat person under whose weight the bar stool was on the verge of collapsing. He seemed sad. Like you are sad after you are fired from the job. He was wearing a suit too. It seemed that he was an office working guy whose only exercise was the commute to and from the office in a car. His appearance was considerably different from the rest of the bar who all looked like ruffians and wore leather. Many of them had a ‘squeeze’ beside them who would show appreciation and clap hands whenever they made a good pool shot. A good number of choppers parked outside reinforced the image of the bar being dominated by some gang. This was not the bar you would like to bring your daughter to. You know, as soon as soon as a young woman who did not look like a total prostitute, entered the bar, people would turn to look at her. There might be whistles and cat-calls. Everything about the bar was just so typical.
But there was something wrong with this guy. He did not seem interested in the people nearby him. The only interaction with the outside world was when he would place his empty glass on the counter and the bartender would replace it with a filled one. He did not look up when a skimpily clad waitress passed by. He did not even look up when a minor scuffle started in the bar. He had one thought and only one though on his mind. But that was a mystery to the onlookers.
It is a common habit that we try to imagine what was the reason behind things being the way they are. Whenever you see a person, you try to guess who they are, a bit about their past just by the way they look, they dress or they talk. You have to methodically categorize things.
‘He is businessman on a trip and bored with his life in general.’
‘She is a student and all she can think of is that her nail-polish looks so cool.’
‘He is a poet/writer and is daydreaming about the heroine in his next work!’
We have to categorize things. We have to have an explanation that fits. But to the people in the bar, this base curiosity would not be fulfilled. For he was very different from them. All they could say about him was that he did not belong here. Apart from that they had no idea. They did not know what work he did. They did not know why he was sad. And most of all, what was he doing in this part of the city in this run-down bar that served cheap, semi-decent drinks. The moment you admit that you know nothing about that guy and that he does not belong here, it makes you uncomfortable. And rightly so, for your curiosity remains unquenched. The mystery surrounding this person rose to such an extent that people were distracted from their games. They would occasionally peak at the person. Even Little Bill, who was accused of a murder but got away with it because his uncle was a politician, sneaked a glance at the guy.
The waitresses however, were scared of him too. For they knew they didn’t matter. They had learned that well. If you quarrel with a customer in this bar, you might go missing only to be found floating in the river 3 days later. ‘And the greatest fear is the fear of the unknown!’ she had heard a wise patron say. They tried maintaining distance from him to the extent that they would take longer routes around him. But even then, they could not refrain their curiosities entirely. They would take side glances at him. But all they could see was his back and his once neatly tailored and ironed suit which had grown a bit shabby. They did not dare to expose themselves trying to look at his face. They knew that poking into other people’s business was dangerous. Surely they would not want to give away a ‘stable’ job for a little curiosity. All they could do was wonder how he actually looked.
The Punks were not scared of him. Why should they be scared? This is their area. Little Bill was a powerful man and under his protection they could do anything in this part of the town. But they were definitely curious. Of course Little Bill never uttered a single word about him. Why should he? That guy was inconsequential. Little Bill would always judge a guy in terms of a physical rival. The moment he laid his eyes upon a person, he answered in his mind, if he could take that guy one-on-one. Given his name not being even close to his physical appearance, he rarely lost in his mind. The one time he did, he challenged the guy to a back alley fight. The rules were simple. One on one. No weapons. Fight till death. He had smashed the rival’s head in less than 30 seconds. He looked at a fat sad man on a bar stool. ‘10 seconds’ he estimated.
The bartender was perhaps the only man who could see him properly. More than others anyways. He wasn’t really scared because he had Little Bill’s hand on his head too, but he minded his own matters and served drinks. He made decent money with this bar that had been with his family for generations. For countless days, he had poured one drink after another. He had not even glanced at most of his customers, simply because it didn’t matter. But this one had him edgy. He had eyed the shotgun kept below the bar-counter to ensure that it was there. How could a simple man wearing a coat and doing nothing other than asking for more beer evoke such strong feelings? In any other bar, he might have been overlooked but here... Something was very wrong. He collected his thoughts and tried to analyze them. The most obvious feature about him was that he was fat and was dressed rather formally. He was wearing a white suit piece and a white shirt but his tie seemed to be missing. The clothes seemed like he had been wearing them for a long time now and that they were sweaty now and had dirt on them. The top two buttons were undone and he could see a hint of gold. Maybe a chain or something. Obviously this guy was rich and from an area where wearing gold does not get you killed. His head was down and he could not properly see his face, only his curly hair. He did note that his gaze never faltered save for when he would push his mug out for refill. He wasn’t weeping but his pain seemed pretty strong. It was like when you have lost everything in life. A huge business loss maybe. Maybe his daughter ran away with some nigger or worse, she was raped by one. ‘What has this country come to!’ he mused. Whatever happened to the good old days when you could treat a slave like one.
The fat man had been in the bar for not more than half an hour. But in his first 10 minutes, had drawn everyone’s attention. People would not be satisfied till they either got an answer or till the man went away. Everyone would have preferred the former. But like any big question, the answer remained elusive.
The fat man had had a few too many. The pain was not drowned but for now, this would have to do. He knew he would never be able to actually forget it completely and lead a normal life. He got up quietly, paid a sum twice the price of the drinks and walked out. Many heads turned. Many eyes followed him out of the bar. Even Little Bill turned once to get a look at his face but couldn’t get a nice view because of so many heads in the line of sight, all fixed towards the exiting person. Even if the fat man was aware of all these eyes on him, he didn’t show it. He just walked out into the silent cold night and never glanced back.
