I go to the show on Friday night, arriving at Bohemians around ten-thirty wearing a black dress and high heels that I purchased the day before from a boutique at the mall. The Conans tell me that I look good; they are honest men, whatever their other failings, and although I don’t need their confirmation, it feels good to receive it. The dress and heels are not for Chad Arroyo, nor for any member of the Part-time Poets, but no one needs to know that. Bohemians is teeming with life, some of it having devolved into lower species of living, judging from the tattooed, pale flesh on display and the stench of clove cigarettes. It’s a hippy/hipster place, full of beanpole men clad in beanies and skinny-jeans, and similarly dressed women with pixie cuts. I dive through a cloud of marijuana smoke and emerge at the bar, where I order a Jack and coke. The lighting is soft and blue, the crowds huddled together, isolated, the music on the sound system anti-folk. I let something out of my chest in one long, drawn-out breath, my eyes closed. When I open them I see the Berry Eater watching me. He’s standing alone in a corner, wearing black like me, hair uncharacteristically combed and slicked back. I raise my eyebrows at him, and he looks away. He holds a Styrofoam coffee cup, his eyes huge in the dim blue light, and as I stare he moves suddenly, lurching forward and sitting himself next to me at the bar.
"A nice night for making romance," I say.
"You don’t want to talk to me," he says, looking down at the bar. "The girl over there didn’t want to talk to me."
"Which one?" I ask, looking down the bar. "That Tinkerbell look-alike with the big-rimmed glasses? What are you doing talking to manic pixie dream girls? They aren’t real, you know."
"She’s hypergamous. She’ll only sleep with someone of a higher social standing."
"I don’t think you’re right about that one. She looks like she’ll sleep with anybody who’ll buy her a drink."
He laughs, shakes his head, mumbles something, and takes a drink of his coffee. I notice he has a hair growing out of the side of his cheek, a curling, twisting follicle that seems to spiral into nothingness.
"Every time I see a girl like that walking down the street with some loser, I fill up with rage inside," he says, tapping his fingers on the bar surface.
"That’s not healthy," I respond.
"Feminism isn’t healthy. Male oppression isn’t healthy. Fucking a bunch of guys isn’t healthy."
"Well then, don’t fuck a bunch of guys," I tell him.
"Hah, that’s funny. What if I slapped you? Would that be funny?"
"How does a two-inch heel through one of your eye sockets sound? Because that would be the result," I threaten, looking him in the eyes. He’s inexplicably angry, his eyes showing it, their centers dark holes feeding red spider webs.
"You’re a misandrist or a slut, I can’t decide which. Maybe both," he says, getting up from the stool and walking toward the exit. I watch as he spills his coffee all over a couple’s booth, inciting shouts and curses, people yelling at him as he scrambles through the doorway, vanishing into the night.
"Who was that jerk?" says Chad Arroyo, appearing beside me. "You look nice."
"That was the berry-eater. And yes. I do look nice. What are you going for with that suit?" He’s wearing a purple crushed velvet number with a top hat, like something the Mad Hatter would wear.
"I’m looking to approximate the appearance of a colorful gentlemen at ease with himself and the world."
"You ditch the top hat and it doesn’t look bad."
"You’re a fount of wisdom, Leona," he says, placing the top hat upon my head. "Sound check is coming up. We’re all wearing colored suits. I picked purple for its royal connotations, and also because I dig Prince."
"Because you are also short and androgynous?"
"He’s a funky craftsman who can really burn it on guitar when he wants to. An 'auteur' as the French would say."
"No one cares about the French," I respond.
"Everyone loves the French," says Chad. "Thanks for coming. Looks like we have a pretty good crowd."
"So on a scale from one to ten, how terrible is your band going to be?"
"A five? I dunno. You know what Gibbons says. Art is subjective."
"It is not. Everything has rules, Chad. Everything has patterns which are discernible. That’s what my customers tell me. The crazy ones."
"Your customers?"
"Knock ‘em dead," I say, slapping him on the back. He retreats to the stage, putting on a guitar, a baby-blue telecaster covered in electrical tape. I’ve always loved electric guitars, despite my inability to play them. The sleek shape, the curves, the signs of wear and tear, the once bright primary colors faded from strumming hands and marred by sweat and blood—can there be a more intimate instrument? A guitar is an extension of one’s personality, one’s habits and cares. A generic mass-produced instrument like Chad’s telecaster becomes unique with every gig and every piece of electrical tape. His guitar tells me he’s a nostalgic fellow (the baby blue) who isn’t sure what he wants to do artistically (the ugly crisscrossing of tape). He wears it high on his chest, not low by his knees. He looks square up there, with his boxy hair and nervous grin, like a kid performing at a talent show. It’s endearing, and I find myself rooting for him. Maybe he’ll make it, this kid. Maybe the Part-time Poets are destined for great things.
The singer Reggie comes out on stage, impossibly thin and manic, his eyes inflamed, spittle already forming at the corners of his mouth. I order another Jack and coke, knowing that this is going to be an ordeal. Reggie starts mouthing into the microphone, making orgasmic noises, thrusting his thin hips and sucking in his stomach like he’s about to vomit. The guitarists play, shards of chords coming out of the amplifiers jagged and broken, and when the drummer starts a primal beat I still haven’t figured out if the sound check has ended or if this cacophony is their first song. "Another," I tell the bartender, handing him a twenty. He closes my tab, and I retire to a booth in the back, far away from the Part-time Poets and their rambling chaos.
It takes about an hour for them to finish their set, and I find myself enjoying a few of their songs, probably due to the three Jack and cokes I consume, indie art rock not being one of my favorite genres. The berry-eater never reenters the bar, though his shadow hangs over the entire evening. Soon after they finish, Chad approaches, two beers in his hands, his face dripping sweat, his purple crushed velvet suit damp and likely suffocating.
"So how were we?" he asks.
"I didn’t walk out of the bar," I answer.
"That good, huh?"
"I think you accomplished exactly what you wanted to," I say. "The hipsters were entertained, and really, as long as they’re happy, who cares about the rest of us?"
"I care," says Chad, sitting next to me and pushing forward a beer. "Here, a little reward. An IPA with double hops. It should cure all that ales you, hah."
I take a drink and make a bitter beer face.
"This is about the sourest thing I’ve ever tasted. My palate developed on Old Milwaukee’s Best and Miller High Life. This is a system shock," I explain.
"Great game by the way. A true classic."
"I’m assuming you’re referring to a video game. I don’t play many video games."
"Get with the times, Leona. Everyone plays video games. Even girls," he says.
"I do cooler things, like go to strip clubs." Ah, there it is. This is why I’ve put myself through the Part-time Poets. I want to gather all of my eggs together in one grimy basket.
Chad raises a bushy eyebrow. "You’re going tonight? To see your stripper friend?"
"That’s right. My roommates are going as well."
"You have roommates?"
"Two bodybuilders named Dave and Arnold. They’re a pair of characters. Brutish, slovenly, utterly charmless folk. Definitely not your kind of people."
"Your life is more bizarre than I imagined. I want to go."
"You don’t seem the strip club frequenting sort."
"Because I don’t look like a Neanderthal?" he asks, gesturing toward his clownish getup.
"Because you look like you’d be embarrassed to get a boner, though that velvet is kind of pimpish," I admit.
"Look, Leona, either I hang out here with the other hipsters and listen to them tell me how I can improve my band, or I go back to my apartment, smoke a bowl, and eat a box of Cap ‘n Crunch. Those are my options at this point." He puts his hand out on the table, looking me in the eyes, his helmet-like hair adjusting itself like a sentient being. "Or, if a certain lady is most gracious, she’ll invite me out with her and her crew to participate in reinforcing the patriarchy."
"Christ, if you talk like that, they’ll eat you alive."
"I kid, I kid. That last comment was said because it was something you’d expect me to say, and I wouldn’t want to fail to meet Leona Chaney’s great expectations."
"I could punch you in the throat again," I suggest.
"That was really mean."
"I know." I shrug my shoulders, nod toward the door, and Chad and I depart for Cans.
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