Beers
James was working through the Belgian beers on the Quarry House menu while I was deciding what to do after their meager Scottish collection.
“I find women who can’t cook endearing.” He said over the menu.
I muttered a reply, considering a shift to the Abita Jockamo, which I always found to be one of the more outstanding IPA’s. But, with the Quarry House’s attempt at a worldly beer menu, it felt somewhat common to order something made in the US.
It was a few minutes before I realized that both James and the waitress were staring at me.
“Huh?” I asked James, while looking at the waitress.
“Huh?” They both replied in unison.
“Uh…the Jockamo.” I ordered.
The waitress narrowed her eyes. I pointed at the listing on the menu and she said, “Ah, Abita!”
“What do you find endearing about women?” James asked.
“Tits.”
“Oh, Nacho. Please try and be serious.”
“Okay. Cunts.”
James shuddered, then changed the subject. “Well… Thank god we went out to drink.”
“You’re paying.”
“Glad to do so, since the alternative is sitting by candlelight in your dismal apartment drinking scotch you stole from your weekend job years ago.”
“Nothing wrong with that.” I glared at the crowded tables surrounding us.
“Heaven forbid a dime escapes your pocket.”
“Abita’s six bucks, James. We could get a six pack for that.
“Shit, Nacho, just when I think you’re okay, I’m violently reminded of your Hibernian heritage.”
“Not Irish.”
“What?”
“My heritage is Scottish.”
“Isn’t that what Hibernian means?”
“No. It’s what the Romans called Ireland.”
“Are you sure about that?
“Actually…no. Not 100%.”
Two beers arrived. My Abita, and a dirty glass, and James got a liter of some insane Belgian brew that poured out milky white.
“What the fuck is that?”
“Monk cum.”
I watched him, horrified, as he tipped the glass to his lips and chugged the monk cum. Then he slammed the glass on the table and screamed, “I love cum!”
That cleared the table pressing up against ours, which had been occupied by three metrosexuals and a weird looking girl who performed a windmill technique to remove and put on her coat.
“Good night!” James shouted as they left. Then, still at top volume, he turned back to me and said, “Is it wrong if I want to fuck a black girl, really hard, from behind, while playing a Youtube video of MLK’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech?”
“Well, you know, as long as it’s consensual.”
“Of course.”
“The whole speech is sexual, you know.” I tipped my glass towards his, “You done?”
“No, there’s still half a liter of cum in here.” He tapped the bottle. Watched me watch him. Then, somewhat hesitantly, he refilled his glass. “Sexual?”
“Let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.”
“Oh-ho-ho. Yeah, yeah.”
“Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.”
James laughed, then screamed, “Put ‘em on the glass, New York!”
“Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!”
Several tables near us had fallen into a sullen silence. James blinked. “Uh…is that sexual?”
“The ‘Alleghenies of Pennsylvania’? Are you serious? How more sexual can you get?”
“I…don’t quite…”
I waved him off, “Then the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado and then the curvaceous slopes of California.”
“Oh, okay. Curvaceous slopes is a little over the top.”
“And every hill and molehill of Mississippi.”
“So was King saying that Mississippi women have small tits?”
“He was, yes.”
“I really want to have sex during that speech now.”
The waitress, who had been standing unnoticed beside us, cleared her throat.
“Another Abita,” I muttered.
“Surprise me,” James said.
“I…can’t.” The waitress looked uncomfortable.
“You can’t just pick a random beer?”
“No. You have to order one.”
“You are incapable of surprising me?”
“…sorry.”
“If you’re single or in an unhappy relationship, you realize that this is probably the reason why.”
I smiled weakly, and the waitress backed away.
“Whoops.” James covered his mouth, “Have I been speaking out loud?”
“Yes. For the last 35 years.”
“You have to pick!” the waitress nearly shouted, her voice wavering somewhere between panic and despair in a way that made me think, briefly, that she was a malfunctioning android.
“I’ll have an MGD and a side order of tatertots.” James ordered, and the waitress ran away.
“Really?”
“If the world ends right now, I want them to find my corpse slouched over a can of MGD and a plate of tater tots. I try to always be prepared for that. Better than recovering my corpse from atop a toilet, eh?”
“If the world ends, then who would come looking for you?”
James seemed confused. “Well…my mom, of course. What do you mean?”