Ten Dollar Cover (2024)

Barry's was run down as hell, which the boss of course passed off as having a "vintage feel" and "history in the community". I guess it did. It had that real classic look. There wasn't a pool table but it had the bottles lining the wall behind the bar and the neon signs and wooden floors and shit. People love that kind of stuff for some reason. I can't say I didn't, too. I miss it a little bit, but I can't spend all day looking backwards. I think that's why I'm even writing this, so I can finally put the nail in the coffin as far as thinking about that time. No matter how many times I tell myself I'm over it, the dreams always come back. Maybe I'm delusional in thinking this will help, but I've gotta try something because ignoring it only does so much. My life is definitely better now, but the past will always be there.

At the bar, sometimes it felt like I'd be standing there doing nothing the entire day. Of course I wasn't really doing nothing; hardly anybody did in those days. I was able to find the blind spots in the security camera's field of vision after the first week, so I'd hide in one and use my phone. I had told myself to stay off social media websites, so I'd usually scroll the news. War, killing, celebrity gets cosmetic surgery, man saves kitten, tiger kills man, killer executed, war, popstar returns with new album, woman saves child, woman kills child, war, man kills child, plane kills child, new car model just dropped, whatever. Just a billion things at once. And that was just a small fraction of the zillions of things happening. By the end of an entire day doing this, it felt like nothing mattered, when really many things probably did. But how does anything I can't change even matter? That's the way I thought during that time. I would have tried to just use the downtime to meditate and do my best to radiate tranquility like I do now, but of course even the odd customer every hour made it so I couldn't. So I would stay in a state of half-alertness, neither focused nor distracted, nor calm nor stressed, just dead and alive, until something required my attention.

Tons of people tried to cozy up to me whenever I was bartending, like they were trying to have their little regular moment or something. One guy came in every single Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday night to get piss drunk. He was constantly telling jokes, trying his hardest to seem sardonic, nihilistic and disaffected, like he was the comic relief character on some show. I don't think he realized how much of a tryhard he came off as. He only made me laugh once, when he made fun of another patron's dead mom. I didn't think it was that funny, but sometimes you just have to laugh. Honestly, I hated all the regulars. Drunk people always pissed me off. I couldn't have ever taken that job if I hadn't gotten sober.

My weekends didn't start until a piercing "What's up, dude" shot through the doorway. Marco was my best friend at that time, before everything changed. "Yo, what I've got for you this week is gonna blow your mind." Marco said this every week, but he sounded more serious this time around, ignoring the fact that he spoke unseriously at all times. When I still lived in town all kinds of people flocked to me even though I felt like my personality was really not that great. A lot of it was definitely because of the way that I looked, but I know that wasn't why Marco hung out with me. It honestly surprised me that he never turned out to be gay, at least to my knowledge. I'm bald now anyways so that gets rid of most guys, but it also makes some other ones, and lesbians, think that they have a chance with me. I just laugh it off most of the time. I don't have time for that shit. I had even less back then.

I let Marco help me out with booking bands at the bar. It was actually my idea to start doing this, since we had the room for it. The boss had no objection to my idea. "Hey, as long as it brings in money I don't care what you do." He honestly meant that. I got paid $25 an hour, which was honestly trash at that time. But at least I got to work alone. I liked working alone for certain reasons, but it filled me with a special kind of paranoia and anger when the boss told me to do shit over the baby monitor. In those moments I almost missed being yelled at by an overbearing egomaniacal drug addict telling me to perform unnecessary tasks just so that I wouldn't relax for a moment. If I was constantly full of anxiety I'd be on the same page as him. My old boss, that is. I heard he died. The coffee shop is still open, though.

I didn't get paid for hosting concerts unless I made money selling tickets at the door, but I really loved music at that time and was happy for the opportunity to put it on where I worked. I knew the whole thing would bomb if I chose the acts though. Nobody wanted to get wasted to ambient music, but I definitely would have if I was still getting wasted. "Hold on, I'll be on my break in two minutes." I was desperate to have something to care about, something that made me feel the way I did when I first discovered Nirvana as a kid, or when I first started binging, or when I first did coke, or when I was in a friend group in high school. Hosting concerts at a bar was kind of a mix of those things. There was music, thrills, and community. I can't say it made me happy but it was something to look forward to.

I polished a few glasses and took two of my favorite shaped ones off of the rack for Marco and myself. Draft beer in one, iced soda water with a lime wedge and bitters in the other. Not to be a broken record but it really was a blessing that I stopped drinking before taking this bartending job. I always wanted to be a bartender because it seemed easy. But I knew better than to do that while I was still an alcoholic; I learned my lesson working as a barista and drinking five to six shots of espresso every morning. So that's why I took up drinking, to "balance it out". I was back on just two cups of coffee a day by the time I got hired at the bar. I would smoke weed sometimes, but only every other week or so. I didn't like losing control of my thoughts. I don't do any of that shit now. Sometimes I want to. I slid onto the green cushioned bench in the booth on the opposite side of where Marco was waiting patiently.

"You ever heard of Screw Loose?"
"No."
"Well their drummer has a side project called OHO. He actually produces for a bunch of rappers, and does like experimental beats and stuff. A lot of really crazy, freaky shit. But it's also like, chill. But really dope."
"Who has he produced for?"
"A lot of people... Garbage Gary, XDOG, Fisher, Day Care-"
"Are those even real people?"
"Yeah dude, you can look them up on soundcloud." I did. "Play it on the bluetooth!" I kicked things off with some Garbage Gary. "Marco, this is trash."
"But the beats are nice, right?"
"I don't want to bring in a DJ set from some dude who produces for a bunch of white rappers. Trash ones, at that."
"But he does his beats live. And Garbage Gary is Latino."
"Still, don't you know anybody else who can play?" Honestly, Garbage Gary wasn't bad. I also knew Day Care from college. He was a fucking asshole who tried to fuck me all the time, but his music was amazing. The beats especially.

"Look, if this doesn't go well we'll go back to doing bands. But I really think it'll go well. Also, I already told him we'd let him play."

"Are you fucking serious? Didn't I tell you you have to ask me before confirming with people?" Suddenly, I heard the baby monitor crackle from across the room.

"Going to have to butt in here. I think you ought to give it a chance. My son goes crazy for XDOG in the house. You've gotta be in touch with the youth when doing this kinda stuff."

"Isn't your son like twelve? This is a bar..." There was no response. His voice pissed me off so much. It didn't help that I'd only met him in person for the interview. The lack of a physical presence caused my resentment towards him to build every day. There was a passive, mounting resentment, and then every time he interrupted my chill over that fucking baby monitor the resentment multiplied.

"Look, I'll tell him we can't do it if you really don't want to. But he's not gonna be happy about that..."

"No, don't worry about it. I'm willing to give it a shot, but he better be as good as you say." I'd like to say agreeing to this was my biggest mistake, but that would be reductive. I have to try really hard not to regret this entire period of my life. "Thanks so much, fam. I promise you won't regret this."

"Don't make promises you can't keep." People often thought I was joking, because I said things seriously that others would only say as jokes.

"All right dude, well I'll let you get back to business."

"Thanks, Marco. I'll see you later." He quickly left and went to his bike chained onto the rack next to the door, his green cap matching the illuminated exit sign. I went on my phone until the baby monitor went off.

That Saturday afternoon, OHO, or Brian, came by with his friends for soundcheck. Sometimes we would close the bar during the day when we had shows at night, so that we had less to worry about. The stage had a dilapidated house drum set that we never moved, a stack of bass and guitar amplifiers in the back left corner and a couple of microphones on stands in front. Everything was set up to face the bar, so I got a direct view, for better or for worse, of every act that came through. Booths were on either side of the stage, with tables between the back wall and the bar. As his friends sat at the tables, Brian began to set up.

"How many drink tickets will we be getting today?" Brian had this look that just pissed me off as soon as I saw him. It didn't help that the first thing he said to me was about drink tickets. I didn't mind that he didn't ask my name; I actually prefer it when people don't. But it was something about the way he and his friends all dressed and acted and looked the same, and that he seemed to be the blueprint for that. Like some kind of cult leader. Honestly, all popular people are cult leaders to me. That's something about me that still hasn't changed. I don't really care about individuality, it's more so when conformity and groupthink are dressed up as some sort of countercultural "look at me going against the grain" bullshit that pisses me off. People really think they're better than everybody else just because they can sing some songs or paint some paintings or wear certain clothes. People are dying. It's insane.

"You each get one."
"Are you serious?"
"Is that too many?"
"Whatever. How many guest list spots do we get?"
"None. It's a ten dollar cover. Did you bring somebody to run the door? I can't do it because I'll be at the bar."
"Marco didn't fucking tell us we needed that."
Thankfully, as his attitude got shittier and pissier, Marco finally showed up. "Sorry I'm late, dude."

"No problem." I decided to keep my cool. For how much he annoyed me, Marco was always there for me. I should have appreciated him more. "You mind managing the show for tonight? I think I'm gonna go grab something to eat."

"Of course, dude. Take it easy, just make sure you're back for the show. Trust me, you don't wanna miss it!" I put my trust in him for the evening.

As you might have guessed, I came back to the bar in shambles. Liquor bottles all over the place, cigarette smoke heavy in the air. I had probably already been fired over the baby monitor by this point, but that was smashed into pieces as well. The boss wasn't even in town this weekend, and I was the only other person who worked there. I'm just glad he didn't sue me or anything. I think he wanted to fuck me too, to be honest. Maybe that's why I got the job. Marco was nowhere to be found. He stopped responding to my calls after this day so I assume he got fucked up pretty bad. I don't think he's dead or anything though. I didn't see anything on Facebook about that or anything, and he was kind of popular. I had the thought that maybe he was just scamming me the whole time. Music people are pretty desperate for spaces to perform in, and he seemed to know a lot of them. I really doubt it though. From what I remember about friendship as a kid, he definitely was genuine. I think.

"What the fuck did you guys do?" I tried my best to sound tough in situations like this. Honestly, I kind of was, and I could take most dudes one on one. But that didn't really matter when I was faced with seven white rappers and a dozen of their fans.

"Pipe down, you dumb bitch", said one of the attendees. "His set's about to start." I resigned myself to defeat at this point. I figured, this is where my life has led me. Might as well live in the moment.

The lights came down and an electric growl filled the whole room like water. Even though he was just playing beats with a controller and a laptop, he had every amplifier in the house hooked up. A soft red glow emanated from the stage. The growl morphed delicately into a hum, the sonic manifestation of the colored light. A kick drum shook the floor, and a sampled snare drum cut through the noise. The set went on and on with no breaks between songs and no rap performances, just a two hour stream of melodies and percussion, with a simple and effective light show. There were sections where people moshed fervently and smashed shit all over the bar and minutes during which everyone in the room was stunned. It was the best music I've ever heard in my entire life, hands down. That was the first time I felt like that in years, like what was happening right in front of me was so important, even though it probably really wasn't.

"Thanks for your set." I didn't really know what else to say. Brian and the others left, stepping over the mess of broken bottles and chairs, still bathed in a warm red light, crunching under their boots like orange leaves on an autumn sidewalk. I sat alone in the bar for about thirty minutes contemplating my next move. I found a pack of cigarettes that someone had left on the ground and smoked one with some matches from behind the bar. I figured there was no point in taking care of the place at all anymore. I sat around for thirty more minutes. For some reason, I couldn't bring myself to leave, or even to go on my phone. I thought about calling Marco, but realized I didn't really want to. I remembered a meditation technique I had learned from a monk in the city, or at least a guy in monk robes. I figured it would help me calm down. I started off by sitting in complete stillness, even letting every itch come and go, and after some ten minutes allowed myself to take deep breaths. Breathing in, I noticed I was alive. Breathing out, I smiled at life. Breathing in, I noticed the pain inside me. Breathing out, I smiled at the pain.