Election Night

A dreary day descended into a depressingly cold November night as Dale Whitmer sat on his bare mattress. He was new to town, new to the area, and new to temperatures that fell below seventy. His soul was having difficulty adjusting to his unsavory surroundings, much like the critics had a hard time understanding his latest film. Leaving the “soon to have heat” apartment a broker had procured for him the day before would be a chore, but his stomach could be silenced no longer. His options were simple — shake off the frostbite and leave his arctic abode or stay inside and chew on his frozen breath.

Dale chose option A.

Quite convenient for his present circumstances was a neighborhood bar down the block named, Etonner. Since he wasn’t seeking out surf and turf and had no interest in trudging around town wearing his signature Burberry London Black Wool Single Breasted Trench Coat, the only jacket he ever owned, the quaint establishment would have to do. From the outside, he could tell this would not be the most reputable of places. The awning that hung in front appeared weathered and no longer a confident green. The face of the bar was made up of ancient pinkish bricks that had been leaned upon, Dale surmised by the countless deadbeats who frequented this hole in the wall. He could see the cops arriving on scene to take away one drunk after another who attempted to headline their own main event.

Dale opened the door and several heads, along with the bartender, turned to look for a familiar face. As if belonging to a hive, immediate recognition that his particular face bore no resemblance to a regular came over the group, and they resumed their drinking and carousing. Fine by Dale, he was there for a burger and a blast of hot air, preferably several blasts.

He walked up to the bar, already regaining sensation in his hands, and asked the bartender for a table. When asked how many, Dale held up an index finger with not a hint of dirt underneath the manicured nail. The bartender told him to take his pick of the many open tables to his right. He was a man in his early forties, Dale imagined, most likely a gym teacher who worked the second job to support his family. Of course, no one told him to have five kids or to purchase a house a little beyond his means. You are a product of your choices, and this man probably had little of his own growing up to do.

Having seen too many lazy Mafioso movies, Dale chose the table in the corner and sat against the wall, surveying his surroundings. This was the definition of a neighborhood bar, a shit load of pictures of who he presumed to be long dead regulars hung above the bar in cheap brown frames. They were a lineup of drunks, and their soulless eyes met his stare and held. A local version of the Terracotta Army, guarding their emperor.

He pulled his eyes from the series of lost souls and continued his visual tour. The requisite dartboard full of holes and chalk scoreboard full of permanent markings hung directly across from him on the other side of the bar. Most likely used by lonely men with a drink in their hand, looking to pass the time in their meaningless existence. The surrounding tables appeared to be temporary, and Dale surmised on the weekends the space was cleared to make way for what the owner hoped to be a larger audience full of people with nothing better to do except stand next to strangers.

Hanging on both sides of the bar were two televisions, one flat screen, and one vintage picture tube. They were muted, with closed captioning scrolling across the bottom of the screen. Dale was surprised the older box was a color one and knew its presence was due to a lower profit margin than expected. Today was November 3, 2020, Election Day. The monitors were tuned to different news channels, with the bar's political leanings readily apparent by where the occupants congregated. Both sides flaunted the same types of talking heads, each expressing the outcome of the race in the appropriate amount of joy or despair.

The actual bar itself was one big wooden plank extending itself along the entire eastern wall. The stools were half full; Dale estimated that only regulars would come out in this weather and assumed that his staring was starting to freak out some of the occupants. With a cough, he reached for the menu, standing on his table like a mini sandwich board, and contemplated his options. He could have a burger, with or without cheese, a chicken sandwich, a roast beef sandwich, buffalo wings, or chive blini with crème fraiche and quail eggs.

Wait…

What?

Sensing the confusion, his waitress entered his field of vision, and Dale already guessed her back story. She once had potential, beautiful, full of personality, and would have made a great wife to a great guy. Except birth control wasn’t a priority until it was. Now estranged from the deadbeat, her decision occurring only after they confirmed their poor choice a second time in the biblical sense. She had one now in college, the other in high school. Now, once again alone, missing those random nights she found herself sleeping next to someone else. And this pattern went on and on until the entirety of her dreams flowed back into the sewer of life.

The waitress, however, had no interest in Dale’s back story or his blank stare and openly wondered if he was ready to order. Dale, shaking the fairy dust from his brown eyes, asked her about the last item on the menu, the chive blini with crème fraiche and quail eggs. From her smile, Dale wondered how often she had heard those words, and the resulting speech put his guess in the upper hundreds. If Dale could condense her second act monologue into a concise statement, he would summarize thusly,

“The chef lived in France.”

Sensing an opportunity to experience true beauty amongst the thorns, Dale ordered the exotic cuisine, along with a Grimbergen, and gave a smile to dismiss the waitress. With his order taken care of, Dale was free to continue on with his examination. Looking over the occupants on the left side of the bar, he saw nothing but sport-themed hats and wretched faces. Men he felt who took an interest in gambling, ignoring their lack of talent in the activity. How much money had been collectively lost by the deadbeats staring forlornly into their dollar drafts? The rent, tuition, perhaps even a wedding ring, hocked in desperation. These were men who did not know their limitations and in that ignorance remained in a prison of their own making.

A chime rang. In walked a gentleman wearing a three-piece suit, with the Webster’s dictionary definition of a Windsor knot. His thinning silver hair had a clean part commonly found on Wall Street, and Dale guessed one would not find a piece of lint anywhere on the man’s body. A man with such distinction had to be a man who possessed some type of power, and a man who possessed some type of power was certain to abuse the notion. Dale knew the man was full of avarice, cruel to his underlings with whom he expected to ring every drop of their souls until the last nickel was found. This was a man who shut his lights on Halloween and complained of too much revelry on New Year’s. His contempt was such that Dale had to mentally restrain himself from accusing the man of gross misconduct right there on the spot.

Despite his outward appearance, the man was openly and strangely demonstrative in word and action. Dale anxiously stared at the man’s hair to see if all his jostling would shake one loose from its polish. This eruption of emotion was probably a passing storm. His true fury reserved for his mouse of a wife and the children he acknowledged with a handshake.

At that moment, Dale realized this was the first bar he had encountered in a very long while whose only sound originated from its occupants. There was no jukebox, and the televisions were silenced. Yet, based on an acoustic anomaly, he had a hard time hearing the older gentlemen, deeply distressed by some event. Ignoring his inclinations to move towards the volume, Dale mentally took a step back and concentrated on the two younger men on the other side of the bar, one of which was in the middle of a Shakespearean monologue.

Based on the similarities in ages, Dale surmised the individual on the left was not lecturing the gentleman on the right. Perhaps he was giving some worldly advice, most likely involving women. The man on the right was probably heartbroken, the Lothario who had met his match with a Don Juan who possessed an extra large wallet. The man on the right listened, Dale gathered, to his friend tell him that there were other women, women who did not base their affections on quantity, be it physical or material. He would one day find the girl who most appropriately fit into the various nooks and crannies of his life. Until then, the young man should buck up and keep his eyes up — if not to see his upcoming happiness then to avoid tripping on his self-pity.

His eyes found an older man at the bar who appeared to have offered up the wrong opinion and was now furiously holding fast to whatever position he maintained with another man, who could be said to have his judgment influenced by his friends Jack and Daniel. Dale was able to hear the bartender attempt to smooth things over by offering both men a drink on the house, to keep the peace and tranquility the bar had tried to cultivate in vain over the years. The two men agreed to disagree and saddled up to drink whatever tonic was being offered with begrudging smiles.

The excitement had ended.

His waitress came over and draped a placemat in front of him, along with a carefully polished set of silverware. Before he could ask, she informed him the chef insisted that whenever someone ordered the chive blini with crème fraiche and quail eggs, they received the appropriate eating utensils as well. Dale picked up the fork feeling more like a talisman, for it brought him back to his youth when he was a dishwasher at his uncle’s restaurant. Regardless of their familial connection, his uncle was a stern taskmaster who would inspect his wash no matter how busy they were. If a single fork were not polished to his satisfaction, his uncle would dump all silverware back into the sink. Dale was warned from the very beginning if his uncle had to do that three times, he would be fired on the spot.

Dale held the fork to his eye, determined to spot the flaw. Then, the knife. Minutes passed as his eyes marched across the surface, and Dale did not find a blemish. To the surprise of his waitress, who had arrived with his beer, he dropped his fork on the floor. Waiting a beat, Dale leaned over to his left and picked up the now filthy fork, placing it on the far left corner of his table. With a certain satisfaction, Dale sat up and locked eyes with his confused waitress. Her face contorted to protest the action before realizing how futile such protest would be. Conceding defeat, she snatched the fork off the table and returned to the kitchen.

Dale stretched out his arms, a mixture of fatigue and exhilaration, took a sip of his Grimbergen, and smiled. He didn’t need to check the televisions to learn the outcome of the election. He knew the universe had already declared Dale Whitmer to be the winner.

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