The Heathers (new version)

Chapter 18

 The Heathers

Working there provides a very interesting and what some may consider a unique dynamic.  By unique, I mean plainly bazaar. You can’t make this shit up type of odd.  At the end of the day, most people forget that the bar is a business because it becomes this larger entity.  This is a place run for and by men 98% of the time. The thing is this, that working in a place made for, maintained and supported by gay men sometimes makes me feel like I’m in high school all over again. While the rest of the world seems to want to relive their youth, I just want to get past it.   I will go further on that statement.  Anyone who utters the sentence, “high school was the best time of my life,” scares me.  If I hear that, then frankly, I’m not sure if we can be friends.  It’s just a matter of opinion, like people who have little children and talk about how wonderful it is.  I’m sure that miracle is glorious.  Young parents often say stuff like “when he-she-it was born, it was the best time of my life!”  You know what the best time of my life was?  Traveling Europe on that cruise with all my disposable income.  Some say tomato, others say ketchup.   It’s just a different viewpoint.  On the topic of high school again, I could barely stand teens when I was one, for this reason alone I know that I will never be that man.  The one we all know and have met.  The ones with the little red porsche and tupe (at least as long as propecia is in existence), who tries to relive their youth vicariously by pretending to be 25 for 30 years old or surrounding themselves in young guys.  Those guys always remind me of that witch in Hocus Pocus who inhales the children’s youth.

The bar is like every cliché after school special, Mean Girls, “California Dreams” (yes I watched this show.  If you don’t know what it is, Google it.)  and some random episodes of “Parker Louis Can’t Lose” all mixed together.  I know I seem to say that a lot in these stories, but it’s true.  High school was nothing in comparison to my experience at the Labyrinth.  In high school we at least know that we are young and stupid.  Here, some people just stay young and stupid for life. It's something that happens when alcohol mixes with the bad Kylie Minogue remixes I suppose.  In high school I had no life, little drama, really it was depressing.  I made Chelsea Clinton look like a rebel. For most of it, I was pretty asexual and oddly okay with it. I assumed that eventually life would just fall into place within 30 minutes, eventually I would join a cool click and have burgers at the Max with Kelly and Lisa by sophomore year. Who was I kidding? I really just wanted to hang with Zack, by hang, I wanted to be his best friend and eventually have that awkward moment where we made out in Mr. Belding’s office which would make him have to leave Kelly for me. Instead, I watched others around me have a lot of drama, sex, lives and I was just there. I was the observer. My high school life was metaphorically speaking like I was that fat guy that just sat at home watching reality TV for years while getting fat, eating twinkles and living vicariously through those I watched.

There are the popular ones here at the Labyrinth, much like those you see in high school based TV shows. We (by we, I mean I) will call them Heathers for the time being and novelty purposes. Instead the high school girls all named Heather, with their blond hair, big-tits and short skirts who are a dime a dozen and run the school and it’s a similar social hierarchy.  Or the brunette named Kelly who graduates a B cup and returns the college years a full D…  Here, Heathers are men who have a specific mix of sass, sex appeal and often find their way to squish their fat asses into Diesel jeans 2 sizes smaller than they should just to keep up with the Joneses. Working here has a way of hypnotizing one into forgetting that there really is a whole world outside of this disco shimmering, limp-wristed maze of a Castro bubble. Like the Heathers of high school, they too can make or break someone in my shoes who has to deal with them 4-5 nights a week.

Within the 5 years that I have spent here, I have always noticed a clear clique that has remained constant during my time, the Heathers.  I guess since it’s a gay bar I should call them the Nancys?  They are Phil’s favorites. They often do not embody the specific, stereotypical image one may imagine a bartender to portray or look like physically. While being very different form one another, the quality that they all share is that they bloom in many ways via working at the bar.  Start out a closed, up seed, end up a shriveled up rose-bud (disgusting double-entendre not intended, get your mind out of the gutter). There are people who have worked here often for 10, 15 years.  There are people who have been here for 2 weeks.  Others have put it like this, “Phil likes to take diamond in the rough and clean them off, mold them, just to eventually toss them to the curb or kick them out of his house.” It’s like this group represent the closest thing he will ever have to children that he can control. Speaking of control freaks, Phil makes Mussolini look compassionate.  Often they go from quiet, mousy wallflowers to unlikely bartenders, who are cocky, sometimes money/and or coke hungry individuals (if not for a long period of time, at least for a small period of time most, but not all try the ski slope). While in my time there, I have seen many different Heathers groups manifested, they all have the same elements in common. Every 6 months or so this group changes, reformulates, a new king emerges while another is dethroned or banished from the place altogether. The Heathers are the ones who get the core best shifts at the bar and this is when they get sucked into the nexus that many bartenders fall into, somewhere between dawn and dusk, where your world is the bar. I just want to get one thing straight.  Getting sucked into this world often has nothing to do with a lack of education. Just cause one is a bartender does not make them a failure at the “real world,” in my opinion it’s about comfort for most of us. 80% Of my co-workers have degrees, some more useful than others, but they have educations.  Bartending here, they make more than they would in their field of study. The majority of their shifts are Friday, Saturday and maybe Sunday. They end up making more money in cash per week than most blue-collar people like us can understand and more than most white-collar people make a week at the same time.  Where all the money goes, that is a whole separate topic. The Heathers are Phil’s favorite bartenders at the moment. When bartenders end up in this group they live in their own parallel bubble of reality. They/we live the lives of vampires, rarely seeing the light or life of day, but without stupid young teenage girls fantasizing about us. Often it is hard for the Heathers to maintain functioning relationships lasting longer than the time it takes for someone to zip their pants. It’s hard to date one of them/us for this reason and hard for anyone to get past the trick title due to our incompatible/ horrendous schedule. I can attest to this personally, but that is a separate story and for another time, maybe a whole book of its own. Since they work every time the world around them lives, they get stuck in the inner-workings of the bar. This becomes their air, water and life before they can realize it.

Since the Heathers mainly hang out with other coworkers who work these good shifts along side them, they rarely let new people into their world. By rarely let people in, I mean they do everything they can to shut the rest of the world out. This is for two reasons; a new person could compromise their good schedule by taking their spot, another reason to watch out for the marbles. Get in the way of a Heather and their ability to make money or keep their job and one should always assume that they could be knifed at any time (not really, but kinda). Often the ones they are weary of are new bartenders, who get promoted astonishingly quickly. We will call them “Floaters.” They may be younger, prettier and have nothing to offer the bar other than a new “fresh” look. These are Heathers in the making that think they are at the bar just for a hot second while “getting through school” or “paying off a few loans.” There are Floaters that come in and out of this group every now and again without a scratch or getting sucked into the Heathers’ world. A world with late-nights/early mornings, a possible coke binge now and again and some other delights. Often though, soon these saps too are also stuck in the inner workings of this place we know as the Labyrinth. The said new said person/child, Floater could also divulge the Heathers’ secrets to the rest of the bar and find ways to get them fired. These people either turn into lifers or miraculously get fired by Phil for no reason. These floaters threaten the Heathers whole way of life. Again, another reason to watch your back in these parts.

There will always those who wish to be a part of the Heathers. We all want a piece of the pie. Some of us want this more than others. James, being promoted only a few months back, barbacked like me, for years. Keeping this in mind, while he always claims to be there just to get by and pay off some bills, he always has had the key makings of a Heather. He would/will do anything it takes to become one of them, even if that means getting rid of one of them. It’s really not as viscous as it sounds since all of them would do the same to cute little James if they could get him out of their way. At the time, there were a few obstacles in James’ way of becoming the Heather king that he knows he can be. There is the current bar’s manager, a coked-out, condescending guy with the style of a George Michael, and the sass of a Charro, but with an ass the size of a baby watermelon. I mean this guy’s facial hair looks like it’s so manicured it’s ridiculous. His eyebrows are insanely plucked to divert ones attention from his natural uni-brow. He is one of those people that likes to bite on other people’s style. The guy that sees you wearing a jacket he likes and the next day he is wearing the same one, a replica or even your jacket if you don’t watch your stuff close enough. Not saying he is a thief, but wouldn’t be surprised if things happen to disappear around him. Greedy cokeheads sometimes will do that kind of thing, but we digress. We will call him Julio for this story to protect anyone from getting offended. While Julio is an asshole to work with, as king of the Heathers he also is one of the best bartenders there. He is good at the bartending part, but as a “manager” he is greedy as hell and if he doesn’t like you, he will make your shifts unpleasant and long. It is though understandable why he gets all the best shifts based on the bartending skill alone and he helped write the bar’s schedule where he could help keep his other Heathers close by for support. Gina is a floater who soon becomes friends with Julio, the other Heathers during Julio’s reign and in turn becomes one of them for a period of time. On many a-occasion, I bump into them wasted, roaming the aisles of the Castro. This is something to remember for later.

While many of us aren’t keen to Julio’s ruling of the bar, we are still all family. Correction, we are all family if your family has a couple of members who will turn on ya’all every now and again. We all are brothers and sister at this place. If you ran out of cash and need a few bucks to go get a coffee or a beer, any of your coworkers here will give you a few bucks. No questions asked. We all trust each other while always looking over our shoulders at all times skeptical that trust. It’s insane.

We all tease each other as siblings do, with the occasional back handed compliment, something along the lines of “Your boyfriend is adorable, was he in Life Goes On? What was his name? Corkey?”

Or something as simple as “Love the jeans, they really make it look like you have an ass.”

To the last comment one replies with a smart backhanded compliment or downright insult like, “You look fabulous, it’s like you don’t even care.”  My other favorite is, “Those pants are amazing, it’s like you’re body is trying to escape them.”

Like I have said in other stories, it is important to have a thick skin to handle this place. While it sounds like abuse, this often is harmless teasing, but it is more often how friendemmies talk. This is often how the Heathers treat James. He takes the trash they dish and sometimes gives it back, but it’s because we all know that he is Phil’s pet. He is the only one of us that gets notes on his timecard telling him of how he is doing such a great job. He also is the only one besides Gina who can request time off of any kind without repercussions or getting punished with months of shitty schedules. While this may not be completely true, it is how it looks to me at the time.

I come to work on a regular Friday night and am ready to bear it all, Julio, the Heathers, the bar and all its perks. As I glance at the bar schedule to see who I will be working with besides the Heathers, to see who the Floater of tonight’s shift is, I am shocked to see that Julio’s shifts are whited-out. Confused by this I double check to see if I am still scheduled/employed at the bar, which I am and go on with my daily duties. One by one everyone scheduled that day shuffles in. They all take a moment to check the schedule as I do. They all have that same look of confusion/relief to see Julio not scheduled to work this Friday night. Did I forget to mention who is scheduled to take Julio’s spot on the schedule? It’s James. Until now, he only worked the daytime, no big deal shifts. James’ attitude now drifts from bar employee-drifter to a lifer. The question is, is he now one of the Heathers? While another one bites the dust, we are used to this aspect of the bar, people disappearing and getting fired for no reason. We never know the actual reason one of our coworkers are let go so we do what gay men do best, gossip about it.  We all go on with our nightly duties and the bar goes on as though Julio never worked there.  There are rumors he was actually hooking up with an evangelical congress man/assassin and got in too deep if you know what I mean… Phil wasn’t going to stand for it and had him deported.  Julio was born in Los Angeles.  After a while there is little proof or memory that he even existed, much like that urban-legend of “Bloody Mary.”