{"id":1336,"date":"2015-05-25T13:00:02","date_gmt":"2015-05-25T20:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/?p=1336"},"modified":"2015-05-25T11:29:42","modified_gmt":"2015-05-25T18:29:42","slug":"another-night-at-tums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/2015\/05\/25\/another-night-at-tums\/","title":{"rendered":"Another Night at Tums"},"content":{"rendered":"

Postaday for May 25th: Fill In the Blank<\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong>Three people walk into a bar . . .<\/em><\/p>\n

Three people walk into a bar. Mary, Maria, and little Marissa, just turned 21. Three generations, none of them related. They work together at Roma, Inc, an office around the corner. The bar is called Tums. Everyone inside is more or less losing their minds. There\u2019s sports on the TV and one of the teams has done something that has driven this after-work bar crowd wild. Mary, Maria, and Marissa glide through the chaos like cherry blossoms floating through a pre-maelstrom breeze. They arrive at the bar.<\/p>\n

Mary, Roma Inc. VP, finance, thin as bones and skin so tight she looks like she\u2019d bounce off of swords. Says to the bar in general, \u201cRum and Coke\u201d and it appears before her, instantly.<\/p>\n

Maria is an operations director, and she will never ever be a VP. She\u2019s married, which isn\u2019t the problem, but she has no kids, which is the problem. She glares at the bartender until he appears. She glares at him until he picks up a glass and a bottle of Chardonnay. She glares while he pours, glares when he sets in front of her. Glares as he backs away, slowly. Maria has curly brown hair, wears a lot of lipstick. She sips the wine with lips pursed so tight that only water molecules pull through, leaving behind the alcohol.<\/p>\n

Marissa just started at Roma. Marissa went to college a year early, got her bachelors in two years, and decided to take a year off to back pack around Europe. She wanted to really slut it up, sleep around, experiment, just go nuts. But everywhere she went, people treated her with respect and dignity. Men we courteous, almost chivalric. She got nowhere with them. She put pictures of herself online, as a test, and was reassured when anonymous assholes unambiguously noted the dirty things they\u2019d like to do to her. So it wasn\u2019t her. Fine. Whatever. Came back home, got her MBA in one year, got a job, turned 21, and somehow ended up walking out after work one evening at the same time as Maria who happened to be walking out at the same time as Mary.<\/p>\n

Marissa asks the bartender for a boilermaker. He brings her a margarita. God damn it.<\/p>\n

Mary looks over at the other two. \u201cI\u2019m Mary. VP.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maria says \u201cMaria. OD, been with Roma 20 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marissa says \u201cMarissa. Just started. I have no idea what I do.\u201d<\/p>\n

They each sip their drinks. The bar has calmed down quite a bit. In fact, many people have left. In fact, Mary, Maria, and Marissa are the only people left. Not even the bartender is there any more. There\u2019s a loud booming sound as the door to the bar closes. The boom echoes, then all is silent.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarissa, you\u2019re young,\u201d Mary says, like one of those questions that comes out like a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d Marissa says.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoes this story pass the Bechdel test?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUh\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot anymore,\u201d Maria says, setting down her glass. She slides off her barstool, and walks towards the door. She leaves. A soon as she does, the door opens and people walk in. The bar\u2019s a little brighter now, and the TV\u2019s back on.<\/p>\n

Marissa stares into her margarita. She hates margaritas. Has hated them every since Spain, where she found the only Mexican restaurant in Madrid, and drank about a dozen of them.<\/p>\n

Mary finishes her Rum and Coke. She stands up too. The bartender\u2019s back, and there\u2019s a few more people at the bar now, a few in booths. A waitress walks by, carrying a tray of chicken wings. \u201cSee you tomorrow I guess,\u201d she says, and leaves.<\/p>\n

Through the increasing bar noise, as more and more people are getting into the game on the TV, Marissa says \u201cNo you won\u2019t.\u201d It\u2019s not cynical. It\u2019s just that VPs work on the 12th floor, and Marissa\u2019s stuck on three.<\/p>\n

The bartender comes by, and without asking, sets down another margarita, and a bill for all four drinks. She picks it up, walks over to a booth where a bunch of people are going to town on some jalapeno poppers. Sets the bill down amongst their soiled napkins. Asks one where the women\u2019s restroom is. Walks in the opposite direction when it\u2019s pointed out to her. Leaves.<\/p>\n

The door closes behind her, shutting out the screams and hollers of a hundred sports fans losing their god damn minds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Postaday for May 25th: Fill In the Blank.\u00a0Three people walk into a bar . . . Three people walk into a bar. Mary, Maria, and little Marissa, just turned 21. Three generations, none of them related. They work together at Roma, Inc, an office around the corner. The bar is called Tums. Everyone inside is … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Another Night at Tums”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5,61],"tags":[13,208],"class_list":["post-1336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-postaday","tag-fiction-2","tag-roma-inc"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p24y52-ly","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1336"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1337,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336\/revisions\/1337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bukkhead.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}