A Sharp Knife for Cutting Limes

I probably wouldn’t be in Mexico if there hadn’t been a knife on the counter at the Bad Dog Bar last Tuesday. I been going to the Bad Dog for two years, since I been working the graveyard shift at Drake Manufacturing. If you ever spent eight hours attaching table tops to the leg frames, you know why that kind of work goes better if you got a couple beers in you. One of the evening bartenders at Bad Dog is Hitch. He was working last Tuesday with Sheila, who waits tables. She ain’t much of a waitress, to put it gentle. She gets orders wrong ever night, even in a place like Bad Dog where most everbody orders the same cheap beer. Sheila’s popular, though, with them low-cut blouses. Most of the Bad Dog customers are guys don’t care what they’re drinking as long as they’re looking down a woman’s blouse. That’s one reason my brother liked Bad Dog right away. Plus he didn’t have to walk far after work. Then he got me to going. And I gotta say about Sheila and them low-cut blouses, when you look down that valley, you know there’s a better world waiting when you get there.

I got to know a lot of guys come in the Bad Dog, like Mitt Reagan, a short little guy  keeps a dog cage on the back seat in his car. He walks around like he’s six foot six, proud as a prince. I seen where he lives and I seen his girlfriend, and I don’t know what he’s proud of. Mitt’s the kind of guy that’ll buy you beers as long as you want to drink, but while he’s getting drunk with you, he’ll decide to go outside and kick your ass. Another guy comes in the bar a lot is Carp Shumanski. Carp’s so thin he looks weak, like he’s sick or something. But he ain’t just thin or sick looking, he’s crazy. I mean the kind of crazy makes big guys who’d fight a cop avoid conversations with Carp. I didn’t see it, but a couple people told me he went postal special delivery once on a big Hungarian guy, screaming at the top of his lungs, crying like a girl, grabbing everthing his hands touched and flinging it at the guy. Then Carp jumped on him and tried to bite out his throat. Naturally, the big guy defended himself. They say that’s why Carp limps a little bit now.

But most of the guys come in the Bad Dog, they’re just regular guys. They work, they hate their job, they drink. You know what I mean, normal working guys. The Bad Dog is a place to go before or after work, depending on what your job is like. That’s why my brother started going, and four months later I got out of jail for something I ain’t done this time, and Toby, my oldest brother, helped me to get on at Drake Manufacturing. I got a younger brother, that useless Ray still lives with Mama and has got him a different career plan once a year. Electrician, computer programmer, day care worker…I don’t want to talk about Ray. Toby was in the army and spent time in Kuwait during the first war, shooting rockets across the desert. He liked doing that, and I always liked hearing him talk about how much fun it was shooting them rockets. “Fourth of July ever day, man.” That’s Toby’s description of being in Kuwait. When he got out of the army, they wasn’t much call to fire rockets in Cincinnati, so Toby got on at Drake. Me and Toby spent some time together at the Bad Dog when we was on the same shift, giving eyes to Sheila and arguing over whose turn it was to pay for the beer.

So last Tuesday Toby come down to the Bad Dog and he sees a guy he don’t really know, a middle-aged guy named Riley, talking to Sheila. Turns out, Riley has decided he’s in love with Sheila, even though Sheila has reached the limit of any potential she ever had. So Sheila’s talking to Riley, and Toby’s waiting to order a beer, which he could of done at the bar, but he’s already set down and he’s waiting on Sheila to come take his order. I know what happened because Hitch, the bartender, told me about it. I wasn’t in the Bad Dog last Tuesday. Finally, Toby gets tired of waiting and he says, “Hey, Sheila, point them things at somebody else for a minute and get me a beer.” Sheila turned around and went to the bar, and Hitch said Riley looked kind of pissed. Hitch said he took to watching Riley, who looked more pissed whenever Sheila took another beer to Toby and she’d laugh at something Toby said. Later on in the evening, after Toby had drank several beers and was gonna take a leak, he went by Riley’s table, and Riley said something Hitch couldn’t hear, but Toby just laughed and kept walking. Riley was ordering boilermakers, beer and whiskey, and he’d already drank several. When I talked to Hitch later he said Riley wanted Sheila to go outside and talk to him, but Hitch told him she was working. “I ain’t talking to you, goddamnit!” Riley said real loud. Hitch ain’t too much bothered by loud drunks, or he’s working in the wrong bar, so he just told Riley again Sheila was working and she wasn’t going nowhere.

While they was arguing, my brother Toby come up to the bar and told Hitch he wanted to pay up and get on. When Toby said that, Riley turned around and looked at him, and Hitch said right then he could see how drunk Riley was. “You the problem,” Riley said to Toby. “You been flirting with Sheila all night.” Toby laughed at Riley and Riley got more mad. Then Toby said, “I ain’t in competition with you, old man.” Hitch said it was surprising somebody as drunk as Riley could move so fast, because he grabbed a knife off the bar and swung it at Toby. Hitch started yelling and Sheila started screaming when blood sprayed all over the bar. Riley had cut a vein in Toby’s neck, and by the time the ambulance and police got there, Toby was dead and Riley was out the door.

Riley’s picture was in the paper next day, and I found out some people at the factory didn’t like Riley too much. He was a bad tempered guy knew how to piss people off. One of them told me Riley was always talking about this place in Mexico, said he was gonna go there someday. That’s where I seen him a few days ago. Right now I’m sitting here in the Alocate Bar down in Mexico. They got Christmas lights all over the bar like they don’t know it’s April. Why the hell are those lights up? And they got some German band on the loudspeakers playing loud like they was God almighty. I don’t mind loud music, but I kind of like to know what they’re saying. I’m tired of the German music, but I ain’t leaving the bar yet. I’m gonna order me another margarita. They do a good margarita here, with Mexican limes, which is better than the kind we got back home. The bartender was cutting the limes right on the bar. So I’m gonna order me another margarita, and then I’m gonna go walk down a particular alley where Riley goes ever evening. When he comes along I’m gonna say, “Hey, remember my brother Toby?” And then I’m gonna pull out that knife that’s been laying there on the bar, the one they been cutting limes with, and I’m gonna shove it in his heart.

David Hutto

Image: A sharp knife – would cut limes beautifully. From Pixabay.com