Perched on two stools that feel like thrones, we shed the meloncholy frailty that comes with too much thought and become boisterous and carefree kings/jesters. Seth is (usually) Amber’s boyfriend, my roommate and one of the sharper employees of Captain’s. Held back only by the dim crowd around him, he doesn’t have a bad bone in his body, but he’s smart enough not to get it exploited. I can’t imagine anyone not liking him, but most seem to take enjoyment in his witty, charming, and at times obnoxious banter. Aside from the occasional late night drunken window of honesty, they aren’t really given a look into the more complex side, as he has mastered the art of inane college bar banter, and keeps himself on cruise control until he sense someone worthy.

It is somewhat disheartening to see how many road blocks have been set by a debilitating enviornment – when it comes from an unwitting source, a misogynistic joke or acting through the motions doesn’t so much bother me as when it’s coming from someone who knows better, who is just swimming with swine because it’s easier that way. And it’s hard to fault Seth or anyone for that, so I blame the world, and release the anger by mocking it over beers with him.

We mock them, and yet we pander to them.

Today/tonight we find ourselves at Mac’s, sliding from stools to a booth that becomes a revolving door of friends, acquaintances, potential bedmates, our condition and wit deteriorating with each new arrival. Bartenders are greeted or said goodbye to during shift change, and we learn that the sun has gone down during a cigarette break. We play the right songs on the jukebox and our one-liners are well-timed. We refer to the women as ‘girl’ and discourage others from leaving the bar in order to get on with life. Nachos and pitchers and shots are ordered. It’s always a party, and we’re always the life of it, and no one but us has any idea how bleak that existence really is.

He wants to be with her. He would – and has – abandon(ed) this in a heartbeat just to hear her take out life’s frustrations on him. When life presents me with a girl like that to pour my pent-up affections into, I often feel the same way as he does, and I think that’s why we’re here, sinking singles into the jukebox and ordering doubles for women we’ve just met and don’t particularly care for. Perhaps somewhere in the back of our minds we’re hoping our Ambers will walk through the door and see us in this pain/festivity, regardless of how unlikely geography or the fact that it’s lunch hour makes the prospect. Maybe we just don’t want to think or remember.

We’d both rather be somewhere else, but a fairly specific somewhere else, and without that prospect, this seems like the next best thing. We sing our songs of sorrow in respective bedrooms where no one can hear them, and check it all at the door. Here we are safe, easy, happy, free. The women are rarely challenging outside of sexual conquest, the regulars give us hugs and buy us rounds, spirits are lifted with shot specials or a Prince song, and no one will find it very troubling if we don’t return their phone calls the next week (or at least they won’t admit to it). The self-destruction seems more acceptable within these walls.

Afternoons turn to evenings, weekend into months, and we hurdle onwards, changing venues, filling up ashtrays, laughing in alleyways, frequenting strange living rooms, arriving at diners when they open. It’s not so much about the women or alcohol, but rather a dogged pursuit of something just out of reach – the returns on our emotional investments we’ve waited on for so long haven’t come, so we burn out our souls here in a frenzied last-ditch effort to recoup what we thought we had coming to us. Anything seems possible over a round.

The tragedy is not in our actions, but in the fact that we’re keenly aware of them. We know what we are doing and foregoing. We can see ourselves in each other, forcing lines and dispositions, pining over the unworthy, and while I think we love what we see at the core, we certainly see what’s gone wrong. Neither one of us has the insight, courage or hope to rectify any of it, so we let it pass and entertain the mundane details of two cute strangers’ trip to Kroger.

Everything I’m looking for in humanity sits across the booth from me, delivering soft-spoken and light-hearted quips to the girl next him. We aren’t yet aware how truly comforting and enriching the other’s presence is, as we’re too busy lamenting the inability to chase down the unattainable. But I’m rooting for him. I won’t make the first move without him, but I want to ditch these girls and make ill-advised proclaimations of embarrassing adoration for the women we’re drinking away. When they reject us, I want to pack up and move somewhere foreign. Arizona. Japan. Scranton. Anywhere but here.

I’m certain we’d find ourselves in similar bars, talking to similar girls, but to bolt in the night would be the endless possibility that we’re searching for. It’s not a solution, but for our ilk there are no solutions, there are only actions and consequences. I don’t know that it would make us any happier, but I doubt it would be half as disappointing than if we were to realize whatever unattained desires we’re drinking off right now.

We can examine each other’s desires and see the myriad of faults and overcomplications, but I doubt if given a magic wand either one of us would deprive the other of their mistake. He would like to be with Amber, and I don’t think it would do him any good, but it has to be better than watching him angle for a bottle blonde without an original impulse in her body. I don’t necessarily want him to be a better person; he’s fine as he is. I just want him to pursue what honestly matters to him, regardless of how chaotic and constructed it may be. But perhaps that’s just because I’ve decided to walk that lonely road myself.

I don’t find it so sad that we’re here. I’m more troubled by the thought that we’re really not missing all that much out there.