Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before

Fernando walks into a bar.

He takes an open stool near a woman in her mid-50s and waits for the bartender to finish serving a group of young ladies seated across the bar. “You're Fonzie's brother, aren't you?” she asks.

“Indeed so, last I checked.”

“I'm sorry for your loss.”

Fernando tips the brim of an imaginary hat her way. “Thanks.” The bartender has yet to finish mixing these girls their drinks.

“Let me buy you your first drink,” the woman says. She knows Fernando's brother, and seems to know him (though by rumor and reputation, or because they'd met at some point in the nebulous past, is something Fernando does not know), but Fernando has no idea what her name is, and he doesn't particularly want to look like a buffoon by asking her what it is, not if she treats him so familiarly. He can return that favor.

Besides, Fernando is not one to turn down free booze. “I'd appreciate that, thanks.”

“What are you having?”

“Ginger vodka with a splash of lemon juice.”

The older woman raises a finger skyward and shouts. “Hey, Canada! Once you finish over there, get me another and a ginger vodka for this young man!” The bartender ducks his head briefly and this seems to satisfy the woman. “He'll get that to us.”

The bartender takes another minute to wrap up his mixology with the other ladies. “We don't have ginger ale here,” he says to Fernando. On the one hand, this is surprising, since ginger ale seems like a thing every bar should keep in stock. On the other hand, this is a bar attached to a restaurant in Zail-Kanzin, so why would they have the makings for good drinks? “Can I get you something else?” he asks.

“Southern Comfort Old Fashioned, then. Sour, please, orange slice but no cherries.”

The old lady looks at Fernando proudly. “You look like you know what you want.”

“I always have a backup plan.”

“What if you couldn't have gotten that here, then?”

“Then probably I'd have gone with a vodka tonic, or maybe a beer, if there any beers worth half a shit here.” All of the taps proudly bear the mark of Miller Lite or Budweiser or similar rice-water ilk, and Fernando can see no minifridge in which cans or bottles of less-wretched brews might lurk.

“They've got Corona.”

“If I wanted to drink piss with a lime garnish, I'd ask for a slice of lime and make my way to the restroom to serve myself.”

The old lady squints at Fernando. “You are exactly like your grandmother. She was so...so....” The lady trails off speaking as she undertakes a quest to discover the vocabulary

“Forthright? One does one's best.”

The bartender delivers the drinks. The old lady has something clear and fizzy in her tumbler, while Fernando's Old Fashioned is tinted ruby, likely with cranberry juice or grenadine. What either of them have business doing in an Old Fashioned is beyond Fernando's understanding of the bar arts, but it doesn't taste like a Bad Idea nor a Manhattan, so he is satisfied.

“How long you staying?” the woman asks.

“This drink, maybe another. I can't stay overlate. I have to work tomorrow.”

“It's the Fourth.”

“No rest for the wicked. I closed the store today so I probably should try to make up for it tomorrow. Hell, holidays are better for my business because people need something to park the kids while they grill and drink in the backyard.”

“You have an explanation for everything, don't you?”

“Everything has an explanation.”

“See, I can't believe that. Some things just happen for no reason.”

“Everything has a reason for happening.”

“Not coincidences.”

“Sure they do.”

The woman twists in her seat and faces Fernando head-on. Her posture is one of defiance. “Okay, explain that to me.”

“There's a reason for you to have been at a place when the coincidence happened.”

“Not always. Sometimes you're just there.”

“Nobody is just anywhere for no reason.”

“What if you didn't plan it?”

“Doesn't matter. You decided on something else that put you there.”

“So the coincidence isn't your fault!” she trumpets.

Fernando shakes his head. “Sure it is. If I decide to walk down Main Street in order to meet my best friend at the movie theater, then it's partially on me when the firetruck crashes through the brick wall and turns me into road lasagna and confetti in front of a crowd of innocent bystanders. If I'd not chosen to go down Main Street at that time, then I wouldn't have been there for the truck to pulverize.” Fernando takes another sip of his drink. It is quite good. “Good news is, this only counts for my choices, and not for others.”

“Why?”

“I can't judge others' choices because I don't know what choices they'd made previously.”

“You can't believe that.”

“Sure I can. I do. That's tautological enough for most purposes.”

“Doesn't it ever get to be too much?”

“Nah, not really. I've gotten pretty good at handling existential crises over the years.”

“But why even be like that?”

“Why not?”

“You say everything's because you made a choice.”

“Yes.”

“Then you chose to believe all the stuff you just said.”

Fernando mulls it over. “Yes, I suppose I did.”

“Why stick with it, then?”

Fernando shrugs. “Because I choose to. Because most other people choose not to.” Fernando tilts back the remainder of his beverage. “Thank you again for the drink, and moreso for the conversation. I'd best return to the afterparty, such as it is.”

“Take care, sweetie. Butt your head against me some other time soon, you hear?”

Fernando grins. “That's what she said. Have a good evening.”

It is easy to take another's “why” for living and apply it to oneself. It is not easy to create one's own “why.”