Give me some truth

 

 

She comes up to me at the bar and tells me she likes my eyes.

My whole life is a load of crap like that, people handing me bullshit and expecting me to swallow it all.

Maybe I’m just looking for truth in the wrong places, expecting it to pop up here when I should  be going to a library or college or something.

Folks here are full of stories, everybody trying to get over on someone else.

Not for any reason either, just so they got bragging rights, having done something nobody else has done, or knowing something nobody else knows.

Me, I know nothing, and keep my trap shut, listening to what others have to say while trying to make out how much of it is bull, and if there is any truth in it at all.

Tommy, the bartender, says I’m a glutton for punishment, and buys me drinks in order to numb the pain.

I hear about wives, ex wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, bosses and parents.

I hear about the love that got away, the painful love that didn’t, and the hopes and dreams of losers who know they may never find love here or any place else.

Maybe I’m looking for love, too, listening to these stories, searching out the looks in people’s eyes until I see the right look that makes my heart jump.

Now, she’s in front of me, my heart bagging on my chess like an escaping convict, her eyes so full of fire I need an extinguisher just to look at her.

Tommy sees it, grins and brings over two drinks, putting them both in front of me, saying I’d better suck them up quick before I fall of my stool.

I tell him to get lost, and he laughs.

She asks me to tell her a story, my story, how I got here, what I hope for, where do I think things are going from here, and for the first time in my life, I’m spilling it all out, feeling my life come to life inside of me.

My moment of truth.