IT'S JUST HAIR

As I walk in, I spot man-bun. He is sitting with his legs crossed in a booth across from two other douchebag looking guys. I literally almost shout, “Man Bun” and wave like it is no big deal. It comes out “Mabu-“ and he looks startled at first but then his eyes light up when he sees it is me.

He jumps from the table and I wonder why a grown man like him would cross his legs and wear a bun.  As he stands up, I realize he is really tall and handsome albeit a dork. I would have to do something about that hair and leg-crossing. I am pretty sure he plays the bongos. He has definitely engaged in a rowdy round of hacky sack at one point another.

This is me again imagining everyone else’s life – probably because I do not know my own. I am constantly looking for something that somehow intersects with or parallels my story. I want something familiar but nothing is when you do not know who you are.

Anyway, he is standing in front of me now and I realize he is not smiling. He looks concerned. He starts to look as though he might pass out as I walk closer to him and raises one finger to the door behind me.

There is a man with a gun.

That’s my first thought. But, that’s because I am nuts.

“What’s wrong?” I say feeling too nervous to turn and look.

“That is my brother,” he whispers.

“Goddamn, I thought I had family issues.”

“No.” he says and walks away. I feel like a poodle who has just been scolded and I turn around to see Man Bun approaching an even taller, more handsome, slightly meaner version of MB. He looks drunk and he looks mad.”

“Where is she?” he is screaming and it instantly clicks with me that he is after a girlfriend.

 “What’s wrong?” I ask his friends at the table. I have walked over there and been invited to sit down while the conflict at the door unfolds.

“Roper bounces here for extra money and he is going to have to get his brother out of here.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. You have any ideas?”

“Well, no.”

“Then let Ropier handle it.”
“Roper? Is that his name?”
“Yeah. Jake Roper.”
“Oh you guys do the whole call each other by the last name thing.”

The guy looks irritated with me and he is luckily distracted by a nearby woman in a dark denim skirt. 

She runs over and drapes her arms around him, “Baby!” she coos.

“Hey baby,” he replies and they kiss too long and too passionately for public.

“Mikey-boo, will you get me a drinky-poo?” she says in a singsong that makes me want to put it in ear plugs. She is attractive – maybe even beautiful – but she is fake and full of herself.

“Hello,” she says as Mike walks away to get her some nasty pink drink that she forces me to share with her later… because that is the kind of girl that she is.

She is wearing way too much makeup but she is beautiful. I keep examining her features. This whole group here at the table that I am just now meeting are all quite good-looking. They look like something out of a country music video.

The little conflict between my new friend and his brother – Kar – ended pretty uneventfully because he convinced him to go home.

Over drinks, they filled me in on the Roper Boys Saga. Jake did not seem bothered that everything was sharing his business, but he did not volunteer much of his own information.

Bad boys from the birth, the brothers had been wreaking havoc on the town for their entire lives. The Ropers, it turned out, had been rough and tumble types for generations with a reputation for fighting and drinking and things like that. Jake did not seem proud or ashamed of these facts. It was as though they just did not matter him.

“Why,” I finally asked him, “does this not raise, I don’t know, a - a reaction from you? Why am I not seeing… anything?”

He bursts into uproarious laughter. “You don’t think I know who you are?”

“No. You don’t.”

“You are Jo de Gaulle. I know. It turns out, you are actually Jo Boero seeing as how you come to see Ray Boero just about every weekend.”

“Wow. I feel a little violated here.”

“How so? I simply paid attention and observed and it was obvious to me and things made perfect sense. I know you were adopted. I knew that you were adopted by the de Gaulles but when you were brought home, she gave up her career to keep you out of the public eye.”

“How do you know that?”

“My sisters read a lot of tabloids,” he says without cracking.

“The consummate guard,” I say.

“And,” he gestures toward me, “the lovely – albeit reclusive – writer. In this case, you truly seem to fit the stereotype.”

I want to argue but he is completely right. The guy has known me for 5 minutes.

“I have known you for 5 minutes,” I say.

“We have known each other for about a year now.”

“What?”

“It all depends on how you define knowing someone.”

“I guess,” I say. I rarely concede in such arguments but his man bun is distracting and the shots are kicking in. I blurt out something really rude.

Put it this way – it came out of my mouth well before I had time to stop it. But, I meant it.

“The hair.” I grab the bun up in my fist gently. “This is too much hair for you, pal.”

He grins sideways, “Well, would you find me more handsome with it cut off?”

“Absolutely.”

He stood up and walked straight to the bar then returned 30 seconds later with scissors. “Cut it,” he said. “Go ahead.” He was smiling like a schoolkid. “It’s just hair.”