I stood behind the bar and watched Sammy Sullivan. He was sitting at a table drinking bourbon and coke and flipping cigarette butts at a tall, thin guy in a cowboy hat sitting at another table with his back turned. It would be only a matter of minutes before the cowboy figured out what was going on. Then, we would have us a show.
I didn’t know why Sammy was permitted in my bar. He was always causing trouble. Maybe I was bored, or maybe I liked trouble. I’d barred him out of the place a few times, but always let him back in. I watched Sammy flip a butt and hit the cowboy square on the back of the neck. I moved toward the end of the bar so I could step out and bust up the scuffle that was about to start.
The kid I had working with me behind the bar shook his head. He didn’t understand why I let the stuff that Sammy was always pulling go on. I shrugged my shoulders to say me neither. I saw that the cowboy was in Sammy’s face and had him by the lapels of his leather jacket.
“I’ll be right back,” I told the kid. I stepped out and took a couple of steps over to the two new best friends. I pushed between the cowboy and pulled Sammy toward the door.
I manhandled him outside and pushed him up against the side of the building to the right of the door. He was drunk. I stepped back and told him he had to go home.
“You telling me to leave?” he said.
“Time to go,” I told him.
“You telling me to leave?” he repeated.
His buddy, Chink, was standing outside off to the side but had not butted in. When I turned my head and looked at him to make sure he understood to stay out of it, Sammy hit me in the mouth. Chink was shocked. I don’t think Sammy believed he’d done it either, but didn’t have more than a split second to reflect on his mistake.
I caught Sammy across the face with my forearm and knocked his head against the concrete block wall of the building. He melted down the wall like hot butter. Chink moved over and covered him so I wouldn’t hit him again. I helped Chink pick him up and carry him to Chink’s old pickup.
When I went back inside and walked back behind the bar, the kid gave me an ‘I told you so’ look. He wrapped up a hand full of ice in a bar rag and handed it to me. I pressed it against my cut lip.
“Sammy going to live?” he wanted to know.
“Depends on how hard the idiot’s head is,” I said and pressed the cold bar rag tight against my lip.
