I often find myself in the town of Bakersfield, California. I know the Central Valley of California would bore a lot of people to death, but Bakersfield is a town filled with incredibly kind people who all exude good vibes - even the homeless people seem friendly. I go to Bakersfield to get away from the liberal anger and negativity that has started to seep into Orange, California.
I don’t normally drink and go to bars, but when you make friends with the local and highly talented tattoo artists in town and they invite you out for drinks, it’s hard to say no. I don’t go and get drunk, I have at most, two drinks and even then, that’s excessive for me. Across the street from both tattoo shops are two tiki bars.
They are such good tiki bars, that people who a part of the tiki culture will literally travel miles and miles to have at least one drink at both. I don’t see why anyone would do that but they are nicely decorated and well maintained and staffed full of very kind people.
My first night there that this story takes place on, after a tattoo, the shop invited me to go and grab drinks at one of the tiki bars across the street. And like I stated before, very hard to say no, so I went with them.
We took up one of the two big booths in the back of the bar. The artists frequent both tiki bars weekly, so they are pretty well known there. I sat on the end of the booth and ordered what some consider to be the best drink, so good it was out of this word! A Mai Tai, I love the citrusy, nutty and rich flavors of the drink. The drinks came out rather swiftly and we all began to chat and drink.
Next to the booth we were at was another big booth and to the side of that booth was a little wooden table with two wooden benches. We heard it before we saw him, someone dragged one of those wooden benches over to our table. The man was tall and thin. He already had a drink in his hand. “Mind if I sit here?” He slurred.
The artists were happy to allow him to join us, after all, Bakersfield is filled with incredibly kind people who all exude good vibes. We all chatted and drank some more, except for the guy who sat there, staring at me, making me horribly uncomfortable. My tattoo artist saw this and snapped his fingers at the man. “Hey, hey, hey, man, what’s your name?”
The man seemed to ignore my artist, but took the silence to ask his question. “Are you single?”
I put on my most polite language. “No,” I said. I had a boyfriend back in Orange.
“Then where is he?”
Why did that matter? “Back at home.”
“So he lets his pretty little girlfriend go around to bars where strange men are?”
A female artist snapped her fingers. “Hey, man, this is a private party, think you can sit elsewhere?”
The man did not stand to take his leave from our table but rather gripped my arm and looked me dead in the eyes. “Does he allow you to fuck other men?”
I tore my tattooed arm away from the freak. “No!” I may have come off meaner than I was intending to, but he was getting on my last nerve rather quickly.
“Would he care if you were raped?”
The owner of the tattoo shop hoisted the guy up by his arm, and took him to the front door where they both exited, the owner stayed out for a bit longer - probably talking to the bouncer about the man’s behavior.
When the owner lumbered back in, the rest of us were packing our things up and paying our tab - the owner told us to all go and he’d take care of the tab. It wasn’t anyone’s fault we ran into a major buzzkill and going to the bar tonight was his idea, so he felt like he should pay.
I made sure to think the owner - even though my drink was eleven bucks, not the biggest part of the tab that night. He looked at me and told me tomorrow at seven sharp, they were meeting at the tiki bar next door to where we were at currently. He told me to be there and gave me a wink - not a sexual wink but almost a protective wink if that makes any sort of sense.
Seven o’clock rolled around the next day and I found myself waiting in front of the second tiki bar for the tattoo artists. We gathered and headed into the basement bar, where I ordered a Missionary’s Downfall, a refreshing herbal and minty drink of Barbados 3 year rum, French pear liquor, pineapple, lime, Demerara and mint. A drink that was created by the G-dfather of tiki, Don the Beachcomber.
We could all hear someone coming down the steps but since this was a public bar open to everyone, we obviously didn’t care. The piercer at the shop stopped in mid sentence. “Oh, shit!” She hissed. We all looked where she was looking and the man from yesterday swaggered into the bar. He sat down at our table. “Please, leave.”
“I wanted to apologize for my behavior the other day,” he said, slurring his words - already drunk again, this drunken man was like a nightmare from which I could never quite awaken from. “I should never say the R word in front of ladies, I know they are far too sensitive to hear such a word.”
Rather than ignore the man I got up. “Where are you going? Don’t call the night early!” Cried the piercer. I didn’t really want to tell the man I was going to the bathroom, so I answered her with a nervous somewhere and she seemed to get the hint. “Can I go?”
I nodded, grateful for the company. We made our way to the front of the bar. The bar had two bathrooms - one for men and one for women, pretty standard. But one stall in each, but you had the chance to lock two doors - the door to the bathroom and the door to the actual stall. Someone had been in the women’s bathroom, what’s great about most tiki bars is that the bathrooms are truly genderless since that seems to be a concern in American society today for some fuck all reason.
I dove into the men’s restroom since I actually had to go, and she said she’d wait until whoever was done first. I felt so safe in the bathroom, protected by two doors that I allowed myself to breathe a sigh of relief. I stood, wiped and went to pull my pants up when I heard a scream.
I didn’t even wash my hands, I just rushed out of the bathroom and saw the owner of the tattoo parlor and the bar owner crash into the women’s bathroom, my heart was still galloping, my hands still trembling. “What happened!?” I cried to my latest tattoo artist.
All he did was shrug that he knew as much as me. The two men came out, the owner looking like he was going to puke, and the tattoo shop owner holding the drunk man, hands behind his back. “Someone call 911!”
It turns out that the piercer went into the woman’s rest room, and the drunk man - having not seen this, picked the lock of the woman’s bathroom, and proceeded to stab her until she fell limp to the floor.
He was pretty certain in his drunken state that she was me, a cold finger of fear inched up my spine at that fact. If I had used the woman’s bathroom, I’d be dead. The Bakersfield police arrested him. Last I heard, he was serving a prison sentence with every chance of parole.