I haven’t pulled a shift at the bar in a couple months so it takes a little time to get my sea legs back. Prices went up while I was away so the memorized math has to be recalibrated. There’s no art on the walls, which is disorienting. My show here is next month so it will go up after whatever is hung the next couple days. Still, it’s always reassuring to return.

K and Donna are here. It’s a new thing to have people visit me at work. There are also a couple sets of people I don’t really talk to anymore. No way to avoid history if you stay in a place for a length of time. There’s no active hostility, just a lot left unsaid. I bring some ice out from the back, queue up my music, and start my shift.

A girl orders two shots for her and her friend with Cokes back. She lets them sit in front of her without touching them a few minutes while they gab. They’re way overdressed for this place. Then I see her gingerly push the last of the ice out of the Coke with her finger and let it slide down the side of the glass to the coaster. She orders another round later, after they’ve spent time in the photobooth, asks for no ice in the Coke.

I came straight from the bookstore so it’s a gearswitch for sure but both jobs are old hat by now. Neither causes much stress. It’s why I keep doing them, I guess. Other things I’ve done for money, like teaching, kept me up at night. I can’t have that from a job. Though, of course, both the bookstore and bar figure regularly in dreams. Just not as a source of anxiety.

Late in the night, just about the time I figure it’s died out for good, a dozen revelers roll in. They’ve clearly come from some event, a concert maybe, and are definitely in party mode. Many rounds of shots are ordered and the couple guys paying do so with large bills. One of them, a beefy guy in a ballcap asks me if I like Chartreuse. I say I tried it once a long time ago and have no memory of it. He’s a rep and says he’s got rare bottles in his bag. The group is coming from an event at another bar he hosted. Guess this is the afterparty.

I tell Thomas about the Chartreuse and he says friends asked him to smuggle some back the last time he went to France. The old monks’ liqueur is back in fashion because of Tiktok.

The host slips me a twenty to let him pour out shots of his $300-a-bottle-wholesale elixir for all who remain in the bar. We all toast. It tastes kind of like a mint lollipop laced with numbing agent. Makes me think I’m about to have my teeth worked on.

They all float out peacefully right at last call. I mop up a leak from the sink, then we lock up and I ride home through the soupy August air.

I read a few pages from Nathan Knapp’s forthcoming, Schopenhauer, into a microphone.