"Do you know what the trouble is?"
He doesn't wait for me to answer, of course, because it's not really a question. I put down my glass of beer while waiting for my plumber/friend to gulp down his pint of stout before he continues.
"You see, three quarters of the women are already taken. Half the rest are just plain ugly. Though," he downs another big gulp of the dark stuff, "half the Taken are also just as ugly. So that leaves that other half of the remaining quarter. What is that?"
"An eighth?" I asked.
"Well, yeah, but what is that group? I mean, they are decent to hot, but it depends on the age too. The older that are, the smaller the group," he is almost yelling now.
"Old as in as old as we are?" I asked, though he is a little older than me.
"Oh, Christ, they can't be older than us. I am not even counting those!" he said then burst into a guffaw.
His name is Gerry. I came to this bar to meet a friend of mine, who has stood me up, apparently, without so much as a text message. She's a real flake, and I am not sure why I am friends with her. But when I saw my plumber, before I could avoid his gaze, he called out to me. I didn't want to mix professional and personal stuff together, but the next thing I knew, we were talking about women. It was sort of my fault since I was so mad that I told him that this friend of mine apparently again stood me up. I explained that it was just a friend, not a date, but then he started talking about women. He's divorced and is paying alimony. Like I said, he's older than me, but not by too much. He's there alone because, coincidentally, he is being stood up too. He claims it has never happened before, and in his case, it was a date, not a "friend", as he amused himself in saying and making air quotes.
So he continues, "And among this, what was it, an eighth, God, I feel like we are talking about a ruler here, an eighth, they are all messed up, more than the ones already with guys. Half of the eighth are just divorcees who will, I am told, in all likelihood get married and divorced again! Just more heartache for everyone, especially us single guys."
I almost asked, "Ain't you divorced?" But the tiny bit of beer is starting to have an effect on my pathetic liver.
"So let's say, just half that group, what is it, a sixteenth??" he screamed out. The music in the bar is loud, the people around us are loud, and his screaming doesn't seem to make much of a difference. His face is all red, all puffy, out of anger or just approaching inebriation, I don't know. He is very different from the guy that last week did a very nice job on a broken toilet. He was always so professional, very friendly. Here I see a very different person, not a worse one, just different. He is also wearing a Red Sox hat, a team I belittle, at best. He is wearing a nice shirt but that is now unbuttoned on the top. He gets the bartender to refill his pint and continues, "So that tiny sliver of 16th is mostly, well, very weird chicks. I mean, you have to wonder, why are they still single? I don't mean the twenty-somethings. I mean, what is a woman in her thirties doing single and never married? Don't you think, George?"
"George" is the name he uses for me because he can't pronounce my name even though it's written in his invoices for me.
"I mean, how screwed up you have to be to be a single woman and still not married and, God, still no boyfriend! You must have gotten through some real shit to still be avoiding men. You must be complaining all the time that there ain't no good men around at all. That you are so distrusting of us guys that you prefer to sit in your own cubical or home and cook for yourself and make a career for yourself, inside your own damn walls instead of reaching out."
He seems a little sober, all of a sudden. He is looking into the distance as he is saying this. He takes a sip from his newly refilled pint glass. Then his eyes fix on something behind me. He tilts his head a little and says, "Look at her, for example."
I turn around, though I hate doing that because by doing so the person inevitably knows we are talking about her. Well, not inevitably as in this crowded space all the guys are looking at some woman at some point. I see a woman in her thirties, very beautiful, her choices of clothing, makeup (even in the dim light I can see), and the way she carries herself, full of confidence, radiating a lot of energy. If I had even a shred of courage, I would go and ask her. Funny, though, that right away I know she is single.
"See how she's talking to her friends, especially her guy friends? She is trying to be close but only because they are her friends. If her boyfriend were there, and we know she ain't got one, she would not be the type that would be all cozy. She's what I am talking about. She makes herself look like she's untouchable, that the only man who deserves to be with her has to get past all that bullshit show of self-confidence, of independence."
When I sensed the pause, I looked at Gerry, who's now looking at me, but not staring or fixing any gaze. His face is more relaxed now, and he says, "What she hasn't figured out is that it doesn't take much, just experience, for a man to gain enough experience and knowledge about how this game works and get around her fake air of 'I-don't-need-no-man'. And he would hurt her in the end, and she would just build her wall even bigger and taller and stronger."
I don't know when he had actually finished his current glass, but he is now done. He takes out some bills and says as he counts them and puts them on the bar, "I don't know why we put up walls and put up with people with walls. Hey, I hope you are not going to need any plumbing done the next two weeks, cuz I am taking off."
"Really? Where to?" I asked, half thinking he would say, "Fishing" or something, to get it out of his system this whole mess with women. Suddenly I remember that I can't count on this friend of mine. No more plans with her. I don't even know why I let her be my friend. She never wants to schedule anything, as if she's waiting for or afraid that something would come up the last minute and my plans would be secondary to everything and anything that comes up. But then Gerry's last words before he dashed off stuck with me.
"I am off to see my sister. She's just out of the hospital, thank God she's all right, the doctors fixed her good. Heart surgery. Crazy, huh? A woman in her early forties with heart problems. You never know. She's got no husband. Never married. She's the only good woman in that sliver of sixteenth. She is honest and open, always has this foolish notion that people, us men especially, are deep down good, and after all that life has beaten down on her, she is coming out of the hospital still believing in this. I hope some decent guy will find her. That's what it's about, you get to be good all your life, but you don't ever have to go and look for anyone."
And he's off.
