Бар Бар Бар
Flash fiction about memory & other nonsense
Memory? woke up this morning with a skull-splitting headache and one sock still on. Sheet marks imprinted the pattern of rest on her body, mostly over her thighs and face. I looked at these lines that covered her and resented their lie. She was anything but rested, and so was I.
We always get up at the same time, Memory? and I. It usually takes me a few seconds to catch up to her, like when you take an afternoon nap on holiday and it’s so hot and you don’t recognise the room so you don’t know where you are for a moment. It was like that this morning, too. I usually take a few minutes to lie in bed, and she allows me that, but she always runs before me to the kitchen to get the coffee machine going; at the table she greets me with a mocking, ‘Are we all up to speed yet?’
Memory? usually gives me a few seconds of peace to get at least somewhat caffeinated, and then inevitably begins her random, chaotic, useless soliloquy. This morning she chose to replay the happenings of Wednesday, 4th March 2020, 10:03 p.m. to 1:15 a.m. (estimation), Moscow Standard Time, with a particular focus on red neon lights, a blond Russian bartender who couldn’t speak an ounce of English (but tried, bless him), and two particularly unpleasant French girls. Anyway. I sipped my coffee and let her do her thing.
OPENING FILE >>>
4.03.2020-EVENING-SEQUENCE-1-22:07.mem
We arrived at that T-something District, on the late evening of the 4th March. We went up the stairs of a dilapidated block of flats that made us think of Raskolnikov. We thought, ‘I’m so happy I came,’ but were we? We were suspicious of the two French girls we had met in the hostel because they didn’t tip the waiter well, and spoke French way too much around us, when they knew — they knew — we couldn’t speak it. But we wanted to have a night out in Saint Petersburg before we left, so we pretended to like them for a few hours more. The sign outside the door announced:
БАР
(BAR)
but it looked like a regular apartment. We exchanged questioning looks with the girls, then went in first. ‘Cowards,’ we thought. But we said nothing and smiled.
4.03.2020-EVENING-SEQUENCE-2-22:10.mem
We walked in. It didn’t look sanitary. We loved it. We thought, ‘this is so cool.’ It was. In the first room, there were three Russian teenagers. It was dark. What we identified as great music was playing on a turntable. Later, we realised it was Gorillaz’ ‘Strobelite’. The second room was the last room of the bar. The place was small.
There were a БАР, БАР stools, a БАРtender and that was it. There was a red neon sign that coloured the waiter’s blond hair red. He looked fourteen. No, that’s stupid. He had tattoos. Sixteen, maybe.
The French girls were too shy, so they made us put in the order. We spoke no Russian, the БАРtender spoke little English. He called himself ‘stupid.’ We reassured him his English was good. It wasn’t.
We managed to order three Russian shots that had ostentatiously cheap vodka and sugary pineapple syrup in them. We took a sip and smiled. We wondered if the French girls would get stingy again and make us pay for the drinks. They didn’t, but winged about the price. We decided this was our last night hanging out with them.
4.03.2020-EVENING-SEQUENCE-3-22:13.mem
We went back to room one. More red neon signs. We sat down with the girls and sipped our drinks. The whole room was red. It was weird to be there with so many teenagers. The bartender kept coming in to change the song. It was vinyl. Every song was great. The French girls were talking about the constraints of living in Paris and how they didn’t want to look like the other French women did. We didn’t really care. We drank the sugary drink and made small talk. We checked our phone to see if our boyfriend texted, but he hadn’t.
4.03.2020-EVENING-SEQUENCE-4-22:45.mem
We had a feeeeeeeewwwwwwww more drinks. Possibly? Probably, Absolut. Absolutely only in order to numb the pain of the mindless conversation. We wished we had better friends. (Any friends.) But we had to travel solo, and it wasn’t that bad, and we were here now, so that’s that. As random as it was, it was better than binge-watching Tarkovsky and scrolling the ***Annoying but Lowkey Impressive Kardashianesque Continuum of Selfies***. We looked up at the wall above one of the Frenchies and thought the graffiti looked cool as hell in the projector’s light.
4.03.2020-EVENING-SEQUENCE-5-23:47.mem
WHAT IS THIS SONG I LOVE IT SHAZAM IT OH OKAY OH GORILLAZ I WOULD’VE NEVER GUESSED, I NEVER REALLY GOT INTO GORILLAZ DID YOU? NON, ME NEITHER BUT HOW COOL IS THIS HUHHHHHH
<<< ERROR
<<< CLOSING FILE
Memory? would’ve kept rambling on if I hadn’t slammed her head into the stove and poured her coffee down the sink. Even with blood running down her forehead, she’s still mumbling to herself.
OPENING FILE >>>
5.03.2020-MORNING-SEQUENCE-1-00:04.mem
— e got back to the hostel — stocky white Samoyed puppy! — see Dostoyevsky’s house tomorrow, need sleep — how many roubles for a pyshka? — and the French girls had fallen asleep already — but the time dizzerence — still no text from —
<<< ERROR
<<< CLOSING FILE
How is it possible? By the time I’ve finished the first sip of my latte, Memory? had already had three espressos, smoked half a pack, and retrieved six abstract sequences. Over two dozen images and sounds and faces are looping through my mind like hollow ghosts. With every passing one, my brain becomes more numb. He’s watching it all like projections on a white canvas.
‘Why not let her have her little bit of fun?’ he says, also giving her a little jolt with his foot. ‘You know how excited she gets in the mornings.’
‘But — what’s her point? It’s all just mindless rambling.’ I say, and she hears me somehow, over the sound of her own voice.
‘How about you tell me? What’s the point of you?’
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