Dario's Day
t was just after opening when he came in, a slight boyish figure. Knew the
barmaid,
no doubt about that. Didn't even have to order. One schooner of VB just appeared
along with a universal whine emanating from a head full of black, unkempt wavy
hair, slumped over the bar, moaning.
On one of the monitors Tyson and Holyfield were slugging it out. They were into the fifth round and Iron Mike was starting to slow down. Anything past the third was always going to be a problem for the New York mauler considering the bums he'd fought after the nick. It was a replay. The fight Tyson couldn't lose. Yeah, sure.
Bit early to be on the piss, Bill thought to himself. Bit early, but with a thousand bucks in his pocket fresh from the tables, who had the clock?
"You want a drink mate?"
Bill Reynolds was like that. A straight shooter. A dinkum bloke. The type of guy who'd been around and seen the odd piece of misfortune. Had even lost the missus and the kids. Most people would say it was the booze. A love affair with the bottle, she'd said the night before the joint was laid bare save for a vegemite jar, a plate, a spoon and a note devoid of revelation. Where was she? Who fucken knew? After 24 years and two kids, more to the point, did anyone care? Maybe Bill, maybe.
"She left me," he wailed. "Just gone." And the kid started crying. Ten past ten and blubbering. Not even midday and sobbing. "I just can't go on."
The Tyson right narrowly missed. Holyfield countered with a left jab, a right to the ribs then a hook catching the world's meanest man hard. Tyson clutched. Holyfield ripped.
They say the first defeat is the worst. It is a time when mortality becomes real. Consider when Ali dropped Foreman in Zaire. For six rounds the Champ absorbed pain. Rope a dope, the scribes wrote later. But it wasn't that. No way. Ali survived in stinking heat, taking it all from a man who only knew attack. And by not contemplating failure, by driving his resources to the limit, by not checking the fuel tank, Foreman came up short, fell and never got up, leastwise not that African night, clipped by a short right, carrying over 200 pounds of professional hate that landed flush on the button. Twenty years later, Tyson ate dirt just the same. Nothin's knew. Just goes round and round, waiting for another fool in a different time.
"Are you sure she's gone for good," the barmaid commiserated.
There was some sort of bond there that Bill didn't understand. Sisterly almost.
"Mate, have a beer."
"Thanks," said the kid
"My name's Bill."
"Mine's Dario."
For the next hour they chewed the fat, speaking about loss and the need, at least from Bill's point of view, to approach each day fresh; a kind of mutated AA philosophy which had a quick burst around the block just prior to inviting the Kid back for a drink.
Later, the older man, insulated by the comfort of booze and a captive audience, sought, amid the relative affluence of a highly expensive, rented apartment, to delve into the Renaissance as promulgated by that 16/17th century Pommie rake turned preacher, John Donne, to flesh out the argument that Life truly was for the Living.
Busie old foole, unruly Sunne,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windowes, and through curtains call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers seasons run?
Sawcy pedantique wretch, goe chide
Late school boyes and sowre prentices,
Goe tell Court-huntsman that the King will ride,
Call countrey ants to harvest offices;
Love, all alike, no season knowes, nor clyme,
Nor houres, dayes, moneths, which are the rags of time.
Bill just wanted Dario to get some perspective. After all, lust, love and and heart-ache had been going on for a fair old time.
"I mean," said Bill, "it's not the end of the world. Fortune favours the brave, my friend, and at your age, you're young enough to find another."
"But she said, 'please don't send me out tonight otherwise I won't come back.' I thought she was only kidding," said Dario.
"Pardon."
"Well, she always said that and I loved her so much." Words from the inner core producing a new batch of tears.
"Send her where?"
"Out. We needed the money."
Dario was a pimp. Now a pimp without a moll. A broken pimp. Broke and riven by inextricable despair. But not so devastated, within the overall scheme of things, that he couldn't offer Bill a smidgen of fellatio, for a price of course.
"I'm not gay," he simpered, "but I don't mind because you've been so kind. It's the least I can do."
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table
Let us go indeed.
Would she not have the advantage, after all?
This music is successful with a 'dying fall'
Now that we talk of dying --
And should I have the right to smile?
Bill had always thought he was a street smart dude. Smashing the shit out of total failure made little sense. So he asked the parasite to leave. Dumb thing was Dario wasn't even offended, even rang the next day leaving a message: I'm sorry. I just want a friend. But by then Bill had gone to fight his way through the stinking, knee-deep, indebted armpits of bodies who chased the financial dragon.
And at the last call he was four grand down minus the $20 prudently shoved down his pants at the outset; enough to get home and sink into an empty bed with a modicum of personal control, requiring assistance from no-one and just as well because no-one was there.
Bill, unlike Dario, had standards. Without rules there is anarchy. His Dad had told him that.
Too true Dad, too true.
