I’d only been back in town for a few weeks. I was at a bar in Downingtown, Pennsylvania, nursing a double shot of Jack Daniels. My childhood friend Andy was tending bar. And I was watching a mean-looking member of the Pagans biker gang walking in my direction, intent on pummeling me into a lump of dog chow.
Let me back track.
It was the winter of 1998, and I’d recently crawled back to the Philadelphia area with an unfinished college education, a mountain of insurmountable credit card debt, and no hope for a bright and sunny future. I had contacted as many of my old friends as I could track down, trying to validate moving back home. I wanted proof that not going to college and not leaving the town you grew up in and not following the promise that you had shown in high school, could actually be a recipe for success.
My search brought me to many bars. As it turned out, one of my oldest friends, a guy I’d known since kindergarten (my cohort in class-clownery through elementary school and on to making videos in high school) was a bartender at one of the establishments I wandered into. I started frequenting the place, trying to suck back as much free booze as I could before I wore out the “old friend” bit, where people feel obligated to treat you to drinks because they haven’t seen you in years and you keep talking about the good times you used to have together. Nostalgia can be very dangerous when you’re drunk. On the few occasions where I was the one with money, I’ve easily dropped a couple hundred dollars rehashing the good ol’ days with friends.
One particular night, Andy and I drank shot after shot with a toothless, long-haired ex-biker named Wyatt. We told him stories about the insane things we did growing up, the crazy things we had planned, and we played round after round of pool with him. I never heard anyone laugh as hard as Wyatt. Whatever we did, he loved every minute.
“You guys are some funny motherfuckers!” Wyatt would yell every so often, between laughs or hacking coughs.
I asked Wyatt about his biker days, and he told me some colorful stories. He’d started out riding with The Warlocks, the second largest motorcycle club in the Delaware and Chester County areas. The largest club was The Pagans, a gang he eventually started riding with, though he never became a member. He was friends with many of them, but his club days were over. Too many fights. Too many near deaths. Too many drug-addled years lost on the road behind him. He just liked to ride.
Andy mentioned that the bar down the street was a Pagan hang out. I knew this from trying to buy beer there in 9th grade. My friends and I had stood around outside the bar waiting for someone who would buy a few six-packs for us. We asked one of the bikers who was on his way in if he could buy us some. We gave him $20 and waited across the street by the train station for what seemed like hours. Eventually the biker emerged from the bar and got on his bike. We ran up to him and asked for the beer. He laughed when he saw us. “You’re still here?” he said, laughing and shaking his head. We asked for the beer or our money back, but he didn’t listen and revved the engine and roared off. Lesson learned.
My friend also informed me that when the bar down the street closed, if the Pagans still wanted to drink, they’d saunter on in here. He pointed to the clock. It was 12:50 in the morning.
“The place closes at one,” he said. “If they’re not here by 1:15, we’re safe.”
As luck would have it, a couple of Pagans wandered in to the bar at one in the morning, as if on cue. They were old and grizzled, long graying hair dripping down the back of their crusty leather jackets. They look like they’d been sent over by central casting as extras in a biker movie. And they had with them four beautiful, teenage biker chicks.
I tried to focus on my drink and not look at them, but it’s been wired into my DNA to stare longingly at any remotely attractive woman that enters a room. And so I found it difficult to tear my gaze away from a particularly sexy young biker girl with silky, flowing red locks and a halter-top that was barely concealing her pert, full breasts.
Andy went to the other end of the bar and greeted them, taking drink orders. The men looked around, sizing up the place. The redheaded lovely looked over in my direction before I had a chance to turn away and we locked eyes. She smiled. I gulped and weakly smiled in return, then pounded the rest of my drink.
She pulled on the arm of the biker closest to her, never looking away from me. I furtively glance at what was going on and saw her whisper something to the man, then nod in my direction.
The look on his face was not a happy one. I don’t know what she said to him. He started moving in my direction. I grabbed my pack of cigarettes off the bar and nervously pulled one out and put it in my mouth. I missed and it dropped to the floor. I got up and picked it up off the floor and as I was standing up I saw Wyatt dart from the pool table and quickly intercept the biker.
He patted him on the shoulder and shook his hand. The Pagan continued looking at me over Wyatt’s shoulder. Wyatt seemed animated and launched into a story that made the man smile and soon they were walking away and the biker stopped looking at me. As they moved to the other end of the bar I saw Wyatt look back in my direction. His look betrayed nothing. Maybe he had just run into an old friend and was looking at me to say he had to attend to other things for the time being. Maybe he was letting me know that was a close call and to keep my eyes to myself in the future. I chose to believe the latter.
When Andy returned to my end of the bar, I told him that whatever Wyatt was drinking to night, it was on me.
“I think he just saved my life,” I told him.
Unfortunately I had very little money on me, so I was hoping Wyatt wasn’t planning to drink the bar dry. Andy knew my situation and said not to worry, that it was on the house.
“Wyatt’s a cool guy,” he said. “And we made him laugh.” He laughed at this himself and went to help other customers.
After about an hour I took the last forty dollars from my wallet and left it on the bar. I was hesitant because I didn’t have a job at the time and had no idea where I’d find another forty dollars in the coming weeks. I said goodbye to Andy and Wyatt and walked to my car. I got in and realized I had less than a quarter tank of gas and a 30 mile ride home. I wondered if it would be improper to go back in and take one of the twenties that I’d left on the bar, and if they were even still there. I wondered if that girl was screwing one of the ancient bikers. And if so, why? And was I really in danger of having the shit beat out of me or did I let my imagination get the better of me? I started the car and drove home.
