Noir at the Bar 2-20-25

 

Noir at the Bar

Tick...tock...tick...tock...tick...tock... 

Really looking forward to this. Gonna pull out all the stops. Gonna take a shower, brush my teeth, put on clean jeans. Cologne, deodorant. Buy new shoes. The works. 

Ideally, in a perfect world, this is how the evening will unfold. The ultimate cocktail. A crime fiction reading that ends in a crime nightmare reality.

First, I read a chapter from my current manuscript, a crime thriller. Then the cafe's front door explodes open. Interpol, the FBI, ATF, DEA, DHS, Secret Service, and a SWAT team bull-rush inside. I get hammered upside the head with beer bottles and chairs, tasered, handcuffed, thrown facedown on the filthy floor while being shit-stomped, pepper sprayed, screaming, and then dragged by my broken ankles to the door (my brand new shoes fall off & some jerk steals them). A horrified crowd jumps up and begins chanting, "Better you than me!"

I'm dragged outside. I'm yelling, "Whatever it is, I didn't do it!" Six police cars are flashing red and blue disco lights. Sirens, bullhorns, gunshots. An FBI agent snarls something about "Guantanamo...get this terrorist to Gitmo..." 

A black pillow case is yanked over my head. I can't see shit. I'm tossed into a black helicopter waiting on the rooftop of the liquor store across the street. The pilot has a Russian accent. Or a North Korean accent. No wait. The pilot sounds like Elon Musk trashed on a 10 day bender on methamphetamines. His eyes are as big as basketballs. The co-pilot says, "Git him to Gitmo then we can git home, git it? Now let's git the hockey puck outa here."

I can't wait. Crime fiction, cocktails, and Cuban incarceration. Really looking forward to this.