Chapter 7 - Cantina

Chapter 7 �" Cantina

Scott rolled the rundown bike along the street as the populous were retiring to their homes or meeting places for the evening.  One such dark hovel was Roy’s Cantina and that is where Scott was heading.  He knew it was where Mike, Carlos and Puerco would be, it was where everyone would be tonight.  The boys drank there as often as they could, often late into the night.

The alcohol there was cheap and powerful, just the fumes alone could put a man to sleep. Men and women, young and old lay slumped in chairs, across tables and against the filthy front window after partaking of the brown drink.  The brewing process created a thin oil-like film that clung to every surface like a drunk to his glass.  Faces and hands left smears in the slick leaving a story sitting at each table ready for the next person to erase and rewrite.

He pushed down the kickstand propping it up dead centre as if it was the grandest and most beautiful site in the town.  The three boys watched through the window with screwed faces as Scott rolled up but remained quiet.

The once Egg-shell white painted walls had turned rotten, cracked and peeling.  A spider’s web of black fractures crawled out from every corner.  Each jittery line served to trap years of dust and smoke that had blown through that narrow, cramped cantina.

Several layers of old paint peaked through the top coat as each one failed to conceal the last.  The many different tints of the past made one by the build-up of grime and slick trapping each under a dull yellow-brown tone.  Whatever vibrancies were once alive in the cantina slowly began to match the colour of the foul liquid drank there.  Dark and lifeless, whether fixture, fitting or folk.

On this and every other day a chorus of coughs could be heard emanating from the cantina between the hum of idle chatter and minor arguments.  The sound of Jazz crackled loudly on a tiny speaker.  Roy tapped along to the tinny rhythms with his usual crinkled emotionless face, the oily substance seeming to have covered him as much as the walls.

That dark brown liquid filled small murky glasses and the regulars would sip the fowl liquid slowly.  They would generally then use coke to wash away the taste.  The simple can of coke, transcending war, genocide and disease it’s dark syrup survived all disasters to greet the lips of anyone still alive.  It was either that or the synthetic orange drink, basically orange flavoured powder in recycled piss water.  If you couldn’t spare the cash you were left with the foul taste all night but it was so strong that you wouldn’t care for long.

It was not just a taste but an experience with a series of spine tingling jolts to the nervous system.  First the taste buds snap and twitch, then a burn in the throat that doesn’t seem to leave, then hitting the stomach with aches and groans.  The only time mouths watered for this drink was just before they vomited.  This was all assuming there was no tomorrow where aching head and stomach sat waiting.

The sweet intonation of the soft trumpets was shattered as soon as Scott stepped inside.  The fumes burned his eyes and nose, reviving memories of the familiar taste.  The bleach-like chemical smelling liquor hit him as if a wall a glass had been placed in front of the doorway.  The bombardment continued with a flurry of questions from his friends.

‘What is that!’ said Mike.

‘It’s a bike, Mike’ Scott cheerfully replied.

Mike Paused, looked at the bike then at Scott and smiled ‘Are you sure it’s a bike?’

A flurry of questions ensued form the three

‘Where is your bike?’ 

‘Where did you even get that?’ 

‘What year is it from?’ 

‘You know it’s a heap of junk, right!?’

Scott blew and puffed out his cheeks and looked towards the three perplexed how they could not see what he could.  ‘No… this was a great bike, I just needs to finish building it and add a few parts,’ Scott said sincerely and slowly. ‘Listen, it still runs!’ Scott raised his leg over the bike and pushed his leg down forcefully on the kick-start, the bike the engine spluttered and turned but did not start. ‘The filter is just clogged, it will run,’ ‘trust me.’ Scott said confidently.

Laughter could be heard from the back corner of the cantina

‘Scott that bike really suits you, it’s a real piece of s**t! Just like you hahahaha.’ It was Dennis and his usual band of cronies who joined in his laughter.

Scott hurled insults to the back of the cantina ‘F**k you Dennis…. and if you even have a mother which seems unlikely, Chinga du madre! A*****e!’

Before the words had finished leaving Scott’s mouth glass bottles began to fly through the air in his direction smashing against the bike and him.  The three boys instantly replied with glass and stones from the ground outside.

‘Stop that s**t!’ Slammed Roy in a rage, ‘You f*****g a******s!’ the bar fell silent minus the jazz which droned on belligerently.  ‘I will f**k the next one of you in the a*s that throws anything!’ grunted foul mouthed old Roy.

They all knew if you get banned from the Cantina you are basically banned from having a life, everyone retook their seats and pushed the broken glass to the side with their feet.  The usual din of the bar continued after a few seconds of musing and the boys began to speak between themselves with the glare of Dennis burning into the back of their heads.

Unusually Puerco was the first to speak ‘Dennis is gonna be a cop you know, he is 18 so now he’s joined.  He leaves Monday for training so this is his last weekend here. Thank f**k’

‘Well at least he will be gone.’ Said Mike.

‘Yeah,’ said Carlos, ‘but can you imagine him being Policia, F**k… but, at least he won’t be assigned here, they never send them back to where they are from.’

‘What kind of dick-bag joins the Policia anyway?’ said mike

‘People like Dennis I guess.’ Laughed Puerco.

‘Well I feel sorry for the district that gets him’ said Scott.

Carlos raised his drink and looked around the table, the boys raised their glasses in succession ‘to Dennis’s future district, may he be turned blind by this s**t tonight.  Salut!’

‘Salut!’ said all

The boys sipped the brown liquid, swallowed, winced and all at once tried to grab the one can of coke on the table to try and wash away the taste.  They all manage to take an eventual gulp after a small scuffle then sat with screwed faces.

‘So what will you actually do with that bike’ asked Carlos in a more open tone than offered previously by the three.

‘I’m gonna race it…’ he said confidently but then fell into apprehension admitting ‘in the capital’

‘What!, that will never make it to the capitol never mind be fast enough to race’ scoffed Carlos.

‘but it will’ snapped Scott, he continued barking points to the group ‘The frame weighs nothing!, when I’m finished I will have quadrupled the power output.’ ‘I just need to clean it up, add a few things and it’s a racer!’

‘It’s way too small,’ said Puerco.

Scott responded ‘That’s why this will be so good, it will be more aerodynamic and can fit through smaller gaps, less fuel, less weight, it will fly.’

‘So explain how this is gonna be fast enough to race in the capitol?’ said Mike.

Scott Smiled ‘well first of all you’re going to help me and then I will show you.’

‘No way’ replied Mike,

‘Come on, don’t you want to see how fast this can go’ said Scott knowing he had mikes help.

‘Shall we get out of here anyway’ said Scott

‘What, why?’ asked mike

‘Go to the ridge or something,’ Said Scott, ‘I hate the smell in here.’

‘Yeah, ridge sounds cool’ said Carlos followed an ignored nod of agreement from Puerco.

‘Ok, ok well let’s get a bottle or something to take then,’ said mike.

The other three went outside as Mike got a bottle of the black stuff

‘I’m not sure, this will start yet’ said Scott

‘Just chain it up, no one is gonna steal that thing anyway,’ Said Carlos

‘I don’t wanna leave it,’ said Scott, ‘erm hold on.’  He grabbed the chain and wrapped it around his handlebars and passed the other end to carlos.  ‘Tow me’

Mike stepped out the cantina with bottle in hand, ‘what’s going on.’

‘Scott wants to die’ said Puerco.

‘It will be fine’ said Scott

‘Ok, well if you fall off don’t blame me.’ Said Carlos and locked the chain to the rear of his motorcycle.

Carlos fired up the engine of his purple machine, ‘you ready?’

‘Just move slowly’ said Scott

Carlos laughed, ‘OK’ and revved the engine.

‘You lot can f**k off with that noise,’ shouted Roy out the door.

He pulled away, jerking Scott forward on the bike.  He managed to hang on as the bike was almost ripped out of his hand.  

‘You dick Carlos,’ he shouted.  

Mike and Puerco jumped on their bikes and followed laughing at Scott as he was dragged through the town streets.

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Reviews

[dan]

Ryan, Your storytelling chops are sharpened up and flying high! I read this chapter due to the manageable length and really enjoyed it. Of course a lot of context was lost to me since I hadn't read the whole in-progress piece. But it read in a very professional tone, the dialogue was sharp and it held my interest throughout. Very nice job! take care...dan

[Ryan Yates]

thanks buddy

[annalysiar]

Very nicely done😃😃😃...

[Josh W.]

I liked this a lot man. One thing I would change is the line "like a drunk to his glass" to "like the drunks to their glasses". My reasoning for this is that a simile typically compares two different things for the sake of imagery. . In this case you are comparing two things that are related and are happening concurrently so I would think that they would be presented that way. But very strong chapter with good imagery.

[Nigel Newman]

Ryan Hi. I've had a look at the other recent comments and tend to agree that this chapter and then previous one are shorter because you've toned down the amount of description, and I agree with the general feedback that it remains consistent style-wise with the earlier chapters and doesn't lose its sense of feel and place - still more than enough description. And i still find it very readable - good pace.

However, none of my previous reservations go away, the biggest of which remains the lack of explanation about the wall - the only substantive explanation I've seen was in your reply to my comment. Precisely why would people be automatically shot if they breached the wall - what happens - who lives - on the other side? You also say very little about the governance in the town - you mention police and that things happen by who one knows, survival of the strongest etc and I get that it's a wild place, a bit frontier-like. It's fine that your story sits in a bubble, and while I don't want pages and pages of what's outside the bubble, I think a little more is required in order to explain why the bubble is, and remains, as it is. Sorry - this is a pet peeve - I must be one of the few people whose enjoyment of the Hunger Games was undermined by simply not believing the financial and economic viability of the model of a fantastically rich decadent Capitol living off the earnings of areas small enough to be able to gather around just one large public screen and have just one railway station - for me it's never stacked up, and it just gets in the way! So please bear in mind my minority view on such matters.

[Hope Rose]

This is really good. It's really descriptive. Good job, keep it up :)

[Mark Alexander Boehm]

Ryan,
I noticed a few grammatical errors (one's that I've made 1,001 times myself and nine times out of ten they're the fault of the keyboard, not the writer)
Example: 'form' instead of 'from'
Overall, though, I found this much easier to read through. You managed to tone down the sort of overwhelming description from the first few chapters without compromising the story or your writing style. I was still able to visualize everything perfectly and it didn't feel like such a drastic change that I'd question who wrote it or if I somehow flipped to a different book.
very well done!

[Tiffany K Charles]

I'm going to start from the beginning ... I can't understand what's going on thus far... so I'll go the start and then I'll give you a proper review......

[Meeks]

These people come from a French background? I think salut is french, so I'm not sure.

You repeat some words too often, too closely. Such as 'liquid', twice in the same sentence, in the beginning. Make sure each sentence sounds new and not as if you just didn't know what to write.

The opening descriptions are getting a bit lengthy. If you really need them and if the bar will be a background for many scenes, consider softening them up a great bit. If you don't need them, get rid of them.
So now we get to the big question: how exactly does one make descriptions interesting?
Style.
When nobody's talking and everything is just rolling at its own pace, that's when your style shows through. Many writers avoid descriptions so much that not-describing has become their style, and then they can't ever write decent descriptions. And that's bad, because this is is the scene editors look for; along with a dialogue scene they can probably estimate how good you are.
You just have to piece the words together so that they're interesting. You write without plot, without dialogue, without characters, it's just the scenery and you. For an entire three paragraphs. Absolutely horrifying. I know because I'm horrified too, and haven't ever written a description that I could read from beginning to end without taking a power snooze somewhere in between the lines.

So really, I can't help you. However, I would like to propose a partnership for helping us both with these: we both write a description and then we suffer through the other's. Practice makes perfect, and it might work if I find someone willing to do it.

But overall, this story does have the certain thing to it, probably the setting. Keep publishing, and hope you agree to collaborate!

[Cyndy Robinson]

Good, I can continue reading the story, lol! Well done.

[TheMalady]

I only read the first and second chapters, however the story is still interesting. I like this one since it holds that comic action with Dennis' group. This chapter is shorter compared to the two, nonetheless, I can grasp the picture and the scenes well. Great job here. :)

[Anna]

I really like this book. It inspires me to work harder to make my texts as close to reality as yours are. Thank you for this beautiful works. I really appreciate your job.
Sincerely, Anna Avr.

[Ryan Yates]

thank you so much