punks giving thanks for beer & peanuts

an excerpt from my published novel

(The punk rock prayer is censored for the internet, ha ha)

“I’m so glad they don’t check IDs here,” Becky said. She asked Brett, “You twenty-one?” He nodded. “Oh. That’s right. You’re old. Cool. You can go to the downtown bars. They always check IDs.”

“Sounds expensive.”

Becky put her nose in the air. “When I saw Skinny Puppy it was well worth it.”

“Yeah,” Sandra agreed with Brett. “They have a cover charge. It’s all gone downhill at the cool clubs. It used to be that if you looked as cool as Becky they’d let you in for free no matter what your age. Now it’s just a racket to make you spend all your money, no matter how cool you are.”

“Well then,” Brett decided. “I won’t be going out for awhile.” He paused to read where somebody had scrawled on the YWCA parking ramp wall in blue marker, The End Of The World Will Be Disco. A 1960s hearse drove down Hennepin with dozens of doll heads glued all over the hood. He laughed.

“This town.”

They passed some Styrofoam McDonalds trash on the sidewalk, then walked alongside a wrought iron fence and went down narrow side steps into the basement bar. Just inside the door, Sandra grabbed copies of the City Pages and the Reader. She told Brett, “This town is so cool they have two big free alternative papers.”

“Free?”

“Paid for by strip clubs mostly, by the look of it.”

Raven chimed in, “You need both of them so you can compare the music reviews.”

The floor crunched with peanut shells. As Brett eyed the peanut barrel and the big glass box of popcorn, he nearly cried, “This is great! I’m so hungry!” After they grabbed their plastic baskets of snacks and sat on stools at a small tall round table, he asked, “You do this all the time?”

“Nope.” Sandra tossed the newspapers aside as if she was already bored with them. “Sometimes we’re too pooped and just go home and pass out.”

“Or too hung over.” Raven twisted his bracelets as if fashionably bored.

Becky walked up to them with a golden pitcher of beer, singing out like she was Danielle Dax, “Heeeeeey YEAH!” Brett winced at the lungpower.

Sandra smiled at the beer. “Elixir of the gods.”

“Don’t drop that!” Raven scolded Becky.

“I wasn’t going to.” She snarled.

“You looked like you were about to. God you’re weak. Don’t ever be a waitress.”

“I won’t drop it! Raven, don’t be an a*s. Get your bony a*s up there and get us some glasses.”

“I’ll help,” Sandra said jumping up. “There’s four of us and he’ll just drop one again.”

When they came back and beer was poured all around, Brett took a sip. Raven stopped him. “We haven’t said grace yet!”

Becky chuckled. “Go for it Raven. Channel Osiris so we can laugh at you.”

Raven said, “Egypt gave us beer. F###’n A!”

Sandra agreed,” F###’n A to whoever invented beer!”

Becky added, “F###’n A!”

“Egypt did.” Raven stood, piously held out his arms and said, “The festival of beer is here and so we sip a tall cool cup of golden light. Elixir of the Gods. Golden light, golden light. Ra delight. Ra delight.”

They all clinked glass, then Brett asked Becky, “Is your hair real?”

“Of course it is!” Becky fibbed, nose in the air.

“Of course it isn’t,” Sandra tattled. “It’s extensions.”

“What’s that?” Brett asked.

Becky kicked Sandra under the table, but Sandra went right on tattling. “They sew extra hair on at the hair salon and it costs a fortune. A lot of punk white girls do dreadlocks since it is so reggae. Reggae is the sound of protest, and pot, and whatever isn’t suburbia. Becky doesn’t have a single reggae album. She’s such a poseur.”

“I have one.”

Sandra nodded. “And you never play it.”