A Little Something I Just Started Working On

The Screwdriver

Years before the word “tool” hit the mainstream to mean a member of the male persuasion who was completely ridiculous in their dress and mannerisms yet thought they were the coolest thing on two legs ever, I was using this word to describe a man I didn’t want to date.

In college, a “tool” was someone who popped their collar, blew their hair dry, gelled it to within an inch of its life and sported designer threads. To a high schooler or a freshman girl, the “tool” may look good, but he was way to self-absorbed to talk to for more than fifteen minutes, let alone try to have a relationship with.
So, when I tried to be smart and sassy at a house party near the end of my freshman year and order a screwdriver, my best friend admonished me.

“Self-respecting girls don’t date tools and they don’t drink them either.” I gave her a funny look. “A screwdriver equals screwed,” she said to me and ordered me a vodka martini.

Her words to me that night about the screwdriver was one piece of advice I heeded all through college. If I ever got the urge to drink the concoction of vodka and orange juice, I only needed to look at the drunk freshman girls at frat and house parties damn near stripping in their haste to get even drunker and make a bad decision, and thus getting screwed in possibly more ways than one.

I did take a sip one time, just to see what screwed tasted like. Despite my affection for a good glass of orange juice with pulp, I never drank an entire screwdriver. Vodka and orange juice were never meant to be mixed together in my humble opinion.

And it seems that my opinion matched 99.9 percent of my patrons because in the five years I had tended bar, not one had ordered a screwdriver. True, I had some older customers who favored Harvey Wallbangers, but no one had sat down at the bar and ordered just orange and vodka in a glass.

No one that is until the biggest mistake of my life walked into the bar by himself and sat down on a stool.

He smiled at me. “You weren’t lying,” he said.

“Nope,” I replied as I refilled a draft Bud Light. “So, what will you have?”

“Screwdriver,” he said.

Passing off the Bud Light I was pouring, I damn near asked “What for?” before I caught myself, reminding myself of all those drunk frosh girls and their penchant for vodka and orange juice.

I should have taken that as a sign right there and then. Screwdriver equals screwed. However, he was no girl and I was no freshman. I began to wonder if age caused stereotypes to change. A 30-year-old male who appeared to have a steady job was not a 19-year-old freshman girl learning the perils and pitfalls of alcohol, and maybe I needed to rethink my screwdriver stereotype.

I have rethought my stereotype. A freshman girl drinking a screwdriver will be screwed. A seemingly adult male with a preference for screwdrivers will screw over the seemingly adult females he may date.

But let me back up briefly. I met Levi on a rare Saturday night off with my best friend Jazz, the one who warned me about screwdrivers in college. Jazz and I went for a delicious dinner at a dive bar far off in the county; then we’d quickly shucked our country roots, came back into the city and settled at a wine and dessert bar. The wine and dessert bar was more fitting for our outfits, but the dive bar was more fitting of our personalities.

While drinking a bottle of Catawba and sharing a piece of cheesecake with strawberry drizzle, an attractive member of the opposite sex approached us. His name was Levi. He had sandy blonde hair that bordered on brunette, big brown eyes, and broad shoulders. Jazz was more than happy to let him join our party when he asked. I was not. I rarely had a night off to hang out with Jazz and now this stranger was wrecking it.

“I’m Levi,” he said.

“Jazz,” Jazz answered then nudged me and said, “Rory.”

“Jasmine?” he asked.

“Maybe Jezebel,” Jazz said laughing and flirting. Levi laughed too. “You’re right though.”

“And Rory is short for?” Levi asked looking directly into my eyes.

“Aurora,” Jazz answered for him when it was apparent I wasn’t going to say anything. “The sleepy princess who had an accident with a spinning wheel.”

“Sleeping Beauty,” I answered with what I hoped was annoyance enough in my voice to tell Levi to scram.

The night continued and I found out Levi was a stockbroker and knew several acquaintances of Jazz that worked with her at her father’s accounting firm. The more we found out, the more Jazz flirted, the more engrossed in the wine list I became, and the more Levi seemed to become interested in me.

“And what about you, fair princess,” he asked.

I jerked up. “Princess?” I asked and wrinkled my nose.

“Ok, I’m terrible with Disney movies. Was she some lucky commoner whose beauty caught the prince’s eye?”

“Oh, no, she was a princess. A legitimate princess seeing as her father was a king and her mother the queen. But I am no princess.”

Jazz gave me a dirty look. I knew that look. For those who knew, I was regarded as something of a princess. But I wasn’t going to let a stockbroker know about the secret assets that generations of my family held onto. We preferred a low profile.

“No?” he asked with an eyebrow arched. “Could’ve fooled me?”

“Last time I checked, princesses didn’t work as bartenders.” Another dirty look from Jazz.

“Oh yeah?” he asked. Where?”

“The Strauss,” Jazz answered quickly for me to lighten things.

“The Strauss? Really? Hard to believe, but I haven’t been there. Everyone talks about it though. It’s a neighborhood legacy or something.”

“It’s an icon,” Jazz crowed happily. “It’s older than the city, in fact.”

“I must check it out then.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Well, be prepared, it isn’t a yuppie bar. It’s a dive and is happy maintaining its dive status. The patrons are the salt of the earth. Except on Thursday, that’s when we have drafts on special and the college kids and business customers come out of the woodwork.”

“Then I’ll avoid Thursday,” he replied.

And he did avoid Thursday. He came in by himself on a Tuesday much to my surprise. I passed his screwdriver to him and told him the price, $3.50. He gave me a five and told me to keep it. I was conflicted at that. On the one hand, it was a good tip and I appreciated it, but the other part of me that didn’t like him wanted to ask him if he thought I needed the money.

I was about to reply when a regular approached. Without his asking, I poured him a draft of Miller and put the drink on his tab. He thanked me and we chatted for a minute.

“Oh, so you can be nice,” he joked.

I gave him a small smile. “When the mood strikes me.”

He laughed. “I hope the mood strikes often while you’re working. I know my customers are hard enough to deal with sometimes, I can only imagine doing what you do.”

“Yeah, and my boss is a bitch,” I answered.

“All owners can be when the bottom line is threatened,” he replied. “So, Rory, tell me something about yourself?”

“What’s to tell?” I asked.

“Well,” he said, “I know all about Jazz from the other night. You heard some about me. Tell me about you. Brothers or sisters?”

“Only child,” I replied.

Levi looked up in thought. “Okay, favorite movie?”

“Casablanca.”

He looked at me curiously. “Who’s in that? It doesn’t sound familiar.”

“Bogey.”

“So, it’s an old movie?” He asked. “Is it in black and white?”

“Yes and yes.”

Levi regarded me. “The polite thing to do when someone is trying to make conversation with you is to answer back with something more than one-word answers.” I glared at him. “Ok, favorite movie done in color?”

“One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”

Levi rolled his eyes and gave a good-natured sigh. “And when was the one made? Before you were born too?”

“Jack Nicholson won an Oscar for it in the 70’s.”

“Are you trying to scare me away?” I didn’t reply. “I’m not going away,” he said as he drained his screwdriver.

“Your money,” I said and poured him another drink. He gave me another five and told me to keep the change.

Levi stayed for two more drinks, until 8 p.m. Gradually, I opened up to him. But when he asked for my, number I declined. Not actually like I am now, but I wasn’t looking to add a plus one onto my status. And, adding a plus one onto my guest list meant I’d actually have to look presentable outside of work. Since I was at work 75 percent of my week, I liked to be as worthless as possible during the remaining 25 percent of the hours in the week.

At the end of the evening, I went home, cuddled into my bed for a full five hours of sleep and didn’t think a bit about Levi. My mind was on work and the new book I had started reading.

Regardless of how much sleep I got, it was never enough, and the morning dawned painfully early for me. I went through my normal routine – worked out, made myself some oatmeal, and then was at the bar by 9 a.m. to get ready for the day.

Needless to say, I was surprised to see Levi the stockbroker waltz in a little after six that evening. Like last night, he sat down and ordered a screwdriver, gave me a five and told me to keep it then attempted even more small talk. I shut myself off even more to him, hoping he’d get the hint.

He didn’t. He ordered two more screwdrivers and left around 9 p.m. after once again asking for my number. Once again, I declined to give it to him.

Thursday, the next evening, as the college crowd was queuing up for their cheap draft beer, I was more than prepared for Levi’s intrusion. 6 p.m. turned into 6:30 and he hadn’t yet stopped inside the bar. With the crowd thick with barely 21-year-old bodies demanding cheap alcohol, I barely had time to think about his absence until I closed the bar at midnight.
While cleaning the glasses, the short order cook, Eddie, mentioned something about my stalker and where was he tonight. I shrugged, officially closing the subject. I liked Eddie, we had fun together at night and played games trying to guess what everyone was drinking about and whatnot, but I didn’t like discussing a man that I didn’t feel the need to form a relationship with.

Eddie didn’t push me, but when Levi showed up alone around 7 p.m. on Friday night, he made a comment to me from the kitchen. I wrinkled my nose at him, told I was single and happy being single, and served a screwdriver to my newfound stalker.

“Do I need to get a restraining order?” I asked.

Levi gave me a smile despite my hostility. “Don’t I have to hurt or threaten you first?” he asked. “Anyway I wanted to discuss something with you.”

“Really? On a Friday night?”

“Well, I needed time to watch the movie and I figured that talking on your busiest night of the week would be a losing battle.”

I looked at him suspiciously. “What movie?”

“Casablanca. Great movie, by the way. I just can’t help but wondering about Ilsa and her true motives.”

I snorted. “There is no wondering,” I replied. “Ilsa manipulated Rick to get what she wanted. I would be hard pressed to believe she even really knew what love was. I mean, honestly, if she loved Laszlo as much as claimed, would she have fallen for Rick so easily in Paris?”

“Wow,” Levi said.

“I know, I’m cynical,” I said.

He grinned. “No, I’m just glad to finally get full sentences from you instead of the standard one-word answer you gave me for two straight evenings in a row.”

“Whoops,” I said and offered him the beginning of a smile. I had to admit I was a bit impressed that he would watch a movie he seemed to have no interest in solely for the purpose of conversation.

“Did I just glimpse…a smile?” he asked.

“It has been known to happen before,” I said. “So why did you watch Casablanca?”

“Well,” he hedged. “I met this beautiful girl. She’s a bartender. Whenever I tried to hit on her, she’d shut me down. I suppose she’s a bit use to men hitting on her. Anyway, I did happen to find out her favorite movie, so I figured it might hold the key to finding out something about her.”

“And?” I asked and wished I could raise an eyebrow.

“I have found out she’s not a hopeless romantic. In fact, she might be more practical than a vast majority of us.”

“Practical am I?” I asked a bit flirtatiously.

“A bit like Rick. You’re jaded and cynical. So I can’t help but wonder what you would do for someone you loved.”
“I don’t know whether to be offended that you think I’m like that or offended at your cavalier use of the word love.”

“We can discuss it over dinner tomorrow,” he said. “I rented One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest tonight and am pretty sure I’ll need someone to help me through it.”

“Fine, dinner tomorrow night. But I work. Until close.”

“That would make dinner plans a bit hard.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Not really. Our first date can happen while I’m working. What could be more practical than that?”

He shrugged. “True. What time?”

I sighed. “Look, Levi, I want to be clear. I work. I work a lot. Weekends. Week nights. I don’t have much free time, and when

I have free time, I try to be as worthless as possible. I won’t entertain you in my free time, I’m not here for your enjoyment.”

He looked at me curiously. “I’m not asking you to marry me,” he said. “I just want to hang out with you. Get to know you a little bit. You intrigue me.”

“Do you know what intrigues me?” asked a regular taking a seat at the bar next to Levi. “Getting a Bud.”
Levi and I laughed. He settled his tab, and then took off, leaving me to a weekend evening with my patrons.

After this evening, I had several red flags. The first was that he seemed to have never even heard of Casablanca or One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. While these may not be deal breakers to some, they were to me. My friends and I were entertainment fiends. We watched reruns of Seinfeld, Sex and the City, and currently watched Entourage and The Office. They were set to record on my DVR. As far as movies went, we liked something quotable. Dazed and Confused and Anchorman were always good go-to movies, but my real love was old school film.

I was teased mercilessly for my taste in old movies, particularly anything with Bogey or Bacall. Yes, that meant To Have and To Have Not was also a particular favorite of mine. But just because my friends to didn’t share my love of old glam Hollywood didn’t mean that they hadn’t heard of Casablanca or Some Like It Hot.

How exactly does this translate to a deal breaker? Well, that’s the thing…my friends and I tend to speak in code. Say something looks really hard and we’ll respond by saying “That’s what she said.” On vacations to New York, I can pretty much come up with a Seinfeld reference for anything I see. All this translates to millions of little inside jokes between my friends and I. Those jokes aren’t funny to those who haven’t seen the movie. If I was a professor teaching Film 101, I wouldn’t mind introducing someone to these movies and initiating them into my inner circle of friends. But I’m a bartender, not a professor and I barely find time to work out and relax.

His tenacity was another red flag to me. Who wanted to put in the time and effort to impress someone who clearly didn’t want to be impressed? And who would watch a movie they had no knowledge of to simply start a conversation? I should feel flattered, I know, that someone would go to this kind of trouble for me. It was like Prince Phillip fighting his way through the thorn bushes to battle evil Maleficent in her dragon form for his true love, my namesake, Aurora. But I was no princess under a spell in a castle waiting for my true love.

Sure, I had attractive qualities about me. I was intelligent, clever, and could be quite deep and philosophical when the occasion arose. Being a bartender, I was patient, a good listener, and had learned my own brand of wisdom from watching my customers of all ages. But he knew none of that about me. He was going off of looks alone. While I wasn’t without in the looks department, I wasn’t going to grace the cover of Maxim any time soon. True, he might be one of those rare individuals who could see the inner beauty of a person, but my cynical side said no, that he liked me because I was “ungettable.”

I’ve never understood those people who pined over someone that seemed out of reach. I’ll admit to having my fair share of Hollywood crushes (Bogey and Brando in the prime, definitely), but they were never anything more than crushes. I knew that I was in love with a projection, a writer’s imagine and an actor’s interpretation of fictional characters, and that my crush was no more than that.

In reality, I never pined after the hottest boy in school, the most successful jock, or the charmer – the men who could have whatever girl they wanted. For one, none of those men respected women. And for two, I knew I wasn’t the girl they wanted. I was too flat-chested, too intimidatingly smart, and way too opinionated for them to waste their time with. I knew this and didn’t want to waste my high school years internally wounding myself over crushes that would never come to fruition.

To make matters worse, Levi had a resemblance to Ryan Lockson, our school’s top baseball player. Lockson was drafted to by the Twins and made it to triple-A baseball before finally calling it quits. I had no idea where he was now, namely because he was an arrogant prick. I overheard him in the lunch line talking with his friends about me. Jazz would say the consensus among the males in the school was that I had the nicest ass in the high school, an ass that was sculpted by dancing and diving for a number of years. Dancing and diving were both sports that helped me maintain my weight giving me a nice ass but a flat chest, a double edged-sword if there ever was one.

This day I was pissed off to begin with since I had stayed up late to a finish a term paper that would have been finished I had not procrastinated. I was in no mood for my classmates ribald comments and actions and refused to let them act like I was someone they could make fun when they knew I was nearby. With a bottle of water in my hand, I turned around and shook the bottle at Ryan.

“You may think you can have any girl in this school, Lockson, but you can’t have me. You may have had girls prettier than me, with a bigger cup size, but this ass will never be yours you cock-sucking waste of talent.”

Done with my tirade, I turned around and left, forgetting the turkey sandwich I had thought about buying. I had Ryan’s friends teasing him, about how he had been told by a girl, but none of them ever bothered me again.