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"The look" The piano was softly playing in the corner. The bartender slid a full glass across the counter, into the hands of somebody. "The regular?" he asked. The stranger nodded, and smiled, but made no move to pick the glass to his lips. He only looked at it, cradling it in his hands like a precious, fragile thing, letting the water condensing on its sides slide down his fingers. He watched the ice floating in the amber liquid slide back and forth across the surface, hearing the ice clinking gently against the edges of the glass; he had a wistful expression on his face. The bartender picked up an empty glass and began polishing it. "You shouldn't do this to yourself, Richmond," he said. "It's torture." The man nodded, but still watched the glass with some intensity. Then he sighed, and got up, and pushed the drink away. He pulled out a crumpled bill, and laid it across the table. "Thanks for the memories," he said. "But you're right, it's stupid. Worse than that, it's pointless." The bartender made no move to pick up the money. "Take it back," he said, nodding to the bill. "I know what it's like." The man smiled, and hooked his hands into his coat pockets, slouching over a bit. "Yeah," he said. "Don't we all." He tipped his hat in farewell, and headed toward the exit. Passing by the piano player, he stopped, and grinned suddenly. "Don't play it again, Sam!" He left. /Knowing everything ain't easy, ya know./ /Of course, you should know that./ /But it's kinda funny, people _don't_ know that. A lotta people don't know anything. They just sit on their bare rumps and think that they've got all the knowledge they need, and you know what?/ /They're right./ /After all, all you need is an ability to count and a good working knowledge of anatomy to get places. Of course, women and men do it differently, but it's all the same in the end./ /Me, I think life's the pits to go about like that. Sitting on my bare rump, thinking that my world is happy happy joy joy, now that's a real kiss-ass laugh. I say its better to know _something_ than sitting in a fluffy pink cloud thinking that all I gotta look forward to is the next shipment coming in. It's miserable being ignorant. No thank you; the mundane and ordinary life isn't for me./ /Of course, that's what I want the most. The knowing is just as miserable as the not knowing. Ironic, these little paradoxes of life. They just make life so… hmm./ /… so goddamn crazy. But that's life, I tell ya./ An average person in Radat will, if asked for information, point to the one and only bar in the place and give a slight shrug and smile. The average questioner, puzzled, will enter the bar and only find a single man. But that is, of course, the best place to go for information. The man knows _everything._ Well, not quite everything, but it's close enough. The average questioner would find it puzzling; why would such a scruffy looking person of dubious morals even bother? And if you asked him, well, he'd only smile and say, "Because life is crazy, kid." If you bought him a drink, he'd suddenly become more amiable, and get talkative. He'll talk about anything-- the weather, politics, the next cargo shipment, who the maid is going to marry-- anything and everything. It's pleasant to listen to; it's easy chatter, lulling you into a sense of relaxation. All the while, he won't touch that drink that you bought for him, but he'll encourage you to buy more drinks. And he'll watch you with an amused smile on his face. Then suddenly, out of the blue, he'll say something. Not something big. Just a small comment, a little bit of gossip, just something that is really disturbing that makes you think, make you troubled. And he'll get up, and give a little sigh, and pay for all the drinks you supposedly bought him, and leave you alone. Leaving you all alone, with several drinks on the counter, maybe all of it just for you. /Where do I start?/ /Where does everybody start, anyway? Oh yes, the beginning. They always start at the beginning./ /Well, you're not getting any beginning from me here. No sirree, that's something that those of an autobiographical bent do. But I ain't one of those jackass weirdos. Nothing's gotta start at the beginning. Everything begins with now. And now is when I'm gonna start. No, don't try to interrupt me, this is _my_ story, it ain't yours, don't even try./ /Of course, it only makes sense that I gotta start somewhere. The usual stuff, maybe? Mother, father, whatever? Nah. What's so interesting about playing with hoops and learning about life? I _know_ life at this stage. You should, too. Whatever childhood is, it's something that you shoulda gone through, or at least figured out what the hell this life is really about, which is what growing up is./ /I'll make this to the point. My past is _mine_. I grew up. It's as simple as that./ /Then there's all the tedious details of my wild and rambunctious youth. I suppose. You want the real thing, or some glittery fairy tale that sounds too good to be true? Well, if I were the reader I'd go for the fairy tale. It's easy, it's pleasant, doesn't require you to think too much or too hard, and I think that's what people want. A pleasant, fascinating story full of ups and downs but mostly ups./ /Well, if you want one of those, you might as well say good-bye. This is not one of them./ /It's not a pretty sight./ /But then again, if you're even going to bother, I'll applaud you. First, for maybe thinking that there's more to life than just living. Second, for bothering to waste time on a story of mine. Third, for being a damn nosy fellow. It's mostly for the third reason I'm doing this. Aren't we all nosy bastards? That's what makes us so very human./ /Anyway, let's start at a beginning. Not _the_ beginning; but _a_ beginning. My beginning doesn't begin with what I do, or where I was born, or what I was doing when I was twenty. It's gonna start where I think it starts./ /And that's in my head./
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