A Bar Fight with Back Hair
Tommy Gunn had a head full of hair that stretched all the way down his lower back like a waterfall. He had hair on his back, too. It looked like it was fused together, when analyzed closely. His bar buddies called his hair spectacle The Unit. Said it was damn funny how the hair never really stopped or started. But, they didn’t tell him about the nickname. Couldn’t bring themselves to do it. Some men had mullets and some ape hair, but Tommy, or TG, as he was known in the town of Seton, had something special. Ladies didn’t know what they were getting themselves into until his shirt came off. Then, Bam! There they were standing face to face with a forest. A modern-day Billy Ray Cyrus. But, Tommy didn’t seem to notice the gasps or finger points.
At night he had beer at Mercer’s pub like the rest of the southern Kentucky locals, and he never backed down from the fights that took place there. Said they were good for his health and libido. The women agreed. In fact, just the week before he had broke a bottle over one fellow’s head and had shanked the man’s friend with the remaining glass shards. Spent a whole week in the slammer for disturbing the peace, Sheriff Watts said. Worst week of Tommy’s life. He shared a cell with a gigolo interested only in pleasure. So, he had to kick that lusty guy’s ass as well.
For Tommy, Saturday evening couldn’t come quick enough; he wanted to run far away from those metal bars. And run he did. He left the battered gigolo and headed straight back to Mercer’s where the usual cast of drunkards sat on their semi-assigned bar stools. Stumpy broke a rack of balls as Tommy walked in, and the entire room turned to gawk.
“Howdy,” Tommy said to the many familiar sets of eyes.
“Well, I’ll be. TG, you sorry sumnabitch. It’s about time you came back here,” the mouths murmured from various corners of the room, some bodies unidentifiable in the dark smoke haze.
“Don’t just sit there, Mercer. Fetch me a Jim Beam and Coke,” Tommy ordered.
“Let’s take it slow TG. What do you say?”
“Nope. Been cooped up all week long in that cell. I need heavy stuff pronto.”
“You need to go home and clean up,” Mercer added.
And the bar owner was right. Tommy had never looked so rough. And that was saying something for Tommy Gunn. His head, his face, and chest hair were all conjoined like some sort of gum-tangled hairy lion’s mane. Stumpy put down his pool stick and waddled over to TG’s hair for a closer inspection. Standing only four feet tall, Stumpy had to look straight up to see into the dark brown mass. Like Thing from the Addam’s Family, Stumpy thought. Tommy stomped his foot and snapped something about not getting any respect. Said he wasn’t past braking somebody else’s head this week.
“The cops will come take you away again,” Mercer encouraged.
Tommy shrugged his brawny shoulders. The hair looked like a cushion under his shirt.
“Does it itch you much?” Stumpy asked as he pointed to the hairy cushion, breaking the silence with his high-pitched voice.
The room gasped, because the unmentionable had been mentioned. They knew how short Tommy’s fuse was.
Tommy looked down into Stumpy’s vertically challenged face and paused. He must’ve been thinking about what to say, because he scratched the brown forest slowly and thousands of follicles swayed in his hand.
“You kidding me?” he finally said, stroking his ZZ Top beard brusquely.
“No, I’m serious. You have so much. How does it feel?” the midget asked, an awestruck emphasis on the last word, as he tried to touch TG’s silky beard.
“Back the crap up! I think you’ve lost it little man. What makes you think I’d let your carnie hands touch my hair?”
There were a few coughs from around the room. A man shifted in his chair, and the wooden chair back made a creaking noise. A pin could’ve dropped and been heard inside the pub.
“Well, is that why everyone’s staring?” Tommy demanded.
“It is. We can’t stop staring. All of it is so much. Even the hair under your shirt,” Stumpy said and added, “We even gave it a nickname.”
The last part made TG jerk his head back towards the midget. “What do you mean you gave it a nickname?” His teeth were bared showing two sharp peg laterals.
“It looks like a very distinct shape from a distance. From your neck hair around to your beard. It forms a U-shape,” Stumpy said. “So, we called it The Unit.”
Tommy stared at the small man for a few seconds. No one moved. They all were certain Stumpy was going to get a bottle over his noggin, or worse, for saying that. But, TG just stood placid for a while, boring holes into the Lilliputian. His stern gaze made the man in the squeaky chair shift and squeak again. The overbearing silence caused a nervous man to tiptoe over to the jukebox and fetch a quarter from his pants pocket. As he reached to put the coin into the slot, he heard TG bark “Put that money in there and I’ll break your pointy beak.”
The bar folk all knew what was next. A roar was emitted from Tommy Gunn’s lips, and simultaneously a stool cascaded into the jukebox bringing it to life. It kicked into the 1990s classic Be My Lover by La Bouche. The dance groove made the room even more intense. Everyone would’ve internally agreed that Steve Earle’s Copperhead Road would’ve been more fitting for a brawl. But, Tommy meant business and music was no matter.
Stumpy was elated, because this was his first real bar fight. In his excitement, he hit a man, who had been sitting with him earlier, with a half empty bottle of Crown Royal. Nobody drinks that shit anyway, he thought.
Mercer was always ready to resort to fisticuffs, because he lost about half of his liquor to foolishness each week, and he went behind the counter for his twelve gauge.
Meanwhile, Tommy lunged for the nervous man at the jukebox with his hairy, monkey paws and made sure to get a good grip. His knuckles turned white as the man’s face became a deep purple.
“Let me down,” the violet-faced man gurgled.
“What was that?” Tommy teased.
“Let me…,” the man started again, running low on oxygen.
“I won’t. You don’t deserve it. None of you do,” Tommy interrupted. “What makes you think you or anyone can just name my back hair while I’m gone. To hell with that!”
Stumpy moved away from his Crown Royal mess that he had made and loped closer to Tommy. He didn’t know what to say. Wanted to live past this night in Mercer’s pub. Tommy wanted to break every bone.
“I started the name calling,” Stumpy said, aware of the implications. “It’s my fault they call you The Unit.”
You’re the one responsible, Quasimodo?” Tommy asked. Not missing a beat, he picked up another stool and hurled it at Stumpy. He connected this time, and the chair sent the midget hurtling into the bar island where his head whacked the wooden panel. Stumpy crumpled onto the floor. Hell-bent on not stopping there, Tommy went over and seized the small unconscious man by his pant leg and was hoisting him onto his back when a shot was fired. Dust and ceiling tiles fell onto the ground, and Tommy held Stumpy statically over his head.
“Drop him, and I’ll not radio Sheriff Watts,” Mercer bargained, brandishing his shotgun.
Tommy looked at the bar owner and let his peg laterals show again. He lowered Stumpy effortlessly, and as he did so, Mercer thought he had gotten through.
“That a boy,” Mercer said, relaxing his voice. As the bar owner lowered his weapon, Tommy Gunn acted quickly. Pushing the midget aside, he ripped off his Duran Duran t-shirt revealing a plethora of chest and back hair and bounded out the door like a crazed wolf aware of a full moon.
