Barleycorn

You know how in the Divine Comedy there are those nine circles of hell, where Dante describes them as concentric and incrementing in wickedness as you get closer to the center? One inside of another, like they're Russian nested dolls?

That's pretty much how I feel about the John Barleycorn in Wrigleyville. It is the nadir of bars, but people below the age of 22 do not know this. They don't see how frat boy douches jaywalk across Clark Street and angrily kick at the back of taxi cabs on their way to the line. They're oblivious to the naive suburbanite bachelorette parties in attendance where those girls truly believe they'll get to go dancing at this bar and not get molested by sweaty heavy-set men.

It truly is Dante's Inferno. The excruciating line to the entrance of the bar takes you to another excruciating line to the upstairs dance floor. Hell inside of a hell. Russian nested dolls.

But somehow someone I know always wants to go there, like Marci last night who wants to make this boy fall in love with her even though just a few years ago he was young enough for cops to call this statutory. "Pete?" she says, tapping my right shoulder every ten seconds. "Omigosh, Pete? Like I really think I like this one, even though he's so much younger than me? But he just seems so inattentive right now? So can you take one for the team? Can you grind on me when we get up on the dance floor so he gets jealous? Pete?"

And if that wasn't bad enough, I somehow almost got into a fight. This is what happens when you reach the second circle of hell: you cut to the front of the line for the upstairs dance floor because all of your friends did, and then people behind you end up wanting to murder you.

Last night it's this Eurotrash kid, complete with faux-hawk and sport jacket, asking me to go to the end of the line. When I pretend not to hear him, he cuts back in front of me and jabs a hard elbow into my ribs.

"Dude, we're all trying to go upstairs, okay?" I say, grimacing a bit. "But there's no need for that. Besides, don't you belong at Crobar?"

"Asshole!" he says, his face inches away from my face. "I've been in this damn line for two hours, SO DON'T FUCK WITH ME, ASSHOLE! YOU MOTHERFUCKING ASSHOLE!" I'm close enough to him that I can feel his blood boiling. It doesn't help that since we're all squished together in this line like sardines in a can, spit is being sprayed onto my face with every word he utters.

I go against my better judgment and decide to swear at him in Polish for a good thirty seconds.

Kurwa, I say.

Gowniarz, I say.

Idziecie domu spac! I say.

And you know what he did? He got even closer to my face, and he headbutted me! Headbutted me!! His bony forehead smacked against mine like he was trying to hammer a nail to the wall.

Who does that? And how do you even react to that? What an awkward thing to do to someone! I looked around a little embarrassed and stunned, wondering if anyone else saw that, and then I just looked away and pretended it never happened and hoped I could leave this horrible bar soon and hoped Marci wouldn't rape me upstairs so that her boy toy would get "jealous".