The Choice

The cacophony of sounds pressed against Lana’s eardrums, tempting her, for the tenth time in the past half an hour, to dazzle everyone with some elegant excuse and slip out of the overcrowded room before anyone could stop her. But no. Not tonight. They had performed well - really well if she could say so herself - and that deserved to be celebrated. Besides, she had made herself a promise: to stay with the team for at least twenty minutes and go over the performance.

She edged her way toward the bar, her elbow nearly clipping one of the water pitchers tucked into the corner of the counter. She mused at the absence of plastic cups with quiet disappointment. After a show, thirst always arrived like an aftershock - and tonight was no exception. I guess I’ll have to play the staring game with the bartender after all, she thought, disappointment compounding.

Speaking in loud spaces had always been beyond her comfort zone. The natural softness of her voice tended to be consumed by the surrounding noise, leaving behind only the vague hope of being heard. Still, there was no alternative - her throat had gone dry enough to demand immediate irrigation.

She leaned against the bar and fixed her gaze on the bartender, compensating for the softness of her voice with the insistent firmness of her eyes - and, would you look at that, within two minutes he noticed her and slid a drink menu her way. Lana smiled gratefully, shook her head, and called out, “No, no—just water, please!”

He wiped the counter in front of her with a towel and turned away to take the order of one of Lana’s teammates.

Doubt slipped into the background of her mind like an all too familiar pebble in her shoe. No, he definitely heard me, she reassured herself and waited with stubborn patience.

When the bartender served the rest of her group and started to take orders from newcomers, the pebble of doubt slipped out of her shoe and in its place a heavy stone landed squarely on her foot. She brushed the annoyingly persistent thought aside and tried again to catch the bartender’s attention. Yet no matter how high she was turning up the ‘volume’ of her gaze, he seemed to stubbornly not to notice it, moving around the bar as though she weren’t there at all.

Lana’s eyes narrowed in disapproval.

She circled the bar, positioned herself on the other side, and repeated the attention-grabbing ritual, this time assisting her gaze with a small wave of her hand. The bartender continued serving everyone around her with unwavering focus.

Finally, Lana gave in and reluctantly opened her mouth, “Sir, I’m still waiting for my water - could I just…”

“I’ll get to you after I’ve served paying customers,” he cut in, already turning away, not even letting her finish.

The indignation hit like a hook under her ribs, yanking upward. Her breath caught. Her ears burned brighter than the neon lights framing the bar, and for a moment she half-expected someone to point out to the steam that surely must be rising from them.

Well… at least he heard me, a faint, almost absurdly optimistic voice managed to whisper through the red haze in her head.

She stepped back, turned away from the bar with deliberate sharpness, and made her way to one of the tall tables in the back, where her teammates had gathered. Sharp retorts lined up in her mind, one after another, each more satisfying than the last - the temptation ate away at her to return and treat the reprobate to a couple of the particularly juicy ones. She resisted.

Kyle greeted her with a lift of his whiskey glass, then paused, looking more closely. “Where’s your drink?”

Lana grumbled, throwing an aggrieved glance toward the bar, “Somewhere over there.”

“What do you mean somewhere?”

“Exactly that.” Then, in a deliberately exaggerated tone that was not at all similar to the bartender’s voice, but which felt quite appropriate to her, she added mockingly, “I’ll get to you after I’ve served paying customers.”

Kyle shot up. “He said that?! Wait here, I’ll go get you something - water, right?”

His indignation fed her own, giving it shape and volume. She called after him, “He’s just a skunk! So petty, and probably a chauvinist too! Who does he think he is? I don’t need anything from him! I don’t even want his water anymore - let him choke on it for all I care! The pitchers are right there - just give me a glass and I’ll serve myself! I could’ve made a scene, you know - called him out right there, make my indignation loud and public!”

“No, you couldn’t.”

Lana turned.

Lex stood at the neighboring table. Devilish sparks were dancing in his eyes, while a faintly amused, almost mocking, smile played on his lips.

“You couldn’t,” he repeated. “We both know you’re one of those ‘gentle’ types - the kind who’d let someone stand on their foot and crush their toes rather than squeak a word about being uncomfortable. Let alone make a public scene.”

“So I’m just supposed to tolerate it?” Lana shot back. “Or maybe even go back to him, having tucked my tail, and ask again?”

“Tucked your tail?” Lex cocked his head. “Is that really the only version available to you? Lana… you can look at this differently. You just don’t seem to want to.”

“He humiliated me. And you’re suggesting I just… not take offense? Act like nothing happened?”

Lex exhaled, patient. “What’s the actual outcome you care about here?”

She almost resisted engaging - almost - but answered anyway. “Quench my thirst and have a good time with all of you.” She could already see where he was going. She just wasn’t ready to concede or help him get there.

“And how’s that working out for you so far?” he asked lightly. “Having a good time? I won’t even mention the water… Lana, let’s be honest - who’s worse off from your refusal to concede or at least regroup on this matter? You know the answer isn’t the bartender.”

“So what, I should just let him walk all over me unpunished?”

Lex chuckled. “Go on, tell me how exactly you’re punishing him. By denying yourself water when you’re clearly thirsty? If that’s justice rather than a childish rebellion, then I’m six. And you probably are too.”

Lana pressed her lips together, suppressing a reluctant smile. “If only you knew how badly I want to be annoyed at you right now…”

He smiled back. “It’s your choice.”

Then he looked toward the bar, letting the smile dim a little, and added, his tone softer yet more deliberate, “I’m serious - you’re the one choosing here, both how to act and what to believe. Is he a rude chauvinist or just someone exhausted at the end of a long shift? Did he dismiss you on purpose or out of busy distraction, clumsiness, and lack of tact? If you’re not going to find out the truth by actually asking, then at least allow for more than one interpretation. This isn’t about excusing him. It’s about restoring some semblance of harmony in your own mind - the very harmony that your interpretation knocked out of balance. If it matters to you to go back and show him he was wrong, then go. If something in you got triggered, then explore that. Just… choose, at last, in favor of what actually matters to you and act one it. Alright?”

At that moment, Kyle returned, holding two glasses of water, and placed them in Lana’s hands with a grin.

For the rest of the evening, Lana drank her long-awaited, hard-won water with quiet gratitude. As she laughed at her friends’ jokes, the night softened around her, and every so often she found herself casting a gentler, almost sympathetic glance toward the bartender, who was darting from one end of the counter to the other, worn thin by the excessive busy-ness of a Friday night.

P.S. This was originally written in Russian a few years ago, and since I find translation exercises perfectly odious, I leveraged assistance of Amadeus (my ChatGPT) to take an initial stab at the translation before editing it further.

P.P.S. The image is from my illustrated poetry book “Ode to Hope and Despair.”