Lamar Theater - Chapter 1

“I don’t think this is going to be a good meeting, you guys,”
the smartly dressed, light-skinned thirty-something year-old black
man announced to the room of about ten. “I think they’re gonna
get rid of some people.”

Dan sat in the conference room feeling the butterflies in his
stomach. He had an idea that he may be about to lose his job, and
that was strengthened by the comment that the man sitting next to him
at the table had just made.

“Like us?” Dan asked. The man nodded curtly.

Then, just as Dan contemplated the stupidity of his own question, the
human resources manager entered the room with the assistant human
resources manager and the vice president of the company in tow. He
did not waste any time getting down to business.

“I’m afraid this meeting is not good news,” he said as he stood
at the podium. “The company has decided to eliminate some positions
and yours are among them.”

Dan’s heart sank. He could not believe what he was hearing. He felt
as if he had been set adrift alone on a lifeboat from an ocean liner.
Why had they done it to him?

Dan went back to his desk to gather his things. He felt both hurt and
liberated. He was about to leave a hated but secure place forever.

He glanced down a hallway and saw that his boss was talking to a man,
probably a vendor, in her office. He knew he would probably not even
see her before he left. He felt angry and relieved at the prospect.
He was mad because he wanted the chance to confront her, even if only
with a dirty look, and see her reaction. He was mollified because he
did not want to do anything he would regret later and have to relive
it over and over in his mind. And that may just be giving her a look
that he would later feel was unjustified.

“It’s gonna be all right,” one of his coworkers said to him and
padded him on the shoulder as he prepared to leave.

“Yeah, I know,” Dan said. He resented her patronizing attitude.
He did not need her to tell him it was going to be all right. She was
a typical, empty-headed, middle-aged Memphis black woman — obsessed
with religion, dumb as a post, and silly as hell.

When he got home, Dan settled into his couch. He thought about what
lay ahead of him. The nation was in the middle of a bad recession,
and it would probably not be easy to find another job. He felt
soothed as he thought about the fact that he was one of many others
who found themselves unemployed at the beginning of 2009, and he knew
he would get sympathy from his family and few friends.

But then he worried about what would happen if he could not find a
job, and he had to give up his apartment and independence. It was the
one aspect of his life that he enjoyed.

The thoughts turned over and over in his mind as he watched
television, telling himself he should refrain from doing anything but
that on the day he lost his job. He sat watching the flickering
images on the screen until the sun went down and they provided the
only light in the room.

That Friday, Dan felt weighed down by the events of the past week. He
had been laid off, spent an entire day at the employment office
getting his unemployment benefits lined up, and started the awkward
process of serious job searching through applying on the internet and
planning to go to meetings with other unemployed people. He felt that
he owed it to himself to go out and do something.

So he decided to go to a nightclub he had been attending sporadically
for the last year called the Salsa Studio. He enjoyed going there,
but never really felt that he fit in. He did know a few people who
were regulars, but it seemed that he could never become part of the
“in crowd.” It was like high school. He was a square peg trying
to fit into a round hole.

As he got dressed in a black button-down shirt, khakis, and black
dress shoes, he felt a certain amount of anxiety creep in. He always
felt a bit nervous before going to the club, but he had added
apprehension due to his being unemployed. He knew he should not
really be spending the money on the cover charge, gas, or alcohol.
But he had made the decision to go and was determined to stick with
it.

He was dissatisfied as he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror of
his little efficiency apartment. He had mousy brown hair and a
perennial expression of unease. As he cocked his head and furrowed
his brow while regarding his reflection, he knew he was not cool. He
was awkward. But then he put that thought out of his mind as he left
the bathroom and readied himself and his apartment for his departure.

When he arrived at the club, it was loud and dark inside. The young
woman at the front desk held up five fingers without saying a word.
Her face was pretty but it wore an expression of ennui that made
Dan’s blood turn cold. As he walked inside the club and looked at
the people around him, it seemed to him that they were all just as
unwelcoming as the girl at the front. They were about their business
of talking to each other, dancing, and watching, but none seemed to
have the slightest interest in him.

He stood back and surveyed the scene. There had always been some
pretty women there when he had gone before, and that night was no
exception. He spied one curly-haired young woman with whom he was
acquainted as she smiled and danced with a Latin man. She was wearing
a very short dress that showed off her perfectly shaped legs and she
had a smile that melted his heart. He decided he would approach her
for a dance as soon as that song ended.

But then, when it did end, a young black man took her by the hand
before she could get off the dance floor and led her back to the
middle of it. Dan cursed inwardly as he turned back to the edge of
the floor behind the tables. Someone else always got to what he
wanted first.

He scanned the crowd and did not see any other prospects, so he
approached the bar instead. The group seemed thin to him, but the
night was still young. He decided he would just have a beer if he
could not find a dance partner.

The pretty, dark haired bartender smiled at Dan as she approached
him. He felt the corners of his own mouth rise as she did so and
warmth circulated through his chest. She was so much nicer than the
girl at the front desk. But they were both unattainable.

As he drank his beer, he watched a blonde woman he did not know but
would like to meet. When he saw her friend leave their table with a
man and head for the dance floor, he decided to make his move.

“Do you want to dance?” he asked as he stood next to her. She
turned to him, smiled and said yes as she took his offered hand.

As they danced, she looked Dan in the eye, unnerving him. He looked
back and tried to smile, but could not shake the feeling of disquiet.
He concentrated on the salsa combination he knew, and she followed it
fairly well, but he really wanted the song to end. He felt as if he
was struggling to ride a bicycle up an impossibly high hill as he
went through the motions and felt the sweat breaking out on his
forehead. He believed the blonde must know how uncomfortable he was.
He did not know why she was just staring at him with such a cold
expression.

A few minutes later he found another young woman to dance with him,
this one pretty and young with long brown hair and an engaging smile.

“This is so much fun!” she exclaimed as they danced. Dan
struggled to share her enthusiasm.

“Yes, it is,” he said as he put on a fake smile. He felt that he
was not matching her energy but was probably bringing her down. He
felt distressed that he could not reciprocate it.

By the time their dance ended, Dan had worked up enough sweat and
anxiety that he needed refreshment. He went back to the bar and
ordered another beer, nursing it slowly and watching the goings on
around him. As the men and women danced, drank, laughed, and talked
while Dan looked on, he could feel the effects of the alcohol on his
mind. Everything became slower and softer. The loud music assaulted
him before, but now faded into the background of his mind. The people
around him were no longer crowding and pushing him as he walked
through the club, but parted and left a way for him to stroll through
unmolested.

Dan danced a few more times as the night wore on. The alcohol
hampered his ability to do the steps well, but he did not care as
much as he did when he was sober. He found himself going back to the
bar and having two and three more beers. It was not typical behavior
for him, but he was enjoying the sensation of the beer buzz and
wanted to keep riding the wave. He was then twenty-nine, but he had
not experimented with alcohol very much because he had only been
living outside of his parents’ house for a few years.

Dan found himself dancing bachata with a young African girl at one
point in the night. She was a student from Kenya. He knew the song
was bachata from the sweet-sounding guitar licks that accented the
music. He found himself very attracted to the young woman, who had
pretty features and an exotic air due to her accent. Dan felt warm as
he got close to her, easing his right leg between her legs as he had
been taught in the bachata lessons he had taken. They moved slowly
from side to side as he moved his hands down to her hips and then the
small of her back. Dan savored the feeling as he kept her body
pressed against his.

In his drunken state, he did not care if he was coming on too strong
or making a spectacle of himself. He just liked the feeling he was
getting. The alcohol had lowered him to animal level, doing what felt
good in favor of any social conventions.

When the song ended, the girl abruptly said “thank you,” and
walked briskly away from him. It occurred to Dan then that he had
gone too far with her. He felt vaguely sick to his stomach. He
thought he had probably drank too much and should drink no more. He
found a vacant stool at the bar and sat there for a little while,
thinking his drunkenness would wear off enough in a short time so
that he could drive safely home.

He did make it safely home, despite being over the legal
blood/alcohol content limit to drive. He had driven slowly and
carefully. It was the way he approached most of his life.

The next day, he woke up early in the morning, just after dawn. When
he did, he felt an urgent need to vomit. He rushed through his little
kitchen into the bathroom and felt the contents of his stomach rush
out of his throat and nostrils and into the toilet with a splash.
When it was done, he realized he had tears streaming down his cheeks.
He was ashamed of himself for what he had done. He had gotten drunk
like a fool and was paying for it in a big way.

As he lay back down on the bed, his body trembled. It was an echo of
the way he felt emotionally. He was scared and at the breaking point.
Nothing was certain anymore. He had been thrown into chaos, and he
had just made it worse. Then he had to go throw up again.

He cried audibly after he lay back down and covered his face with his
hands.

“No, no, no,” he moaned like a child. He thought of all the
mistakes he had made in his life, and what a bad person he was. He
knew he had gotten himself to that point. It was all his fault, and
he hated himself for it.

“I’m sorry,” he said as tears rolled down the sides of his
face. He was apologizing to everyone he had ever let down — old
classmates, friends, his parents, and himself.