La Arquitecta

Chapter 14

David Hernandez walked into his local bar, as he did most nights of the week. Having a few beers was always needed after finishing a shift at the shitty warehouse job he found himself lumbered with. Who wanted to work packing and shifting boxes all day? Not him, that was for damned sure. But since he had a criminal record, he wasn't able to get anything better.

It was all that stupid bitch's fault. Rape, using violence to override consent. That was what they had charged him with, and somehow managed to find him guilty of. The whole thing had been a ridiculous overreaction on her part, and yet somehow he had ended up doing six years inside. Six fucking years, for nothing, he raged, as he did every day. Six years of his life that he would never get back.

So what if he had gotten a bit forceful with her in the heat of the moment? What difference did that even make? If anything, surely it made the sex more enjoyable to get a bit kinky with it? But no, the little slut had decided to go running to the cops and claim that she had been raped, using the bruises on her wrists where she had been tied up as evidence of his wrongdoing. That, when added to the DNA evidence they had been able to recover from her, had been enough to convict him, despite his defence that yes, she had been tied up and they had had sex, but as part of a bondage game. How had that not stood up in court? The justice system in America was totally screwed up, he thought.

Now, with a criminal record for that kind of offense, whether deserved or not, his prospects in life were severely limited. That was why he worked a crappy warehouse job fit for braindead monkeys, had to drink in this dive bar surrounded by the dregs of society, and lived in a shit hole of an apartment in one of the roughest areas of The Bronx borough of New York City. All because of that fucking whore and her parents encouraging her to go to the cops.

"Usual?" the bartender asked when David sat down on a stool at the bar. The question also constituted a greeting, barely.

"Yeah," David replied, looking around the place. Great, he thought irritably. There was a group of guys at the other end of the bar. Late teens or early twenties, he guessed. They were talking loudly and laughing at each other, with complete disregard to anyone else around them. They were reacting to whatever nonsense they had convinced the bartender to put on the TV. It looked like wrestling. How pathetic.

"There you go," the bartender said, returning with David's preferred beer.

"Can't you put something better on the TV?" he asked impolitely as he handed over money to pay for the drink.

"Sorry, man. Those guys were here before you and asked to have that on."

"Great way to treat your regulars," David griped, even though he knew he had lost the argument. He didn't bother to acknowledge the bartender when he returned with his change.

"Hey, can you turn it up a bit?" one of the young guys at the end of the bar called to the bartender.

David sighed, trying to control his temper. As if he wanted to sit there listening to fucking wrestling, or idiots shouting about wrestling. But he wasn't to let them make him walk out, either. Why should he leave because of their obnoxiousness?

A few minutes went by while David worked on his first beer. Drinking it started to take the edge of his bad mood, which was why he came here after work in the first place. He cringed when one of the wrestling fans shouted something at the top of his voice, obviously trying to impress his buddies.

"Braun!"

Braun? What a stupid word to shout. Then David realised that the guy was copying some weird looking meathead on the TV, who was standing there with his arms raised above his head. Apparently there was an arena full of simpletons doing the same thing.