Author Games: Red Room

Task Two: St. Judas

Swaggy Pete

I do this cool thing every Thursday night where I get really fucking trashed at the Red Robin next to campus. There are two Red Robins in town, and if you wanna go to the real Red Robin, you drive twenty minutes and go inside and there are a shit-ton of arcade games and you order a burger (I can't remember what the burgers are called) and you don't get trashed because that's not the real Red Robin's thing. The fake Red Robin is spelled Redd Robin so it doesn't get sued. You go in and there are no arcade games and Billy Joel is playing in the background and the bartender has maybe three drinks he can make you, plus some craft beers from a brewery these TKE's I know run out of their basement. Fake Red Robin doesn't check IDs. There are three customers max at any given moment. The lights are always blinking on and off like the bulbs are about to explode, and this guy I know found out he had epilepsy because he came in here and immediately had a seizure. It's the worst bar in town.

So I'm there on Saturday instead of Thursday because these freshmen said they were gonna show up, but they're not here and I'm listening to Piano Man and draining a pint of craft beer like I'm showing off for someone, except the bartender went to the bathroom so nobody's watching me. I'm also on Tinder and I'm swiping through some college girls, but I'm not getting matches. The bar smells horrible tonight. I don't know how I missed this before, but it's like someone tried to eat a cigarette and then threw up all over the floor, and the bartender just mopped it into the floorboards without using any cleaner so the smell just leaked into the ground and now it's here forever.

This is not a good day for Swaggy Pete. Usually when I come here, there are a couple girls sitting in the back who thought this was the real Red Robin, and they're so happy to see someone normal in this nightmare bar that they practically jump all over me and we have a kickass time. The Redd Robin motto is "All About Those Customers" because it's written on this neon sign over the bar, and that is so true, because I would never come here if there were no customers. But today there actually aren't customers, and the weird atmosphere is making me feel like a fucking loser for coming here when I had four other parties I could've gone to. Party Warehouse is raging tonight. Tire Barn is on fire. Fake Red Robin was probably condemned five years ago, and the bartender is probably a ghost or something, and I'm probably fucking hallucinating this entire building, along with everyone I've ever seen inside of it.

"Crazy thought," I say to the empty bar. "What if this is hell."

Joe is still in the bathroom, so he can't tell me that I'm a fucking idiot.

"Purgatory," I say. The room is spinning, so I take that as a sign that I'm onto something. "I'm here because I fucked up somewhere. That's why none of these girls are matching with me, because they're all dead girls. Ghost girls. They don't have time to fuck, they're too busy repenting."

Joe is still not back from the bathroom.

"Real Red Robin is heaven," I say. "Am I right? Tell me if I'm right. God, you dirty dog, I know you eavesdrop on my shit. Santa, too. One of you grandpas better tell me I'm right. I figured your game out, didn't I? I've been dead for years."

My head hits the counter, and I choke on the mouthful of beer that was in my throat. Now that I think about it, I don't remember how much I drank over the past hour. Maybe the craft beer was too powerful for Swaggy Pete.

The deal now is that I'm passing out, and I'm feeling it happening except I don't want it to happen because I'm still in Fake Red Robin. This is not a good place to pass out. If I fall off my chair and land on the ground face-up, I'll choke on my own vomit and die. It's happened before. (Not to me, but to this guy I heard about from Paul, and also maybe to me because this bar makes me feel like God abandoned me.) Joe won't give a fuck. People dying is good for business.