This is a group of tinycentric writers and illustrators/artists, creating and discussing original stories and artwork.
The Bar in Mechanicsburg
Though it is past ten, the bar has not thinned out. It is a curious place, stuck at the end of scrub and the beginning of nowhere, surrounded by thickets of unmown brush, leftover election signs and mechanics’ shops. And though it is popular, it is quiet. There are no whoops of revelry unless a group of homecoming kids stumbles in. It is the kind of place in which you might expect a woman who is half crocodile to feel inconspicuous and comfortable. I sit to her right, similarly accepted. It is our place. Here we can say anything.
The bar celebrates its own existence and does not pander. I am friend of neither the owner nor the barkeeps, though their friendliness extends to nods when they see me. It is here I tasted my first whisky, because a local eccentric nosed his way to our table and said “Ladies, this is too sweet for my taste, and I can’t help but notice you have at least a dozen empty cupcake liners piled up between you.” He held out a whisky glass half-filled with amber liquid. “And this is...?” I asked, pushing my nose against the rim of the glass. “Nirvana,” said the eccentric, sober as you please. “Liquified and given a small edge of snap-to-attention.” “Smells divine,” I said, downing it. “We’ll have some of that to round out the cupcakes.”
I catch the waitress’s eye and she nods. We are dealing with all the struggles of the universe, and we need whisky. It isn’t about good versus evil, man versus nature, or anything close to that. The universal struggle boils down to “the persistence of stinking liars versus the embarrassed lied-to rest-of-us winnowing them out and, after learning from their f~cking relentless sneakiness, shoving payback down their Godforsaken throats and trying to get past the shock of being had, not in a good way”. Four shot glasses are placed between us.
“Yup,” says Miss Crocodile. “Though I commend your identification of the struggle, it's a cumbersome entry for the universe’s history books. How about ‘liars versus lied-tos’ or ‘lying scum versus the fooled’?”
“Good,” I reply. “I’m thinking ‘lying scum versus the fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, I won’t get fooled again’.” I am fizzy with sugar, not yet sh~t-faced.
“Very George Dubya Bush,” says Miss Crocodile, flashing her double row of teeth. Four more glasses shimmer before us. “And again, commendable if unwieldy. Let’s try for a succinct version tomorrow. Same time, same place. For now, it’s a hit. Bring on the woes of the world.”



