Method For Madness - Chapter 2.5

This chapter follows Evan after he leaves Jane and Roark in the pub and he goes to the local night club.

Hope you all enjoy and feedback is always welcome!

Chapter 2.5

Evan sat in the smoking area of Cafe Bar smoking a cigarette alone. The terrible music assaulted his ears. He didn’t usually smoke but when he was excessively inebriated he remember Roark telling him that your brain craves nicotine so it can function over the onslaught of alcohol. So here he sat.

He observed everyone quietly. The bouncers stood tall, chewing gum with their arms crossed refusing the drunks and raising the age limit to 25 when a group of 3+ young lads try and gain access. Although, they would conveniently forget to ask to see the ID of the clearly under dressed and under aged girls entering. They must be freezing he mused. Desperate to gain entrance and get some heat into their bones and a dulling drink in their hands.

He looked around again. The rain hadn’t ceased and continued to pelt the fabric cover above his head. The drone of noise was constant yet he managed to make out snippets of conversation around him. “Hey haven't seen you in ages!” “I only ever see you here!” “what’s up buddy? Haven’t talked to you properly since secondary school!” Evan smiled, amused about the validation of Roark’s theory on this place.

He recognised his friends. He wondered why they participated in this charade. They were getting ripped off on drinks, on their poorly made and excessively watered down drugs all for the slim chance to meet a girl and possibly bring one home. The girls were average at best. He wasn’t being mean it was just a fact. They weren’t pretty, they hadn’t an original thought in their heads and expected every man here to worship them.
Evan supposed that that’s what happens when the good girls get into relationships and the supply decreases. If they waited long enough the demand for them will rise and the tolerance for their bullshit would simultaneously rise.

He watched Sean desperately try and converse about anything with one of the airheads they used to go to school with. She looked clearly uninterested but the nostalgia of easier times kept her somewhat engaged in the conversation.
Evan then noticed how some of the lads had wised up and attempted to baffle the younger girls with bullshit since they couldn't dazzle their contemporaries with brilliance.

Evan chuckled. He made a mental note to tweak his theory. The average girls only have a certain amount of time before the supply of younger girls increases and the threat of new entrances forces them to retaliate. Porters 5 forces in action. The younger girls had begun trickling in and gained all the attention of his friends. The older girls noticed too. Two of them stormed off muttering something about pigs and referring to the girls as sluts.

Evan felt conflicting emotions. On the one hand he was amused at the scenes unfolding in front of him yet he thought back to when he was the age of the younger girls and had been smitten by a beautiful girl called Hazel. History was repeating itself in front of his eyes. The girls were far more interested in his friends, the older guys than the guys of their own age who couldn’t even get into the night club. Just like what had happened to him.

Unrequited love is a tough pill to swallow. Inexperience and youth had not helped the situation. He remembered the day she left the party he was at with an older friend of a friend all too well. They ended up in a relationship.
Later in the year while they were still together Evan had a free house for a couple of days and Hazel came up to hang out. They were good friends. Evan was just in love with her. Her style, grace and attitude. He learned a lot about women from her.
Evan could never forget the day he sat at this kitchen table with her as she relentlessly questioned him about what girls he was interested in. How he decided to be straight with her.
He confessed his love and how he had always loved her. From the time they were in the sick room together for break time because he had a broken arm and she a broken leg. How he couldn’t wait till the rest of his classmates went out to play and he would go to room 12 and see her.
Evan would also never forget her reaction. Shock and pity. They were after all, good friends. She had not wanted to hurt him but she was in a relationship for one and did not feel the same. “You have a symmetrical face” she had told him, to try and soften the blow of rejection.

He did not speak to her these days. After his admission of love her boyfriend had tried to fight him. Even after they broke up Hazel somehow resented him for his feelings towards her. She became unjustifiably angry at him for his feelings. She would verbally attack him out of nowhere and because of his feelings he did not want to hurt her by retaliating which only infuriated her more. Hazel drifted from their friend group shortly after everyone started college.

Evan was ejected from his memories by a burning sensation in his hand. The cigarette had burned to the stub without him noticing. Evan looked around. He could not see his friends anymore. Maybe they had successfully bamboozled the girls with their bullshit. History repeats he mused,as he put the cigarette bud in the ashtray and headed for the door while putting his coat up. He nodded to the bouncers on his way out. Always good to be polite to the men who can ruin your night.

@MadMan