The Mirror Bar

I know the words to every single cheesy eighties song they play at the mirror bar, which is not officially named The Mirror Bar but which my friends call the mirror bar because every single wall is covered in mirrors. Everyone checks themselves out when they’re dancing and fixes their hair; a couple making out watches themselves on the wall near me and I try to maneuver around them, trying not to stare (but how can I not? They’re everywhere), tripping over the heels I had a stupid impulse to wear tonight. I do a sneaky torso rotation during one song but have to remind myself that even though I am dancing and surrounded by mirrors, I’m not actually at a dance class and that that sort of self-scrutiny is sort of not very cool. Although, seriously, tell that to the maker-outers.

Life is a mystery everyone must stand alone.

I am, as usual, hanging out with a couple of beautiful women and we swirl out into Courtenay place when we get tired dodging the flailing limbs of all the guys trying to spin on the pole in the Mirror Bar. It’s one of those nights where everyone is out, everyone’s trying to decide where to go and trying to figure out where their friends are and who they might hook up with tonight. We saw one hen party in the mirror bar and a couple more out on the street, the bride in her veil heading for kebabs. The three of us are feeling a little…old, actually. We see a young girl who seems about fourteen and also does not seem to be wearing pants. I think about pants. Pants are so important, you know, so integral to going-out preparation. My own personal going-out checklist, just as an example, looks like this:

–appropriately supportive underpinnings

–pants

–lippy

–product through hair

–wipe extra product on side of dresser, where probably it will accumulate over time and form some sort of gel
stalagmite

–necklace

–pants

–keys phone wallet

–mint imperials to eat on bus ride

–check bus schedule

–check door lock

–wait, keys? Oh, right. Phew.

–CHECK PANTS

but clearly that poor cold girl is young in the ways of the world and doesn’t know about assuring one’s pants are on before one ventures forth into society.

The night bus has to creep down Courtenay Place because there’s so much traffic. Danica and Kiri are going to stay out a bit but I’ve got class in the morning—plus I’m feeling pretty perfect at the moment: slightly keyed up and sweaty from knowing all the words to all the songs and I’m with fabulous fun people and my feet don’t hurt too much. Best to quit when I’m ahead. We have to sidestep some intriguingly chunky street vomit and when we get to the bus shelter—the bus hasn’t made it here yet but I can almost see it down the road, even without my glasses—there’s an exhausted drunked kid sprawled out beneath one of the benches, his weary little head sunk on his elbow. He is still managing to text, and I wonder what he could be saying. “2 trd 2 sit on bnch not sre how wll get on bus prbly crwl uh oh vmit! Ply ded! Kthxbye” I kiss the girls goodbye and get my change and get a good window seat and the bus crawls around the corner to Kent Terrace and I can just hear the screeching of all the loose-limbed laughsome girls in the back under the earbuds.

What goes around goes around goes around comes all the way back around.

In addition to the smeary screamy sixteen year olds there’s an older couple smiling tolerantly in the seats across from me and I wonder what they’ve been up to tonight. Did they go to the mirror bar too? Did they know the words to every song? I look out the window at the Embassy. We pass the Maple Lodge, the Basin Reserve, rumbling along as the bus driver swings giddy around the corner, lurching me against the guy sitting next to me. There’s my work. There’s the barren industrial stretch of Adelaide Road with the video stores and hazard protection clothing shop. There’s my New World, there’s Simon and Turrina and Michael’s house, there’s the dairy, there’s the Berhampore graffiti bus stop, there’s the other dairy, there’s the third dairy. There’s the point at which on my walk home I usually remember I’ve forgotten to buy milk.

Where is my mind, where is my mind.

Off the bus and out across the street under the stars, under the Southern Cross, under the full full moon. Click quickly up the stairs and into the house, where I’ve left the hall light on and the bed neatly made. Throw the keys on the dresser and wrench off the heels. Soon my face will be washed and my teeth will be brushed and I will be sweetly snuggled up in bed, only seven hours until bellydance class tomorrow morning. It’s hard to believe I didn’t always live here, that this hasn’t always been my city and my Saturday night.