Look at me!
I have never had a straight man look at me like that. And he gets paid to. He stared at my body like a construction worker would if Jessica Rabbit walked by. I was wearing my only pair of skinny jeans. I bought them earlier in the day because my regular, ill-fitting jeans I always wear would not get me into this place. I look good in them.
Do I look the bouncer in the eyes as he’s evaluating me? Is that one of those unspoken rules everyone knows but me? “Duh, never look a bouncer directly in the eyes, Lee. They take it as a sign of aggression. Of course you didn’t get in,” they’ll text. I’ll read that text while I’m sitting alone at a table in a McDonalds, slowly stirring a Reese’s McFlurry, while my friends dance on tables and order $800 bottles of vodka delivered to them by supermodels who, curse my luck, are probably also super into Jews.
I’m lost in thought when he asks for my ID.
Nice, I think. I’m in! This is the easy part. I open my wallet and in one smooth motion, I hand him my ID, like I’ve done a thousand times before to bartenders. Except this time I don’t.
Instead I hand him a Jamba Juice gift card that’s been sitting in my wallet behind my ID for six months.
“Ha ha,” I laugh uncomfortably, as I take back the gift card and hand him my ID. “No gift card for you?”
And then, like the stereotypical bouncer that he was, he comes up with the coolest response ever uttered when presented with a gift card with a tropical motif, used in the event a white person wants a flavorful, healthy treat.
“I ain’t want it,” he says.
Damn. There it is. He ain’t want it. Now it was confirmed what I had long suspected, that this 300 lb rock of a man could not be bribed with 20 ounces of Super Yumberry with a Flax & Fiber Boost.
And then he lets me in anyways.
Success! I’m in I’m in I’m in! No one can take that away from me! SUCK ON THAT, all the people in high school who never thought I was cool! I’m in a super swanky New York City lounge and you’re not!
I scan the room. Everyone is dressed to the nines. It’s packed. The music blares a remix with Lil Wayne on it. I listen to a girl drone on endlessly about her apartment renovations.
I sneak out the back, hoping my friends don’t notice. I could really go for a Jamba Juice.
