Started the night solo with a spicy margarita at the hipster bar.
Outside, two Black dudes were posted up in the corner booth — spread wide, gold chains catching the last light, that loose-limbed alpha calm. I asked if I could join since the space was wide open. They nodded. Real recognize real.
Five minutes of quiet and tequila. Then they got up to leave — and the game turned on.
“You know,” one of them said, “this corner right here? Prime real estate. Girls always ask to sit here.”
Noted. These guys were dialed in. Before they dipped, I ran through the local bar circuit with them. One looked me over and said, “You’ll be fine.” I said likewise. We shook hands, swapped names (already gone), and they disappeared into the night.
Five minutes later — like clockwork — a group of three girls and a long-haired dude asked to join the booth.
I let them in.
One skinny, black-haired girl kept interrupting her friends, gesturing toward me: “Let him talk. Let him finish.” Alright then. Filed.
The guy whined about Star Wars. The girls giggled, sipped their drinks, and floated off to another table. No love lost — my margarita was finished, and the energy was shifting.
I hit the trail.
On the way, I passed a trio of Black guys scanning the scene. The shortest one, clearly the leader, stopped me.
“Where you headed?” he asked — curious, intrigued. A solo man with a steady gait draws questions.
I told him about the cabin-core bar I was hitting. Invited them. He said he was married, but still liked to “stay sharp.”
I smirked. “I used to be like that too. About to be divorced. Crossed the line.”
He gave me a look like I had the cheat codes.
Turns out we went to the same Southern party school. That sealed it — they followed.
At the bar, I found out the tall one was a web dev, three years in. I told him five years is when it gets easy. The leader rolled his eyes.
“Y’all rich. I’m just a teacher.”
I shot back: “Yeah, but you get summers off.”
He laughed, then ordered a round — four punishing tequila shots, straight up, no lime, no chaser. Pours looked like something out of a college hazing ritual.
The third guy — half-Black, half-white barber with a ginger beard — kept ducking out to argue with his girlfriend. Possessive type. He’d come back like nothing happened and slam his drink like it owed him money.
I survived the shots, barely. And that’s when it happened.
An Indian guy floated over — summoned me.
“One of the girls I’m with thinks you’re cute. Told me to come get you.”
He pointed across the room like a sniper. Precision wingmanship.
I clocked it. Then circled back to the bar.
That’s when I saw him — pasty white guy in a backwards cap.
“Scott?”
It was him. My white counterpart. Grew up with me. Same party school. Same path — software engineer, now burned out.
Turns out he’s a multi-millionaire. Anime junkie. Fetish for Japanese girls. Looked like a washed-up tech bro in a crumpled tee, wild hair, and dad shoes. Still pulling women like it was gravity.
White privilege in raw form.
I introduced him to the leader of my earlier crew. Three dudes from three different worlds, bonded by the same party school. I bought the round — green tea shots. A nod to the old rituals.
Then the Indian wingman returned and summoned me again.
This time to the FOB table. The Indian girl watching me asked, “Are you married?”
“Used to be,” I said, with a smirk.
I dropped a few stories, kept the mystery high, then peeled off to find Scott.
Found him mid-social orbit, playing messiah to the stragglers.
I invited him back to my place to pregame before the EDM afterparty. He said he’d catch up.
I walked home solo. Crashed.
Woke up the next morning to a string of texts from Scott, timestamped around 2 AM:
“Come back”
“Wya?”
“Phone gonna die bro”
“You ok?”
Shit.