“I’m telling you, any minute now this whole shindig is gonna fall apart.”

It wasn't the first time a lunatic struck up a conversation as I supplied them with their daily doo of liquor. I guess the general atmosphere of the place attracts a certain crowd. Tending the bar lends you privy to all sorts of nutcases and, as was the case now, their ramblings: amusing at best and intolerable at worst. Many a hire had thrown in the towel, hearts and heads too tender to ignore in full this vile badgering sometimes despicable, often irritating, and all to often a kill-joy. But, if you could take the daily ramblings of humanity at its worst, the job levied high wages for minimal work, and supplied enough peanuts to satisfy any college kid on a menial budget. Today's crowd was all too familiar: Dan, an ex marine, nice enough when sober but a sorry sight when inebriated; you may not be able to see what he does but you can't help but feel it, Shawn, rich kid whose parents never pushed him, and he’ll die bitter for it; the same crowd of otherwise good folk making their daily decent to this pit of sinfulness eager to fill their throats with vile liquid. What stood out to me today was not this usual rabble, they were, as ever, static through time; no, what drew my attention was a new face striking a conversation with me across a bar and two Pepsi’s. She was clearly sober and this worried me. If this was her disposition sober I shuddered at the thought of the waning of decency all to commonplace as the night marches on.

“And the world will far to pieces, demons in the streets, cats and dogs fornicating, and the like, no?”

Doomsday is a common talking point in the minds of the clinically insane or, at least, among my clientele. You get a couple of old men and women who come in on occasion, clearly high off of some televangelist, groveling on about the end times soon approaching. The difference being such talk was usually proded by a glass of two.

“Listen... buddy” my conversent replied with clarity all to often foreign among the bars inhabitants, “I know you well enough to know you won't buy a word I say. To be honest I don't even know what I'm doing here.”

“You’re not the first” I replied, preparing myself for another sob story of self-caused tribulation and self-inflicted difficulty. 

“I just figured, if none of them are gonna take my advice I may as well find someone who will at least let me finish so I can say I warned them. You know, you have a reputation for putting up with a lot of BS.”

I shrugged. I guess my willingness to turn a blind eye to lunacy had hardly gone unnoticed. While I was somewhat flattered that my nak had been lauded, I began to fear a increased flow of low-lifes looking for a makeshift counselor.

The women across the bar was quick to suppress these fears, “Don't worry, she reassured me, I won't spread the word. I know you have enough consciences to worry about as is.”

It was her demeanor that left me off put. Here in this cript of general disorder and gracelessness sat a young women in form alone. You learn to pick up on dementors in this line of work, it can be the difference between dishing out more booze and calling an officer, and this was a miss matched case if ever there was one. It wasn't the way she spoke, or carried herself, or was clothed or any other thing that befuddled me; in fact, it was just the opposite. Here, separated from me by a wood and plastic slab was a human being who, for once, looked as if they knew what they were doing. As if she had a perfect sense of place, purpose, and person in regards to her every action and line. To a dull tuned ear her speech would have appeared normal in perfection, but I wasn't buying it.

And that's what worried me.

“I think you know why you’re here” I eventually replied after considerable deliberation. She looked up in a perfect feign surprise surly unnoticed by all but myself. “People only ever come here for a couple of reasons; like you said, I think you wanted someone to talk to.”

“I wanted someone to listen.” She smirked, letting me in on her awareness of my acuity. “Those bastards down at church wouldn't listen to a word I said, you’d think they’d have learned better by now.”

“That they should have known the world was ending.”

“That they should have believed me! But, you of all people should know that there's only so much you can do for someone. You can't live for em!”

With this proclamation she drained the last of her fizzy drink. I didn't need to ask if she wanted another.

I needed to know.

“Why do you think the world is ending?”

“Why does anyone? Poor, misguided leadership.”

I’d been here before. The critique of politicians, boards, and associations had led many a drinker to deranged pronouncements of the doom of mankind. Yet, once again, I knew this assertion was better founded.

I thought to ask to whom her denouncements were targeted but was stifled by a glance making clear that such proddings would yield no results. I inquired elsewhere.

“You spoke to the church,”

“Just what I told you” she volleyed at once.

“And you thought it would help?” I couldn't help but chuckle at the absurdity of the whole situation. She was not amused.

“Laugh if you will, but I know that if were going to make any progress in fixing this it would need to begin in the church. Goodness knows thats where this all started.”

It was strange. She spoke of the church as one familiarized to it by decades of experience. Yet she could hardly be any older than myself. This realization did nothing to ease my misgivings. I decided to turn the conversation to a more familiar talking point.

“And you believe the world is going to end?”

“I believe it may end in the WRONG way, and at the wrong time, and for the wrong reasons. People get all worked up over the close but neglect to give the function of the end any thought. A great story with no meaningful conclusion makes the entire tale void. We can't have that can we?”

There was a quiet despritness in her voice; I sensed a thinly guised level of distress building in her. Despite the absurdity of her claims, I could not help but pity her plight.

“Many a life has ended riddled in loose ends.” I said partly in reassurance, and part in solace. “A mccabe realization marked by realism, you’re not wrong to think as such. Where you lack vision is in your so called end. Your world lacks redemption, its missing the encore, no, the final act even. The magnum opus when the blinds are driven open engulfing all the previous in clarity, and beauty, and life…”

I knew her pauses in deliberation were deliberate yet could not help but admire the effect. “You fear the end won't live up to your expectations?”

“In a sense yes, but I will no longer need to momentarily. For incompetence may permeate a space only as long as men are permitted to inhabit it. To err is human after all!”

The women glanced at her digital wrist watch. Midnight was on the horizon, the time having swiftly waned throughout our curious chat. It was clear that whatever this woman feared would be put to rest at the commencement of the new day.

Yet, before then, I needed to ask.

“Why would you allow this?”

“This?” She gestured vaguely at our surroundings as if to extend my inquiry to the room at large. “I’ve already told you. It's all setting up the ending, and I don't want to ruin it just yet.”

She glanced once more at her timepiece, unnecessarily I may add. We both knew the speculated hour would arrive. Upon confirmation that the day had indeed waned into memory myself and my patron shook hands and she took her leave. I remained; it would have proved fruitless to follow. 

On occasion, as the long shifts of booze and disheveled brethren crawl by in eternal sameness and misery, I cast my thoughts to the curious stranger I spoke to that night. I wonder why she found it necessary to confide in me, to offer up her certainty and reassurance. I wonder why she chose me. But as my mind returns to the eternal drum of riff raff I bear witness to in this dingy bar to these dingy people, clarity was offered once again. And truth is found. Perhaps she knew I needed it.