Summer Soap, Part 5: ‘Love is the medicine, two of us in harmony’

Barkeeper Leah:

I finished off the three Murphy’s, and dropped them in front of the middle-aged couple and young woman, then cleared the judgement from my mind. I didn’t want to know. Even if the woman looked a good bit young for them. The Monastery saw weirder crowds, and it wasn’t even the weirdest bar I had worked at on Gillabbey Street. I’d be fine.

“Thank-you kindly,” the young one smiled, before turning to the couple, sliding an elbow across the bar to prop her chin. “Is she, uh, going to be alright?”

Eric turned to his wife just as she raised a hand to her mouth and choked on a hiccup. Same old Ariana. I reached underneath the bar for the pack of Alka-Seltzers I kept just for them. The tablets fizzled into nothingness before Ariana even picked up the glass of water.

She nodded a thanks in my direction. “I’m fine,” she stammered, rising to her feet. “Just damn indigestion. I’ll just grab some air, give me a moment and I’ll be right as rain.”

“Yeah, yeah. She’ll be alright, Alexis, this happens often,” Eric trailed, eyes tracing his wife. “And thanks for the beers.” He watched as Ariana stepped around the corner, out the door and rested beside the window of the smoking area outside. “So,” Eric turned back. “Love?”

“Yes, love,” the young woman insisted. “I noticed your rings - congratulations - so I’m imagining the two of you are in love. That’s what this interview is about: What do you think of love? Where do you think it’s from? What do you think it is?”

Eric took a sip of his Murphy’s in pause, flicking his gaze to me, before back. I didn’t want to know, but I couldn’t help but listen. “Well, I’ll skip that second one for a bit. But, what do I think? It’s great, of course!” He laughed awkwardly. “We’ve been together a decade now, married for the last seven. I couldn’t ask for anything more.”

Eric turned to watch Ariana through the window once more and a pause fell. That woman was something else, but he had always been sweet. And not the middle-aged-married-man-creep kind of sweet. Just a genuinely kind person. But Alexis remained silent, only taking a slow sip. Waiting.

“I think,” Eric finally continued, his eyes still looking out the window. “I think love is the medicine of life.” Another laugh escaped him. “Even if it isn’t exactly helping her at the moment. But you know what I mean? You know that feeling when you’re listening to music and a perfect song comes on for what you’re doing. For what your mood is? And it just hits and the instruments, and the singing and everything is in harmony and reverberating through your - everything!? It feels like all your hairs are raising, and like you might be weightless for a moment and float a bit.

“That’s what being with her feels like. Like harmony. When we’re together - most of the time - we’re in consonance with each other. And it makes everything else easier. It makes all my other problems, not fall away, but become more manageable. It’s like being with her makes me stronger. I don’t think I’m co-dependent like, you know? But I can’t deny that I’m better for it. For her.” 

Eric turned back to Alexis. “Does that answer your question?”

She was smiling now. “Partially. Although I’m trying to figure out how to bring you back to the second question.” The two shared a laugh this time before Alexis continued. “But I guess the more relevant follow up is: You talk about your love how it is now - ten years later - but what, then, do you think of the beginning of love? How do young people like me,” she gestured to her face, “despite the wrinkles, experience love like that?”

“Well... that is the relevant problem.” Eric took a long sip. The ice was broken now. “I see kids all the time that are just... angry. Secluded and bothered, like. Expecting things to fall in their lap. But that’s another story. What’s relevant is that they expect love to just happen. For the first person they fancy to be the one and who they’re destined to be with. And then they’re a dick about it and don’t know how to handle their emotions because they’ve never loved before.

“So, I can’t speak for you,” he continued, “but I’d say that’s the solution. People need to love more. Now, I’m not a hippy or anything like that, but you know what I mean. People need to grow up loving, loving the earth, loving the birds as if they were your own pets. Some kids these days don’t love their own bedroom enough to clean it.”

“They live without harmony?” Alexis reached.

“Exactly! They live without harmony in anything. And then life feels like chaos, because there’s no love.”

The door outside clattered from being closed and a moment later Ariana re-entered. The corners of her eyes were wrinkled in a wide smile and she had both hands raised in a double thumbs-up around her glass.

“Alright, Eric, love, hop-skip over,” she pushed, leaning against her husband’s seat. “It’s my turn to talk with the pretty young lady.” She flipped a smile toward Alexis and tapped a slap-slap into Eric’s back.

Eric stood with a sigh. “And this is my harmony that I desired so bad.” He slid his Murphy’s from the table, tapped his wife’s glass, and stepped toward the corner that led outside. “I’m going to do myself a favour and embrace a little chaos for a moment.” He gave a small wave, cigarette already in hand. “Keeps the sanity in check, really makes the consonance feel better when it’s there.”

Before her husband was even out the door, Ariana clung to Alexis’s arm. “Alright then, have a crack at me.” She smiled.

Alexis inched back in her seat but Ariana remained, clawed over her forearm. “Love. What do you think of it?” she managed to ask

I inched closer to the two. This was going to be good. Ariana was the best to gossip with.

“Ugh.” Ariana pouted. “Well, it’s all very depressing, no?”