A few years back my friends and I got in a bar fight. Huge surprise right?
Me, Nails, Merph and my brother Joey Mac were drinking at a shitty bar. The only reason we were at this dump is because my buddy B-ride bartended there and we figured we'd get some food before we went out to an actual bar. It was a Friday night, not too late, and the place was dead. We shot the shit and busted balls and were having a decent time getting drunk. Joey was 20 at the time so he was drinking illegally, but other than that, we were having a decent time, behaving ourselves, and minding our own business.
Let me preface this story by explaining a little bit about my buddy Merph. He's a big dude and he gets riled up faster than Mike Tyson. He's not overly friendly with strangers, and he holds grudges with the best of 'em. Saying that, he's also one of the most loyal friends anyone could ask for. If you're his friend, he has your back without question. The problem is, he's such a troublemaker, that usually it's his friends who need to have his back.
So here we are, the 4 of us sitting at the bar and B-ride behind it. Merph is drinking vodka, so we're pretty happy that there is nobody else in the bar; until wouldn't you know it, a couple of douchebags walk in and sit right next to him. They're drunk, loud, and clearly grating on Merph within seconds. He looks over at the rest of us with the unmistakable face that he gets right before he goes off. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who caught it. I looked at Nails, who at the time had a broken hand. I looked at my brother, who was underage and could get B-ride in all kinds of trouble if the shit hit the fan. I thought to myself, "Damn, looks like I'm gonna be the only one who is of any use when Merph tells these kids to shut the fuck up and if they take exception."
Merph looked over at Douchebag #1. The kid had the audacity to say "what's up" to Merph. Not in a tough guy way, but more in a friendly drunken kind of way. He might have even offered to buy Merph a drink. It didn't matter, he could have offered to blow Merph and it wouldn't have made a difference. Merph had made up his mind.
"Kid, shut the fuck up, stop looking at me." That got our attention. We let out a collective sigh, like "Here we go again, thanks Merph!"
B-ride, ever the pacifist, even though he's built like a brick shithouse, attempted to diffuse the situation. He tried everything. He made jokes, he bought the Douchebags drinks, and honestly, nobody really thought anything would come of it because there was only two of them.
In Merph's defense, the kids WERE douchebags. They started to get defensive and invited Merph outside, which of course riled up and surprised the rest of us. There were 4 of us, even though Nails had the broken right hand, and only 2 of them. What could they hope to accomplish? Regardless, Nails and the McRoberts brothers, followed Merph and the douchebags into the parking lot. B-ride pleaded with Merph to let it go, but his attempts were falling on deaf ears. We entered the parking lot, which was empty aside from a few cars and much to our surprise, a large limo bus. Merph had blinders on was seeing red. Right before he went in for the kill, I put my arm out to stop him. I was the only one who had realized it at this point, but the douchebags had led us into a trap. A hornets nest. A rolling bachelor party. "Fuck."
Douchebag #1 and #2 briefly entered the bus as the four of us prepared for what would surely be a beat-down of epic proportions. It was too late to turn tail and head back inside. We would stay and fight, broken hand and shattered egos in tow.
Douchbags #1 and #2 exited the bus followed by Douchebags #3 through #14. You know that scene at the end of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King? Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli and the hobbits are surrounded by the Orocai and are about to make their final stand. They are all back to back and ready to go down in a blaze of glory. That was the 4 of us, except we didn't have swords or axes or bows. We had an angry drunk who wasn't thinking clearly, two feisty Irishman on the smaller side who could throw a fist or two around, and Nails with the broken hand. As they approached, I made a last ditch effort to talk Merph down. I wasn't scared, but we were clearly outgunned and outmanned. "I don't suppose there's any room for diplomacy, is there Merph?"
As if I wasn't even there, Merph charged the busload of bachelor party attendees like he was William fucking Wallace. Granted, one on one, Merph probably would have handled each one of these clowns, but 14 against 3.5 were not good odds. Without much of a choice left, the rest of us followed, even Nails with the broken hand, God love him. Merph's charge led him strait to Douchebag #1, who he quickly knocked out cold with a single haymaker. That was about the extent of our victory. He was descended upon by the rest of the army and was pretty much rolled up. Nails and Joey stuck together and fended off several attacks while standing back to back. I didn't see much of what went on with those two, because most of the angry mob was focused on Merph. I put my head down and barrelled into the group of douchebags who were on top of Merph. Merph was doing ok to not wind up in the hospital, mainly due to his sheer size and drunken rage, but he didn't stand a chance against so many other dudes. I jumped up at full speed and turned my body into the backs of several of the assailants, throwing blind punches and knocking them off balance, drawing some attention. If Merph was gonna take a beating, I was going to at least take some of it with him. Despite the punches and kicks connected to both of us, we continued to call them pussies and other things, doing our best to avoid serious injury.
Just when all hope was lost, out bursted B-ride from the kitchen of the bar like Gandalf. He started picking dudes up with one hand and tossing them like rag dolls across the parking lot. I swear it looked like he came riding out on a horse with a bright white light surrounding them. It was glorious. He pulled the gang of deceitful, trap-setting pussies off of me and Merph, and sent the entire douchebag army running.
He yelled at me, since Joey was underage. "Get Joey the fuck out of here!" I didn't argue, B-ride had just dispersed an entire angry mob single handedly...who was I to argue?
My brother and I beat feet just as the cops arrived. One tried to stop us to ask what our role was in this fracus. I didn't look at him as my face would clearly have lied to him, "Not sure, sir, we were just leaving."
We reconvened later to tell our battle stories. As it turns out, all of us avoided trips to the clink or the hospital. The douchebags weren't so lucky. Karma ruined their evening in the form of the boys in blue. Was it Merph's fault that the fight started? Of course. But what cop would believe that 4 guys purposely took on an entire busfull of drunk guys in the middle of their bachelor party? So even though we lost the battle, we felt as though we had won the war.
I guess if you're going to trick someone, even someone as legitimately in the wrong as Merph was, into a trap like that, you need to be able to suffer the consequences of Karma.
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