The Upholsterers

Some pollsters come into Rusty’s the other night after work, and it was pretty embarrassing because I thought they said upholsterers. Me and Tommy and Ed were standing out in front having a smoke because the PC crowd thinks they’re going to live forever if they don’t let a guy smoke in the actual bar. I tell these two that I don’t need nothing upholstered, and Ed says, “Pollster, dumbass! They’re taking a poll.” He’s always lording it over me and Tommy because he has an associate or whatever degree from some community college in California, kind of in the way those other Republicans were lording it over our man at the debates before he kicked their ass and took their gas.

So these pollsters — the girl was around 35, and not exactly Pam Anderson, but I’d of taken her home if she was all that was left in Rusty’s on a Friday night at closing time, and the dude looked like he might still have been in college — say they’d like to find out a little bit about us, income- and education- and whatever-wise. I tell them I didn’t bother with community college, or even the last year of high school after the first couple of weeks because in the summers when I’d go out on plumbing jobs with my uncle Pete I must have heard him say a million times that what they teach you in school ain’t worth squat in the real world, and this from a guy who may not of come home smelling like the perfume counter at Walmart of whatever, but was making pretty close to 200,000 bucks per year, and not shy about letting everybody know it.

Ed and Tommy talk about theirselves, and then the pollsters ask who we plan to vote for for president in November, and Tommy, who’s pretty funny, says, “Well, duh!” The pollsters act like they don’t know what he means, and I say, “Donald J. Trump, just like anybody with half a brain is going to vote for,” and Ed hoots at that and offers me a high five, which I’m not going to pretend I don’t feel pretty goddamn good about.

The pollsters — I’ve noticed that their names, Joy and Paul, are on these little plastic ID things they’re wearing around their necks – ask what we like about Mr. Trump, and Tommy says, “You got all night?” And now Ed’s high-fiving him, and I feel like I’m already back to third on the pecking order.

“Well, duh,” Ed says. “He’s got balls.” He looks right at Joy as he says this, but she doesn’t…what’s that word?...flinch. “He says what he believes, not what anybody tells him to say. He says the Chinese are taking our jobs, and that the Mexicans are sending all their rapists and drug dealers and whatever over here. The man speaks the truth, y'all.” Paul’s writing as fast as he can write while Joy just maintains whatchamacallit — eye contact —with Ed, and nods a lot.

“And he’s been on TV,” Tommy says. “How cool would that be, having a president who was the star of his own TV show?” Ed high-fives him again, and it’s painfully obvious that I’m falling farther and farther behind, so I say, “And his wife, Melanie, is about a 12. A man doesn’t get somebody as hot as her unless he knows what he’s doing, 'all.” Now Joy’s looking at me in that serious, interested way she has, and nodding, and it feels really good, but Tommy of course won’t let me enjoy my little moment of glory. “And don’t try to tell me his daughter, Yvonne or whatever, isn’t smoking hot too.”

“I’d do her,” Ed says, and him and Tommy, who’s laughing like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard anybody say, are high-fiving again.