For a moment, the silence seemed to stretch out infinitely- and the world stopped turning. The girl, Sarah, lay sprawled on the floor. Above her stood a mountain of a man. Everybody else, from bartender to bystander, watched and tried to look away at the same time.

Then everything snapped back into real time and the words had already left my mouth.

“Knock that shit off right now!”

He turned to me and I could see his life chiseled into the stone of his face. That craggy surface looked like it had seen a lot of trouble, nose broken, eyes hard, teeth that had never seen a dentist.

The noise that came from his throat was a quiet, menacing bass that somehow complimented the shrill soprano sobs that came from his feet. “Excuse me? I didn’t hear you.”

I swallowed the last of my beer and slammed the bottle down as I stood up. I had paid for it and figured I might as well get the most out of it.

“Deaf and ugly? What a surprise!” I exclaimed mockingly.

His fist lashed out like an avalanche and the fight was on.