Gossip.
They always come early for the first check-in. Not to see who’s here, to see who isn’t. That’s the real list; they scan empty stools and missing faces like detectives at a crime scene. Because nothing like knowing someone is having fun without you, and nothing brings peace like confirming they’re not. If table five is empty, Why isn’t Kostas here? If the corner stool is free, Did Eleni go somewhere better? Fun elsewhere is dangerous. Every bar has one. Every. Single. Bar. The
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
Better than.
“I should be better by now,” she said once. Not sad, angry. Exhausted-angry. She scares me when she’s angry. I asked, “Better than who?” She stared at the Negroni like it owed her answers. “Myself,” she said —like I was supposed to agree. The problem is that when there’s no opponent, you become both the fighter and the punching bag. Every loss feels personal, and every pause feels like failure. She couldn’t rest. Rest meant falling behind a version of her that didn’t even ex
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
Unfamiliar
People think relationships end in a single, dramatic moment. They don’t. They fade. They end in inside jokes that stop appearing. In stories you no longer finish because the other person already knows—or worse, doesn’t care anymore. What was left between them wasn’t anger. It was muscle memory. She always comes first. I think she knows he’ll be late. And I think she likes having him wrong. I passed the glass of water—two quick hellos—and turned to grab the Campari. “Where are
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
One Stool Apart.
They weren’t sitting together together. One stool apart. That’s friendship distance. Close enough to share a bowl of nuts, far enough to survive the truth. I’ve known them for four years. Long enough to know they were friends before they opened their mouths. “You still owe me forty dollars,” Maria said, lifting her Negroni like evidence. Eleni—quieter, already tired of defending herself—let the comment pass like she’d heard it before. “Emotionally or financially?” I smiled an
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
It takes a Negroni.
Sometimes it takes a Negroni to remind us, Happy New Year she said, almost smiling. Few hours earlier, she’d walked into the bar. She didn’t order champagne. She didn’t want bubbles pretending everything was light. She ordered a Negroni—the most honest drink in the room. Bitter doesn’t apologize, sweet doesn’t dominate, strength doesn’t shout. They coexist. Equal parts. No lying. No pretending one flavor wins. “How was the year?” I ask her, with a loud celebratory voice—as if
Stefanos Oungrinis
3 min read
December, the Saturday of the year.
The city starts dressing up, and people become sentimental in public again. Lights go up on streets that passed unnoticed just days before, and suddenly everything smells like cinnamon and expectations. They call it the most wonderful time of the year. And maybe it is. But I haven’t seen daylight in a week, and we’re “doing great,” which is hospitality code for: nothing is on fire, but everybody is one breath away from crying. I just had coffee with the manager. He brought co
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
Nostalgia soundtrack
He always started his set with Mulatu Astatke. No matter the night, the crowd, or how many people were actually paying attention. That slow, confident swing of Ethiopian jazz was his ritual, his anchor. “Because it reminds me of when music had patience, when people did too,” he said, when I asked him why always Mulatu. The way he said it made the room feel older for a second, “Oh, you’re one of the old ones who romanticize nostalgia,” I teased. He laughed, shaking his head as
Stefanos Oungrinis
2 min read
