When I was a fresh bartender, I had a couple sitting in the corner, already drinking when I started my shift. They seemed like they knew each other really well considering how much they had their hands on one another. But I still came by and asked if they were okay. The man just waved me off while the woman said, “I need some water.”
The man laughed it off and told me, “She doesn’t need any water. She’s fine.”
She was not fine. Clearly. I decided I was going to cut the two off anyway and bring them some water. As I was filling up the glasses, I heard the woman say, “Stop. I said no. I don’t feel good.”
Her tone and attitude changed instantly. She kept pushing his hand away when he reached for her face, turned her head away when he tried to kiss her. Loudly told him, “Stop. I’m done for tonight.”
So I made sure to refill her water the moment she finished it, and I stayed within earshot of them the whole night. And every time I did, the man got mad at me, told me to leave them alone. Their friends were there, surrounding them and told me that those two always fought when they were drunk and apologized, so I relaxed a little. But the last time I refilled her drink, I heard a loud crash.
She fell out of her stool and hit her head on the floor. And he calmly drank his drink. Their friends didn’t even blink. I jumped over the bar to tend to her and he just said, “Don’t worry, I’ll take her home. She always ends up like this. She drinks too much.”
But it didn’t sound right.
Then the woman began convulsing.
I yelled for the other bartender to call 911 and when I did, the guy suddenly disappeared. I tried asking thr friends questions about him and they just blew it off as the woman being a black our drunk. And one of them said, “We’ll get her home. Don’t worry.”
But when thr EMTs showed up with the police, they all disappeared too.
A few days later the woman came with an attorney. She asked me and the other bartender who worked before me some questions. Turns out, she didn’t know any of those people. They weren’t her friends or her boyfriend. They had met that night, when the guy asked her if he could buy her a drink. At the hospital, they found traces of Rohypnol in her system.
The guy had Roofied her. And his friends were in on it.
The security camera footage showed he had put something in her drink when she left for the bathroom before my shift.
So seriously, it happens. You have to be careful with your drinks! Always watch it, don’t let anyone handle it, and take it with you wherever you go–even the bathroom. Or if you’re a regular at that bar, ask the bartender to put it behind the bar. We’ll do it.
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