away.
“I don’t know – I honestly don’t remember going outside. I just remember sort of waking up by the telephone pole – alone. Guess I had things on my mind,” I replied acknowledging his unspoken tone. “I mean it – no booze tonight – none!”
“Yeah, Mike said you could have some vodka, but to keep you away from the Southern Comfort, at least until he got here later,” Rick said.
My body stiffened; I turned on my heels, started to open my mouth to object to Michael dictating what I should and shouldn’t do, but then changed my mind and replied, “Don’t worry – I don’t want any, I felt like shit when I woke up, but I would like a joint… if it’s the same stuff you guys had last week.”
Rick just grinned, winked and pulled a pack of Marlboros out of his T-shirt pocket. Tucked between the package and the cellophane wrapper was about a quarter of a joint. Handing it to me he said, “This will have to do for now – that asshole at the end of the bar is getting impatient.”
~~~~~~~~
Rick was a biker – left over from the ‘biker bar’ days. He was about the same height as Charlie, but a good deal heavier – not fat, but well-muscled with a tattoo of a naked woman on his right bicep placed so that when he flexed his arm muscles, her boobs appeared to grow. On his left arm, higher up, closer to his shoulder was a tattoo of an eagle over the large orange letters HD with the words Harley Davidson Cycle in a semi-circle underneath, and eagle wings supporting the whole design. (He had other tattoos that he volunteered to show me ‘in private’ but I declined.) His wavy, coffee brown hair was just below his ears, a full beard and mustache set off his lips and his bright blue eyes didn’t miss a thing – always darting from one person to the next, sizing them up. He could usually spot trouble brewing in the bar and have it stopped before anything ever happened. And Rick was a lady’s man – he showed any female entering the premises how he could tie a knot in the stem of a cherry using only his tongue, letting them know that he, and his tongue, were available to perform other ‘services’ if they cared to come back around closing time. Most nights there was someone waiting to take him up on his offer. The whole act was very entertaining to watch, almost as choreographed as our daily conversation. Although he tried not to let it show, he was your all around good person under that tough guy façade.
Levi was a different story entirely. Most of the time he dressed like a higher-class version of Charlie, hippie all the way, but giving off the impression that he was somehow slumming by working at The Canteen. There’s no way to express what Levi looked like other than to say he was, hands down, one of the most gorgeous men I had ever seen, with eyes even brighter blue than Rick’s - they looked like blue sapphires, and honey blond hair that always smelled like he had just washed it with a ginger spice-scented shampoo. It was easy to see how the other females Charlie had hired fell prey to his smooth, self-assured, educated voice that belied his true manner. His soft facial features, those high set cheek bones, inviting smile, and lips the color of Merlot wine were straight off the fashion pages of Vogue . His act was so smooth, so polished – glittering like a multi-faceted, high quality, De Beer’s princess cut diamond – he could be irresistible. He reminded me of Stephen. No, he didn’t look like him at all, but something in the way he moved… so confident, so sure of himself. Or maybe it was just the way other people were drawn to him, as if he was the North Pole and they were mere magnets unable to turn away. But for me, there was something else I couldn’t quite put my finger on, couldn’t quite discern, other than Charlie’s rule, that kept me away. Keeping my distance from Levi was no problem at all.
~~~~~~~~
It was Saturday night so the bar was busy, but not hectic like
“I don’t know – I honestly don’t remember going outside. I just remember sort of waking up by the telephone pole – alone. Guess I had things on my mind,” I replied acknowledging his unspoken tone. “I mean it – no booze tonight – none!”
“Yeah, Mike said you could have some vodka, but to keep you away from the Southern Comfort, at least until he got here later,” Rick said.
My body stiffened; I turned on my heels, started to open my mouth to object to Michael dictating what I should and shouldn’t do, but then changed my mind and replied, “Don’t worry – I don’t want any, I felt like shit when I woke up, but I would like a joint… if it’s the same stuff you guys had last week.”
Rick just grinned, winked and pulled a pack of Marlboros out of his T-shirt pocket. Tucked between the package and the cellophane wrapper was about a quarter of a joint. Handing it to me he said, “This will have to do for now – that asshole at the end of the bar is getting impatient.”
~~~~~~~~
Rick was a biker – left over from the ‘biker bar’ days. He was about the same height as Charlie, but a good deal heavier – not fat, but well-muscled with a tattoo of a naked woman on his right bicep placed so that when he flexed his arm muscles, her boobs appeared to grow. On his left arm, higher up, closer to his shoulder was a tattoo of an eagle over the large orange letters HD with the words Harley Davidson Cycle in a semi-circle underneath, and eagle wings supporting the whole design. (He had other tattoos that he volunteered to show me ‘in private’ but I declined.) His wavy, coffee brown hair was just below his ears, a full beard and mustache set off his lips and his bright blue eyes didn’t miss a thing – always darting from one person to the next, sizing them up. He could usually spot trouble brewing in the bar and have it stopped before anything ever happened. And Rick was a lady’s man – he showed any female entering the premises how he could tie a knot in the stem of a cherry using only his tongue, letting them know that he, and his tongue, were available to perform other ‘services’ if they cared to come back around closing time. Most nights there was someone waiting to take him up on his offer. The whole act was very entertaining to watch, almost as choreographed as our daily conversation. Although he tried not to let it show, he was your all around good person under that tough guy façade.
Levi was a different story entirely. Most of the time he dressed like a higher-class version of Charlie, hippie all the way, but giving off the impression that he was somehow slumming by working at The Canteen. There’s no way to express what Levi looked like other than to say he was, hands down, one of the most gorgeous men I had ever seen, with eyes even brighter blue than Rick’s - they looked like blue sapphires, and honey blond hair that always smelled like he had just washed it with a ginger spice-scented shampoo. It was easy to see how the other females Charlie had hired fell prey to his smooth, self-assured, educated voice that belied his true manner. His soft facial features, those high set cheek bones, inviting smile, and lips the color of Merlot wine were straight off the fashion pages of Vogue . His act was so smooth, so polished – glittering like a multi-faceted, high quality, De Beer’s princess cut diamond – he could be irresistible. He reminded me of Stephen. No, he didn’t look like him at all, but something in the way he moved… so confident, so sure of himself. Or maybe it was just the way other people were drawn to him, as if he was the North Pole and they were mere magnets unable to turn away. But for me, there was something else I couldn’t quite put my finger on, couldn’t quite discern, other than Charlie’s rule, that kept me away. Keeping my distance from Levi was no problem at all.
~~~~~~~~
It was Saturday night so the bar was busy, but not hectic like
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