The Wonderous Dating Game

by J. M. Mason

  I didn’t know how little experience Jenny, Jodie, and I had about biker bars. Ignorance is, at times, is bliss. In our case that ended up proving to be true because of beginner’s luck.

  I told my oldest son, Jim, of my excitement about the prospect of the visit to see the bikers up close and personal, as well as about going out on the town to make a splash in the ocean of men. I didn’t want a repeat of no one knowing where I was going in case my body showed up on the news.

  His eyes widened, his mouth gaped open, and I heard a rapid intake of air. He didn’t just look surprised. He was more on the stunned side of the dial.

  “Mom!” Jim said, louder than I expected, and I flinched. “What are you thinking? Do you even know what kind of bar you’ve chosen to go to?”

  He continued to express his doubts and objections about my choice of places to visit. His head was shaking so much I felt he needed to go to the doctor to see if he had a neurological problem.

  “Mom, do you know what a biker’s bar is?” Jim asked. “It isn’t like Sunday School.”

  “How bad can it be? The bikers must have girlfriends and wives, don’t they? We should be safe because it’s a public place.”

  “How many of you are planning on going out together to this bar?”

  “The ladies I work with, Jenny, Jodie, and I’ll be going out Friday night to Buster’s Bar.”

  “Please promise me you won’t stay there alone if one or both of your friends find someone to go home with. I’m not happy with you all going to a bar, period, choosing to go to a biker’s bar is beyond stupid. But I’ll have to trust you’ll be safe.”

  “Don’t worry. Buster’s Bar is a public place, and I’m sure they have workers there that look out for people. Bouncers will take care of the problems before they become dangerous. Besides, I’m a grown woman, and I think I can take care of myself. What could happen that’s so bad?”

  Jim’s brows pulled together as he looked at me with his eyes narrowed like he doubted me. He shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and groaned as he walked away and left me alone. Is he OK with my going or not? I didn’t have a chance to run this idea by Walter, he was out of town, so I decided it was a good thing to do.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Friday night came, and I was excited to go out someplace new and experience something that would be different from my mundane life. I felt it was good to dress casually for the evening in a pair of faded jeans and a T-shirt with flowers across the chest and my black leather boots with flat heels. I was biker ready.

  Jim suggested I drive myself to the bar and park near the door, so I didn’t have to walk down the street in the dark alone. I’d told Jim that Jenny, Jodie, and I had agreed to take our vehicle in case one of us found someone to love.

  When I arrived at Buster’s, I met Jenny and Jodie in front of the bar so that we could walk into the club together. Our motto was “safety in numbers,” and Jim indicated this to be valid when he asked how many of us were going out together.

  There was a table located toward the center of the room near the pool tables that was a perfect location for watching the people. Shortly after we sat down, a tall, well-built young man approached us and leaned down toward my ear.

  He smelled so good that I fought the urge to grab him, pull him down and nuzzle into his neck to breathe in his essence. I opted for the next best thing, I took in a deep breath, and held it, so the fragrance titillated my senses. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the fantasy that floated through my mind. Suddenly, my eyes flew open, and the dream burst when I heard him whisper in my ear.

  “Are you Jim’s Mom?”

  What a mood crusher, but I took in one last deep breath, pulling his scent into my lungs. It tickled the hairs in my nose, and I sneezed loudly, right onto his handsome face before I covered my nose and mouth. He quickly stood up, frowned, wiped his face off with the back of his hand, and continued to look down on me as he waited for an answer to his question.

  “Excuse me for sneezing in your face,” I said. “Yes, I’m Jim’s mother, who are you?”

  “My name’s Brad, Jim asked me to make sure you all are safe tonight. I’m one of the bouncers here. You ladies have a good time. If you need me, feel free to call out my name.”

  “Really?” Jenny asked. “Where do you find all these good looking guys to watch after you?”

  He winked at us as he walked away without an explanation of why he was acting like a bodyguard. I liked the idea of a personal bodyguard, but I knew it was forced on him by Jim.

  “I’ll be talking to Jim about this,” I said. “I’m a grown woman, besides I’m the mother, and I should be able to go out on the town and paint it red any time I want. I may be old, but I’m not ancient, damn it and I can take care of myself.”

  No one argued with me, so we ordered drinks. Because I’m the designated walker in my body and I would need to drive home later, I drank a mixed drink of Grapefruit juice and lime soda. I requested a lime slice with a cherry on the top to make the drink look like it was a substantial mixed beverage, they didn’t have umbrellas for my drink.

  The men hanging out in the bar, playing pool ignored us, and the women, dressed in leather, obviously glared at us every time we looked at the men shooting pool. The women intimidated me, and I considered going home, this place wasn’t for me.

  It was loud from the balls clicking and plumping down in the pockets of the table and the junk box was cranked up to the limit, it rattled the lights swinging over the pool tables from the vibrations.

  Before I could tell Jenny and Jodie I was leaving, I found out why Jim felt I needed protecting. A fistfight broke out over by the pool tables behind me to the left. There was much grunting, pushing, and wrestling with a few punches pulled on each of the men as they bounced off the pool tables and customer tables.

  They reminded me of the pinball machines I liked to play when I was young and vital. The only difference, there weren’t any bells and whistles when they bounced off something hard, only huffing, puffing, grunting, groaning, and the sound of soft tissue that contacted a hard immovable object.

  Jenny, Jodie, and I were laughing and taking bets on which biker would win the struggle along with the biker girls. One of the bikers, whose arms and chest was covered in tattoos fell with his right arm landing on my leg as he slithered to the floor at my feet.

  His right hand fell off my lap and hit my foot as he landed with a thud. I screamed, pushed back my chair, and prepared to rise to run for my life.

  The large unfortunate man laid on the floor and didn’t move. He was dressed in greasy blue jeans and a black, well-worn leather vest, sporting many patches. He didn’t wear a shirt under the vest, and his hairy chest rose and fell as he took in deep breaths of air. At least he didn’t die at my feet. I knew when someone was alive, even though I’m just a receptionist in a medical office.

  The smell of alcohol was nearly drowned out from the strong smell of unwashed underarms, cigarette smoke, and old spilled beer. His bald head came up between my legs as he tried to get to his feet. While that may have been exciting under different circumstances, I wasn’t amused or turned on by the event.

  I saw two hands reach down in front of me, as I pushed the biker’s head away from my crotch. Then Brad appeared in my peripheral vision. I stopped pushing the man’s head away as Brad used the biker’s momentum to pull the odoriferous man from the floor, then pushed, pulled, and dragged him toward the door we had entered a few hours earlier.

  The biker roared his dissatisfaction and swung his arms wildly to sucker punch Brad. As Brad walked by the other man involved in the skirmish, he clutched him by the arm, that was cocked and ready to punch his biker buddy, Brad drags them toward the door.

  “You two need to take your fight somewhere else,” Brad said. “You’re not welcome here. We have ladies present, and I don’t like your attitude. Now get.”

  I sat with my mouth agape, and I was speechless. The men did what Brad had told them w
ithout argument. They both walked to the door, shrugged their shoulders, while the men and women of their party filed out the door behind the fighters. The fighters said as they left, “Sorry, man, we didn’t know there were ladies present.”

  After Brad watched the men walk away, he returned to my side, knelt in front of me, looked me over to see if I had any bruises. He was so gentle, and he acted like he was searching his mother for injuries.

  “Are you hurt?” Brad asked.

  “No, I’m fine,” I answered. “That was different.”

  “Yeah, I would say that was definitely different,” Brad said. “You ladies should consider going down the street to the Underground Bar and Grill. It’s safer for ladies out on the town. They have Karaoke there tonight. I recommend you go out on Friday nights. They aren’t as wild as Saturday nights can be.

  “I’d hate to have Jim mad at me for getting his mom hurt.” He patted my hand. “Please, consider going down there. You ladies are too nice to be in a place like this.”

  We looked at each other, gathered our things, and got up to leave. Brad walked us to the street where our cars were parked.

  “Thank you, Brad,” I said. “I’ll tell Jim you took good care of us.”

  Brad left us to return to his job. We stood silently for a few minutes when Jodie popped up and asked, “Does this mean we were bounced out of the bar?”

  “Yep! We’re badass,” Jenny said.

  We burst into laughter as we thought about being bounced out of a biker bar the very first time we went out. We were all in our forties and single. I couldn’t wait to tell Jim about being kicked out of the bar before Brad could tell him what really happened to us.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  We stood and watched Brad go through the door of Buster’s as we were lost in our thoughts. It wasn’t our plan to go home, yet no one suggested we go to the Underground. The fight stimulated us with an adrenalin rush so much we were wide awake and needed something constructive to do to keep us out of trouble, so we didn’t have to go home.

  “I’m tired of the bar life for one night, how about we go to Bud’s Truck Stop out on the Interstate for breakfast and then go home,” Jenny suggested.

  “I’m hungry and could use a change of scene,” Jodie agreed. “We can go to the Underground some other night.”

  I didn’t want to tell Jenny and Jodie that I never really wanted to go to the Buster’s in the first place, yet I didn’t want to stay home alone. I’d never been to such a place in my forty-plus years, and I wasn’t enthusiastic about going back there again, though, I didn’t want to go home and spend the rest of the weekend on my own.

  “Let’s go. Should we go in our cars or go in one car?” Jodie asked.

  “Let’s take our own cars,” Jenny answered. “We live in different parts of the city, and it’ll be easier for us to go home from the truck stop.”

  Bud’s wasn’t busy when we walked into the brightly lit dining room and chose a table in the back of the room. It was nearly two o’clock in the morning, and the place was rather quiet for a truck stop, although there were many eighteen-wheelers parked in the lot around the store.

  It was a place where people could smoke, so the air was hazy with smoke hanging in the air from earlier in the night. A short, disheveled woman, wearing a dirty, dingy, gray apron that had been white once upon a time over jeans and a T-shirt, slumped across the floor toward us, her hands held menus and three glasses of iced water. Her shoulders were rounded, pins were hanging from strands of dull gray hair in need of professional care.

  I struggled to hold back a burst of laughter when my mind completed the picture of my stereotypical waitress, with a lit cigarette, a long ash dripping off the end, threating to fall as she walked. Her mascara was running down her cheek, and her false lashes were clinging to her eyelids for dear life, and her red lipstick feathered upward in the cracks around her lips.

  She set a glass of water in front of us and slapped menus down on the table, narrowly missing the glasses she had just sat on the table.

  “Whacha want to drink?” she asked.

  “Coffee for me with half and half, please,” I said.

  “Me, too,” echoed Jodie and Jenny.

  “Do you want Vanilla or plain creamer?”

  “No, we want real cream, not the artificial creamer, please,” Jenny answered.

  The waitress plodded across the floor to the counter where the coffee pot was located, she filled three mugs with black liquid and picked up a small bowl with little cups of creamers poking out of the top. It was amazing to watch her balance the number of objects she carried in her hands to the table without spilling a drop of coffee.

  The coffee smelled like it was burned. We knew we were either too late or too early to have a new cup of coffee. We smiled and thanked her for her offering, knowing it was fruitless to ask for a fresher cup of java.

  “By dang, if it’s good for the truckers, it should be good enough for the likes of you,” I heard her telling us in my mind.

  Again, I nearly giggled as I pictured her wiping her arm across her nose and hacking up a wad of spittle, turning her head, and spurting over her shoulder. Then hitching her fingers in the belt around her waist, tugging to pull up her pants like an old cowboy, telling us to suck it up and drink the mud she offered, “Drink up ladies, it’ll put hair on your chest.” As if this is what we all desired the most in life.

  We made our choices from the menu so that when the waitress returned to the table, we could save her steps and give her our order. It was a good plan. However, she had to go back to the counter to retrieve a book to write down our orders for the cook.

  Bud’s wasn’t unlike other places where weary night travelers could go for something to eat in the middle of the night. They were open 24/7, and while they looked dirty, the food was like home cooking and remarkably tasty.

  My mind wandered to many nights sitting across a table from Mom and Dad with my brother and sisters in a place like this when we were relocating. Faces of the past morphed over the faces of the waitress, who was overworked.

  The cook always looked tired and sad, sitting at the counter when he completed an order, cigarette hanging from his lips, head bowed. Dad would say, “I wonder if that old boy would rather be out drinking with his buddies instead of breathing in so much grease cooking for all who don’t give one whit for him or his problems.”

  Did Dad speak from his own experience, or was he talking for his Dad, who spent many years cooking in a café just like this one? It’s hard to say. My walk down memory lane faded as Jenny poked me in the ribs and demanded, “What’s the matter with you? You looked like you lost your best friend.”

  “I was just reliving a pleasant memory for a moment. It isn’t important. I’m sorry, did you ask me something?”

  “No, Jodie and I were just discussing Brad. He’s so cute, too bad he’s the same age as your son.”

  “Yeah, I know. I’ve thought about being a cougar and finding someone like my ex did, but I just can’t see myself with someone so much younger. My ex believed I was too old for him. Can you imagine how I’d feel if a younger man would suddenly wake up and see my wrinkled face lying on the pillow beside him? What would we talk about? What music would we listen to, etc.?”

  “I haven’t thought about any of that,” Jenny confessed. “But I remember how good sex was when I was younger. Maybe, the new wore off with my marriage.”

  “I didn’t know you were married before,” I said. “While we are talking, what happened to John and you?”

  “John’s working out of town for the next three months. His job, at times, takes him out of town for an extended period.” She smiled bleakly. “As for my marriage, it only lasted a year. He was gay, and he felt he needed to make a point with his family. They were so stiff in their religious beliefs they disowned him even though he married me. Jeff tried to be a good husband before he told me he was gay. I don’t understand how parents can do that to their child.”r />
  “I’m sorry about that,” I consoled. “I know what you mean about parents disowning their own blood. I can’t imagine having a life without my sons. I believe that being gay isn’t a sin, and it’s a thing that’s determined before we’re born. Somewhere along the line things changed for some people. Many people say it’s a sin because the Bible says that no lovers of men will enter the kingdom of God, then they ignore the list that includes lying and a host of other so-called sins,” I said indignantly. “Then they ignore that Jesus said no marriages would be in heaven. Yet, they still marry, some frequently.”

  “Really?” Jodie said. “I didn’t know that.”

  We sat quietly, sipping our coffee, and eating in a relaxed state. After we sat in our private thoughts for a while, a bright idea struck between my eyes, nearly blinding me with insight.

  “Oh, I was just wondering,” I said. “I didn’t mean to bring down the party. But back on topic, would you want to date someone as young as Brad? I mean, could you get naked around someone built like Brad?”

  “Ew,” Jenny replied. “When you put it that way, no. It would be embarrassing. I roll up the girls every morning and stuff them in my bra. I hope each time they won’t unroll before I get them corralled and blacken my eyes. I’d hate to have a young, hard-bodied man try to make love to me and have to find the nipple down on the waist.”

  We burst into laughter. A couple of truckers turned and looked at us. We raised our coffee mugs and toasted them, then laughed some more.

  We talked, laughed, and devoured every morsel of food on our plates before we got into our cars and drove to our homes with a promise to see each other at work on Monday. It was agreed we had the best time ever.

  Of all the nights I have been out on the town, being with my friends was the most enjoyable. Maybe, I should reconsider having a man in my life. I’ll spend some weekend thinking about living alone and going out on the town to have a good time when the mood moves me. I knew that having a man in my life doesn’t define who I am, so why not just be single?