Wanderlove - Rachel Blaufeld

by Rachel Blaufeld

  She nodded. “Okay, enough about that. It’s off my chest. Tell me more about the crowd that comes in here. Hot? Sexy as fuck? Any good-lookers in their early twenties? For me, of course.” She waggled her eyebrows above her eyeglass frames, and I couldn’t stifle my laugh.

  Good-lookers in their early twenties made me think of Price, the prick who hadn’t been nice, but then was. I’d met two people in this city. One was sitting in front of me, and the other didn’t even know my name.

  “We’ll get a good crowd tonight. You won’t be sorry you came. I swear.”

  I poured myself a Diet Coke just as the bells over the door jingled and the music started to pour through the speakers. It was five o’clock on a Friday, officially happy hour, and the TGIF crowd was filing in.

  Smiling, I told Bev, “Have fun, girlie,” as I prepared to make several hundred drinks. “Oh, watch out for the bunny,” I added with a wink, and poor Bev squinted at me, her brow furrowed. I didn’t offer any further explanation. She’d figure it out soon enough.

  At the end of the night, Bev stayed with me as I counted my tips and had a drink. “Oh. My. God. I had no idea what you meant when you mentioned a bunny. Who the hell is that? And what is that all about? I’ve lived in New York all my life, and I never.” Bev laughed into a glass of water.

  “I told you to look out for him. Apparently, it started back in the Village years ago, probably when we were babies. A guy named Frankie would dress as a bunny and hit on all the female customers in the bar. He was apparently pretty famous there, and when he got older, his son took over. Being a poor New Yorker, he moved to Queens. His name is . . . wait for it . . . Frankie Junior.”

  I released my hair out of its messy bun, scratching the nape of my neck where it was itchy from a few too many hairs pulled tight.

  After several rounds of laughter, we made small talk in the afterglow of a good night for all, including Frankie Junior, who’d danced with Bev. She’d flirted with him and everything else that moved on two legs and had a penis, and I’d raked in the cash.

  For a while tonight, we both forgot about our moms. Bev needed to forget because she ached all over at the prospect of losing hers. As for me, I ached all over at the prospect of finding mine. We were opposing ends of the same continuum, thrown together by some random stroke of kismet.

  As I sipped a vodka and tonic, I somehow knew my not telling Bev the truth would haunt me, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it. The multitude of ways this whole Paula thing could end were too great, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to share that with anyone just yet.

  When we were finished, I waited with Bev for her Uber before splurging on a cab home.

  With my cheek against the cool pillow, I didn’t think of Robby. A dark-haired, sort-of-older (which made everything more questionable) guy had taken up residence in my mind, and I wasn’t sure how it made me feel, other than happy.

  Price

  Saturday afternoon, I kicked back in my apartment with a cold beer and my book—Cannery Row—hiding from all the Big Apple had to offer.

  I’d read the plotless story several times, and it was still my favorite. Sad, how it became truer and truer to my own life. Rather than the cannery employees, we were the struggling, down-and-out farmers. Then there were the people in the surrounding big cities who had chosen a different life. Except now, I was caught between the two worlds.

  The doorbell knocked me out of my reverie, and I made the mistake of opening the door without looking through the peephole first.

  “Hey, Price. I’m house sitting this weekend for my aunt, and I was wondering what you’re up to?”

  It was Monica—a mistake from when I first moved here. With Moira’s harping on me to sow my wild oats ripe in my mind, a bruised ego from my mom pushing me to this place, and a momentary lapse in judgment, I found solace in the girl down the hall. Grateful to learn she was only house sitting for her aunt who lived in the building, I’d sworn never to shit where I ate again.

  Now as she leaned against the doorjamb, wearing a black crop top and even blacker leggings outlining her camel toe, her feet bare, I recalled why I don’t sleep with neighbors (or house sitters of said neighbors) anymore.

  “Having a low-key weekend,” I said, trying to avoid long moments of direct eye contact. I’d learned my lesson . . . city girls weren’t like the girls back home.

  “You should come out! It’s Saturday.” She leaned forward, her fake tits on display, bouncing with her every step.

  I knew all about them . . . her dad bought them for her on her eighteenth birthday. I’d had to bite my tongue in an effort to resist laughing at that. Tits for a birthday gift! Apparently, it wasn’t uncommon around these parts. Can you imagine?

  On my eighteenth birthday, I got gift cards to the wing place and the gas station, and an “Attaboy, now you’re a man” from Bruce.

  “Thanks for the offer, but I’m probably going to stay in.”

  “Nooo. You can’t. This building is so lame. It’s so quiet, I can hear the clock ticking. You need to come out with us. It’s a group,” she said coyly, twirling her hair between her thumb and forefinger, a duck face replacing her smile.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said to get rid of her.

  “Oh, great. I’ll come by around nine and we can share an Uber, then grab everyone else. It’s a plan.”

  “I’m not a definite.”

  “See you later,” she said over her shoulder, already sashaying her ass down the hall.

  Happily alone again with my book and my beer, I spent the rest of the afternoon on the couch.

  A little before eight, I opted to head out and pick up some food, trying to avoid Monica and her Uber. With a bag of cheap Chinese takeout tucked under my arm, I grabbed the keys hanging from my mouth to unlock my apartment, hoping I was safe.

  “Priiiice! Woo-hoo, let’s go!”

  “I’m not really feeling it, Monica.” I waved my bag of takeout in the air. “Plus, I’m in ratty jeans and a flannel. I’m sure you don’t want to be caught dead with me. I hardly scream New York’s finest.”

  “Are you mocking me?” She looked at me, her head tilted to the side, her breasts rising and falling with each breath, her eyes wide.

  Shit. I didn’t mean to make her feel bad.

  “No,” I lied.

  “Come on, let’s go. We’re going to Astoria to see the bunny. No one cares what you’re wearing. Eat your food later tonight. Just leave it in your apartment.”

  “Okay.” I turned my key in the door, shoved my food in the fridge like she said, and locked back up. I couldn’t insult the woman and then not go, especially when she was giving me a second chance.

  “A bunny?” I asked when we got on the elevator.

  “Yeah, Frankie. He’s so, so, soooo fun! He used to hang in the Village, but he’s found a new home in Astoria.”

  “A real bunny?”

  “No, silly.” She pinched my cheek and leaned forward to playfully brush my nose with hers, filling my nostrils with her overly vanilla scent. “A cross-dressing bunny. You’ll love him.”

  There was no appropriate response to this.

  We picked up two other people in the Uber, a girl and a guy from the Upper West Side. “Mandi with just an I,” and “Sidney, not Sid.”

  Fucking New Yorkers. They always scream their uniqueness.

  “Price, just like what something costs,” I said by way of introduction, unable to resist running my smart mouth.

  We sped out of the city, over the bridge, and through the streets of Queens until the Uber pulled in front of a restored building, the letters TVRN painted onto a faux-worn trim. Right away, I could tell this was one of those froufrou places pretending to be a shithole.

  After Sidney, not Sid, paid for the Uber on his app, we all volunteered to pick up the ride home, and off we went. A large bald guy stood at the door, handlebar mustache, rock band T-shirt stretched across his chest—could he be any more cliché?

  “Cov
er is twenty-five for the guys, nothing for the ladies.”

  Of course.

  Pulling my worn leather wallet from my back pocket, I shoved a fifty into the guy’s hand. “I got him too,” I said, jerking my head toward Sidney.

  When we walked inside, I saw I was right. Bourgeois disguised as a shithole.

  “Come on.” Monica tugged on my shirt. “I see a table.” She hustled as if her life depended on it to a misplaced farm table.

  “Why are we in Queens again?” I asked. “When we live near a thousand bars?”

  Monica rolled her eyes. “It’s fun to go slumming, like the Village back in the day.”

  “What do you know about back in the day? You’re about as fresh-faced as they come.”

  She slapped my arm. “Stop! Come on, let’s have fun!”

  My head shook on its own. Of all the ideas, this was close to the dumbest.

  I ran my hand along the table’s finish, too glossy to be from a farm, too smooth to have ever been in a real working-man’s kitchen.

  “First round’s on me,” Sidney declared as I sat my ass down in an uncomfortable chair. “What’ll you have?”

  “Ooh, I want a margarita on the rocks, definitely Patrón, and yes to salt,” Monica said without even looking up at Sidney. She was fixated on her own cleavage, adjusting her tits just so.

  “I want a Moscow mule,” Mandi said. “Don’t you love those mugs they come in?”

  “Bottle of beer for me, nothing too rich for my blood,” I said.

  Sidney sneered at me. “Coors Light?”

  “Nah, I don’t do light. That’s for wusses.”

  This got his ass moving toward the bar, and I settled back in my seat, taking in the place.

  A DJ spun loud music in the corner, eclectic tables crowded the floor, light bulbs strung from fake barbed wire hanging from the beamed ceiling, crown molding lined the perimeter, and a long shiny wood-grain bar stretched across the back wall.

  Chuckling to myself, I watched Sidney jockeying for position at the bar while Monica and Mandi discussed their outfits as though they’d been called to the White House and their matching crop tops were of the highest security scrutiny.

  Poor Sidney was waving his hand in the air, desperate for the attention of a bartender, when finally, a pint-sized thing called him over. Her dark hair was piled on top of her head, strands of it flying everywhere, a tight royal-blue tank top stuck like glue to her perfect chest.

  Lifting my gaze back to her face, I recognized her. There was my galloping stallion, looking proud, working in Astoria.

  How ’bout that?

  This night instantly became much more interesting.

  “Here.” Sid shoved a green glass bottle in my direction and set two sloshing drinks on the table. He took a healthy pull of his draft beer—I’m sure some yuppie IPA bullshit—before moaning about the line at the bar.

  “I’ll do the honors next time,” I said, happy to offer.

  “Fine with me. So, did you scout any fine fish in the sea while I was gone?”

  “What?” I couldn’t help the eye roll. “We’re in Queens. There’s willing and able girls everywhere, but no fine fish in the sea.”

  Except for the girl behind the bar. Who was definitely more than just willing-and-able snatch. Way fucking more. Yep, I knew this from our few minutes together. She was one tough nugget, curious mind and eyes, bold and timid at the same time.

  Make no mistake, I’d have her number and her story after tonight. There was something about that one—she was different from the others, and she didn’t seem to know it. I’d noticed a slight shadow of pain behind those sea-green eyes, and while I didn’t like the way it made me feel—like I wanted to take it away—it drew me in anyway.

  “Oh, I love this song! Dance with me.” Monica tugged on my arm, bouncing to the techno beat. She was up and out of her seat in no time, teetering on her heels. “Let’s go,” she whined, and I begrudgingly accepted.

  I was barely moving in place, obliging Monica with the full-body rubdown she was attempting to choreograph, when I looked up and caught her gaze. Her being the girl—young woman—whose name I didn’t even know yet. She was watching from behind the far end of the bar, her eyes lasered in on me and the woman trying to paint me with her scent.

  I shook Monica’s arm, trying to get her out of her reverie, and said, “I gotta go to the bar.” It was lame, but so were her trite pickup lines and unoriginal moves. I wasn’t just some dumb farm boy.

  As soon as I was on the move, the girl pretended to get busy. Real busy, stuffing glassware on and off the automatic wash machine. She kept her gaze down behind the bar and continued to slam, soak, rinse, and shove each glass onto the drying rack.

  “Hey, can I get a drink?” I played it cool despite the fact that I’d been sweating about this mysterious girl all week.

  Her head lifted, along with her right eyebrow—cute as hell. “Can you? Or is it time for you to return to the senior citizens’ home?”

  I felt a smile tugging at my lips. “Soon, but not before you get tucked in for the night. You still need one of those, right? Do you like milk and cookies with your tuck-in?”

  “Touché. What can I get you? No—let’s see if I can guess. Scotch on the rocks for the returning adult student? Or maybe high-end vodka and soda for his distinguished palate?” Her gaze did a quick trip to my chest and back up. “By the way, what’s with the flannel? You trying out various ‘I’m not really a rich New Yorker hipster looks,’ or are you just slumming it?”

  Her messy bun flopped backward with her giggle and air quotes. It made me want to reach over the bar, snag her damn hair, pull her over to me, and show her just how not hipster I was.

  Whoa, cowboy.

  “You’re awfully judgy tonight,” I said. “Skip dinner? Forget your vitamins?”

  “Nah, I just call it like it is. Had stuff shoved down my throat for way too long. Turning over a new leaf, and all that jazz.” She waved her jazz hands, mocking her own words.

  “Got it. So you’ve been had, and now you’ll have anyone in your way.”

  “Scotch or vodka, pretty boy? Leave the analysis to the paid help.”

  “Beer, whatever’s your special. Cheap and easy’s actually my drink of choice.”

  She bent down and pulled a bottle of the same brand I’d had earlier out of the cooler and popped the top. “Here ya go, Price.”

  I can’t even get into what my name on her tongue did to me. It was inappropriate in forty-nine states.

  “Thanks. You’re a piece of work . . . oh, right, I don’t even know your name, young lady.”

  “I know.” She winked.

  Some random rap blared in the background, and I’d never felt more out of place.

  Tossing a few bills on the bar, I turned to go, my ego reassured with the knowledge I’d be back for more. “Actually, I wore flannels before the hipsters did. That’s what we did back home on the farm. Of course, only after we spent all day actually doing real work.”

  Her mouth hung open. She should learn not to always judge a book by its cover. I suspected that was a big part of whatever issues she had going on, but I had time to teach her.

  All of a sudden, I wasn’t so fucking pissed to have been uprooted to this piece-of-shit city.

  Emerson

  Imagine my surprise when I looked up and saw the star of my recent fantasies grinding on the dance floor with some trashy model wannabe.

  Okay, okay. He wasn’t the one doing the grinding, but really . . . what the hell were they doing in my bar?

  Just like that, he spotted me and made his way over, and what did I do? Insulted him some more.

  Now he was walking away from me, and I wanted to yell, “Come back. Please!” Luckily, another crush of people swamped the bar, and I needed to either serve drinks or get mauled.

  “What can I get ya?” I called into the crowd, and just like that, Price was lost in the sea of people.

  The orders dragg
ed on—whiskey and soda, rum and diet, two IPAs, a pale ale, vodka and cranberry, a million mules—until finally “the song” came on. It was from before my time, but I knew it. Not from here, but from my dad.

  Silly, but at the mere thought of him, my heart hurt. My dad. Everything between us was so mixed up, but I didn’t have time to dwell on it.

  The pineapple song blared through the speakers, and there he was. Frankie strutted his stuff around the bar, lifting his leg and groping men and women alike. The crowd was already halfway to bombed, and everyone was into any and all of it.

  Everyone except for the object of my attention.

  No, Price watched with a half smirk and leery eyes as the cross-dressing bunny captivated the room. The music changed, and Frankie still did his thing. Customers vied for his attention, especially the chick who Price was dancing with earlier.

  If she was the type of girl he went for, there was no way I—the Virgin Mary—remotely had a chance with him. All I had was an overactive imagination that seemed to play well for phone sex.

  “So, is this an every-night thing?”

  The question knocked me out of my thoughts, and I found Price standing in front of me, an empty beer bottle in hand.

  “Who? The rabbit?”

  “You working here. How many nights a week do you do this?”

  “Oh. Want another?”

  “I asked you a question.”

  “Not all of us can do as we want—go to school, hang in bars, have fun.”

  He leaned close, his forearms on the bar, his breath hot on my cheek. “I think you’re making some heavy assumptions for a not-quite-ripe bartender, don’t you? I mean, you haven’t been doing this so long, have ya?”

  He was so near and all man, testosterone and some type of masculine musk practically wafting from his pores. If I’d ever thought Robby was a real man, I was wrong. Robby was a sheep in wolf’s clothing.

  “What did you say?” It’s the truth. I hadn’t heard a word he’d said.

  Price moved closer, leaning over the bar, and his lips tickled my right ear. “I said . . . I think you’re making some heavy assumptions for a not-quite-ripe bartender, don’t you?” He pulled back the tiniest of tiny bits and watched me swallow, his gaze following the visible lump going down my throat.