by H. T. Night
I pulled my black Mustang into the Shiners parking lot. The bar is about two miles from my gym. I worked out in Anaheim Hills at a gym that specializes in mixed martial arts training. The parking lot was unusually empty for a Thursday night, but then again, it was New Year’s Day; most people were already in bed after a long day of watching football and pigging out on Christmas leftovers and beer. I didn’t have the luxury of eating like a pig since I had to keep my weight around 175 pounds. And beer was pretty much forbidden for fighters. It was said that beer put on weight faster than any food.
I got out of my car and stepped on the crushed gravel parking lot. It was a reasonably cool evening, so I decided to grab my leather jacket from the back seat of my Mustang. It went well with my immaculate white t-shirt and Levis 501 button-front blue jeans that molded to my hips like they were custom made. I had showered and cologned up at the gym and I looked and smelled like a warm, summer day. But, because I had a hangover, I knew my breath was probably yucky. It was Altoid time! I reached in my left pocket and pulled out a container of wintergreen Altoids. I tossed a couple in my mouth. Considering Altoids were the most I had splurged on my diet all day, I thought it would be okay to knock back a couple more.
I put on my coat, straightened my clothes and then looked at myself in my driver’s-side mirror. My eyes were a tad bloodshot from my workout but I didn’t have any eye drops, so I decided not to worry about it. Besides, it was kind of dark in Shiners. My dark brown hair seemed a tad messed up, but then again, I couldn’t walk into a bar looking too immaculate. I had learned that a slightly scruffy look could be appealing to women.
I walked across the parking lot and counted a total of five cars. Was there anyone inside? Worst-case scenario, I could chat it up with Megan, the bartender. She was cute and was well-endowed and I could at least get my flirt on. Practice makes perfect.
I opened the door to the bar. The door had peeled-off paint on the outside, and they covered the inside with big beer advertisements.
I peeked in and Jonesy, the doorman, was there sitting on a stool looking bored to death. He was a rather large man with a giant head. He looked like he could be an extra in a motorcycle movie.
“Tommy, what’s up, brother?” He stuck out his fist and bumped it with mine.
“Not much, Jonesy.” I knew I wouldn’t have to show my ID, and I was actually glad not to. I had been going to the bar since I was eighteen. If they’d ever wanted to see my real I.D., they would know I had pulled the wool over their eyes for four years with a fake one.
Just like I expected, there was no one in the bar except a couple of the regulars, old guys who would talk your ear off about politics and the state of the American economy, if you let them. Not tonight, I thought. I walked to the bar area and Megan was behind the bar, looking as hot as ever. She was wearing a hot, black skin-tight top with a pair of cut-off jeans shorts. The girl sure knew how to get a tip.
“Hey, Tommy, have a seat, cutie.” She seemed genuinely glad to see me; she was probably bored to tears listening to the old men talk about elections. I caught some of their conversation in dribs and drabs. It was tedious.
“Trust me, Megan, there is only one cutie in this bar and it sure as hell isn’t me,” I said, as I planted my butt on the high barstool.
Megan smiled at me flirtatiously and said, “Jonesy is looking hot tonight.”
“Yes, he is. No one but Jonesy is quite able to pull off the old-school MacGyver mullet hairdo and mix and match it with a Vincent Price goatee and Elvis sideburns. What’s not to love?”
She laughed. “That’s for sure. What can I get you, Fighter Boy?”
I hesitated and then said, “I’ll have a Patron. Make it a double shot. Neat.” Sometimes, I like to order a drink to impress, but it’s hard to impress a bartender with anything but a tip.
“Sure thing.” Megan grabbed a Patron bottle from the back of the bar. She had to tilt up her body to get the bottle and thank God she did. I caught a glimpse of an ass cheek. Wow, that did the trick! I would put that image in my mental vault and whip out that baby as needed in times of solitude.
I’m not a pig, so I definitely didn’t let on to Megan that I was pretty turned on by her little reach-up-to-grab-a-bottle performance. A woman like Megan knows she’s hot and works it for all she’s got. I’m sure the ass cheek slid out on purpose from her tiny cutoffs. If I was to comment, it would just put me in a category of every hard-up creep who comes in here looking to hit on a defenseless lady bartender. If Megan didn’t work here and I had met her out in the real world, I might have hit on her. But there was no way I would do anything other than harmless flirting. I make it a point not to shit where I eat. Shiners was my home away from home and I took it seriously that I should not get involved with the employees. No matter how cute.
Megan turned around and poured me a double shot and set it in front of me along with a couple of limes and a salt shaker.
“You know me so well, Megan.”
“I aim to please.”
“I know you do.” I put a little salt on my wrist and cut a lime in half. “Here’s to the new year!” I licked the salt, downed the double shot and sucked the lime. It went down smooth, Patron always does. “Slow night?” I asked.
Megan smirked at the idiocy of my obvious question. “I expected it,” she said. “I have no idea why the owner even has this place open. He gives us two vacation days, Thanksgiving and Christmas.”
“Well, I’ll tip you good.”
“I know you will, you always do,” Megan looked over my shoulder and then paused. “Don’t look now, Tommy, but a ‘Ten’ just walked in and she’s all alone.”
“Wow, a ‘Ten’ even.” I didn’t look around.
“She’s hot. I’d do her.” Megan said.
“She’s either really hot, or really nasty,” I said, under my breath. Hot girls tend to make out with odd-looking chicks at parties. There’s something about a bad, genuine hard-ass chick that turns on straight girls. But that sort of girl does nothing for me.
“She definitely hot! Turn around, you chicken-shit.”
“I’m not chicken-shit, I’m savoring the moment. I like to pace myself.”
“Well, Mr. Pacer, you blew it. She just left.”
“You’re fucking kidding me.” I turned around and saw the door close. I looked at Megan and gave her a look that said ‘this girl better be worth going to the parking lot to check out.’
“Go see for yourself,” she said, and began wiping down the counter.
I got up and hurried past Jonesy and went outside. I opened the door and right beside the door on the right was a beautiful brunette. She was sexy in a hot Playboy centerfold way, but still had enough girl next door in her to tell she was grounded. At least, I hoped so, you never know with girls from Southern California. She was looking at her phone and typing a text message. I decided I’d better do something, too, so it didn’t appear like I had only come outside to see her. Which I had. I took a couple of steps to the left and pretended to text on my phone.
I mouthed out loud what I was supposedly texting to give the illusion I was really interested in my make-believe text. I had to play it like I was completely unaware of the hot brunette that I was standing next to me in the parking lot. This kind of move hardly ever works, but it was worth a shot.
I took my time and eventually looked over at her to see that the brown-haired beauty and me were about fifteen feet apart. She caught me looking in her direction and I gave my sincerest, warmest smile. Her eyes locked in on me. Bingo! She was interested.
“Do I know you?” she asked.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Why?”
“I don’t know, maybe it was just the way you were looking at me.”
“How was I looking at you?” I said, laughing.
“I don’t know. You looked at me like you recognized me.”
“Sorry, I was just texting a friend and you caught my eye.”
She nodded her hea
d like a woman who hears that kind of thing all the time. She stopped texting and looked up at me and said, “Why is the bar so dead?”
“It’s usually pretty active. It is New Year’s Day.”
“Oh yeah, it is. That’s funny, I was up until noon last night, I took and nap and then came here. So, it feels like the next day. Even though it’s the same day.”
“That would do it to you. Sleeping during the day always messes up my internal body clock.”
Then something odd happened. She looked at me with a concerned, puzzled look. I looked at her and then she motioned toward her nose. You know, that motion people do when you have a booger. Are you kidding me? Really? I have a big booger hanging out of my nose? Apparently, not just a small one, she looked at it like there was an asteroid hanging out of my nostril. I was horrified.
She continued to stare right at my nostril and now her face went from moderate concern to absolute horror. How big was this booger? I finally reached toward my face and as I did I felt a drip fall from my nose to the ground below. Holy shit, my nose was bleeding.
“Are you okay?” she asked, rushing over to me.
I tilted back my head and the young lady pulled some tissue out of her purse.
“Don’t put your head back you’ll choke on your own blood,” she said. “You need to lean forward and pinch your nose.” She grabbed my hand and led me back inside the bar. She walked me across the bar to the restroom area.
“It only took you five minutes for her to punch you in the face, Tommy.” Megan yelled out, laughing, as I was being swept off by my new brown-haired friend.
She took me into the ladies’ room. She was still holding my hand while she opened the door to the bathroom. The first thing I noticed was that there were no urinals and all of the stalls had doors. There was even a little table with a plant on top. Are you kidding me? The men’s bathroom was disgusting, and this bathroom looked like a room at the Hilton.
“Lean over the sink,” she said. “Why is your nose bleeding? Did you get into a fight?”
I pinched my nose and leaned over the sink. I looked at myself in the mirror. Damn! Even their mirror was bigger! The blood flow seemed to be slowing.
“You have a name, bleeder?” the woman asked wiping my nose for me. She leaned in and wow, she smelled incredible. She smelled like vanilla and I liked vanilla a lot.
“My name is Tommy.”
“Tommy? Is it short for Thomas?”
“No, and that wouldn’t be short. The two names are almost just as long.” I counted the letters in my head.
“Okay, smartass. You never answered me. Is there a reason why you’re bleeding all over me?”
I owed her an explanation; I mean after all, she had brought me into the women’s bathroom. “I’m a professional mixed martial arts fighter and sometimes my nose just unexpectedly bleeds. It has to do with the fact I’m constantly losing weight.”
“A professional fighter?” her eyes lit up. “Nice. That is about the most interesting thing I’ve heard all day.”
“Is it more interesting than a guy bleeding in front of you, seconds after meeting him?”
“No, that definitely was more interesting. You’re two for two in the intrigue department.”
“What about you, Florence Nightingale? Do you have a name?
“Yes, I do.” She continued to wipe my face.
“Well...”
“My name is Sasha.”
“Sasha?” I asked.
“Yeah, I know it sounds like a stripper name, but it was the name I was born with. I’m Argentinean and my parents were trying to be more American.”
“Bambi or Bubbles wasn’t on your parent’s radar?”
She laughed. “I guess there are worse stripper names. I should be thankful.”
“I don’t think it sounds like a stripper, more like a villain in Batman.”
“There you go. I could be Catwoman’s twin sister.”
I finally took over and wiped my nose. “Not too many American girls would do the whole hot-nurse bit routine. So, I do have to give it up to Argentina.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m all American, I was born here. My parents are from Argentina.”
“Well, be sure to thank them for me. They raised an outstanding young lady.”
“Wow, you lay it on thick, don’t you?”
“In any other case, that would be an accurate statement, but in this case, I couldn’t be any more serious.”
“You’re sweet.” And then she finally did it. She gave me the ‘I think you’re hot too’ look.
“Can I buy you a drink?” I asked. It was the least I could do.
Sasha looked at me in a way a girl does right before she makes the ‘I’ll hang with you for the next couple hours’ look. “Sure,” she said. “And you’re in luck. The bleeding has stopped.”
“That’s good. It would give a whole new meaning to a Bloody Mary.”
“Now, that’s just gross.”
“Hey, you’re the one who got intimate with my nose, minutes after meeting me.”
Sasha shook her and laughed and swung open the door. I looked at my nose in the mirror and it was bright red. Nice, I look like Rudolph.
Sasha stepped outside the bathroom and took a seat at one of the many empty tables in the bar. I followed her and yelled out, “Megan, two more shots of Patron.” I decided to look at Sasha to see if tequila was okay.
“Patron sounds good,” Sasha said, “and a beer chaser would be great. I only like imported beer; I’m girlie like that.”
“Okay, green bottle it is,” I shouted one more time to Megan. “Make those two shots and 2 green bottles.”
“Wow! Fancy, Tommy. She must have cleaned you up real good!” Megan winked at me.
I ignored the comment.
Megan made the drinks and brought them over and Sasha and I talked and laughed for the next couple of hours until Megan yelled out ‘last call.’
Sasha told me she was a waitress at a coffee shop in Brea. She had gone to nursing school, but had to quit, due to lack of funds. We joked and laughed and made fun of just about everything we could think of. She was my kind of chick; she could dish it out and seemed to be up for anything.
The bar closed down and I walked Sasha out to her car. I hadn’t drunk any alcohol since the first shot when we first sat down. I knew I had plenty of time for the alcohol to make its way through me. I could pass a breathalyzer test any day of the week. Sasha, on the other hand, was a buck fifteen at the most, and she followed her shot and beer with about three more beers and two more shots.
“You okay to drive?” I asked
“Oh, is this your big ‘don’t drink and drive’ move, where you convince little old me to sleep over and you’ll give me the bed and you’ll sleep on the couch?”
“Who said I would be the one sleeping on the couch?”
“Oh, confident, are we?”
“Not confident. I just have my dates take the couch. I find it’s the right thing to do once I’m completely done with the seduction aspect of the evening.”
“Seduction? A girl should be so lucky!”
“Honestly, I thought I’d take you to Denny’s to get some coffee. I don’t make it a habit to take girls to my place right after I first meet them.”
“Oh, you live with your parents!” Sasha began laughing hysterically. “I knew your charm came with a price.”
“No. I live alone in a two-bedroom apartment by myself. And, I don’t remember my parents. I was raised by my grandparents. My grandma mostly.”
“Aww.” Sasha was really buzzed. She began touching my face in a way that wasn’t the least bit sexy. “That explains your Southern charm.”
“Southern charm?” Maybe Southern California charm. There is nothing Southern about me.”
“Trust me; I’ve spent a lot of time in the South. You would fit right in. They’re all corn-fed like you.” Sasha then began feeling my muscles. “Damn, you’re really muscular. How many hou
rs a day do you work out?” She felt my entire upper body. I eventually stopped her hands before she got to my legs and put them by her side.
“Look, let’s go to Denny’s. You’re drunker than I thought. We’ll hang out there until you can think clearly.”
Sasha had taken out her keys when we first left the bar, but now she was putting them back in her purse. “I guess I could use some coffee. Coffee would sober me up.”
“That’s my Mustang over there.” I pointed across the parking lot at my bad boy.
“Nice, like I said, very Southern. All it’s missing is a Dale Earnhardt for President sticker on the bumper.”
I walked her over to my vehicle. I opened the door and helped her in the passenger side. I shut the door and walked behind the car and watched as Sasha looked at my door and noticed it was locked, she leaned her drunk body over and unlocked my door. One more for Argentina! I loved it when a girl did that. It shows she’s thinking outside herself. Sasha was drunk and she still pulled it off. Bravo!
Chapter Two