Audrey’s first thought when Ricardo came into Bar &
Grill- her first impression from the color of light in his eyes and his cock strut stride- her first thought was that he was a criminal, probably a
killer, a sociopath and scoundrel, a liar, a cheat, and that the man belonged bolted
behind iron bars or made to sizzle pretty on the hot seat of the electric chair.
And it made her spill her water.
She picked up the glass and took her tray- Manhattan neat and Rum and Coke- to the
table with the boys from the bowling league. It was the first hour of a long
night, and she could feel her head throbbing low from the shots knocked back on
yesterday’s shift. She had promised herself today that she was gonna get up
early, get downtown and buy that dress pattern her sister had told her about,
see the new picture the paper said was so good, but here she was, back at work,
barely make it on time, hung over the hard way and nothing to show for the day.
She promised herself she would get it all done tomorrow, maybe stop by and see
her little nephew Joey too.
There wasn’t much in the way of customers tonight- just some
of the regulars- arguing about Ike or taking gin slow and steady, a muscular
lesbian couple hiding in the back to lick their fingers away from buying eyes.
It was a dusty bar in Gallup off Route 40, and every time one of the customers
asked Audrey how such a beautiful young blond came to work in such a dive she
said the same thing: “Buy me a bottle of champagne and I’ll tell you the whole
story.”
That always ended the questions.
But this man who just walked in, this Ricardo, he was
different. She smelled the danger. She liked the smell.
The boys from the bowling league were at the table in the
corner, and Audrey had been trying hard to learn their names- Barney and Martin
or maybe Bobby and Marvin- but they were so boring it made her head throb. They
had been coming in for six weeks, same drinks, same conversations, same
pantomime flirtations, same terrible jokes, but their names... she just
couldn’t. She wouldn’t. They both looked like oranges been sat out too long in the sun.
She served them their cocktails, her blond hair spill over
her shoulders and onto her warm breasts- exactly why she didn’t wear her hair
up- and Benny and Melvin’s eyes took the ride from the silky strands of lemon to
the powder-white skin of her cleavage, veins visible in the sweet of the meat,
their eyes melting in the happy valley between, their minds trying in vain to guess
the color of her pink.
Audrey laid the order out the same way she always did, the
way she was taught: she picked up the empty glasses first, put them on her
tray, and set fresh napkins down on the warped wood of the table. Only then did
she place the new drinks down on top of the white squares, and it worked as it
always did, that perfect moment between the empties removed and the next round
landed when the boys looked at the table bare before them, helpless, out of color and conversation, waiting
for the cold of liquor dull. She watched Bobby and Marvin’s faces, pupils
dilate in anticipation, and she caught the relief on their faces when the glasses touch
down. The boys smiled, and said something cute to Audrey that she forgot
immediately.
‘They’re all just dogs,’ she thought, and then: ‘Good god I
need a shot.’
She left the gutter boys to their alley babble, crossed the
bar like a tiger taking attendance, rub her shoulder slow against Ricardo, who
had sat himself at the bar, next to that suit salesman who was always in here. The
salesman’s name was Carl. Or Mike. She stepped behind the bar.
Ricardo felt her brush by, touch her body to his, and he give
her a dirty look like she was a housefly at a church picnic.
He hated her. And it gave her goosebumps.
“Business keeps me on the road,” Carl or Mike said to no one
in particular. “Always business.”
Ricardo didn’t even look over, he just called to Gus, the
barkeep with his face in the funny papers. Gus stood up from his stool.
“What’ll it be?”
“Whiskey,” said Ricardo, and Audrey mouthed his next words
as he spoke them: “And leave the bottle.”
She checked herself in the mirror behind the bar, made
pucker with her mouth and a frown at what appeared to be the birth of a wrinkle
around her eyes. She slow paint a fresh coat of red on her lips glossy as she wondered
what would it take, how much it would take to get this guy at the corner of the
bar to fuck her hard in the back room. He was a thin man, angry hard, his clothes
hang off him like they were borrowed- or stolen- and the jacket he wore over
his work shirt looked worn. Beaten. There was spice in his blood- definitely
Latin- Audrey could taste it from here, and his dark hair cast a black shadow
over his eyes.
She walked over to Ricardo- less swing in her strut this
time- and watched him take the shot glass to his stubbled face. Carl/Mike was
clicking on the stool beside him, still casting his net.
“In my line of work you find yourself working around the
clock... tick-tock.”
Ricardo, without looking over: “That’s wonderful.”
He downed the rye. She could see the shot hit his stomach.
He needed it like she did.
“Buy a girl a drink, Mister?” She stood before him, looked
at him with eyes open, no pretense, no games for this man who obviously didn’t
play them. Her legs in black nylons made jangle as she tried to find the
balance... she couldn’t hide the itch.
Ricardo looked over at her, cautious, for a long moment.
Then his eyes fall back down to the bar.
“Get a glass.”
Audrey pull a rocks glass off the shelf, opened the icebox
where she was greeted with a solid block making vapor. Gus was supposed to
break it all down at the start of every shift but as usual he had more
important work to do: he was sat back down in his chair, his head buried in the
paper, his combover greasy falling down across his forehead.
Audrey took the ice pick and drove it into the glacier,
chipping away, her honey behind making sway to the music of the jukebox. She
knew he was watching- she could feel him between her cheeks. When she had
cracked a few good cubes she used the tongs to drop them in her glass, turning
around to put the glass in front of Ricardo.
She put her icy finger in her mouth. And she sucked.
Ricardo looked up at her, the fire ignite, traces of a smile
at the sight of her lips going to work. Or maybe just the whiskey kicking in.
Audrey got bold as he poured her a generous shot. “What’s
your name, Mister?”
Ricardo refilled his shot glass. “Ricardo. But you can call
me JD.”
She held up her glass, let the ice cubes knock and spin in
liquid orbit while they make the whiskey chill. She looked at him through the
amber of the liquor. “Okay Ricardo."
He looked at her then, awake, alive again, and in that
moment Audrey heard the pitch change, the record on the Rockola suddenly come up to speed, now the music playing right and bright and loud. She looked at
Ricardo hungry and ready to be fed, and she thought to herself: ‘Gotchya.’
Ricardo raised his glass. “Here’s looking at you, doll.”
Their glasses met in mid-air, said hello in chime, and they
drank together.
They both took the booze.
“Busy. Busy. I don’t even get to see my wife and kids.”
Carl/Mike probably kept selling in his sleep. Cheap suits don't move themselves.
Ricardo turned to him, a dirty look, and then as an afterthought: "Shuddup." He turned back to Audrey.
She downed her drink and set the glass down. “Would you
help me with this box in back?” She turned and headed to the back of the bar
without an answer, leaving a perfumed sillage for Ricardo to follow, the first
drops of anticipation already leaking down her thigh.
Ricardo waited until she was all the way back, until he
could smell the seafood buffet, waited to make sure that fat barkeep didn’t see
them go off together. He wondered in passing if the old man had any idea that
he had only minutes left to live, and that he was wasting them reading the
birth announcements in the local rag paper.
Before he went to the back he turned to the man next to him
at the bar: “What’s your name?”
“Me? Carl.”
“You got a car, Carl?”
He nodded.
“Stay here. I think we can do some business.” Ricardo stood,
left Carl at the bar, smiling into the bubbles of his 7-Up, took the walk to
the back room of this strange bar, took a detour to take this waitress, to take
her body to his, to commit acts of loving violence and violent love so profound
they would require photo documentation.
In the back room, in the dark, amid the stack of liquor
boxes Audrey was unpeeling her clothes, wondering if she would survive. She
smiled.
If she did she’d make him buy another drink.
