The air conditioner tried -mostly- in vain to keep the heat of the day out, but it was only able to blow cool at best (or warm, depending if you were a glass half empty, half full kind of person) as I watched the cactus and scrub brush pass by in a blur, against the mountains that seemed to stand still behind it from the passenger window of our great rented metal beast wondering if this was where Area 51 was suppose to be, and if so how cool it would be too maybe catch a glimpse of one of the “so-called“ UFO‘s that supposedly flew from it, sweet beaded along the top of Fat Joe’s head as he sat behind the controls driving faster than the posted sign stated; faster than the law aloud, and I almost wanted to reach out and slide my hand over the top. Almost.
“What’s the matter?” I asked him, for Joe been quiet for quite awhile now and I was beginning to wonder why. After all, it was his idea to take this little drive through the countryside in the first place.
Fat Joe sat quietly, saying nothing in return, and I was about to ask again, when he finally spoke. “Nothing…well…I don’t know…No, it’s nothing.” He stammered. “It’s just…It’s just that I thought that, well, that maybe, that this -I mean Vegas- would be more like that…movie.”
Jesus Christ, getting something out of him today was like trying to get a baby to eat it’s shitty smelling veggies. “And what movie would you be babbling about? There happen to be quite a lot of movies about Vegas, so you’re going to have to be a little more specific for me to know which one you fucking mean.” I pause a second, then said, “You don’t mean that fucked up Nicholas Cage one, do you? The one where he hangs out with the hooker and drinks himself to death?”
“NO!” Fat Joe exclaimed, loudly. And he look generally shocked as he looked in my direction. I stared back cool as a cucumber, or at least pretended too with the sucky A/C and all. I was also starting to think that maybe I should of drove, and would have if I had known that Joe was in such a delicate manner.
“Joe, do you mind that if, well, that maybe…,” I pointed out the windshield as I spoke; as the great metal beast veered into the oncoming lane of traffic, but I kept my eyes on Joe the whole time “…that maybe you’d like to watch the fucking road as you drove. I mean you don’t have too, I just thought that I’d make the suggestion before we met with anyone face to face.”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. Shit.” Fat Joe turned his gaze back to where it belonged: The Road, the car swerved quickly back into it’s proper lane, the great metal beast rocked back and forth, I let out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding until I let it out. “That’s not the movie, however.”
“Well that’s good. Because I wasn’t up for that. Hookers maybe,” I laughed, “But no dying.”
“No. The movie I was referring too was ’The Hangover’.
“Oh, god! Why? That movie sucked!”
“What?! How can you not like that movie?”
“Easy. It’s called taste.”
“Taste?”
“Yes, taste. Something apparently you don’t have.
“Aw, come on. That movie was great.”
“If you say so. Listen…,” I said, rolling my eyes as I changed the subject, all ready growing tired of the conversation and the merits of that film and how everyone besides myself, for some reason, thought that movie was funny. But hell, each their own. “…where the fuck are we going? Because if we keep going the way we are, we’ll be in LA by dinner time. Unless that is where we’re going. Then I say: drive on, my good man.”
“LA? No. Why would I be driving there?”
“Fuck if I know,” I said, sarcastically. Then: “Nicholas Cage?” but the joke went over his slick, bald head.
“No. I just had to get out of Vegas for a little while.” I didn’t understand why -we’ve only been boots on the ground in Sin City for less than a full twenty four hours, and yet somehow I could. Fat Joe was already down a good thousand clams while I was up three hundred. But I didn’t tell him that. Fuck no. I was already paying far more than I thought I was going too when that fat bastard called me five days ago and told me how we were going to Vegas and I didn’t have to pay a thing except for souvenirs and shit. Where I whole heartedly said: “Not a problem. When are we leaving?” (Fat Joe had just come into a wad of cash thanks to a workman’s comp settlement over a back issue and that prospect of that money had been eating a hole in his pocket even before he knew how much he was actually getting.) But then the day before we were set to leave, good ol’ Fat Joe was nice enough to let me know that he wasn’t paying for everything, no, just the airfare and the rooms and the food. Not the gambling -which was fine by me, I could find some spare coin of my own to do that with; which then the morning of departure it was down to just airfare and room. Which unfortunately put me in a little bit of a tiff with the wife who already had a slight tiff about me dropping said trip in her lap the day before as it was. I was just glad that we were leaving when we were or I might of ended up paying for the whole trip myself. But hell, beggars can’t be choosers and the wife was already pissed. Might as well stay true to the course. I knew, however, where this new, or should I say lack of commitment was coming from. It was coming from -what he called anyway- his girlfriend. His married to somebody fucking else girlfriend, Rae, who was, no doubt in my mind what’s so ever, out right now spending his money (that, for whatever the fucking reason, she thought was rightfully hers) faster than he was in Vegas.
Now that Fat Joe’s attention was where it was suppose to be I went back watching the scenery past by at about a hundred miles an hour, Fat Joe’s voice droned on about his stupid fucking movie and why I should like it, and how it would be so cool if we were able to somehow relive it. (A fact that might be hard since neither of us had any Ecstasy or even had a clue where to find it), and like the cactus his voice just blurred into nothing but a tone as I tuned him out. Thinking about where and what my wife was doing at this moment in time. About how she was -like I stated before- pissed that I was leaving in the first place but then I went and came home two hours late -sans calling mind you- from work the day of. (mainly because I was told last minute that I had to pick Rae up from work because for some fucking reason she had to house sit while we were gone. Unfortunately for me Rae lived thirty miles in the wrong direction, that, and we only have the one car so my wife was stuck until my arrival) The very same day that she had made plans to go out with her friends as some kind of fuck you towards me. (If I can, she can sort of thing. It was a jealousy thing, I knew. A type of thing to get under my skin: if she didn’t know what I was doing than I can wonder what she was doing type of thing, and really I couldn‘t blame her) The two of us went through a stage where we hurt each other for what ever reason. Well, I knew why. I started it by fucking an old girlfriend then was retarded enough to tell her about it. Then she went out and did something similar in retaliation, that got me jealous to the point to where I did it again and so did she… and you know how the story goes. But then six months ago we finally came to our senses, and instead of divorce the two of us made a pact to stop the nonsense. And now, here I was going to Vegas without even the thought of even considering what she thought. And when I finally got home she let me know all about it as she grabbed her things. Things were said that probably shouldn‘t have been said, mainly on how much of an asshole I was, because we both knew they couldn’t be taken back. But then, of course, I had to top what she said -mostly because I was pissed that she was pissed and wouldn’t let me explain: “I hope the plane doesn’t crash or I just die because you’ll feel bad that those were your last words too me before I left.” The slam of the door was her reply.
“What?” I asked, turning back to Fat Joe and his sweaty head, not sure whether or not he actually said something with some sort of meaning or had nothing to do with the movie ’The Hangover’. “What?”
“I said: ’What the fuck is that?’”
I followed Fat Joe’s meaty finger as it pointed out the windshield, towards what, at first, I wasn’t sure what the fuck it was (figuring it was the heat playing tricks on my eyes, or being tired, or just fucking jetlag -whatever), but, yes, the thing I was looking at appeared to be a car: that of a car as it sat partially submerged in the ground nose first, it’s ass end hanging out, pointing towards the sky accusatorily as if it was dropped from the heavens by some child like God or some weird alien civilization that had grown tired playing with it. But whatever the case maybe of how the fuck it got there, it freaked me out, and I wasn’t ready yet to get a closer look as Fat Joe pulled our own metal beast off to the side of the road and parked near it. Up close I could see that this wasn’t just any car, but a late 1970’s police cruiser; the same black and white used in the movie ’The Blues Brothers’, and I almost expected to see them lying on the ground near us in the shade waiting for a ride. Mercifully, as I gave a cursory glace around, they weren’t. This trip was getting weird enough as it was.
“How do you think that got there like that,” Fat Joe stated. I guess he was talking to me as for I was the only person sitting next too him, but the with the way he said it I wasn’t all that sure, and it caused me to give another look around to make sure it was just us on this dusty -and, regrettably- lonely roadway. What a cliché this would be if some how the two of us went missing, abducted to be anally probed by…well…anything.
I hear the door pop as Joe opened it, letting in the blast furnace heat and giving me new appreciation to our little AC unit that tried so hard to keep it at bay. Gravel crunch under Joe’s foot as he stepped from the confines of our vehicle, and I found myself following suit, all-be-it on autopilot.
Up close the fear I felt recedes, and as I take it all in I can’t remember why I was uneasy with the car too begin with. I crouch down next to it and peer inside. Dirt has vomited from the air vents, like a sick child who ate too many sweats, and filled up the foot wells all the way up to the and past the bottom of the seats. I stick my head inside. What’s left of the seats are torn, grey with dust as their springs and metal skeleton are exposed; the windows are all smashed out, their remnants ground down too nothing and long forgotten. I hear Fat Joe say something I can’t make out as I crawl the rest of the way inside and stand on the broken and cracked dash board; where the steering wheel should be is just a hole partially filled with debris. I climb to the top and out the rear window. Fat Joe ran back to the car, pulled out his little camera and started taking pictures of me.
After about ten minutes we got over heated and bored; Fat Joe refused to go inside saying how he didn’t want to get dirty but we both knew it was because he’s so fat, whatever, I didn’t care if he didn’t, just that if he did to get it over and done with so I could get back to the world A/C.
Rocks pelted the bottom of the great metal beast, and a dust cloud rose behind as Joe pealed out and back on to the black top. Racing away and top speed, destination nowhere. We cruise along discussing on how the squad car got where it got, how it was a good thing we took pictures because no one was going to believe us when we told them back home.
The conversation fell away back to silence, the hum of the road the only noise now (the radio crapped out to mostly static and half garbled voices). I was ready to head back to the bright lights and choked casinos of Vegas whether Fat Joe wanted to or not, but before I had a chance to say anything he once again pointed his finger and asked, “What the hell is this now?”
Thankfully is wasn’t a half buried car this time around, but a sign that read: ’The Ranch: The Original Cathouse’.
We pulled into the lot that reminded me of a cantina I once went too in some Mexican backwater town when I was in college (And that’s not a good thing). A chain linked fence ran from both sides and around back of the windowless cinder blocked building; heat radiated off the roof and made the air appear wavy as the sun bounced off it. What looked like little single person campers sat inside the perimeter of the fence, behind the building -which I take is The Ranch.
Fat Joe looked over at me and smiled. “Hey, now this what I’m talking about.”
“What is?” I asked, annoyed, because I already know what the answer is going to be.
“You know what this is, don’t you?” Pause, and even before I had the chance to answer “yes”, Joe continued on. “This is a whore house. An authentic fucking whore house.”
“Actually it’s a cathouse, it says so right there on their sign. And I fail too see your point?”
Fat Joe looks at me, confused. “What? You want to go in, don’t you?”
“In there?!” I point towards what just looks like hell; a scene from a bad B horror movie film filled my mind along with memories of the that time in Mexico that I‘d rather care to forget. “No I don’t want to go in there.” And if he felt that I should assuage him by going in there because this little trip of ours hasn’t yet lived up to what he thought it was, well, that was too fucking bad. I could just imagine what the girls inside looked like, and I figured we could find better looking whores at some truck stop than we were going to find inside The Ranch.
Joe gave me a stunned look. “We…Wha…Why not?”
“Well it seems pretty fucking dead for a whorehouse,” I pointed out the window towards the lot that had only two cars, “don’t you think?”
“Maybe it’s just… early?”
“Early? Really? Maybe it’s because that their whores look like ugly men rather than hot women.”
“So…”
“So lets go.”
Joe, dejectedly, put the metal beast in gear and pulled out of The Ranch: The Original Cathouse’s parking lot and -to my joy- it quickly receded behind us.
Silence regained it’s grip inside the car, only this time tension had seeped in as well, mostly it oozed from Joe like the sweet did from his pores. The silence, and the tension, didn’t last longer than a few minutes.
A few miles down the road another sign appeared above and next to the road. Wiping clean the scowl that was on Joe’s face.
Now this was how I thought a Nevada brothel should look, not like it was some third world prison camp you sent your undesirables, but with a resort like elegance, an elegance that was the Plush Horse.
The black top looked fresh and new as we pulled into the nicely landscaped parking lot, not yet faded by the ever present sun above our heads, and also, the Plush Horse actually had cars, all neatly parked in-between bright yellow lines, and from the looks of things it appeared to be a busy day.
I felt somewhat ashamed as Fat Joe parked our dirty, dust covered great metal beast we had rented the day we dropped into Vegas next too the gorgeous looking Mercedes, but then I felt slightly better when I saw that most of the other vehicles in the lot were about on par with ours.
“This looks like the place too be,” Joe declared, as we got out. The black top made the already unbearable heat even more unbearable, unlike when we got out and got a closer look at the car, while hot, the sand seemed to absorb the suns rays and back in Vegas itself the shadows of the buildings helped survive the heat, here however it seemed that the two us just stepped out at the gates of hell.
“Yeah, and I can see why,” I asserted, wiping the sweat from my brow, “being outside today is the worst. Whose idea was it to travel too the dessert at the end of August?”
“Hey, I didn’t hear you say ‘no thanks’ when I brought it up.”
A small flight of concrete stairs lead up and under an overhang, and I was more than grateful as the temperature must of dropped a good ten degrees as I walked under it; cool air greeted us as the buildings two huge doors swung open as we approached and I expected too see, maybe, a couple of huge security guards on the other end but our only greeting was the dark, mysterious interior so I figured that doors must have been automatic, then I saw the small camera as it sat above the door. It takes a moment for our eyes to adjust, but when they do I’m greeted to what I hope Heaven (if there is one) is like: Beautiful woman in lingerie strolling about; standing at the bar that‘s off to our left and in the back; at tables with customers. The whole place is that dissimilar than the restaurant bar that is back at our hotel. I, however, found two things strange as I took it all in. The first was how many -I guess you would call- regular women, meaning women that didn’t work there, just hanging out, talking with the girls and guys, eating and drinking like they were anywhere else than a house of ill repute. And the second were the wait staff. Readily serving the drinks and food. I took a sidelong look over at Fat Joe who was gazing back in my direction, a huge shit eaten grin plastered across his face. Before I had a chance to say anything, one of the wait staff, a stunning woman in her own right (but what would expect in a whorehouse?), walked over too us.
“Hi, welcome too the Plush Horse. First time?” she said, smiling.
“Shows that much, does it?” I replied.
“Wouldn’t worry about it. Are you going to want a table or are you just here for the bar?”
The smell of food hits me, reminding me that is was it was afternoon and that I hadn’t eaten anything since the breakfast buffet. “Table. Please,” I said.
She showed us a booth and told us that we could find the menus along the wall as she laid down another menu -what I figured was the drink list but was anything but- in front of us. I grabbed the two others, tossed one towards Joe as he picked up the menu that was left.
“Any good drink specials?” I asked.
“Ah, specials yeah, but I don’t know if they can be considered drinks.”
I looked over at Joe, confused, as he slides the menu over too me, and I’m astonished at what I see printed before me: A list of sexual fantasies (with one, two, three or more women; different rooms and parties) that read off like you would find on any other menu. The one real difference -other than it was all sex- was that there wasn’t any prices. Before I had a chance to take it all in a scantily clad Hispanic girl (who couldn’t of been over twenty) sat down next too me.
“Hi, my name is Rose,” she held out her hand for me to shake it, which I did. “Is this your first time at the Plush Horse?” The question was becoming a running theme, which I’m sure that they are all taught to say. Fat Joe answered for me as he eagerly holds out his own hand for her to take. “Awesome. You guys are in for a real treat. So, where are you from?”
“Chicago.”
“Cool. I’ve never been there, but I hear it’s great. Well, at least in the summer.” There wasn’t any trace of an accent as Rose spoke, which made me ask where she was from. “Born and raised in LA, baby.” Rose laughed as she said this, then quickly changed the subject. “So, anything on there look good too you?” Rose indicated the menu -the one for sex- that sat in front of me.
I looked down at it. “You might say that. But there aren’t any prices.”
“Yeah, I know. Stupid isn’t it. But state law says that we can’t discuss that unless we are back in our room.”
“That is stupid,” Joe chimed in, feeling, I suspected, a little left out of the conversation. “This is a whorehouse, isn’t?” Rose’s smile faded at the vulgarity of the way Fat Joe used the term, but quickly returned. “It is at that,” Rose replied. “So, would either of you like too, maybe, go back.” Rose looked at me the entire time she spoke. “Ah, I don’t know,” Joe asseverated. “We just got here and all; we’re still kind of taking the place in. Hell, we haven’t even got our first drink yet.”
“No problem, what do you want? I’ll run and get it, then, maybe, you guys would like a tour or something?”
Joe and I looked at each other, earnestly. “Sure,” I said, “That be would great.”
Rose departed for the bar as Joe’s grin returns. “She likes you.”
“Please. She’s paid too,” I said, rolling my eyes. Something I seemed to be doing a lot lately, especially on this trip.
Rose reappeared with our beers in the company of another, this one a sparsely dressed Asian girl, but ’girl’ isn’t really the appropriate word for her as she is somewhat older than Rose by, I would say, at least a decade.
“Hope you guys don’t mind that I my friend joins us?”
“Not at all,” Joe responded.
This one’s good, I thought as they sat down next too us -the new whore went right for Fat Joe, and immediately started flirting; laughing too hard at his bad wit, and was very touchy feel-y. Rose saw how Joe sort of danced around the whole going to the back issue, so she not only enticed us with a tour but brought along a friend as well. We drank the beers and then the two us were lead back to the inner sanctum. The inside of the Plush Horse was bigger than it appeared on the out, each ‘working girl’ had there own room where they, along with working mostly out of they also lived in (the two of them explained that each girl was required to be on premises for a three week stay). Along with the private rooms, the Plush Horse also had fantasy rooms that consisted from everything to dungeons (for the those who like to be tied and spanked) to the more romantic (bubble baths and garden rooms), out back, behind the building itself, was a large pool (that was empty at the moment, but we were assured that wild skinny dipping parties were commonplace), and just behind the pool were two small Spanish style villas that were rented out for parties of three or more and on a weekend basis.
“I can only imagine what that would cost?” Fat Joe joked.
“They start at ten grand if you want the ’weekend’ package,” the new girl -whose name was Buttercup, or so she told us anyway- unreservedly gave forth. I figured since we were all away from the front that prices could now be freely discussed.
“Money well spent, if you want my opinion.” Joe said; Buttercup squealed excitedly as he grabbed her, who in turn was more than happy to grab back -mostly around his cock.
The tour wrapped up back where we started: our table, where a fresh round of drinks had been deposited in our absence.
The girls left us alone for a moment (like I said, Rose was good), too do whatever whores do, Fat Joe turned to me after he watched them disappear in the back. “Well? Do you want too?”
“Do I want too, what?” I asked in response, feigning stupidity. For I knew exactly what he wanted too do.
“Do you wanna -you know-” Fat Joe leaned in closer over the table and dropped his voice to a near whisper “-with the girls?”
I leaned closer too Joe, and said, loudly, “Why are you whispering? We’re in a whorehouse.” Joe sat back, dejectedly. “And for the answer to your question: I don’t have the kind of cash that I expect they’ll ask for.”
“Come on. It can’t be that much.” I raised my eyebrow as Joe took a quick look back to where the girls went. “You don’t think so, do you?”
“All I’m saying is that with a place like this it ain’t cheap.”
“Tell you what, I’ll pay for yours.”
I raised my eyebrow a second time. “You must really want too get laid.”
“I’ve never been with an Asian before.”
“Joe, you haven’t been with a lot of girls before,” I laughed.
“Fuck you.” Pause. “So are you in or out?”
“What the fuck do you need me for?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t want to do it… alone…So, what do you say?”
“Fine. But only if you’re paying.”
Fat Joe slaps his palm on the table. “Hot damn!” He turned again excitedly to see if they were coming back.
Ten minutes later I found myself sitting upon a bed in a room that was slightly larger than the one I shared with Joe back at the Palms Casino.
“What would you like too do,” Rose said, sitting down next to me, handing me a menu that was like the one that was at the table. Only this one had prices and I nearly fell off the edge of the bed when I took notice of how much everything was. I quickly handed back the menu. “Nothing on there, Sweetheart.”
Rose tossed it back on the writing desk from once it came, crossed her legs, batted her eyes and said to me: “That’s fine by me. I always found that thing tacky anyway. Was there anything that you would like that wasn’t on there?”
“I don’t know.” I was stalling for time. While I put on a good game I wasn’t really up for this. And I knew it was just a matter of time when the phone would ring and Joe and I would be on our way, knowing that there was no way in hell he was going to pay these prices. The pause stretched into an uncomfortable silence as the call never came, and I could tell from Rose’s posture that either we make a deal or I walk away. “Well, that bubble bath room looked kind of nice.” I couldn’t believe my ears as the sound of my voice reached them. Bubble bath, where the fuck did that come from?
“That’s a start. Anything else?”
“Sex I guess.”
Rose laughs. “You guess.”
I felt as my face goes flush. “I mean, of course sex.”
Rose bats her eye again “Alright. Sex and the Bubble Bath room…” She thought for moment “…that will be eight thousand.”
I nearly choked as she said this. “That’s way too much. We did tell you guys that Joe was paying for it all right?”
“What price were you thinking then?” Rose asked, unperturbed.
“Five hundred?”
“Four thousand.”
“One.”
“Two thousand. That’s as low as I can go.”
“Two it is. But I’ll have to clear it with my friend.”
“Not a problem.” Rose stood up and made her way to phone that sat in the wall beside the bed, I took a gander around the room as she spoke in hushed tones and that’s when I first noticed that we were not alone. A small closed circuit camera sat in the upper corner. I found a second one near the door just as Rose came back and once again sat on the bed. “It’s all settled.”
“Glad too hear it,” I said, trying to hide the shock that I was feeling. Buttercup must really have Joe’s head up his ass.
“I’m going to go down to the cashier, so while I’m gone I need you to shower, okay? There are towels and soap and whatever else you need in the bathroom.”
“Yeah, okay.”
Rose kissed me on the lips as she stood. “Be back shortly.”
The bathroom was nice, large, and it took me a second to figure out why it had two toilets, then I felt like a moron as I realized that it was a bidet.
I was just finishing when Rose reappeared, helped me towel off then handed me a soft robe. “Follow me,” she said, taking my hand and leading me back down the hallway from which we came, we took a right instead of a left that would of took us back to the front.
An oversized in-ground tub was already filling as we arrived; white suds piling up like clouds atop the water. Rose sensually removed what she was wearing, revealing her tan skin, the darkness of her nipples, the very little pubic hair she had between her legs. All of which made me instantly hard. Rose left her heals on, and walked over too where I stood, reached inside my robe and tenderly caressed my erect cock. Rose slipped the robe off me, gently guided me towards the tub and helped me in before she slipped off her heals and slides in next too me. Rose reached over the side of the tub to the controls that were in the floor next to it and ceased the flow of water with a flick of a switch, she dimmed the lights with the same controls, brought up the jets making the water swirl, then she pressed on something else causing bubbles to fall from the ceiling. Rose quickly moved away from the side, turned, giving me her full attention.
“You like?” She asked as she maneuvered her way between my legs. I started to answer but the time for small talk was over as Rose grabbed the back of my head, pulling me close and kissed me deeply, passionately. With her other hand, Rose stroked my hard manhood, slowly at first but then with more gusto as I responded to her actions. My own hands found the soft parts of her body: her breasts, her pussy; Rose took my hand that found her cunt and guided it around her, our lips separated and she began to gasp and moan as she thrashed against me as I slide a finger in and out of her ass, waves of water sloshed over the side of the tub, Rose stroked my cock faster, squeezing it harder as she did and our moans became a chorus as we climaxed together. Rose leaned against me, the two of us panting -trying too catch our breath, my finger still deeply buried in her.
“You want too move on to the next round, or have you had your fill?” Rose asked, breathlessly; almost at a whisper.
Back at the private room, Rose told me to lay on the bed, straddled my body, tears the package on the condom she seemingly pulled from nowhere, then placed the rolled up piece of latex around me using only her mouth. The action had me rock hard all over again (which I assumed was the whole point of the process), then Rose took me in her hand and slides me inside her.
The bed squeaked as Rose grinded her pelvis against mine, this time around was all business like, but it didn‘t matter, and it didn’t take long for me to come a second time.
“I hope your friend had as good of time as you seemed too,” Rose said. I had to chuckle as she laid down next to me. Fat Joe was the last and furthest thing from my mind at that moment. “I’m sure he did,” I replied. “I’m sue he did.”
“I hope so. Because I would hate to think, since he paid and all, that his time wasn’t as good.”
I raised my head up off the pillow. “Believe me, it doesn’t take much for Joe to have a good time,” I said, a little annoyed. I mean, where the fuck was this coming from all of a sudden.
“That’s good. Buttercup knows how to please a man.”
“I’m sure she does.”
“Would mind though if we headed back, just to make sure that he doesn’t feel that if he was cheated; that you might have had a better time.”
I rolled my eyes as I got out of bed. “Yeah, sure.”
“You’re not mad, are you?”
“No,” I said, getting dressed. “Why would I be?”
Rose crawled across the bed to where I was standing, kneeled next to me on the bed, slipped her fingers through my belt hoops and pulled me closer. She looked up at me as I looked down, I could feel the warmth of her against my stomach, her breath on my chest as she spoke. “Listen,” Rose said, “you had a good time right?” I nodded my head as I pulled on my t-shirt. “Then do you think-” (‘Oh boy, hear it comes,’ I thought) “-that, maybe, I’m worth a tip? The house takes sixty percent of what I make from the client, but I get all of the tips.”
I knew it. I just fucking knew it. They work you over from every angle possible, squeezing you for all the money they can get. And since most people were still thinking with their dick they say yes to whatever they are asked. “Yeah, sure…I guess. But I don’t have a lot though,” I lied, “considering that -you know- my friend paid for this and all.”
“That’s no problem. Whatever you can give would be great.” Rose got out of bed, began to dress. “There is, however-” Rose faux cringes, and it’s so obvious that it is almost embarrassing “-one more thing.”
“There always is.”
“You have to tip our house Mother as well when we leave.”
“What the fuck for? It’s not like she did anything.” Rose looked somewhat shocked at my outburst, definitely not expecting it, the cameras quickly ran through my mind and what they were there for: security I was sure (and from the look on Rose’s face at the moment, I was almost expecting a group of thugs to burst through the door, kick my ass and take all my money, but then I thought how stupid that sounded),but what if they made tapes of all that goes on in these rooms (more stupidity, I’m sure), so I said fuck it and asked how much -or how little, really- I had to give this person.
“Just a hundred will do.”
“Fine. But that hundred is coming out of what I would gave you.”
Rose lead me back, she was silent the entire way. The house mom sat in a little office with a window that looked out into the hall, almost like a receptionist at a doctors office. She asked if I had a good time and I told her that yes I did, and that there was a hundred for her as well as the two for Rose. So much for being ahead in the cash department. After that, Rose took lead me back to the bar, got me a beer (on the house, thankfully, since I’ve spent too much as it was for something that was suppose to be paid for -almost like this trip itself), and sat with me. Fat Joe was nowhere in sight, and I was hoping that he wouldn’t be much longer. I was more than ready to go.
After a couple of minutes on small talk about nothing, Rose excused herself -she had to get cleaned up, she said.
I was happy she was gone.
A while later, Fat Joe came back, his Buttercup in tow, beaming like a man who just won the lottery. They sat across from me in the booth. “How was it?” Joe asked.
“Great. How about you?”
Joe and Buttercup giggled like a couple of schoolgirls -annoying the shit out of me in the process- being all touchy feely once again. “Oh, yeah. It was the time of my life.”
“Good too hear. So, are we ready to go then?”
“Go? Why? What’s the matter?” Buttercup whined.
“Nothing’s the matter. I’m just tired and it’s like an hour back to Vegas.”
Joe looked a little perturbed by the fact that I was ready to hit the road, but he said, “Yeah, sure. No problem.”
“Oh, do you have too?” Buttercup whined again. Her voice was beginning to grate my nerves, and I could tell that Fat Joe was picking up on my annoyance.
“Yeah, Sweetheart, we have too.”
The sun had set during our time at the Plush Horse, the air felt cool and nice, not that bottled air that seemed to permeate the inside of the bar and all the rooms, just a glow over the horizon that could only be the lights Vegas.
“What’s the matter?” I asked him, for Joe been quiet for quite awhile for a guy who just got laid as we drove back and I was beginning to wonder why.
Fat Joe sat quietly, saying nothing in return, I was beginning to get a sense of deja vu, when he finally spoke. “Nothing…well…I don’t know…No, it’s nothing.” He stammered.
“Fuck, dude. Just spit it out already.”
“Well, I feel bad.”
I looked over at Joe, the glow from the lights on the dashboard illuminated his face and it and gave the impression that his head was floating in space from the blackness outside the window. “You feel bad about what?” I asked.
“Well…well, this was the first time that I ever cheated on Rae. And I feel bad about it.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me right?”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“Had it ever occurred to you that she’s married? Married to someone other than your dumbass? That, maybe, you can’t possibly cheat on someone that’s, ah, oh yeah, that’s already cheating on their fucking husband with you?!”
“But-”
“But nothing! Just shut the fuck up and drive! If anyone here should feel fucking bad it‘s me since I‘m actually married.”
I rolled the window down so the noise of the wind would drown out anything else Fat Joe had to say, and stared off into the darkness…
COPYRIGHTED PAUL DABROWSKI 2011
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