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She laughed. “Your mind is playing tricks on you, Alex. Just relax and enjoy yourself.”
We entered with her looking back over her shoulder at me. “I should warn you this is not fashionably chic, but the patrons are less pretentious than what you’ll find uptown. That’s why I like it.”
I followed her inside the dim lit bar, seeing the same blinking flamingo as the one hanging on the wall in my fantasy. The same antique wood and polished brass, the same scuffed tables, and black and white checked floors, the same little dance floor and stage where I’d taken the pleasure of many men. Even in my fantasies, I’d had the same reason for coming here…less pretentious people.
I could hardly breathe, and it took some moments to shake off the immediate numbness. We sat at a table and ordered margaritas from a voluptuous redheaded waitress. I looked around nervously, then gazed at the bar where a couple of men were staring back at us, in particular, giving the lovely Jane a thorough inspection. She seemed oblivious to the attention, meanwhile my heart raced and my tummy was all atwitter. My hands were cold with sweat, and I had to stop myself from chewing on the pink straw in my margarita.
“You okay?” Jane asked. “You look a fright.”
“I don’t know, it’s just this place.”
She entertained a quizzical look.
“This is just so weird. I know this place and I know I’ve never been here.”
“Not so weird, there must be a dozen places like this in the city – the prototype of the trashy dive.”
“No, it’s not like that at all. This place is exactly like a bar I’ve imagined, down to the last detail.”
Her smile broadened. “My, you have powerful thoughts.”
I sat there primly not knowing what to say, while her eyes peered into me as if she knew exactly what was going on.
“Fantasy and reality blending into one. I’m not sure it’s all that strange.”
“For me it’s strange.”
She laughed lightly. “You’re a creature of unexpressed desire, and it’s all rising to the surface.”
She left me with little to say but, “You’re very insightful.”
“I’ve been around.”
We sat for several more moments looking into each other’s eyes. I wondered who would speak first. Finally, I shook my head, and stared off. I wasn’t sure I wanted her knowing me so intimately. After all, I didn’t really know her at all. I looked around, trying to make sense of the bar, and my fantasies, and why this unusual woman was taking such interest in me.
Jane just pressed on. “You’re a restless, discontented woman pretending to be someone I don’t think you really are.”
Oh did that hit home! I wanted to cry. All the tension that had held me together these past weeks seemed to crumble away in seconds. She was right, so terribly right. I was so tired of being two people and not liking either one.
“Hey, don’t look so serious, this isn’t the end of the world. We’re here to enjoy ourselves.”
I laughed nervously. “I guess I don’t really know how. Frankly, this place scares me.”
“Don’t sound so hopeless.”
I’m sure I looked as hopeless as I felt and Jane wouldn’t let up.
“Honestly, Jane, I’ve never really had a man.”
“Oh, men are just by-products,” she explained. “Whether you have one or not isn’t as important as who you are, and why you want one. If you want a man to fulfill you, you’ll never find any peace or contentment. No man can do that for you. You can love them, enjoy them, fuck them, but don’t expect them to make your dreams come true. You have to be happy with yourself and what you’re doing with your life. Men can’t do that for you.”
“Easy for you to say, you’ve obviously had a lot of experience. I’d just like to have had one, just one man, just to say that I’d made mad passionate love one time.”
“Well, I can assure you, you’re going to want to make love more than once,” she said with a grin. “And you sure as hell aren’t going to snag a guy by living in your dreams, locked inside your head the way you are at work, hardly talking to people, thinking all the time. You need to get out of your rut and make yourself available!”
There were several men at the bar, drinking beer, their cold mugs sweating in their hands, their conversation lively, their masculinity pouring from them, their deep voices spilling about the room. At that moment, I realized that I was not only dazed, but terribly frightened just being so close to all that testosterone. I think I would have run from the place if Jane hadn’t been there. Before I could reply to her last comment, she was out of her chair approaching the two men sitting closest to us.
“C’mon Jeff, Alex here needs to dance,” she said as she pulled the two men off their stools, and grabbed me from my chair almost in the same motion. She nearly pushed me onto the dance floor, and I practically stumbled over Jeff. He loomed above me like a giant, his tall lanky frame beginning to move easily with the music, some 90’s hit I remember hearing many times. He looked wonderful in his jeans and sweater. Casual, not too scruffy, clean shaven with distinct features that would make any woman look twice.
