She laughed. She didn’t want to, but couldn’t help herself. From below the bar, I reached over and started rubbing her leg. She froze for a moment and then her leg relaxed, and she put her hand on top of mine.
“Well in that case,” she said, trying pretty badly to look shy, “you can buy me another drink.”
I did just that. Actually it ended up being quite a few drinks. And it didn’t take much convincing on my part to get her to leave with me. Nothing more, really, than raising an eyebrow.
I got my car and drove both of us back to my place. We didn’t say much during the ride, and I don’t think we said a word on getting there. We went straight to the bedroom and silently took our clothes off. And then we went at it. Half way through she fell asleep on me.
I didn’t really appreciate that, but I didn’t let it stop me. When I finished I rolled off and looked down at her; oblivious to the world, with her mouth wide open and snoring like a sick dog. I couldn’t help feeling insulted. What I wanted to do was dump her out into the street in all her glory and let the rest of Colorado take a crack at her. But what I did was put my foot against her side and push until she toppled off the bed. I closed my eyes and eventually felt myself sliding into something cold.
I woke the next morning feeling groggy and stiff. After a while I realized the low moan I was hearing wasn’t coming from me but from the floor on the other side of the bed. I remembered Margo. There was nothing else to do but wake her and get her on her way, so I leaned over and started shaking her. She opened her eyes and slowly sat up, rubbing her neck and grimacing.
She asked how she ended up on the floor.
I shrugged. “You must have tossed yourself over while you were sleeping.”
“How did that happen? You have me bouncing off the walls or something?”
“Yeah, you could say that.”
She made a face as if she were going to sneeze, and instead groaned. “Next time, be a little easier on me. I don’t think my neck could take that again.”
She stood up, all stiff-legged and awkward, and collapsed backwards onto the bed. Rubbing her head with both hands she said, “It looks like it’s too late to be bashful. How was I?”
“Like a doll.”
She turned and gave me a puzzled look, but didn’t say anything. Maybe she picked up the sarcasm in my voice, but decided I was just talking goofy. Anyways, she collapsed back onto the bed and started with the moaning again.
Right then I got my first really clear look at her. The haze and the booze must have screwed up my vision before because I was all wrong about her. There was a lot to look at. Maybe the light in the bar wasn’t flattering for her, or maybe she needed to dry out some from the alcohol, or maybe I was just too damned mad to see straight. Whatever it was, lying there looking at her stretched out on my bed, I could see she was certainly something.
Her waist was thin enough to wrap my hands around, and brother, I would’ve needed more than that to get around her hips and chest. Don’t get me wrong-I’m not saying they didn’t look good on her. They looked damn good.
It was funny, but the night before I would’ve sworn her face looked like a ball of putty, bloated and blotched. Well, I was wrong about that too. In the bright sunlight her face was maybe a little pale, but still as pretty as they come. A person couldn’t have been more wrong about anything.
I started feeling a dryness in my mouth and an itching someplace else. I rolled over onto my side and started massaging her. All at once her body got stiff and tight, and she started with the excuses. Her head hurt too much, she was feeling sick, her hangover was killing her-you know the rest of them. She didn’t move away, though, and I didn’t let her excuses stop me. I kept it right up, hoping she’d give it to me before I had to take it from her. Sure enough, her body relaxed, and she melted into me.
After we finished, we lay there with her all over me, whispering all sorts of crap into my ear. What else could I do but pretend to like it? If she knew what I was thinking, I don’t suppose she would have been whispering that stuff to me. Maybe some of the words, but not in the same context.
She started playing with my hair, and well, my poppa taught me to be understanding with gals so all I could do was grit my teeth. I told her I had clients waiting at my office, and asked if it wasn’t about time for her to be heading home.
“Oh,” she said, pouting. “I thought you were beginning to like me.” And she stopped playing with my hair, and started playing with something else. Well, what else could I do? As much of a chore as it was, we went at it again.
When we finished, she gave me that nice easy smile of hers. “Mmm,” she said. “That wasn’t so bad, was it? Why don’t you go get me a nice big drink? Surprise me.”
I got up and made her one, and made myself a bigger one. When I got back, she was bent over my phone with her backside facing the door. As she heard me, she turned her head and informed me she was writing down my phone number and giving me hers, just so we wouldn’t accidentally forget later. I wanted to go over and give her ass a nice accidental on-purpose kick, but as strong as the temptation was, I resisted it. On walking back to the bed, I did manage to give her a friendly slap. Judging from the way she jumped, I guess it was questionable as to how friendly it was.
I gave her a drink, and she sat back down on the bed sipping it slowly. She rubbed her ass a little gingerly, but decided to give me the benefit of the doubt. She asked if I’d like to spend the day with her.
“Now, honey, you know I would.”
“Why don’t we, then?”
“I already told you, I’ve got people waiting for me.”
“You’re no fun.” She pouted. I swear she fluttered her eyelids at me as she went on, “I’ve had a crush on you for the longest time. I might be your biggest fan. Now that I’ve got you, I’m not about to let go.”
“Is that a fact?”
“It sure is!” Her eyes blazed for a second. Then she caught herself and turned the cute stuff back on. She wiggled her ass closer to me until she was just about sitting on my lap. Then, playing with her fingers along my chest, she asked, “Why do you have to be so difficult? Haven’t I been nice to you?”
It went on and on, and well, it was all pretty cute. All the blushing and eye fluttering and whispering. After a while I had enough. It took quite a bit of coaxing on my part to get her panties back on, and even more to get her out the door and into a cab. The whole thing tired me out. By the time she left, the only thing I wanted to do was crawl back into bed. And it was tempting. But with all the folks in this world that counted on me, it didn’t seem as if I could do anything else but drag myself off to work.
Chapter 9
What I had told Marge about having people waiting for me was the truth, and it was almost eleven before I got in, giving my nine o’clock and ten o’clock appointments plenty of time to stew. As soon as they saw me arrive, they tore into me. Nine O’Clock complained that I had a hell of a lot of nerve, and Ten O’Clock agreed, insisting that the least I could do was give them both discounts.
It really was a lousy way to treat folks who might hire you, and I felt bad about it. I tried my best to calm them down, joking that they should pretend they’d been waiting to see a doctor. At least that way they could think of me as being early.
Nine O’Clock interrupted me. “I don’t see anything funny about being inconsiderate.”
“No,” I tried explaining. “I don’t think it’s fun-”
“You’ve got a lot to learn about manners,” Ten O’Clock piped in.
“Well,” I said. “I’m sorry-” I heard the door to my anteroom open and turned to see my eleven o’clock appointment, Tom Morton, walking in.
“Excuse me,” I muttered under my breath, and I greeted Morton at the door and showed him to my office.
That set off the fireworks. “I’ve been waiting two hours!” Nine O’Clock exploded, his face lit up with fury. “I demand you see me first!”
“If you’d just be patient,” I said, “I’ll be right with you. This is an emergency-”
