I can just imagine these two having sex. Probably do three sets of ten reps. Probably have mirrors on the ceiling and all the walls. Probably wouldn’t sell me a video of it.
I put in a good half hour. Okay, twenty minutes.
I do some lat pull-downs, seated rows, hamstring curls, and assisted chin-ups on this machine where you can set a counterweight so you’re only pulling up about twenty pounds of body weight but it looks like you’re doing a manly-man chin-up, something I could never do in P.E. class, something Ceepak does whenever he has some spare time and sees a convenient horizontal bar.
Then, to work on my abs, I sit on one of those Swedish balls and try not to roll off it.
I’m toweling off some sweat when I see the dentist from the bar at Big Kahuna’s swing open the front doors. He marches to the desk. Flashes the check-in girl his card.
She scans it. Scans it again.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “It’s being rejected.”
“What?” The dentist strains to look over the desk and see what bad things the computer monitor is saying about him. “Look up Hausler. Dr. Marvin Hausler.”
Computer keys clack.
“You haven’t paid your dues in two months.”
“What?” Now he reaches over, grabs the monitor and tries to swivel it around, only it’s not on a lazy Susan type deal so it only budges an inch or two. “Let me see that.”
I toss my towel in the wicker laundry basket and amble toward the counter.
My cop sense tells me we’re about to have an incident.
“I really can’t let you see the computer screen-”
“This is fucking unbelievable,” fumes Hausler. “I come here every weekend.”
“They updated the membership rolls late last night, told us to double-check everybody’s cards today-”
“This is total fucking bullshit. I paid my fucking dues.”
“If you’d like to put the charge on a credit card-”
“What? So you can double-bill me? Fucking forget it!”
I’m about to butt in when Gail comes out of the women’s locker room in her street clothes, which, by the way, are just about as skimpy as her gym clothes. Up top she has on this tight little yellow-and-red Sugar Babies tee-looks like the vintage logo from a bag of Sugar Babies. I swear she bought it at a store for newborns, it’s that small.
“Hey, Marvin,” she says.
The dentist backs away from the counter. Stops acting like a spoiled brat.
“Hey,” he says, his voice all silky and deep. Maybe he studies Luther Vandross CDs. “How’s it going?”
“Great.”
“Missed you last night.”
“What?”
“The date we didn’t have. How’s your grandmother?”
“Huh? Oh-better. Thanks!”
“Good. Glad to hear it. Hey, I got Leno tickets for down in AC. Interested?” Dr. Marv is leaning one cocked arm against the counter now, putting on his suave ‘n smooth moves.
“I don’t know.”
“We could take your grandmother with us. If she gets sick again, I could write her a prescription.”
“That’s sweet.”
“Hey-I just want to be close to you.”
I can’t believe this. Dr. Marvin Hausler, DDS-whose face reminds me of the glasses-wearing chimp you’d see on a monkey calendar-is using recycled Carpenters’ lyrics from 1971 to hit on Gail Baker? What do they teach these guys at dental school?
“I told you, Marv-I can’t. Not anymore. Not right now.”
“Why not?”
“Because, okay?”
“Because why?”
The dude sounds like he’s two years old.
“Anyway,” says Gail, flashing her dazzling white smile, which, I guess, Dr. Hausler had something to do with, “thanks for the invite. Have a great workout!”
Gail bounces out the door like a jiggling pack of Sugar Babies with only two candies left in the bag.
“Whoa. Wait up, Gail …”
Dr. Hausler storms off after her. Maybe he wants to give her a few flossing tips.
I turn toward the floor-to-ceiling windows and watch their sidewalk scene play out.
Gail, of course, keeps her cool. Keeps on smiling and looking hot as hell.
Dr. Hausler, on the other hand, is fuming. Waving his arms up and down like a sixth grader throwing a temper tantrum when he finds out his gorgeous teacher won’t even consider dating him because, well, he’s a kid and she isn’t.
Rabid spittle is flying out of his mouth now.
I wonder why guys do this.
Do they really think girls will hop in the sack with them if they act like screaming meemies? That they’ll suddenly say,
Ain’t gonna happen.
Gail leans in and gives the dentist a quick peck on the cheek.
“Thank you,” she says, I think. I need to take a class in lip-reading.
“Fuck you,” says Marvin-his lips are much easier to read. Especially because he keeps repeating himself: “Fuck you!” This time he adds “Bitch!”
Then he storms off to his sports car.
Gail bops up the sidewalk. I figure she has an appointment at that nail spa. Probably needs to get the white tips repainted so they keep looking good against her golden-brown tan.
Me?
I need to hit Chunky’s Cheese Steaks.
I earned it.
“So long,” I say to the girl behind the front desk, who’s on her cell phone.
She waves so she doesn’t have to interrupt her phone call.
“I know,” she says to whoever she’s chatting with, “the guy is, like, such a total jerk. No way would I ever let him drill me.”
I smile.
A dirty mind is an eternal picnic.
A little before three, having taken Samantha a Chunky’s Cheese Steak to help her plow through her law books, I head up Ocean Avenue to King Putt Mini Golf.
You can see the T-shaped pylon sign topped with a bright orange ball from half a mile away. At the base of the pole stands the Bob’s Big Boy of Ancient Egyptian Golf: a six-foot-tall resin cartoon of the chubby Boy King himself. Instead of the classic staff of Ra, Tut totes a putting iron.
The miniature golf course itself is actually pretty awesome. Mr. O’Malley spent about a million bucks landscaping its curving hills, water hazards, “Sahara Desert” sand traps, fake palm trees, and carpeted putting greens. You can arc your ball over a sleeping camel’s humps, try to shoot it through the Sphinx’s legs, or see if you can jump it all the way across the bright blue (like Sno-Cone syrup) River Nile, which, in some spots, is two feet wide.
I pull into the parking lot. It’s decorated with hieroglyphics on lampposts to help you remember where you parked. I see Ceepak’s silver Toyota over in the Owl section, so I look for a spot close by.
There are none.
They’re all taken.
Including the slot right next to ol’ dinged-up Silverado.
