I used to dream about the women who sat at the corner of my bar. One night was so much like another. From 8:00 to 11:00, I would serve drinks and they’d sit together with legs drunkenly spread, only the thick mahogany bar between us. I would dream about the women all night, and forget their faces in the morning. I imagined kissing their skinny lips, all framed by wrinkles, the scars shared with every lifelong smoker. I wanted each to notice me but they wouldn’t. I never blamed any of them; as the man behind the bar, as the man with the right words on the tip of his tongue, and never rolling off it, I learned to be just another extension of Marks Street Bar. Even on my nights off I would go to the bar and search for company. One Sunday night, as the alcohol gathered at the corners of my mouth, I met Michelle. The impeccable brunette, with deadly long legs held together by fishnet stockings and covered above the knees by a strapless black dress. I must have dropped my jaw as I stared at her blurry figure, “Its snowing” I stuttered, “honey, don’t” she said with an understanding smile, placing a large hand on my arm.
Twenty minutes later, with mention of a party I knew downtown, we were alone in the backseat of a Desoto cab. Then, she kissed me, her lips parting, her hand clutching the back of my head. We never made it to the party, changing our course halfway there towards her ritzy loft on Ambrosia. Once we reached the bedposts we rushed into our birthday suits uncovering our every scar and mole. She let herself fall onto the bed. Like snow melting from a mountain her thick set of hair cascaded off her head, revealing a manly stubble. My hands fell to my side and my eyes to his wig, now tangled on the hardwood floor.