The breath of early June is in the air, so sweet, so warm——-laced with the scent of lilacs.  The evening breeze ruffled through my hair, for me, this is the fairest time of day.  Thinking back, her face resembled someone with a hybrid pedigree, part French, part gypsy——-a precocious child of the Greek God Hedone.  She hid unspoken promises and dirty secrets behind her waning smile.  She must of thought I was a pervert because when she noticed me staring at her, she gave me the stink eye. 

I liked the way she stroked a pool cue and the way her cleavage was exposed when bending over the perfectly lit pool table.  She took her shot with blue cigarette smoke hallowed around her. She spoke softly with an exotic accent from an unknown foreign land. It didn’t even matter what she had to say, I just liked listening to her hypnotic voice.  Then she screeched, “What are you looking at weird-o?” I knew right then and there, this was not going to have a 1940’s happily-ever after movie ending.  But I was already in way too deep to back down now. The shot of tequila burned the back of my throat. I knew I wasn’t going home until either I made her, or she made a fool out of me.

She was like an old fashion vinyl record, something that needed to be treated with reverence and handled with sensitively——-to hurry and fumble with her would only leave an indelible scare on something of such perfection. She’s a song I’d never grow tired of.  Pretty girls grow old, but good songs never do.  She had me humming “Girl From The North Country”. 

Her rose colored lipstick clung to an empty shot glass. She wasn’t one of those chardonnay sipping bores easily impressed with stock-market babel, she craved the excitement that came with jazz musicians, black magic dealers and men who knew what they wanted and how to get it. My palms were sweaty, my heart pounding as my libido pushed me forward.  I prowled about in a circle at the edges of her perimeter.  I threw back another shot and walked on over to her and with a pandering voice asked her to dance. She shook her head no.  Shaken and perplexed I blurted out, “Okay, how bout an an arm wrestle?”  She didn’t answer, she just spit on her palms, rubbed her hands together and then stretched out her small manicured fingers——-at least I was touching her flesh, even if it were in a contest of strength and courage. She dipped her head down and then locked her eyes on mine in an intimate manner. Neither one of us allowed ourselves to blink.

Her hand felt soft and warm.  I applied pressure and she responded with a quiver in her grip.  I felt the momentum moving in my favor as her forearm began to falter. From under the cocktail table she allowed her soft warm inner thigh to rub up against my knee. That poor cotton summer dress didn’t stand a chance, inching up closer and closer, slowly giving way.  She looked up at me with those fucking eyes——she wasn’t playing fair, she played dirty——Goddamn, losing never felt so good. From the jukebox the song “Bitter Sweet Surrender” blared—–her leg began to mercilessly move in rhythm with the song. For God’s sake, she was taking advantage of me, breaking me down.

My forehead glistened with sweat, my bicep began to tremble——my trousers grew even tighter. She had me, she knew it——-She teased me——moving in a little——moving out a little—there was a wave of tension leading to a singe point of no return.  She was unexpectedly much stronger than she first appeared to be—–isn’t that the way of all woman.

They tore down that old bar where we use to hangout. It was a place where we spent many a night laughing and getting drunk.  I have a memory of us dancing beneath a streetlamp at two in the morning. She had the power to turn a dark dank alley into a place where broken glass, dumpsters and the sound of screeching car tires became a stage for danger and romance.—— Yes, I said romance, minus the stench of stale piss.