Play Maker

C
opyright
© 2016 by Katie McCoy

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T
o my future
Mr. Play Maker. 

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A
ll it took was
one look and I knew exactly what he wanted. It was a gift, really. He crossed the crowded room, coming straight towards me, just like they all did, his gaze saying everything I needed to know. He stopped in front of me and licked his lips.

“Let me guess.” I leaned forward, watching his pupils dilate as he watched my deft hands do their magic. “Gin and tonic.” I slid the glass across the bar.

His eyes widened. “How did you know?”

I winked. “A good bartender can always tell.” And I was a good bartender. Hell, I was a
great
bartender. I could figure out someone’s drink of choice in an instant. You just had to know what to look for. He was wearing a slim fitting J Crew suit. That said he was young, modern, the kind of person that might be interested in the more artisanal style cocktails. But he didn’t have any of the patterns or flourishes that some men his age were embracing. So he still liked to keep things traditional. Something that Don Draper might have felt comfortable ordering. Gin and tonic was a drink that seemed to be gaining popularity, but still maintained an old-fashioned feel. And once you see it, you couldn’t unsee it. Mr. Gin-and-Tonic, through and through.

And now he was mine for the whole evening. He wouldn’t try ordering at the other end of the bar. Nope. He thought that I knew him. Which he liked. Because everyone liked feeling that way. Everyone wanted to be known, to be seen. All it took was a simple observation and I had him in the palm of my hand.

He tipped well and returned to the group he had come in with. But he kept looking back. The men always did. Because not only could I make a killer cocktail – the exact one they wanted before they even knew they wanted it – but I wore my uniform extremely well. The same curves that had gotten me teased in middle school were bringing grown men to their knees over ten years later.

Maya liked to call me the blonde Jessica Rabbit. All boobs and butt, both which strained against the black shirt, black pants and little black vest I had to wear for work. Even though I was completely covered up, I couldn’t change the way I always seemed to be on the verge of spilling out of my clothes. Not that I’d want to. Because if I couldn’t get a guy with a drink, I could always get him with a well deployed “bend and snap”, just like Elle Woods. But that was only used as a last resort.

The guy wasn’t bad looking – though a little on the skinny side for me – but unfortunately for him I just wasn’t in the mood tonight. I pulled my gaze away from that side of the room and pulled out a stick of gum from my purse. It was a bad habit of mine, but since barely anyone was in the bar, I popped a piece of doublemint gum into my mouth and started chewing. When the gum was soft enough, I started blowing bubbles. I could make them pretty big if I concentrated, but I mostly just loved the soft poof they let out when they deflated. Or the crackly pop they made when they burst.

My first bubble popped, causing Maya to glance over at me. She rolled her eyes. She didn’t understand my gum addiction, but I didn’t understand her love of juicing basically everything. Every day she came in with some new mixture she had made up in her juicer. She was convinced there was a tonic out there for any ailment. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it all basically tasted the same. Like liquid grass.

She sidled over to me now with today’s concoction. It smelled like old carrots, but she was sipping it like a martini.

“You are so weird,” I informed her.

“It’s good for the skin,” she insisted. “Not that you have a problem with that, you zit-less bitch.” It was said with love.

“Hey, I’d kill for your hair and you know that.” I told her. She did have beautiful hair.

She flipped it over her shoulder. “Juice, baby.”

I rolled my eyes. “Juice did not make your hair that way. That’s all genetics.”

But Maya wasn’t listening. “Love me, love my juice,” she said, heading back to her end of the bar.

“That’s why you’re still single,” I teased.

She gave me the finger. And a smile. Best friend ever.

We had just opened, so the bar was practically empty. Slow nights were pretty much the only time Maya and I could talk on the job.

I loved being a bartender, but weeknights were the absolute worst. Barely anyone came to the hotel bar during the week. We got a few guests, but most of the clientele worked nearby, so it was large groups coming for our Happy Hour deals. That meant a rush of people ordering before seven and then standing around nursing their $5 beers while they caught up on work gossip. Drinking was more perfunctory during the week, which didn’t really equal a flowing tap or chatting up the bartender. Everyone would be driving home afterwards and no one wanted to stay downtown too late. For me, that equaled a lot of time alone at the bar, standing on my feet and waiting for them to leave.

I lived for weekends, the bar filled with the crush of crowds from the hotel, convention center and all the nearby date joints. The air was always filled with excitement and sex, and the adrenaline could carry me all the way past closing and beyond. On a night like that, I might have held eye contact with Mr. Gin-and-Tonic for a few seconds longer. Direct eye contact was usually all it took to get him to book a room in the hotel.

And all my relationships were one night stands. I wasn’t interested in relationships and even if I was, my life just wasn’t set up for them. There were too many other things in my life that were way more important than coddling some man’s ego. Because that’s what relationships seemed to be. I had learned that the hard way. Some guy who had found my sexuality and sex appeal exciting until we started dating – then it had become a liability. Something to be guarded and monitored. And if that wasn’t bad enough, I found there was no room in those relationships for the person that mattered the most to me – my brother.

Not a lot of people understood that Mikey needed stability and routine. That he wasn’t your average twenty-year old. My brother had a form of Down syndrome, which manifested in a lot of obsessive behaviors, most of which centered around his favorite show, Doctor Who. There weren’t a lot of people who could tolerate his single-minded focus on the Doctor and his companions. So there weren’t a lot of people that I allowed to participate in that part of my life.

My brother was precious to me. My best friend, my biggest cheerleader. And he came first. Always and forever. I had yet to find a guy who understood that. A guy who could put his own needs aside to support me once in awhile. So I said goodbye to being a girlfriend and embraced sluthood fully. And never looked back.

But I was a responsible slut. One who had strict rules for one night stands. Use protection, obviously. I was on the pill and always had condoms in my purse. Never go down on a guy unless he went down on me first. You could tell a lot about a guy by his expectations of foreplay. The guys who weren’t interested in my orgasm were ones that didn’t get the pleasure of experiencing theirs with me. I didn’t do selfish sex. And last, but not least, I never went to their house and never, ever stayed the night, no matter where we were. I was very much a wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am and damn proud of it. It was a policy that worked out well, though I still joked with my fellow slut, Maya, that we should get a commission from the hotel for how much extra business we gave them.

For the most part, there was nothing better than a round of good sex to end your evening, but tonight just wasn’t the night. I caught Maya’s gaze as she was taking orders at the other end of the bar. With one single raised eyebrow, I could tell she was feeling as bored as I was, though she angled her head towards a guy in the corner indicating that she definitely wasn’t going to end her night bored. She wasn’t as strict as I was with her one night stands, when she made them book a room at the hotel it was because she wanted to stay at a five star hotel and order something off the room service menu.

“Lawyer?” I asked when she came back to my side of the bar. The guy was wearing an expensive black suit, probably handmade, maybe Italian. That meant money. In Los Angeles that could mean lots of things, but despite the obvious quality, it was still a pretty simple, serviceable suit, which usually was reserved for attorneys.

“Good guess,” she leaned down to grab a bottle of seltzer. “Agent.”

I let out a whistle. “Suite or penthouse?”

“Suite,” she pulled back the collar of her shirt to show me the room key tucked into her bra strap. “He’s only a junior agent. But I’m still ordering the waffles.”

“You’re obsessed with those waffles,” I poked her side playfully. “How many times have you had them this month?”

She gave me a naughty smile. “Four.”

“Damn girl,” I whistled, giving her a once over, though I knew I’d never see any evidence of those waffles on her rail thin body. Though she was blessed with a supermodel’s metabolism, Maya was also kind of obsessed with fitness and ran marathons like they were going out of business. She was always trying to get me to join, but the only kind of exercise I was interested in was the kind that ended with an orgasm.

“You don’t even know, Nicole,” Maya licked her lips. “I don’t think there’s anything better in life than great sex followed by these waffles. They are smothered in dulce de leche, topped with vanilla ice cream.”

“I guess I’ll just have to take your word for it,” I interrupted, not interested in watching her get orgasmic over these waffles. Again. Between the waffles and her juice, she was obsessed. Besides, getting a guy to order room service was definitely not my thing. I didn’t have time to linger after sex and I didn’t want any of the guys I slept with to get the wrong idea. I couldn’t risk them getting attached and I’d had too many close calls lately – men were so sensitive these days.

I glanced back at Mr. Gin-and-Tonic, who was still casting fervent glances in my direction. And not “ooooh baby, the things I would do to you” kind of glances. The “you seem like a nice girl, maybe my mom would like you” kind of glances. Yeah, he was totally a long-term kind of guy and I was not that kind of girl. At all. Not anymore.

“What about you?” Maya glanced around the bar, which was only about one third full. Slim pickings and she had definitely snagged the best option. Mr. Junior Agent was watching her with a gleam in his eye. A very specific kind of gleam. One that promised sex. And waffles. And never calling again. “Anyone catch your eye?”

“Not tonight.” I turned my back on Mr. Gin-and-Tonic. Definitely relationship material. Definitely not for me.

“Really?” Maya frowned. “No one?”

“They all scream commitment,” I told her. “I’m on a bad luck streak,” I crossed my arms. “The last two guys practically begged me for my number afterwards.”

She grimaced. “Ugh. Let’s hope my agent doesn’t want to talk about his feelings.”

“What is with guys these days?” I asked. “It seems like half of them think that when I say ‘one night stand’ I really mean ‘but secretly, I want to be your girlfriend’.”

“And they accuse our gender of being the clingy one.” Maya rolled her eyes. “Remember when that guy kept sending flowers to the bar?”

“Peony Pete!” I laughed. “How could I forget? He did not know how to take no for an answer.”

“I know!” Maya giggled. “I know I’m hot, but come on!”

“I would have sent you roses,” I told her.

“That’s because you’re a classy broad.”

“The classiest!” I readily agreed and then sighed. “Why is a good one night stand so hard to find?”

“You’d think it’d be a piece of cake in Los Angeles,” Maya shrugged. “Guess we’re just looking in the wrong place.”

“Not according to my mom,” I told her. My mom was a tabloid junkie and according to them, all the men in Los Angeles were cheating on their wives. I kept trying to tell her that she couldn’t judge the entire population of a city on the actions of a few philandering celebrities, but she was still deeply concerned for my honor. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that my honor was long gone. That it took off around the first time that she did. But I was doing my best not to bring that up. We were starting over. She was trying. I was trying. Which meant humoring her, a lot. “My mom is convinced I’m surrounded by manwhores.”

“I wish!” Maya exclaimed. “I thought becoming a bartender would guarantee an endless supply of men with commitment issues.”

“Me too,” I shook my head. “I guess we should have specified the kind of commitment issues we were looking for. Namely, the not-interested-in-it kind.”

“Men,” Maya sighed.

“Seriously,” I lifted my hands. “Where’s a good manwhore when you need one?”

H
ours later
, after Maya went upstairs with her man-of-the-evening, I went home to where my brother was parked in front of the TV, watching the 2013 Doctor Who Christmas Special.

“Hey, buddy,” I ruffled his hair as I passed by to drop my purse off on the kitchen table.

“Twelve,” he pointed at the screen.

“Oh, is this the first time he shows up?” I asked innocently. I was referring to the twelfth incarnation of the Doctor, who was Mikey’s second favorite. Or at least he had been last week. The list changed on a daily basis.

Mikey turned around and let out an enormous sigh. I bit my lip, trying to hide my smile.

“50
^th
Anniversary Special,” he reminded me, even though I knew. You didn’t live with Mikey and not know the exact moment a new Doctor was introduced, even if it was only for a brief second.

“Want to help me make some cheesy noodles?” It was our little routine. Even though it was almost 2am, I was usually pretty hungry after my shift and sometimes this was the only time I got to have something resembling dinner with my brother.

He nodded and even though he kept one eye at the screen, he came into the kitchen. Cheesy noodles was our version of mac and cheese, with two boxes of noodles and one packet of cheese. Sometimes if I had a good week tip-wise, I could throw in some chopped up hot dogs. Unfortunately, tonight we had to go hot dog-less. But Mikey didn’t seem to notice, his eyes on the screen as I heated a pot of water on the stove.