“Are you excited about tonight, or do you need a paper bag to blow in?” Andrew asks, coming out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist.
“Both,” I say. I set the remote control down on the nightstand and sit up in the bed. “I know the song, but it’s my first solo. So yes, I’m freaking out a little.”
He digs around inside his bag by the TV and finds a pair of clean boxers. The towel drops to the floor. I tilt my head to one side, watching his sexy naked ass from the bed. He steps into his boxers and snaps them around his waist.
“You’re going to kick ass,” he says, turning to face me. “You’ve had plenty of practice and you’ve nailed it already. Besides, if I thought you weren’t ready, I’d tell you.”
“I know you would.”
“Well, are you ready for work?” he asks, slipping on the rest of his clothes.
“Yep. I guess so. How do I look?”
I stand up and twirl around, dressed in a skimpy spaghetti-strap black top and tight jeans. “Wait,” I say, putting up my finger. I slip my feet down into my new sleek black calf-high boots and zip them up the sides. Then I retwirl and do my pose again, overdramatizing it a bit.
“Unbearably sexy as always,” he says, grinning, and then he steps up to me and runs my braid through his hand.
Tonight I may be performing solo “Edge of Seventeen” by Stevie Nicks, but for two hours before I go on I’m going to waitress and Andrew will be busing tables. Score! I get the cool job.
It’s a packed house when we arrive at seven. I love the atmosphere of this place. The stage is decent sized, but the table and dance floor are enormous. And it’s full, which makes me that much more nervous. I walk through to the back, my hand clasped in Andrew’s as we weave our way through the crowd. We got lucky with this temp job to be able to work together for a few nights. Every other side job along the trip since Virginia has been sporadic. I’d work cleaning rooms here and there while Andrew would bartend or even fill in as a bouncer. He may not be steroid-big (and I’m glad because that’s gross), but his muscles are big enough that they hired him easily. Thankfully he didn’t have to drag anyone out by their shirts or get into any fights.
Our boss for the next few days, German—it’s his name, definitely not his nationality, because the guy is as redneck as they come—hands Andrew a white apron and a pin-on name tag that says Andy.
I hold in my laughter, but Andrew sees the amused look on my face.
German rubs his chunky sausagelike hand across his nose, wipes it on his jeans and says, “A’soon as someone leaves a table an’ takes ther’ shit wit’em you get o’er ther’ an’ get that table ready fer anodder customer.” He shakes his finger at Andy, er, I mean Andrew. “An’ don’ touch tha tips. Dems’ de waitress’s, y’hear me?”
“Yes, sir,” Andrew says. When German looks down at his order slip book for a second, Andrew mouths the words What the fuck? and I try to straighten my lips into a hard line to keep from smiling when German looks back up at us.
German looks at me, I mean really looks at me, totally unlike he was looking at Andrew just now. He smiles a yellowed smile and says, “An’ you jus’ need ta look ’zactly like you do now. Put on dat sweet smile an’ rake in dem tips.”
I can only imagine what the other waitresses who work here full-time have to go through with this guy.
I bat my baby blues at him and say with a sweet, seductive country twang in my voice, “I sure will, Mr. German. And lata when my shift is ova’ I’m sure you will unda’stand that I’ll need to go in tha back an’ freshen up before I perform t’night.”
I notice Andrew’s eyes get bigger and more intrigued, but I keep my attention on German, who I already have so tightly wrapped around my finger that if I told him to lick the floor he would ask Fer how long?