I’m fucking things up.
The guys at work decided this morning to take me out for “lingerie lunch” at Legzz, a seedy strip club down on Meridian Street. A mini-bachelor party, they called it. We left the office at noon. It’s now three o’clock. All of us—me, Aaron, Chuck, and Hector—are anywhere from slightly tipsy (Aaron, he’s Jewish, and a lightweight) to quite nearly tanked (that would be yours truly, the bachelor).
Aaron Rosner is the publisher of College Avenue Press. An import from West Bloomfield, Michigan, with eyes too small for his face and a head of tight curls, he’s the only Jew I know in Indianapolis. His close relationship with the Borders corporate office up in Ann Arbor—I think he’s sleeping with the fiction buyer—has almost singlehandedly kept us in the black. Aaron’s real claim to fame is that he was the high school classmate (confirmed) and childhood friend (alleged) of Elizabeth Berkley from Saved by the Bell. He reminds me of this incessantly, to the point where I’ve started calling him “Jessie” or “Spano” as the mood suits me. Rounding out the trio are College Avenue’s sales and marketing director, Chuck Gill, and Chuck’s dark-haired, vaguely George Clooney–looking roommate, Hector Rush.
“A toast to Jimmy Chitwood,” Hector says. That’s his nickname for me. It’s an ironic reference to my lack of basketball skills. Hector never fucking shuts up. He’s the media relations director at the US Hardcourt Championships in downtown Indianapolis, and over the last half hour I’ve learned more than I have ever wanted to know about professional men’s tennis. In no particular order: Jim Courier generally keeps to himself, Bud Collins drinks beer during rain delays, Goran Ivanisevic loves to go clubbing, and Stefan Edberg is a nice guy who practices perpetually with his shirt off in front of the ladies.
“How about just a toast to bachelors?” Chuck says.
We hold our beers up. “To bachelors!” we shout.
Hector slaps a ten-dollar bill on the table. I eye it skeptically. I’ve avoided the customary lap dance up until now. “I thought you said you didn’t have any bucks to tuck?”
Hector smiles. “I saved one for you, Chitwood.” He signals a dancer to approach.
The lunch crowd at Legzz is comprised of escapist truckers and second-shift factory workers getting a buzz on before they clock in. The clientele is reflected in the dancers, a cast of toothless, stringy-haired drug addicts with bad skin. The one who approaches me has no breasts, no ass, and even worse, no calves. She’s wearing a cowboy hat and cowboy boots along with G-string panties, all of which suit the song, Bon Jovi’s “Wanted Dead or Alive.”
“A dance for the bachelor?” she asks, straddling me.
“If you’d be so kind,” Hector says. He reaches over, stuffs the ten-dollar bill down the front of her panties.
Aaron, Chuck, and Hector are laughing their asses off. I can honestly say this is one of those rare times I’m not enjoying a mostly naked woman writhing on top of me. She’s ugly, but not as ugly as we are. I miss Beth, but I don’t miss being this guy.