Sweet Little Thing(13)

I yelled to the bartender, who was looking on in disbelief. I shrugged. “It’s my bachelor party.”

He nodded. “Right on. Congrats, man. Are those your friends?”

“No!” I yelled back. I paid for all the drinks, another downside to hanging out with idiots, and then I walked outside and gave a homeless guy four dollars for one cigarette.

Tyler followed shortly after. “That was crazy.”

“Are they still fighting in there?” I said, blowing a lungful of smoke into the air.

“No, Kyle escaped out the back door while Josh was puking behind the bar. He’ll be kicked out for sure. It’s only a matter of seconds.”

Sure enough, ten seconds later, two burly bouncers came out, dragging Josh between them.

“We’ll take it from here, boys,” I said before turning and flagging down a cab. “I’ll walk home. Do you want to get Josh to his place?”

“Will, this is your bachelor party—we’ve only been to one bar. We have a couple more stops on the agenda.”

“Dude, I’m done. I’m over it.”

Josh stood between us, swaying. “That bitch cheated on me,” he slurred. “Stupid whore. Im’a kill her… and him.”

“Whoa, Josh, settle down,” Tyler said. “We’re gonna get you home.” Tyler turned his attention toward me. “Will, you have to come with me. What if he passes out?”

“You’re f*cking huge; you’ll manage.”

“I can’t lift three hundred pounds of dead weight.”

“Take me to find Brittney. Please, guys.”

“No, we’re taking you home.” I barked, “You can cry all you want, but no one is going to die over a skanky belly dancer.”

“Why you callin’ her a skank, man?” he said and then began weeping like a baby.

We managed to shove Josh into the back of a cab. Tyler got in after him, and I slipped into the front seat. Josh mumbled his address and then farted and burped at the same time. I spent the rest of the drive to Josh’s house with my head out the window.

Unbelievably, when we reached his apartment, he was able to fully navigate his rotund body up the narrow staircase to his door. After we made sure he was safely inside, we went out to the cab and got in the back.

“Seriously, Tyler, I think I’m done.”

“I have a surprise for you.” He whispered something to the cabbie. The man nodded.

“I’m tired.”

“All you have to do is sit there and watch.”

“No. I said no strippers.”

“Be quiet, *.”

When we pulled up in front of my loft and studio building, I turned to Tyler. “You’re dropping me off at home. Is that the big surprise?”

We hopped out; Tyler told the cabbie to wait. He pulled a set of keys from his pocket and began unlocking the door to the studio. The first thing I noticed was that the alarm didn’t go off.

“What are we doing? Please tell me you didn’t hire strippers to come here.”

“What are friends for? Come on, it would be a waste of money if you didn’t go back there and at least sneak a peek.” He patted me on the back and then pulled a flask from his jacket pocket. “Here, you might need this. It’s whiskey—only the finest.”

“Tyler, I don’t know about this.”

“Just go back there. Take a seat in the control room.” When I took the flask from his hands and entered the lobby, he said, “Have fun.”

“Wait a minute, you’re not going in there with me?”

“No way, this is all for you,” he said before abruptly shutting the door and locking me in. He strolled back to the cab, and then without looking back, he threw his hand up and waved good-bye.



TRACK 5: Breathe

I shook my head, took a larger-than-necessary swig from the flask, and began heading down the long hallway to the control room. It was so dark that I had to feel my way over to the light switch. I brushed the switch plate with my hand and noticed that someone had placed tape over it, preventing me from turning the light on.

Then I heard a female voice whisper, “Uh uh,” over the control-room speakers. I felt my way to the sound board and chair and sat down. I was squinting, trying to see inside the sound room, when the music began playing. Even though there were no lights blinking on the board, I still felt around for the buttons and knobs but quickly realized the equipment in the control room was off except for one microphone feed.

Whoever was in the sound room had control of the music. I recognized the song right away from the humming in the beginning. It was “Retrograde” by James Blake. The sound room remained dark until the first clapping beat of the song. What happened next is hard for me to put into words, but goddammit, I’ll try.

Right at that first beat, a small light went on overhead on the other side of the glass. The dim spotlight shone down into an empty space in the middle of the sound room until a woman very slowly and seductively stepped into the light. She was wearing a short, black lace dress, so short I could see the black garters peeking out from underneath. Feeling my heart rate increase, I wiped my sweating palms on my jeans and rocked back in my chair nervously.

She threw her leg up onto the piano bench and then ran both hands up her thigh, raising the dress even higher. With ease, she reached down and removed her black stiletto heel, setting it on the bench beside her foot. She raised her dress again and unbuckled the garter from the leg still perched on the bench. In painfully slow motion, she rolled the material down and off her foot before tossing it into the darkness. I could see bright red nail polish on her fingers and toes, the same shade of red she wore on her lips. It was like the overhead light created this illusion that the woman was in one of those black and white photos where only a few objects are colored in. Her skin was radiant and glowing against her dark, almost black hair. She put her heel back on and then repeated the same torturous motion on the other leg as I watched in complete awe.