Parked in her car port

By the time that I was carrying that skillet with the two hairs in front of the bar, I just had to laugh.  I'd just seen my whatever-he-was-to-me with his ex ( or not ) fiance, dumped ice cream in a sweet girl's hair, dug the ice cream out of her ratted do', given it to her and told her to enjoy her dessert, had an emotional melt-down in the bathroom, and received 20.00 for being a bad waiter....So, I laughed.  I mean I laughed.

"What is so funny?" the bartendress ( who was a lovely red-head with straight Cleopatra hair and eyeliner to match)  asked from behind the bar as she shook a cosmo.

"My life," I managed to say through my chuckles, but there were tears too.  Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion.  I paused for a minute in front of the bar.

"You're crying too?" she asked.  "Here...set that down and garnish these drinks for me.  Tell me what's so funny.  I NEED a good laugh."  She had several drinks lined up in front of her on the "Corona" bar mats, and I could see  orders falling like a ticker tape out of her computer....So, as I stabbed cherries with frilly plastic toothpicks and squeezed lime wedges in the drinks of strangers,  I told her the whole sordid story.  I mean, I spilled it all.  I had a moment of weakness, and I told her everything.  I didn't know exactly where to start, so I started from falling out of the shower when the naked Bart semi-goosed me, and I ended with the two hairs on the skillet....I even told her about Cora and Mother's erotic escapade, and the Noxema lady, and my perverted land-lord.  I was there for a good fifteen minutes.  I felt so clean inside after I'd finished.  Like she was the Pope, and she was just a bartender with an ear......

"We need to talk more often," she said after her fit of laughter. "I had no idea your life was so interesting.......By the way, I saw you grab the ice cream out of her hair from up here.....(( and she laughed some more))...... and I saw you run to the bathroom....Is your ankle hurting?"

"Yeah," I said.  "I need to go home so I can work this weekend." (( I told you that it was hurting, but I really just needed to go home because of my emotional turmoil.))

"Then, go home.  I'll close your section....You don't work again til Friday, so go on home and rest tomorrow..." she said with some kindness in her heart, but I knew that she was sending me home to lick my wounds and not to rest my ankle.

"Thanks," I said. "You won't tell anyone what I told you, will you?"

"Oh honey, I'm a bartender.  I don't tell nuthin," she assured me.

"Good...I could really use a good friend here..." I said as I garnished the final drink.

"Honey," she said with a bit of bitterness in her voice. "I don't have friends.  I only have associates."

On my way out the side entrance, I pondered her statement and wondered what she'd meant by it.  Jeannie, the bartendress, always appeared to be in a good mood.  She was always smiling, but apparently, she'd learned something that I hadn't........yet.  She only had associates.  What did she mean by that?  I'd taken a chance by trusting her and telling her my recent soap-opera type life story.  I tossed her statement over and over in my head as I limped to my Ford Ranger, and I couldn't comprehend her meaning...I was friends with anyone I liked, but apparently she made a distinction and didn't have friends at all....and didn't want any.....but my thoughts were interrupted by a voice behind me.

"You!  You!  Stop!  I want to talk to you," I heard a female voice yelling.  I kept walking because I assumed she was talking to someone else in the darkened mall parking lot.  I'd learned to get in my truck and leave as quickly as possible because some of our waitresses had been mugged of their tips on the way to their vehicles, and I didn't want to be a victim -- especially tonight...cuz I'd made a killing.

I heard footsteps hitting the pavement hard and fast approaching me, so I quickened my pace, and then I felt a tap on my shoulder.

"You...I want to talk to you," the ex ( or not ) fiance' panted to me.  I stopped, turned around and faced her.  I even looked her in the eye...I didn't have anything to be ashamed of.  I'd done nothing wrong.

"About what?" I asked blankly.

"You know what," she said sorta feisty with a gnarled look on her face -- and I'll give her this, she had a pretty face..same eyebrows as mine, even.  But, I didn't answer her.  I just looked at her, and cocked my eyebrow and dared her to continue with this attitude.  She must have realized from my facial expression that I wasn't gonna' take any shit, so she altered her approach, but not by much...and she cocked her eyebrow, too (( and I'd never met another person who did that besides my mother.....)).

"What can you tell me about Bart?" she asked perturbed.

"Who are you?" I didn't exactly feign ignorance, but I did seek clarification.

"I'm Eugenie................ and you know who I am..." she got feisty again.

"Nope.  The only Eugenie I've ever heard of died in Gone With the Wind......and she was a brat who liked to throw fits too..." I got feisty right back and cocked my eyebrow a little higher....and placed my hands on my hips.  Most guys shy away from bitch fights with girls, but I never did and never do.  I had a sister, and I knew full well that girls were NOT --  and never had been  -- made of sugar and spice and everything nice....(( I had concluded as a young boy that whoever wrote that crap must have never had a sister)).

"I'm Bart's ex, " she said, and she'd uttered the magic "ex", so I stood down.

"What do you want to know?" I asked with a little kindness in my voice. I dropped my hands to my sides and released the cock from my brow. Since she was still in the "ex" category, she was no threat to me.

"Are you his boyfriend?" she asked desperately.

"No," I answered with complete honesty.  And I wasn't. 

"Then what was that drag queen guy talking about last night?" she asked quizzically and confrontationally.

"What drag queen guy?" I asked sincerely.

"Mother something" she uttered with some bitterness through clenced teeth.

"I have no idea what you are talking about," and I didn't.  The last time I'd seen Mother, she was parked in her car port.