Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 83040 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 277(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83040 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 277(@300wpm)
Following me inside.
7 - Shep
When I got to the Mule Pit and found the door locked, I thought for sure I’d made the whole thing up. There’s no real evidence that this is a bar. That it was open. That there was a band playing. There’s a little trail in the dirt leading to the front, but it’s a tiny affirmation.
So when she called for me as I was walking away, it felt like something out of a dream. A good dream where the thing one has been obsessing about actually happens.
Obsession might be a little strong for how preoccupied I’ve been all week about this bar in the woods and the girl I found inside, but it feels like she’s been the only thing on my mind when I wasn’t thinking about work. Maybe I didn’t wake up thinking about her, but I did fall asleep each night with her in my head.
She’s pretty, but lots of women are pretty. This one though… I dunno. I can’t put my finger on it, but I like her. It’s that instant kind of attraction that doesn’t come along very often. At least, not reciprocated. I get that she’s a whore and it’s her job to show interest in me, but it felt like more than that.
Which is what all guys say when they fall for a whore. But anyway. This is different.
All this is just my excuse to take her up on the offer when she beckons me inside. There’s no possible way I say no. I go in, through both doors, but pause at the top of the steps, unsure what she’s got in mind.
“Follow me,” she says. “It’s this way.”
There’s a way around the stairs that I hadn’t noticed the first time I was here because it’s a half door to my left that matches the wooden walls, kind of making it disappear. I follow her through it and we travel the length of the large room below on a catwalk-like balcony that might be meant for lighting people, but nonetheless leads to the opposite end of the bar and a stairwell that goes down.
We descend and find ourselves in another hallway. The girl stops at a door and looks over her shoulder at me. “Be right back.”
I let out a breath after she disappears into the room, then lean against the wall with my hands in my pockets. It’s real. I didn’t make it up. Which is a relief, because if I had made it up… well, I don’t know what I’d do, but hallucinating a whole morning of traveling through the woods to a secret bar inside an abandoned coal mine would be a tragic escalation to my current problems.
Still, even if I didn’t imagine it, it’s all very weird.
The girl comes back holding up my credit card. “Here you go. And you can check. No one used it. I didn’t even charge you for the time we spent together.”
I sneer a little. “I paid cash. I gave you a fifty.”
“I know.” She reaches into her bra and pulls out a fifty-dollar bill. “But I’m givin’ it back.” She holds it up between two fingers, close enough for me to grab. But when I reach for it, she pulls it back. “Unless you’d like to spend it now.”
I scoff, even though I don’t really mean it.
“You did come all this way,” she coos. “And while I don’t know where you come from, I know for sure it’s not close. The Mule Pit isn’t exactly the corner bar.” She waits for me to answer, but when I don’t immediately come back at her, she keeps going. “You won’t even stay for a drink?” Then she offers me the fifty again. “Even if it’s on the house?”
“Well, I guess I could stay for a free drink.” She smiles at my response. “But I don’t wanna sit at the bar. I’d rather go back to that room we were in last time.” Her grin grows. “Keep the fifty. It’s a tip.”
Her eyes dance mischievously as she tucks the fifty into her bra. Then she flips her hair and turns towards the hallway. But while I was concentrating on her eyes, she was grabbing my hand, so I follow her.
We don’t end up in the room we had last time. It’s a much better one that has a bed. “You’re presumptuous,” I say, chuckling a little as I close the door behind me.
“Well, this room has a bar.” She pans a hand to it on the right side of the room. “Plus a couch. But if you’d like to start in the bed, I’m not complainin’.”
The problem with whores is that they’re paid to be nice to you. Not only that, they’re really good at it. Not that I’m an expert or anything—I’ve never even been with one—but they congregate around bases, knowing that guys like me are here one minute, gone the next. And just before we deploy, we’re all thinking the same thing. What if I don’t come back? Wouldn’t it be nice to have the comfort of a woman before I die?