{"id":2536,"date":"2014-05-18T16:00:35","date_gmt":"2014-05-18T16:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/?p=2536"},"modified":"2017-10-28T04:16:53","modified_gmt":"2017-10-28T04:16:53","slug":"blues-bar-biloxi-joseph-cavano","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/blues-bar-biloxi-joseph-cavano\/","title":{"rendered":"Blues Bar: Biloxi by Joseph Cavano"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"bar\"<\/a><\/h1>\n

Blues Bar: Biloxi<\/h2>\n

by Joseph Cavano<\/p>\n

Old Orange Shirt contorts his corpulent body and reaches for his wallet. This time he withdraws a fifty and tosses it onto the bar. Brown Eyes, who\u2019s been watching, springs into action. \u201cWhat\u2019s a girl have to do to get a gentleman to buy her a drink?\u201d<\/p>\n

Balancing herself on four inch heels, she moves in close and points to a sign. Well drinks-half price. \u201cI haven\u2019t had a martini since the night me and Johnny Kiker got engaged. That was my first mistake. Worthless son of a bitch.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m fighting hard to pay attention, but it\u2019s not easy. I\u2019ve seen this movie before. I know how it\u2019s going to end.<\/p>\n

Orange Shirt smiles, exposing a grill of store-bought teeth.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you say, Honey? Be a sport. Treat a lady.\u201d<\/p>\n

The old guy nods and taps on the bar. \u201cGive the lady a Martini, Rick.\u201d Then he reaches over and places his hand on her ass.<\/p>\n

\u201cTake it easy, Honey. You haven\u2019t bought anything yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Old Orange Shirt\u2019s face flames crimson. He removes his hand and slowly turns toward me.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat the hell are you staring at?\u201d he yells, though I\u2019m not looking at him at all but at the girl who has already downed her Margarita in a single, greedy gulp.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know what I\u2019m talking about. Don\u2019t act like you don\u2019t. You\u2019ve been watching all evening. I\u2019ve seen you in the mirror.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re mistaken, Sir. I\u2019ve been watching the game on television. Notre Dame. I taught there.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve known towns like this before. I\u2019m a stranger and he\u2019s not. I\u2019m glad when Brown Eyes abandons her drink and grabs him by the shoulders. \u201cWhat\u2019s the matter with you? Don\u2019t you see the collar? He\u2019s a priest for God\u2019s sake.\u201d<\/p>\n

“No harm done,\u201d I tell her.<\/p>\n

She places her hand on his shoulder and kisses him lightly on the cheek. \u201cI\u2019m sorry I got angry with you before. I still have forgetting to do, and I need a pal to help me. What do you say? There\u2019s a nice place outside town.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI was wrong to touch you like that. Disrespectful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBaby, like I told you then. The night\u2019s young. What\u2019s the hurry? Haven\u2019t you heard the story of the tortoise and the hare?\u201d<\/p>\n

I watch in the mirror as she takes him by the hand and leads him out the front door.<\/p>\n

I wait ten minutes until Notre Dame\u2019s down twenty-seven points and well on its way to another inglorious defeat. Then I finish what\u2019s left of my Coke and leave.<\/p>\n

Brown Eyes will be sitting in the car with him in the wooded area just before Smokey\u2019s. I\u2019ll park a discreet distance away and wait until they\u2019re both occupied. Then I\u2019ll approach quietly and relieve Old Orange Shirt of everything but his teeth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Old Orange Shirt contorts his corpulent body and reaches for his wallet. This time he withdraws a fifty and tosses it onto the bar. Brown Eyes, who\u2019s been watching, springs into action. \u201cWhat\u2019s a girl have to do to get a gentleman to buy her a drink?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[375],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literary-story"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2536"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3620,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536\/revisions\/3620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.everywritersresource.com\/shortstories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}