Authors: Maris Black
“You really think I should get drunk?”
“Ben, everyone should get drunk when they break up with someone. In fact, I think it’s a rule.”
7
THE Bottom is scary as hell, I won’t lie. Corey and I both have on jeans, t-shirts, and leather jackets, so you’d think we look similar, but we don’t. My jacket is a Dolce and Gabbana hoodie, and his is a battered throwback to the seventies. My black Converse high tops are like cartoon versions of his lace-up military jump boots. While I’d fit in perfectly at an L.A. nightclub, Corey is clearly the style victor here in the Bottom.
The walk isn’t bad at all, though by the time we’re halfway there, the cold has set in and we’ve both abandoned talking in favor of blowing warm air into our hands. Even in this weather, the streets and sidewalks of The Bottom are populated with rough looking guys of all ages, and I don’t even want to know what they’re up to.
“Don’t make eye contact with anyone,” Corey mumbles under his breath without looking at me. He doesn’t even have to tell me that. My instincts won’t let me look anywhere but straight ahead. By the time we get to the run-down shack of a bar, I’m glad, though it looks like it could fall down if a good gust of wind came by.
Shortly after we sit across from each other at a table for four in the dimly lit one-room bar, a tired looking woman approaches us. “Can I get you boys a beer or somethin’?” she asks in a bored monotone. Her frizzy bottle blond hair is tied back in a low ponytail, her makeup all but gone. She doesn’t have a tray or a uniform, but I’m pretty sure she’s the waitress and not just some random woman offering to buy us drinks.
“Bring us two Vodka Red Bulls.” He smiles at me from across the table. “For a pick-me-up. You can choose what we have next, but I’m buying all night.”
“You haven’t even gotten paid yet, Corey. Don’t hurt yourself financially just to impress me. I have more than enough.”
“Chill out, Doc. I had a few dollars put back for living expenses, but thanks to this awesome, wonderful, amazing man, I don’t have any living expenses now.” He puts a hand on my forearm and squeezes. “Please let me say thank you. I don’t have much to offer a guy like you, but I can at least buy you a few drinks on the day you break up with your girl.”
I snatch my arm away before I realize what I’m doing, and for a split second his face registers pain. I don’t mean to be rude or hurt his feelings. He’s just a touchy-feely person, and I’m not, that’s all.
“I appreciate it, Corey, and I’m glad to have you staying with me. It’ll be nice to have someone around for a change. Big houses aren’t that much fun when you’re just wandering around inside by yourself all the time.”
“Well, technically I won’t be in the house with you. I’ll be out back in the pool house.”
“Yeah, technically,” I agree.
“How do you feel about throwing parties?”
His question catches me off guard. “What do you mean? What kind of parties?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not planning on turning your pool house into a stoner’s hangout or nightly rager or anything. I mean like both of us hosting a party and inviting the people from the hospital, so you can show off your gorgeous house. I know you want to. You were beaming with pride when you were showing me around, like a kid showing off his new toy. It was so damn adorable.”
My face heats with embarrassment. “Yeah, when I was remodeling, I always imagined having parties. Incredible music, exotic food, good wine, dancing in the ballroom... I even had a whole house sound system installed, plus the one at the pool house. Sometimes I hear a song and think about putting it on my party playlist. The party just never happens.”
“You should let me help you plan one. I’m fairly good with people.”
“What do you mean
fairly
good
? People fall all over themselves to get to know you. Work has turned into a freaking Corey Butler fan club. The nurses are probably out right now getting t-shirts with your face screen printed on them.”
He looks down at the table with a shy smile, then lifts only his eyes, looking at me from beneath his lashes like girls do when they’re smitten. It coils my stomach up into a double knot and flips it upside-down. No wonder the nurses are melting into puddles at his feet. I think he’s just accidentally zapped me with his flirt laser, and while I know he didn’t mean anything by it, I’m mortified by my own reaction.
“You okay, Ben?”
Thankfully, the waitress chooses that moment to return with our drinks, and I practically swallow mine whole while Corey is counting out cash to her. “Bring another round, and hurry,” I tell her before she can leave the table. I don’t want to be able to think at all right now.
It’s around nine p.m., and the room is slowly filling with people. All types and ages are here, men and women. Some look like they could be underage, but I’m a doctor, not a cop. If one of them chokes on an olive or overdoses on drugs or gets stabbed, I’ll be here to help. Otherwise, I guess it’s none of my business. It’s a different culture, anyway, in this tiny little section of our tiny little town, and I don’t know the rules yet.
“I’m going to have to carry you out of here if you keep downing drinks like that,” Corey says with a smile.
“I’m just a little nervous about being in this part of town.” It’s not exactly a lie, but I’m more nervous about him than our surroundings. “You aren’t worried at all?”
“You have no idea where I’ve been, Ben. I’ve slept under bridges and squatted in crack houses before. It wasn’t always that bad, but sometimes it got that bad. The past few years have been much better. Getting my equivalency diploma and going to EMT school completely changed my life. I’m legit now. But that doesn’t change the fact that I know my way around the ghetto, or that I can survive any-fucking-where. So to answer your question… no, I’m not worried.” He flashes a big grin, and I have to admit I’m fascinated.
“You sure are a gritty son of a bitch, I’ll give you that. Not sheltered like me. I meet all kinds of people in the hospital, and I get close to them on a certain level. But I always manage to stay in my little world, you know? The grocery store is as close as I get to the real world. I just work all the damn time. Even talking about working makes me tired these days. Don’t tell anyone, but I think I’m burning out.”
“You definitely work too much. Even I can see that, and I just got here. You need to get your mind off of work, and anything else that stresses you out.” He scans the room with his keen eyes. “Which lady would you like to have tonight, Doc? Pick one.”
I laugh. “I just broke up with one, now you’re wanting me to choose another?”
“Nothing serious, just a little fun. Some dancing, flirting… Pick one.”
“Uh… that one.” I point to a natural-looking redhead at a table near the sparsely populated dance floor.
“Pretty, but she’s taken.”
“How do you know? She’s sitting alone.”
“I’m more observant than you can even imagine. A side effect of living on the streets. That woman’s husband is at the bar getting drinks, but you knew that, which is exactly why you chose her. I’m not letting you off the hook that easily. Choose another.”
He’s right. I did know the woman was taken, but I’ll be damned if I can guess how he read me so easily. This time I choose a woman with long, dark hair and colorful knit cap who’s selecting music at the jukebox.
“That’s more like it. I’ll be back in two shakes.”
He leaves me alone and vulnerable at the table. My drink is gone, and I have nothing to do to occupy myself. I’m sure I look just like what I am, a socially awkward geek who’s going to implode if his cool friend doesn’t hurry back.
Corey approaches the girl as easily as he seems to do everything. His hands are shoved in his pockets, and he’s taken on the posture of a shy but charming schoolboy. I wonder if it’s all affectation, because it’s hard to believe someone can be that artless and that deft at the same time. He’s either a master manipulator, or sex incarnate. Either way, it’s some scary shit.
Of course the woman takes the bait. She follows him to the table, and he deposits her into the chair to my left before taking his seat opposite me. “Allie, this is Dr. Ben Hardy. Ben, this is Allie. She’s a waitress at the seafood restaurant out on Highway 280.”
“Nice to meet you, Allie.” I shake her hand.
“I’m going to get drinks,” Corey announces. “What are we having this round, Ben?”
“Manhattans. And a glass of ice water. A glass of ice water per alcoholic drink helps with a hangover. Doctor’s orders.”
“Good lord, we’ll be in the restroom all night.”
While Corey trots off to the bar to order our drinks, Allie looks as embarrassed as I feel. “You’re
the
Dr. Hardy? I have friends and relatives who are your patients. You’re my mother’s doctor, for crying out loud. Are you sure you’re really Dr. Hardy?”
“What, do you think I’m an impostor using a doctor’s identity to pick up chicks?” I immediately regret my rudeness, but she only laughs.
“You wouldn’t need to use anyone’s identity to pick up chicks. I just wasn’t expecting someone so young and good looking. Also, it seems a little odd to see a doctor in this hole-in-the-wall.”
“Yeah, I’ve never been here before. It was Corey’s idea.”
“Well, I’m glad you decided to take his advice. He said you broke up with your girlfriend today.” She lowers her lashes and shoots me a look similar to the one Corey gave me earlier, but hers is a pale facsimile and has absolutely no effect on me.
“Yeah. I figure if the Stud Muffin of the Year over there is giving love life advice, I ought to take it.” I gesture toward the bar, where Corey’s already got three young women hanging on him. Two on one side, one on the other like a scene out of a movie. I never thought things like that happened in real life, but her it is right in front of me.
Allie laughs. “He’s really popular, that’s for sure. But don’t sell yourself short. I came over here was because I thought you were the cutest guy in the room.” She settles her hand indiscreetly on the table near my arm, and I choose to ignore it.
Corey shows up with the tray loaded with a round of Manhattans and three high balls of ice water. “I can’t believe you made it all the way across the room balancing all that and didn’t spill anything. With three martini glasses, no less. I can’t even manage to hold one without spilling it.”
“Hey, man,” he says in what he thinks is a Manhattan accent but is unfortunately more Midwestern. “If I can intubate a four-hundred-pound man with vocal cord nodules, I can carry a few stinkin’ drinks. I do expect a nice tip, though.”
I laugh like hell, and so does Allie though I’m sure she doesn’t understand the medical terminology.
“You tubed an opera singer?” I ask.
“No. It was a scenario in our textbook. But you’re a fucking genius to figure that out. I’ll bet your IQ is 160 or better.”
I give a tiny mock bow before tasting my drink and coughing. “Uh… as far as Manhattans go, this is worse than awful. But then this isn’t the Waldorf-Astoria.”
“Maybe you should take us to the Waldorf-Astoria for Manhattans sometime,” Allie says.
This girl’s daddy must have been a glass maker, because she’s transparent as hell.
Corey’s expression is arcane as he regards me from across the table. The dark gleam in his eyes and the slight curl of his lips give the eerie impression that he’s just looked straight into my soul and picked up on my thoughts.
Is he laughing at me?
Suddenly I can’t focus on anything else. I don’t give a shit about the pretty waitress sitting beside me babbling about Cozumel and needing a new passport. I just want to know what’s going on in Corey’s mind to make him look at me that way. And I want to know what he thinks of me. Does he think I’m a repressed bore? A workaholic asshole? Does he like me?
Shit. I’m drunk.
I slam the rest of my horrible drink, setting the empty glass down carefully, because as an emergency doctor I happen to know that a large percentage of nerve and tendon damage to the hand is caused by stemware punctures. Then I stand and make my way silently to the restroom. I need to get out of the smoky room and clear my head. The Red Bull has got my heart thumping and my thoughts racing.
Unexpectedly, Corey follows me in. “You okay, Doc?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just needed to get out of that smoke. I’m not really used to it.”
“I feel you there. I can’t stand it, either. It burns my eyes, gives me a headache, and makes my clothes smell horrible.”
“Same here.” I lean over the sink and splash cold water on my face, feeling my senses come alive from the temperature shock.
“Why don’t you come dance with this lovely young lady I’ve procured for you this evening? She is so hot for you, I can feel the waves coming off of her.”
“I don’t care about her, Corey. She’s a digger.” My voice is harsher than I intend it to be.
“Ben, I’m only trying to show you a good time and help you take your mind off the negative stuff, but I certainly don’t want to make things worse. I just want you to be happy. You tell me what I can do to make you happy, and I’ll do it. Whatever it is.”
I regard my image in the mirror. My eyes are slightly hollowed from stress, but my hair is damp and curling at the temples after splashing my face. I’m feeling refreshed, but also a touch manic, which is never good. “I want to play a drinking game.”