Chapter 23 Chapter 22: Dates, Waits and Dates
I was becoming a regular, I thought jokingly to myself as I neared the pulsating red neon sign of the Apostrophe. It buzzed like a trapped insect against the deepening twilight. It was Friday night, and the whole town seemed to have surrendered to its rhythm. The bass from inside was a physical thing, a vibration I could feel through the soles of my boots, and I could recognize the thumping, synth-heavy songs even from out in the street. I had to squeeze past a mass of bodies milling about the door, a chaotic ecosystem of laughter and shouted conversations. I could feel their stares appraising, interested and a flicker of validation cut through my anxiety. The new wool knitwear jumper, falling just right from my shoulders, was doing its job.
When I finally reached the door and pulled it open, a wall of sound and sensation hit me. The thick haze of smoke, the primal beat of the music, and the roar of a hundred overlapping voices wafted out, threatening to consume me whole.
The bar was packed wall to wall, a single, shifting organism of people. It was so dense that everyone's hips and shoulders seemed adjoined, moving to a collective, unspoken rhythm. I tried to make my way to the bar with some semblance of grace, but this was not a night or a place for grace. I ended up elbowing and worming my way through the press of warm bodies, a muttered "sorry" lost in the din every time I bumped someone.
When I was roughly three people deep from the bar, I caught Silver's eye. She was a whirlwind of motion, pouring, shaking, taking gist, but her gaze locked onto mine for a split second. With a practiced gesture, a subtle flick of her chin and a tone that was both a command and an invitation, she called to me through the masses. Miraculously, the wall of people seemed to part, creating a narrow channel that let me through to the sticky, sanctified haven of the bar.
"One sec and I'm yours," she said. Her voice wasn't loud, but it carried above the rowdy banter with a clarity that was entirely her own. She finished with the customer she was serving with a final, efficient smile and then turned fully to me.
My breath did a double take. She was truly, devastatingly beautiful in her element. Her skin shone with the healthy gloss of a light night's work sweat, catching the dim lights. Her hair was piled up in a messy bun, a few escaped tendrils curling at her neck. She wore a revealing lacy black top that showed a full, magnificent cleavage and left little to the imagination. She was power and allure personified.
"Hi Nanda," her voice was almost a purr, an intimate sound meant just for me in the middle of the chaos. "What can I get you?"
I didn't want to get drunk tonight. The emotional whiplash of the day had left me raw, and I was scared that if I started, I wouldn't stop. The last thing I wanted was a foggy head and a pounding hangover for my interview tomorrow. "Just a jo and ice, please," I said. The words felt quiet and wrong coming out of my mouth, too tame for this place, too weak for this version of her. I leaned in closer, raising my voice. "Yeah, a Jo and ice, Silver, please. You look… great tonight." Everything felt wrong. I could barely hear my own thoughts, let alone hold a conversation. Normally, I thrived in this type of electric atmosphere, but tonight it was a barrier, stopping me from connecting with the one person I needed to see.
I think she saw the frustration and overwhelm on my face because her expression softened from bartender mode into something more personal. She leaned across the bar, her hand briefly covering mine. "This is the rush," she said, her voice a low, comforting hum meant just for my ears. "In an hour or so, it'll quieten down. We'll talk then." It was a promise, and I clung to it. “By the way you look great” she said with a sexy, cheeky smile, over her busy shoulder.
The bar was a sea of boisterous, loud Nates, their energy a palpable, aggressive force that filled the room. They were a pack on the hunt, all testosterone and bravado, their eyes constantly scanning for their next conquest. I felt like a lone gazelle who had wandered into a lion's den, my new clothes feeling less like armour and more like a target.
I spent the next hour or so in a state of low-grade siege, constantly fighting off wandering hands that "accidentally" brushed my hip or lower back, enduring deliberate bodychecking as Nates shoved past, and engaging in a tedious form of word-fencing against a barrage of slurred, cheesy chat-up lines. "Hey gorgeous, buy you a drink?" "Don't I know you from somewhere?" "Smile, beautiful, it can't be that bad!" Each interaction chipped away at my resolve.
I just could not find my inner party-self. The music that usually freed me now felt oppressive, the crowd suffocating. My initial drink of jo and ice, meant for sobriety, turned into a meeka and jo, the sharp, sweet spirits warming me slowly against the chill of isolation. The drinks did little else for me than making my bladder feel like it was about to explode. After what felt like an eternity of wrangled jostling, I finally forced my way through the throng toward the bathroom.
The queue for the two working cubicles was long, a winding line of weary-looking Pollis. This wasn't just a line for the toilet; it was a clandestine sanctuary. Women were congregated here, a temporary sisterhood away from the noisy bar. They were resetting makeup in smudged reflectors, tidying escaped strands of hair, sharing exasperated laughs and commiserating glances. It was the one place in the entire club where the predatory energy of the main room couldn't reach.
I was finally at the front of the queue when a petite Polli emerged from one of the cubicles with a flushed, self-satisfied smile. I slipped hurriedly past her into the small space and was immediately hit by the foulest, most eye-watering stench of raw sewage. Gagging, I held my breath, did what I needed to do, releasing all the liquid pressure of the night into the waiting toilet. But when I was done, a new social anxiety seized me. I was afraid to open the door. What if the next person in line thought it was me who had created that horrific smell?
I gingerly cracked the door open, ready to make a swift, apologetic escape. Instead, Silver was standing right there. Before I could utter a word, she grabbed my arm, forced me back into the foul cubicle, clicked the lock shut behind us, and silenced my surprised gasp with a deep, desperate kiss. It was a minute of made passion, a chaotic, wonderful collision that made me forget the stink, the noise, everything. After that blissful minute, she broke it off, breathing heavily. “I have to work,” she smirked, her eyes sparkling with mischief. Then she wrinkled her nose. “And it reeks in here!” she laughed.
As we emerged, flushed and slightly dishevelled, the line of waiting Pollis had not moved. Their arms were crossed, and their expressions had shifted from weary patience to outright, unamused fury. It was abundantly clear they were not pleased with having to wait to pee while we had taken up the precious, limited bathroom space for a make-out session. Silver just winked at them and slipped back behind the bar, leaving me to face the judgmental glares alone, my face burning with a mixture of embarrassment and giddy triumph.
When I came out from the toilet, the atmosphere in the Apostrophe had undergone a seismic shift. The frantic, pounding energy had ebbed. The crowds had thinned to a comfortable bustle, and one could almost hear each other talk without having to shout. The round-faced, pleasantly drunk Nate I’d been talking to earlier had, with a chivalrous yet sloppy gesture, saved my seat at the bar. Not wanting to be rude, and with Silver still busy mopping down the well, I slid back onto the stool. I spent the best part of the next hour immersed in a raucous, good-natured debate with him and his friends, a rotating cast of characters who seemed to materialize from the thinning crowd. We debated politics, the ongoing war, and any other hot topic they could find, my opinions flowing more freely with each free drink they shoved into my hand. Anything for a free drink, I thought wryly, knowing it was really about the distraction, about not sitting alone with my thoughts.
Finally, with the last of the stragglers served and the rush well and truly over, Silver emerged from behind the bar. She came and sat next to me on this side of the counter, claiming a stool for herself like a soldier coming off the front lines. She’d return once in a while to pour a simple drink for a remaining customer, but her presence was now with me. I could see she was tired, a slight droop to her shoulders, a shadow under her bright eyes, but the adrenaline from her busy night still sparked a vibrant excitement in her. It made her glow.
She leaned into me, her shoulder pressing against mine, and her voice was a low, intimate murmur that cut through the leftover noise of the bar. “Forty minutes and I’m off. Come home with me.” It was more of a statement than a question, delivered with a confident warmth that brooked no argument. Her eyes held mine, and in them was a promise of the quiet intimacy the noisy bar had denied us all night.
And before I knew it, the forty minutes had flown by in a blur of her closing duties, and I was sitting on her soft sofa, the familiar comfort of her space wrapping around me. The sounds of the city were a distant hum here. I was ordering a pizza on my com while the sound of the waterdrop drummed a steady rhythm from it, a domestic sound that felt incredibly intimate. I was exactly where I was supposed to be.