Chapter 13
13.
Cranberry ’n’ Vodka
“Disco Witches dance to save the world, and because the rhythm compels them.”
—Disco Witch Manifesto #2
By seven PM Asylum Harbor was doing steady business. Like Dory had promised, customers were only ordering beers, vodka cranberries, martinis, and the most basic mixed drinks. But just in case he needed to employ Ronnie’s cheating trick, Joe hid the Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide in the crack between the beer cooler and the sink, for easy access.
“What’ll it be?” Joe said to the next customer, copying Vince’s cool, causal demeanor.
“A vodka cranberry please, but only a light splash of the juice, if you don’t mind.”
“Gotcha,” Joe said.
The first wave of customers was mostly male and older, wearing Ralph Lauren and smelling of Cartier cologne and cigarettes. But when the merman’s tail hit eight PM , a more varied crowd paraded in, including several younger men and a handful of women. Joe kept hoping the Gladiator Man (or someone who looked like him) might walk through the door, but no dice. And he kept thinking about the annoying deckhand in the harbor, and how stupid he’d felt staring at him the way he had, and then them laughing at him. It was the same way the deckhand had laughed at Joe that first morning on the ferry. What is that guy’s problem with me?
“What’re you daydreaming about?” Vince asked.
“Nothing. I didn’t realize there were so many people out here yet,” Joe said.
“Mostly owners. You won’t see half of ’em again until October, when they close up for the winter. The preseason young ones are mostly workin’ fellas like us, out here for the long haul. House boys, rent boys, pool boys.”
“That’s a lot of boys,” Joe said. “What about her?” He pointed to a voluptuous blonde standing at the bar, with yellow bangs sweeping her eyelashes and a smile so big it was like she had enough teeth for two women.
“That’s Chrissy Bluebird. A legend. Got famous doing that seventies porn Holly Humps Houston . Has her own cable access show. Hey, Chrissy! Meet Joe, our new bartender!”
Rather than shake Joe’s hand, Chrissy reached over and tousled his chest hair. “Hey, handsome, you be safe out there, you hear me? Maybe I’ll have you on my show one day!” She then applied an additional layer of lip gloss on her already glistening lips and was quickly overtaken by another gaggle of middle-aged gay men.
Joe smiled, watching her work the crowd like she was a porn star Princess Diana. “That’s pretty cool, we have celebrities coming into the bar.”
“This island is crawling with that kind of famous shite.” Vince tossed his head, indicating several more customers arriving. “Back to work!”
Joe scooted over to his end of the bar and started popping off beer caps like they were candy dots off paper. He was mastering the double pour, one hand vodka, one hand gin. It soon felt like he had been bartending all his life, and the manageable but steady stream of customers showed their appreciation—with cold, clean dollar bills left on the counter with a wink and a smile.
“Nice to meet ya, Joe!”
“You must come visit our place on Pine Walk!”
“We’re having a party in two weeks. We’ll put you on the list!”
During the next lull Vince walked over to a beaming Joe. “Don’t let all this attention go to your head,” Vince teased. “The sludge mat gives you an extra two inches of height. Also, a bag of oats would be popular if the customer thought it stood between him and his booze.”
Joe didn’t care why he was getting the attention. He liked being liked, and he liked being really good at something for once. Maybe this bartending thing was his true calling in life. But then, just after ten, a deluge of nearly fifty new customers flooded the bar. “What the hell?” he shouted over to Vince. “Where’d all these guys come from?”
“I told ya,” Vince said, shaking two tumblers simultaneously. “We’re the only game in town right now. Remember, we need these lads coming back! So look sharp!”
Joe moved as fast as he could, slamming cocktails on the counter with one hand and collecting money with the other, the whole time trying to remember Ronnie’s hints on the gay game and how to flirt for better tips. But the line of customers grew restless, hollering for Bud Lites, Heinekens, vodka cranberry, vodka cranberry, vodka cranberry. Sweat dripped from Joe’s pits. His hands shook. A vodka cran spilled all over his chest, garnering a glare from Vince. Joe didn’t dare stop to wipe it off for fear he’d get further behind on serving. Just when he thought he was catching up, a man in his thirties with bulging muscles and a radiant smile approached the bar. “I’ll take a Grey Goose and cranberry for me, handsome!” he chirped. “And three Absolut and tonics for my friends. His twinkling eyes lingered on Joe’s nipples, which peeked from his furry, vodka-and-cranberry-stained chest.
As Joe grabbed the Grey Goose, Vince trotted over and whispered, “Psst! That’s Frankie Fabulous you’re serving.”
“Is he famous?” Joe asked.
“Pines royalty. Gets invited to every party since he’s always smiling and brings his own entourage. We need him to become a regular, so don’t screw this up.”
Joe returned with the Grey Goose, but Frankie Fabulous was wiggling his fingers at him.
“We’ve changed our minds,” Frankie said with twinkling eyes. “We’d like one Manhattan for my fuddy-duddy friend here, and three Long Island iced teas for the rest of us. We’re celebrating the new bar decorations … a sexy one in particular.”
“A Manhattan?” Joe tried to smile as his stomach did an anxious somersault. “And three Long Island iced teas? Gotcha.” Fuck, fuck fuck! He couldn’t remember a single ingredient in a Manhattan other than a cherry. Nor did he recall seeing a jug of ice tea (Long Island or regular) anywhere during setup. He hated to do it, but he’d need to employ Ronnie’s cheating trick for the Manhattan without Vince noticing.
“Hey, Frankie!” Joe shouted, deciding to figure out the cocktail first. “I’ll be right with you, just need to grab some special cherries.” He winked. “That’s a million-dollar smile ya got!” Then, as Ronnie taught him, he shimmied his jeans down and bent over to show a slice of his butt crack while he reached between the cooler and the sink for the Mr. Boston . It wasn’t there. His stomach knotted. Frankie Fabulous was whispering to his friends, giggling, as were several other customers who had approached the bar to order drinks and catch a peek. Joe just knew they could see he was a fraud. Having no other choice, he bolted over to Vince’s side of the bar. “Um … hey,” he said. “Frankie Fabulous asked for a Manhattan, but I can’t remember how to make it and I can’t find the Mr. Boston anywhere. Also, he wants three iced teas … the Long Island kind, but I can’t find iced tea anywhere either.”
“Ya didn’t memorize the book like I told you, did ya, Cheater Peter?” Vince pulled the Mr. Boston from his back pocket and tossed it at Joe’s cranberry-stained chest. “We’ll be having a talk later. Meanwhile, a Long Island iced tea is a cocktail. It’s the five white liquors, with a splash of Coke. Now hurry up and get those men their drinks, ’cause I’m in the weeds! And pull up your feckin’ pants!”
Joe rushed back to his station with the Mr. Boston . The line for drinks had grown to three deep, and Frankie Fabulous’s smile was starting to look less genuine.
“Those drinks are seconds away, handsome!” Joe smiled extra hard, bent over, and found the drinks in the Mr. Boston. His brain couldn’t hold onto anything. More men were shouting their orders. Concentrate. Concentrate. He felt a weird, warm sensation in his right back pocket. Howie’s good luck charm? He fished it from his pocket and huffed in its weird scent. A sudden sense of calmness and surrender came over him. “Fuck it,” he muttered, shoving the charm back in his pocket and turning toward the choir loft of booze bottles. Five white liquors? Vodka, gin, and … triple sec! That was it. What else? Rum. Yes. But that was only four.
His eyes raked the bottom of the back shelf for another white liquor—any white liquor. What exactly was Everclear? Didn’t matter! He poured a hefty dose into the ice-filled tumbler and topped it off with a splash of Coke. After shaking the tumbler, he filled three tall glasses. They sure looked like iced teas. For the Manhattan, he only remembered the whiskey and cherry and faked the rest.
“Here ya go, hot stuff!” He placed the counterfeit cocktails in front of Frankie Fabulous, and sexily licked the excess booze off his fingers—something he’d seen Ronnie do. “You and your handsome friends suck these up. Who’s next?” he called out, wanting to be in the middle of another order before shit hit the fan. Fear and adrenaline pumped through his veins. If he was gonna go down, he was going down in a flaming cocktail of glory. “You got two holes, gentlemen! Let’s fill ’em!” he called out (another Ronnie-ism).
The crowd laughed and catcalled. Vince gave Joe a “what-the-feck-are-you-doing?” look. Joe had no time to engage. A dozen more orders came in, including three more perplexing cocktails. He felt almost fearless. He patted Howie’s good luck charm in his pocket, then did as he had done before: briefly bent over, showed some crack, glanced at the mixology book, remembered maybe two of God knows how many ingredients, and pretended to make the drink like he was Tom Cruise in Cocktail . He was sure he’d be fired at any moment, but five minutes passed, ten minutes, thirty minutes—and not one complaint. But then, just before midnight, Frankie Fabulous beelined for Vince. He was not smiling. This is it, Joe thought. I’m going home.
“Vince!” Frankie Fabulous slurred loud enough for Joe to hear. “Vincent, my Irish person, I must talk to you about your new man! He’s … he’s … just so adorable, and such a poo … I mean a probe … I mean professionalism. Those Long Island iced teas he made were the bestest Long Island iced teas I’ve ever had in my lifetimes! It put your cocksnails to shame! Shame! Shame! Keep this going and maybe this old bucket of blood might not die when the Promethean opens.” He belched. “I think I’m gonna be sick …” Frankie Fabulous stumbled out the door to barf off the side of the deck, showering the walk below.
A huge smile erupted across Joe’s face. Vince would be compelled to praise him after Frankie’s compliment. But instead, Vince looked straight past Joe and turned pale. Standing inside the entryway was a tall, older man with a carefully coifed shock of white hair, wearing an untucked Oxford shirt and designer jeans. As he walked to the center of the bar, customers parted like the Red Sea.
“Hey there, Scotty!”
“When’s the Promethean open, Scotty?”
“Looking really fit there, Scotty!”
When the man and Vince finally locked eyes, Joe could sense the air between them turn to dry ice.
“That’s Scotty Black, isn’t it?” Joe whispered.
“Yeah,” Vince said. “Look at his face. He’s worried sick we’re doing better than he thought.”
“Why?” Joe asked. “I thought you said his agreement with Dory says we have to stay busy?”
“It does. But the chiseler wants a reason to kick Dory out,” Vince said, barely moving his lips. “He’s been telling everyone he wants this to be Asylum Harbor’s last season.”
Scotty Black’s icy eyes slowly rolled from Vince to Joe, whom he looked up and down. A faint smile dented his cheek, and a moment later he left.
“So that’s what he’s after, is it,” Vince muttered to himself, then said to Joe, “Don’t be surprised if that slimy bastard tries to pilfer you from the bar.”
“Me?” Joe asked. “He’d want me for the Promethean? But he told Ronnie he wasn’t looking for any other bartenders—”
Vince grabbed a loop on Joe’s jeans and yanked him like a disobedient child. “I’m tellin’ you now, if you dare go with that bastard, I’ll cut your hairy little throat.”
How strange, Joe thought. Just forty-eight hours before, he hadn’t had a job, and now he had a bar manager and the most powerful club owner in the Pines fighting over him.
“Don’t worry,” Joe said. “I would never bail on Dory or you.”
“Remember that.” Vince released Joe from his grasp. “Take your dinner break now. We’ll be slammed again in about twenty minutes. Howie left you some food in the Charlie’s Angels lunchbox at the end of the bar.”
“When?” Joe said, surprised. “I haven’t seen Howie all night.”
“It’s not my job to be your feckin’ secretary!” Vince snapped. “Now go eat somewhere where customers can’t see ya chew. And memorize that goddamn book!”