It hadn't been a good year. Here it was, an hour to midnight on Christmas eve and I wasn't feeling that I had a lot to be thankful for or to look forward to. At fifty years of age I found myself wandering city streets almost aimlessly.
The previous year my wife had passed away, I was struggling to make the basic sales quotas in my job and I was carrying more debt than I could realistically afford. So here I was far from home on December twenty-fourth, feeling dragged out after a long fruitless day of dead-end sales calls and wondering what the hell had happened to my life. Not a pretty picture I know.
I stared up at the big steel bridge spanning the river high above me and it was only at that moment that I realized that I was down near the warehouses in the area of the docks. Probably not the safest place to be in the middle of the night but it was deserted. A light snow was falling and drawing a thin sheet of white over the harsher sides of the city. A light caught my eye.
Across from a dingy all-night coin laundry, I noticed a window with a tiny blue neon sign that proclaimed a small bar and grill was still "open" for business. I recollected I had skipped lunch and dinner and was famished. 'What the hell,' I thought, 'a quick bite and a beer and then call a cab to take me back to my hotel. A BLT and a beer would go down good right about now.' I pushed the door open and stepped inside. The thick wooden door swung shut silently behind me on a spring.
It really fit the name hole-in-the-wall. Just a counter with six stools and a tiny table off in the back corner. The place was empty. I shrugged off my coat and slid onto a stool about halfway down the line. Couple of snow scene prints on the wall, some garland and a string of lights across the top of the mirror behind the bar. I guessed that a door with a round window at the end of the bar led to a kitchen. A tiny brass plaque embedded in the wooden top of the bar counter read "Mrs.C's Bar". There wasn't a sound. Not from the kitchen, not a radio, no tv, no sound of traffic outside. At that moment, you could've convinced me I was the last man in an empty world. Then she came through kitchen door. I couldn't help but stare.
My wife had been the only girl for me until her recent passing but it didn't mean I hadn't done a little window shopping now and then. But the woman who came through the door in that bar was nothing like any of the women I had usually found attractive in the past.
The term, BBW, big beautiful woman, leaped to mind as she strode up the length of the bar to where I was sitting. She put her large hands palm down on the countertop in front of me and smiled. Her smile was dazzling. I guessed she might be close to me in age but it was hard to tell. There were no lines in her wide face and there was a distinctly rosey hue in her cheeks that looked perfectly natural to me. And her eyes sparkled like lights in a crystal. She wore a snug, red scoop neck that plunged to reveal two extraordinary breasts barely contained within. I'd also taken note of the tight knee-length green skirt that was fringed with what appeared to be a slightly furry white hem.
I was spell-bound. Speechless. Enthralled.
"Hungry?" she asked in a voice that was almost musical yet husky. I nodded, my brain having disconnected completely from my voicebox. She smiled again, her teeth flawlessly white.
"Just be a sec then," she said and headed back toward the kitchen, her large firm ass sashaying perfectly behind her. I figured she'd gone to fetch a menu. She was back not a moment later. "Name's Mrs. C," she said with what I just might have been a wink.
She put a plate down in front of me between a set of cutlery I hadn't noticed before. On the plate was a warm sandwich. A BLT. She reached under the counter and set a beer down next to the plate. Curiously it was my favorite brand. I looked up at her bewildered.
"BLT love, only thing left in the house I'm afraid at this hour. Took the liberty of toasting it for you as you seemed a bit chilled."
I looked down at the label on the beer and back up at her.
"Only brand we carry hon, hope its alright?" she asked, clearly concerned with the look on my face.
"N-no, it's fine," I managed to stutter out, "great, thanks."
"Not at all. You get that into you while I clean up a bit."
"You look fine to me already," I blurted out like some nervous adolescent on a first date, and immediately felt like a perfect fool. She put her hands on her big hips and smiled the sweetest smile I had ever seen at me.
"That's lovely of you to say, but I was talking about cleaning up the bar here, not meself." I mumbled an apology for heavens knows what reason and she just kept smiling. I wolfed down the sandwich, thinking I'd probably still be hungry after but once the last crumb was gone, I felt comfortably full and warm.
I watched as she wiped glasses clean and set them in a neat line behind her, my eyes following her every move when she wasn't looking my way. And for the first time in too long, I felt a distant stirring in my loins. I sipped my beer and enjoyed the lines of her full form over and over, savoring every curve - until I realized she could see me in the mirror whenever she looked up. Her reflection was also watching me, more with bemusement than lust I was sure.
She cleared my plate away and we began to chat. Well, to be truthful, it seemed to be me doing most of the talking and her doing the listening. I am normally a private man yet before long I found myself pouring out my story to her in one long stream of unhappiness. Her shining eyes never left my face. When I finally shut up it felt like I'd been talking for hours. About everything. My whole life maybe.
Once again I felt a fool and proffered an apology for my run-on mouth. She laid a soft warm hand on mine and patted it, my smaller hand disappearing entirely beneath hers.
"Do you feel better?" she asked with a mischevious grin as she continued to hold my hand.
And you know, I did. I felt drained, emptied, and, well, good. Better than I had in a long time. I nodded.
"Ah," she said, "then I have done my job here. And now, I have to close up." I looked at my watch and was astonished to see that it was still two minutes to midnight. It felt like I had been there for hours. I quickly shifted off the stool.
"Sure, sure," I said, scrambling to put my coat on, "I don't want to keep you on late. I mean tonight especially." She laughed delightedly and it made me feel good the way she laughed. Made me want to laugh too.
"Not at all," she chuckled, "I enjoyed your company, and all the more so since I am always alone on Christmas eve."
"Ah, husband travels a lot on business then, like me?"
"Mmmmm, you might say that," she answered, curiously placing a plump finger alongside of her nose.
"Well, you have a good Christmas," I managed to get out as I fumbled for some money to pay the bill. She waved off my money.
"On the house tonight," she said sweetly. I couldn't talk her out it so I thanked her profusely and turned to leave. Somehow she reached the door before me and switched off the neon "Open" light.
"Where are you going?" she asked lightly.
Oh yes, of course, she could see I was going to need a cab and was going to offer to call one. But do you think I could remember the name of the hotel? I drew a complete blank. Honestly. It was embarassing. I confessed my selective amnesia and hoped she wouldn't laugh or throw me out on my ear. She shook her head.
"No silly, I meant 'Where are you going?' I live upstairs."
You could have knocked me over with a feather. I mumbled something about her husband. She smiled as she locked the front door and taking me by the hand, led me to a side door I hadn't noticed before and up a narrow flight of stairs.
"Don't worry about him," she said gently as we went up the stairs, me in tow, "he's halfway around the world by now."
I gotta admit I wasn't real comfortable with all this. She opened a door that led to a small apartment. It was basically a one room with a kitchenette along one side and a huge four-poster bed dominating the other side.