Meeting someone is like walking into the middle of a story; one where there's no beginning that defines who the characters are. If you're sincerely interested, you have to stick around and read between the lines, as well as spend a lot of time listening. Only then will you begin to understand what drives people to be who they are.
This story is like that. You're walking into the middle of group of people who you don't know, so it is beyond any shadow of doubt, you will be spending a lot of time listening and reading between the lines in order to get to know them even a little. That is, if you're interested.
There's a small amount of humor, some romance, and yes, erotic moments. On the flip side, there's infidelity, deceit, and a few broken hearts. Life is like that. People are like that. They rise, they fall, and then they move on.
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In the late seventies, New Orleans was, and always had been, the darling of the south. There's a lot of history behind the 'Crescent City', some good, some bad, but all of it interesting. It's a big city made up of diverse cultures. People make New Orleans what it is; not the food, and certainly not the industries that support the area. But, people are its backbone, and there are a lot of them there.
I wasn't born there, so I wasn't considered a native. I was raised in the Deep South, and I came to New Orleans in the late seventies. I was married at the time, and had two very small children. My husband went to work in the oil industry, and like every other outsider, New Orleans adopted us into their family of what they referred to as 'oil-field trash'.
I held that honor for the duration of my short-lived marriage. That was, until I caught my husband cheating with more than half a dozen women, one of which was my best friend. Hell, everyone was cheating on someone in those days, but I was one of those young, naïve oil-field wives who didn't, or wouldn't, believe it could happen to me. Finding out about his infidelity changed my outlook on life in more ways than one.
Within two years, I found myself the divorced mother of two, and no longer in the protective circle of the other oil-field families. I was on my own, and I was scared to death, but I was determined not to go running back home with my tail tucked between my legs. That would have been admitting defeat, and I wasn't about to do that.
So, I moved in with another oil-field castaway, a divorced mother of two as well, and we toughed it out for a while together. We took turns babysitting and working. She worked days, and I worked nights. I was a cocktail waitress. I was married before I graduated high school, so I didn't have the experience to do much more than that. My experience was limited to being a wife and mother up until then.
Strangely enough, that combination of living with a friend who still had some connection with the oil industry, and taking a waitress' job afforded me the opportunity to meet a man. By coincidence, he worked with my roommate, and he drank for recreation at the lounge where I went to work. He was a nice guy; he was a very nice guy. We soon began dating.
It wasn't long before he asked me to move in with him. I think it was more for the sake of convenience than anything that prompted him to ask. Or, maybe he was just one of those nice guys who was prone to being a 'rescuer', and no one was more of the proverbial 'damsel in distress' than I was at that time. He stepped right into the shoes of husband and father without a second thought and without the actual benefit of a marriage license.
Within six weeks, things changed between us. He was still a nice guy, of course, but he focused more on being single than he did on being a live-in husband. He still went out with his friends nearly every night, and he didn't include me in those outings. It came to a head when he told me I needed to find my own friends, because I didn't fit in with his. He also told me that he didn't enjoy coming home to a wife who wanted to have sex every night. That was all I needed to hear.
I began to formulate a plan for moving out, but when he realized my intentions, he adamantly insisted that wasn't what he wanted either. He just wanted to be a devoted dad to my kids and for me to leave him alone otherwise. We declared a truce based upon what he said he wanted.
By late November, I decided to go back to school and earn a degree so I could eventually support my kids on my own. Roger was in favor of that to some extent. I wanted to go to law school. He agreed to pay for it on one condition. I had to take a two-year trade course and complete it first. I settled on legal secretarial school. At the same time, I traded my job for another higher paying one.
I took a part-time position at a local restaurant that specialized in decent food for an affordable price. It had a tavern with a large clientele comprised of both professionals and working class. They had live entertainment on weekends. I began working as a cocktail waitress with aspirations of moving up the ladder eventually.
It wasn't long before I fell into a short-term relationship with one of the band members. He also seemed to be a fairly nice guy, although much younger than was my taste in men. He was older than I was by only a year or two, but still, he was what I considered a kid since he had never been married or even in a stable relationship.
I didn't consider it cheating. By my estimation, cheating involved a partner or spouse who actually cares. That didn't apply in my case. The simple fact was, I didn't even consider it dating. It was just one of those things that happens. A fling. And, as much as he said he wanted it to be a permanent relationship, it was destined to end abruptly. One door closes, and thankfully, another door opens.
You are about to meet the doorman. Granted, none of us knew it at the time, but the door was a revolving one. People came and went through it often, and they all went their own directions eventually, but for a time, we seemed to congregate in one place, just for a few laughs and some good companionship.
It was a strange and unlikely man who held the door open for me. Ivan was a regular customer. He was thirty-eight, six-foot-three, black-haired, brown-eyed, with a well-groomed full beard. He was extremely handsome, and always impeccably dressed. I had become acquainted with Ivan under unpleasant circumstances a month prior to my break up with the member of the band. Ivan and I reluctantly became friends who loved to hate each other.
I looked up one night to find my service area filled by several large men. It made it difficult to maneuver around them and do my job efficiently, and it was compounded by the fact that they were grossly drunk and Ivan was going out of his way to harass me.
At first, Ivan merely introduced himself, but it progressed from there. He was leaned against the bar eyeing me every time I walked past. Next to him was a man who was another inch taller than Ivan, and if it is possible, who was better looking. The two of them looked so similar that they easily could have been brothers. In fact, I thought they were brothers. I heard them talking about me under their breath several times before Ivan made his first move.
"Hey, there. You're new, aren't you?" Ivan asked nonchalantly while chewing on a toothpick.
"Not really. I wasn't born yesterday. I'm almost twenty one," I said snottily without looking up. His companion chuckled lightly at my humor. I wasn't laughing. I was annoyed that they had set up housekeeping in my service area.
"Well, I'm Ivan. So, what's your name, honey?" he pressed. He was handsome, but not enough to excuse his drunkenness.
"Well, it's not honey, Ivan," I said shaking my head. "Ivan Hoe, just like out of the storybook, huh?" My sarcasm was only slightly veiled.
"What's your name?" Ivan demanded again, propping himself against the bar and undressing me with his eyes. I wondered what it was he thought he saw beneath my outrageously unfashionable uniform.
"My name is Cindy, Ivan Hoe." Maybe if I answered him, he would lose interest and go away. My feet ached already, and it was going to be a long night ahead.
"Well, Cindy, this is Jon. He's got the hots for you, but I told him you were already otherwise occupied." Ivan indicated the other man and grinned. Jon glanced at me, smiled, and dropped his gaze to the floor. Interesting response for someone who 'has the hots' for me, I thought.
"Nice to meet you, Jon," I said softly and quickly turned my attention back to Ivan. "So, you told him I was otherwise occupied, did you? What made you think that, Ivan Hoe?" I asked.
Jon laughed an uneasy laugh and stood up straight. I figured from his laugh he was at least sober enough to pick up on my current mood. Ivan clearly was not.
"Nothing really," Ivan shrugged.
"So, you just go around making it your business to stick your nose in
my
business? We just met, Ivan Hoe, so how would you know how I choose to occupy my fucking time?" I snapped.
It was Ivan's turn to stand up straight and he looked stunned for just a few seconds. Jon was laughing openly at my bravado. I took my tray and left to deliver another round of cocktails. When I returned a few minutes later, Jon was eyeing me with something akin to admiration. His smile was captivating and I wondered why I had never noticed it before. I'd seen him around a few times. Usually, with a different girl each time.
