I walked through the doorway to the hotel bar and began scanning the crowd. I was curious to see how the local talent was shaping up tonight. My left hand began to itch, specifically my left ring finger, so I idly scratched the pale band at the base as I let my gaze slide across the room.
I took a couple of steps into the darkened bar, glanced at the rectangular shaped bar in the middle of the main room, the stopped and stared. What immediately sprang to mind was the lyrics from the Jimmy Buffett song, "There she sat at the corner of the bar/As I broke another string on my old guitar/Someone call a cab/Lady won't you pay my tab?"
She was a short redhead, five-foot-nothing, wearing a little more makeup than I tended to prefer, but she had the kind of rack I've always liked and a body that carried it well. There was one other thing she had that really caught my attention. She had what I've always referred to as The Look.
The Look isn't something that you can necessarily describe in specific words. The Look certainly involves looking good, but there's that indefinable something she just has to have. For starters, women with The Look tend to be a little bit older. Young hotties can look good, but they haven't had enough time to develop the proper attitude that always accompanies The Look.
Women with The Look
Know Who They Are, and Like It.
Women with The Look are
Confident and Know Exactly What They Want, and Won't Settle for Less.
Women with The Look
Aren't Necessarily Shopping Around, but When They Find It, They Make Sure They Get It.
Most guys don't truly understand what The Look is all about. From my experience, women with The Look tend to intimidate men who instinctively head the other direction. The biggest part of The Look is the fact that you'd better bring your A-Game. Even the hint that you might even have the possibility of a B-Game is enough to have women with The Look leaving tire tracks on your torso as they head down the road, not even looking in the rearview mirror at your mangled body.
What they really don't get is the fact that women with The Look are worth all the effort required. You can have all the young hotties -- they're a dime a dozen. You manage to get yourself a woman with The Look and you have something that will leave you gasping and breathless. They're so above the rest of the females in the fray that looking for anything less means you're cheating yourself of an experience you'll never forget.
That's a lot of words trying to quantify something that's basically undefinable. But like the Supreme Court justice said in a ruling, you know it when you see it.
She had it. Oh, yeah, she had The Look, in spades. I felt my pulse pick up, and a stirring in my gut, and a little bit lower as well. The Look always gets me going. And this time, it got me going toward the corner of the bar, even if I didn't have an old guitar as an icebreaker.
I had taken two steps, and then started cursing myself for my hesitation as I'd walked into the room. A tall guy with a goatee sidled up next to her as she was finishing off her beer. It was obvious he was getting ready to buy her next drink.
But then she did something curious. She turned toward him, and you could tell she was saying him no thanks. He persisted, said something that he obviously thought was clever, and then waited confidently for a response from her.
She looked at him, shook her head at him again, and when he looked confused at her response, she said a short phrase of some kind. With that, his eyebrows went up and he scuttled off as quickly as he could. You could almost smell the scorched flesh from whatever she'd told him. Whoa.
I smiled and walked toward her. I figured, what the hell, what did I have to lose? As I approached her, I said, "You look like you're ready for another one. My treat."
She looked up, and instead of the blank stare she gave the other guy, the redhead smiled at me. "It all depends," she said. "Are you a lying sack of shit?"
How the hell do you answer that? "I do my very best not to be." I paused then added, "Miller Lite, right?"
The redhead nodded. I smiled at her, and she smiled back. "Hi, I'm Steve."
"I'm Anna." I sat down on the seat to her right, and gave the bartender the order for two beers. "You sure you're not one of those guys who's a lying sack of shit?"
"Pretty sure. Been having problems with that type lately, huh?"
The beers showed up, and I handed her one of the bottles. As she took it from me, she glanced at my left ring finger and saw the pale band. Her eyes widened just a bit. That's when I looked at her left hand. There it was -- that same pale band. Interesting.
She smiled. "Matter of fact I have. You see that guy that just came up to me?" I nodded. "He used a really tired, standard pickup line. I asked him how limber he was. That stopped him cold. Then I told him to go fuck himself."
"At least you got rid of him quickly," I said. "Any suggestions for me?"
She gave me a smile. "Yeah. Let's move to one of those open booths."
"Sounds good to me." We picked up our beers and strolled over to a corner and sat down. "At the risk of sounding lame, I haven't seen you here before. I sure would have remembered that."
She gave a little chuckle. "I'm from out of town. Work sent me here for to take some classes. If I want to get promoted, or get a raise, you have to take these two and three day seminars. They're kinda boring, but it's nice to get away every once in a while. Gives me a chance to relax, or even party a little bit."
"Well, I have to warn you, I'm actually a professional bullshit artist, so be warned."
"Nice." She took a sip of beer. "I can tell. At least you're an honest bullshit artist. That last guy looked like a real weasel."
"Let's just say I approve of your judgment. I'll do my best to live up to it," I said, laughing. Then I took my own slug of beer. I asked her what she did, and she began telling me about her job, throwing in stories about crazy customers and the like.
I loved watching her as she talked. She had a pleasant voice, and a wry way of saying things. Being in a corner booth had its pluses. We weren't sitting across from each other -- instead we were side-to-side, and since I'm rather hard of hearing, I had to slide over a bit, and lean over to hear what she was saying. I tried to concentrate on looking her in the eye, but it was hard since she was wearing a top that was slightly unbuttoned and showed some cleavage. Nice cleavage, too.
I responded with my own work-type stories, and the whack jobs I'd run into on the road over the years. I got her laughing, and she had her own stories. Playing "Can You Top This" with her was fun. Almost as much fun as another variant of the game would be.
The bar was kind of quiet, a little bit dead, but like usual, they had the music playing too loud. Fine with me -- another excuse to get a little closer to hear what she was saying. I had to get up to get our refills, since apparently they'd sent the waitress home. I have to admit I was checking her out pretty good, and after a couple of brews, not only I was getting a little bit interested, it was showing. I think she caught me looking down her shirt a couple of times, but didn't say anything. On the contrary, I caught her checking me out the second time I got up to get refills on the beer.
When I came back with the beer that last time, I handed it to her, and I swear a little spark of electricity hit both our hands. Love cheap carpets in bars. She let out a little "whoa." The smart-ass line was uttered before I could even think about it. "We definitely made a connection there. Must be fate"
"Don't get ahead of yourself, big boy," she said. But she patted my hand when she said it. Voluntary contact. And it felt pretty damned good. Another of those little ice-breakers. Very nice. And then I noticed we were sitting even closer together, almost touching.
We continued talking, but the stories were getting a little more personal. I asked her what kind of music she liked, etc. etc. etc. As we were finishing our third beer, the dreaded Call Of Nature hit. Dammit, right when things were starting to click.
I headed back to the john, and even though there weren't many people in the bar, there was a line. It took me a good three minutes to get to the urinal so I could piss and get out of there. I made a beeline for the corner booth. There were two empty bottles on the table, but no sign of her. I figured she had to pee as well, so I headed to the bar to get two more beers.