Wednesday nights at The Blue Devil Lounge in Ithaca, New York, they have a social hour that illogically lasts from 7 to 10 and is called 'Cougar Happy Hour'. During that time the ladies who fit that description get to buy well drinks for a buck a pop.
Since it's a college town, the women who come in to take advantage of the specials stand out like a sore thumb, not that the hot ones ever have to spend any of their own money for the discounted drinks anyway because the young men doing the hunting are happy to spend a couple of bucks for the chance to score.
It was on a Wednesday night in October when a combination of factors formed a perfect storm of sorts, and it was under that cloud that the following events occurred.
***
"It's a kennel," Dave Johnson yelled into his friend's ear as they stood at the end of the bar and surveyed the scene. "Slim pickings here tonight. I think I'll go back to the dorm and jerk off."
"Suit yourself," Steve Everett yelled back at his friend over the sounds of Sweet Home Alabama on the jukebox.
The Lynyrd Skynyrd tune was typical of the music played during Cougar Happy Hour every week, as the bar tried to cater to the older crowd, figuring that the guys would listen to anything in order to meet a female. This made the clientele consist mostly of barely legal boys and women from 35 to 60.
"You look like you're interested in somebody," Dave said to Steve as he watched his friend looking down the length of the bar. "Please don't tell me that you're checking out that train wreck in the blue."
"So what if I am?" Steve said.
"You're new at this," Dave said, reminding his roommate that he was more experienced at the Blue Devil Lounge scene. "Let's go. We'll come back next week, only earlier so we don't have to wade through the leftovers."
"Go ahead," Steve said. "I'll probably be back at the dorm soon."
"If you come back to the room with her, I'll never let you live it down," Dave said before leaving. "She looks like somebody... what's her face? The old bag on the Beverly Hillbillies. Not Granny - the other one that had the hots for Jethro. Miss Hathaway."
"Funny," Steve Everett said as he let his dorm-mate leave with his laughter echoing behind him.
In reality, Steve knew that his friend Dave was spot on. The resemblance was there, and as Steve watched the woman sipping a drink without anyone nearby, he took a long look at her.
Tall and skinny, almost painfully so, and wearing the style of eyeglasses that didn't take any years off of the half century's worth of chronological baggage she was carrying, she did play the Miss Hathaway role well.
The fact that none of the guys in the bar were giving her a second look was sad in a way, especially when you thought about the guys that were passing on her. It wasn't exactly like they were all that hot themselves.
So Steve grabbed the bartender and asked him to send a drink down to the woman, and after he took Steve's money and delivered the cocktail, Steve waited for the woman to react.
She seemed stunned when the drink arrived, and after she squinted down toward Steve she called the bartender back and said something to him. The bartender nodded and came back to Steve with a message.
"The lady says that she would like you to join her," the barkeep said before heading towards another customer. "Said something about not wanting to drink alone."
Steve nodded and grabbed his drink to join the woman who didn't like to drink alone. After all, she wasn't that unattractive, he reasoned, and was a very nice person as Steve recalled.
He knew that because he had known the woman all his life, and had recognized her right away. Steve knew that once he got closer and out of the dark corner of the bar he had been standing, Marie Hartwell would recognize him too.
"Thank you for the - omigod!," Marie said as she saw who had bought her the vodka and tonic. "Steven? What in the world are you doing here?"
"Hi Aunt Marie," Steve said and he leaned over and kissed his mother's sister on the cheek and slid onto the stool next to her. "I could ask you the same question."
"Me? Oh - I - well, I was on my way home and I decided to stop in for a drink," Marie stammered, and Steve nodded. "Never been in here before and it looked like a nice enough place."
Steve nodded and said that he had never been in The Blue Devil Lounge before either, and Steve suspected that Aunt Marie might be lying even if he hadn't been. All of the signs inside and out made it clear what the place was, at least on Wednesday nights.
"I guess," Steve said. "How's Uncle Ed?"
"Uh - Ed is - well, we aren't together right now," Aunt Marie said with considerable embarrassment.
"Oh" Steve said, and hearing that made him look at his Aunt a little differently.
Steve had always had a sweet spot in his heart for his aunt, who looked a lot like his mother in some ways, although his Mom probably outweighed Aunt Marie by almost 100 pounds these days.
Almost six feet tall, Steve figured and the weight was anyone's guess, although whatever it was had to be at least 25 pounds less than normal for her height.
Measurements? Not exactly 36-24-36, but more along the lines of 30-25-35. Steve chuckled when he remembered his mother telling his father once that Aunt Marie's nickname when they were growing up was 'The Carpenter's Dream'.
"Flat as a board and easy to screw," Steve recalled his mother cackling after telling dad the old joke that was new to Steve back then.
His mother and her sister had a strange and strained relationship, which was probably why their families didn't get together much any more, at least not like they used to when Steve was young.
Steve had been staring at Aunt Marie's bare arm next to him, with the bony elbow on the padded rail of the bar. Her skin was a ghostly white, and as Steve wondered whether he could get his thumb and index finger to touch if her wrapped them around her bicep, he realized that she had asked him a question.
"Sorry." Steve said, blaming his inattention on the noise.
"I said that I didn't think you were old enough to drink."
"I'm not," Steve said while leaning towards Aunt Marie's ear and the familiar scent of her perfume, giggling as he nuzzled into her light brown hair which had a hint of gray at the roots. "Fake ID. Don't tell on me, okay?"
"I won't, so long as you don't tell anybody you saw me out drinking."
Having made a deal, their conversation turned to other things. Marie said she had heard that her nephew was coming out here to college, and wasn't it a coincidence that they ran into each other like this?
As for Steve, he kidded that the reason he chose Ithaca was so he could be near his favorite aunt, but while he was exaggerating about that, the thought that he might be able to scrounge a meal or something did enter his mind.
"Sorry about you and Uncle Ed," Steve said, which was partly true, but only as it affected his aunt, because Steve had always thought his uncle was a blowhard.
"I'd - I'd rather not talk about it," Aunt Marie said with a touch of sadness, and while that put a momentary damper on the conversation, before long they were laughing and reminiscing.
Steve looked up at the clock and saw that he had been talking with his aunt for over an hour, and he was having a blast. Aunt Marie seemed to be having fun too, and it wasn't just because of the drinks she was throwing down either.
Around that time Steve started making contact with his aunt. Innocent stuff, like their arms touching and him putting his hand on her forearm, and while Steve wondered if his aunt was noticing, she wasn't stopping him and was even joining in, and it was around then that the tone of the conversation changed.
"I'm probably getting a lot of guys mad," Steve said. "Monopolizing you like this. I should clear out and let somebody else enjoy your company."
"Don't go, Steven," Aunt Marie said, clutching his forearm to keep him around even though he wasn't moving. "Nobody wants to hit on me. They rarely do. At least not this early."
"Oh, I doubt that," Steve said, smiling while realizing that Aunt Marie pretty much admitted she wasn't a rookie in this meat market after all, just like he had suspected.
"Wish I was," Aunt Marie mused. "Sometimes, if somebody is drunk or desperate enough - but usually it's just me alone with this."
Aunt Marie lifted her glass with that, looking at it with slightly glassy eyes, and when Steve whispered that she had to be kidding because she was still pretty she shook her head and looked at her nephew.
"No - no I'm not."
She didn't say it looking for sympathy, or wanting Steve to tell her she was wrong. Marie said it like it was a fact, and she was right. She wasn't pretty. She never had been and never would be.
"You are to me," Steve heard himself saying as he leaned close to his aunt and squeezed her while kissing her on the cheek.
"You're so sweet. Always were," Marie sighed as her eyes misted up. "If you weren't my sister's kid I'd..."
"Don't let that stop you," Steve said, laughing in case she took it badly, but she just laughed and shook her head.
"Do you remember when you used to give me baths in that plastic dishpan thing?" Steve asked.
"Oh dear. Don't tell me - you can't remember that! You were just a baby!"
"Seems like I do recall it, but that's probably because I always see that picture at home of me sitting there in that thing with a rubber ducky and you squeezing a wash cloth over my head to make it rain."
"Oh how you used to laugh!" Marie chortled. "Those were good times."
"You know, I would love to get one of those baths tonight," Steve said, and he saw Marie's startled reaction.
"Heavens, I don't know what happened to that basin, and besides you would never fit in it now. You're as tall as I am these days," Marie said with a laugh.
"No, I couldn't fit in that. Don't have a tub at the dorm either, but you've got a bathtub, right?"
"Steven!" Marie said, her pale cheeks blushing.
