Something Else (15)

Chapter Fifteen – Jack Takes Mickey Down

It was a chilly Wednesday night in November. I had three months under my belt now as a bartender and Something Else was humming right along as the hottest watering hole in North County. I was making great money. Almost all of it came from tips and along with his minimum hourly wage he was taking home about $500 to $600 a week.

The ’63 Ford Galaxy had gone to the junk yard when I blew the engine on the highway on my way home from a Rod Steward concert in Illinois at SIU Edwardsville. It was a long cold walk for me and my buddy Mort. We got to a payphone at the exit just across the Mississippi River that October night where I called a tow truck. Mort stuck his thumb out and they we got a ride most of the way in back of a pickup truck. Luckily, I carried a $100 bill hidden in my wallet for just such difficulties.

I sold the Ford for $50 and upgraded to a beautiful blue ’70 Chevy Chevelle I found on a used car lot on the Rock Road. I put $200 down and the sales guy financed the rest at 9.5% interest. I had a little nest egg now. I was finally flush. I had a good steady job, and the outlook was bright.

Tonight was the ‘Sexy Legs’ contest and by 9:30 pm there were already five buxom beauties signed up to compete. Richie wanted two more and was working the room. The grand prize was $250, a VIP card and dinner for two at Steak & Ale.  $100 goes to the runner up and free drinks for all of the contestants all night long. Some of them needed the liquid courage to exhibit their bodies to a crowd of mostly ogling men. Others just liked to show off, enjoying the attention. Wednesday was always a fairly busy night. Richie expected to do $3,000 in cover charges and another $4,000 to $5,000 in liquor, beer, and wine.

Eddie held court at the main bar station and Jaycee was in the middle tonight, leaving the far end for me. I liked the far end and had built up my own clientele, made up mainly of guys I could relate to. Some of them had been in the military toward the end of the Viet Nam war. The bar was so busy though, that there wasn’t much time to chit-chat and to reminisce about the bad old days.

There were also a few women who liked to hang out at my end of the bar. One in particular was the girl named Trini that I had met on the first visit to the bar before he started work there. She usually came in with her sister Anna and they would drink Tequila Sunrises. They‘d buy the first one and hope to chat up some young stud who would pony up the six bucks for another one…and maybe a third if they got lucky, but not in the biblical sense. They were good girls.

There were a few other ‘sweet young things,’ as Eddie liked to say, that appreciated my limited talents. After all, I thought I had a solid body and reasonably good looks. They flirted with me over the bar, and I was happy to smile and flirt right back even knowing that the girls didn’t tip that well, but I appreciated the attention. If all a guy wanted to do was get laid. This was his candy store.

The DJ tonight was Brad. He had become one of my friends because of his somewhat sick and irreverent sense of humor and general disregard for authority. During the day he worked at ‘Peaches,’ a record store in Dellwood. The guy had a great radio voice like some of the best FM disc jockeys and he knew his music. Like me he was really a Rock n’ Roll guy but was relegated to working in this new disco world to pay the bills.

Much of Brad’s schtick was programmed. Bud had a guy at his ad agency write copy for all of the promos, so Brad had to stick to the script. One of the lines Brad had to say every hour that he hated most was “Welcome to Something Else. St. Louis’ Only Honest to Goodness Dazzling Discotheque.” Early in his set, before the club got busy Brad was notorious for changing the script to “Welcome to Something Else. St. Goodness’s Only Honest to Louis Dizzling Dascotheque.” Of course, most customers were just getting settled in and didn’t notice the humorous intentional slip of the tongue. But the other bartenders and I noticed, and Eddie wasn’t amused.

When Brad veered off the path Eddie would get hot, duck under the bar, and make his way to the DJ booth. He would demand Brad’s attention and read him the riot act. Brad would smile and say “I don’t work for you. I serve at the pleasure of the General Manager.” With that Eddie would storm off looking for Richie. And Richie would laugh at him because he knew that Brad was a great DJ and the customers loved him. But Eddie was undeterred and would respond with “Bud Winner would not be happy.”

At about 10:30 pm I needed change and couldn’t get hold of Richie, so I hurried to the front door. A black limo rolled up to the front door and three men dressed similarly in black leather jackets got out. The limo blocked the drive and stayed well past the disembarkation. There was a line at the door, but the men disregarded it and moved to the bouncer at the entrance. Larry was at the podium checking IDs and stopped them.

“You see the line?” Larry said pointing to the thirty people patiently waiting to get in.”

The biggest guy said without looking at the line “We are Jaycee’s guests.”

Larry had a walkie talkie and spoke into it “Hey Louie. We got three guys out here saying they are Jaycee’s guests. Should I let them in?”

Louie replied, “Yeah, I guess so but get a name and I’ll let her know they are here.”

Larry looked at the big guy and said, “What’s your name?”

“I’m Mickey.”

“Wait.” Larry said putting up a hand then saying in the radio, “Louie, tell her it’s Mickey.” Then Larry lowered his hand, removed the red velvet rope, and allowed the three men to enter.

A man who was standing first in line said “Hey, I’m a friend of Jaycee’s too.”

Larry said, “Shut the fuck up asshole or you won’t get in at all.”

I made change from the cover charge till and watched as the men entered.

This must have been Mickey’s first visit to Something Else and he seemed a little disoriented as he walked through the foyer due to the bright flashing lights and loud disco music. He saw the wide opening leading to the main bar area and moved toward it with his two buddies close behind.

When I got back to my station, I saw Louie behind the bar speaking to Jaycee. Neither of them was smiling and they both looked toward the entrance at the same time. Mickey and the entourage appeared. Jaycee was shaking her head slowly and I moved closer to hear the conversation, but I only got pieces of it.

“Who is this guy?”

“He’s my ex-boyfriend. I thought he was out of my life.”

“Do you want me to tell him to leave?” Louie said.

“No.” She replied. “We don’t want any trouble and this guy is trouble with a capital T.”

“Okay, but I’ll tell ‘the Stooges’ to be on alert.”

Louie came to the other end of the bar and told me what was happening. Then he stopped at Eddies station to inform him too, before ducking under the bar and moving off to one side of the room where he keyed the walkie talkie and broadcast the warning.

Eddie took a particular interest and stopped making drinks even with customers clamoring for service. I watched closely but continued serving customers. Jaycee just concentrated on making drinks and collecting the cash, only looking up at her patrons.

Mickey got to the center of the bar directly in front of Jaycee’s station and stood there silently. Then after she had finished a transaction, he said loudly “Courvoisier. Straight up.”

Jaycee looked up from her pour mat and stared blankly at him. Then she moved to the back bar and retrieved the Cognac, picked out a snifter and poured it. She placed it in front of him on a cocktail napkin and said “What are your friends having?

“Two Budweisers.”

She moved to the reach-in, retrieved them, twisted off the tops and set them on the bar.

“Eighteen dollars,” she said curtly.

Mickey pulled a gold money clip from his pocket revealing a huge wad of cash and stripped off a fifty-dollar bill. He dropped it on the bar and said, “Keep it.”

Jaycee took the bill, moved to the cash register, and made change. Then she came back to him and put the bills on the bar.

“I don’t need your money. I’m busy. What do you want?” She said.

“I thought we could talk.”

“That’s what you said the last time I saw you. Remember beating the shit out of me? Remember the black eye that I had for two weeks. Remember this?” She said pointing to a chipped tooth on the left side of her mouth.

“I told you I was sorry.”

Jaycee said “Sorry don’t cut it. How did you find me?”

“Samantha at Risqué Business.”

“I don’t believe you. She’s my friend. She would never give me up to you.”

“I gave her $200 and told her I wouldn’t hurt her.”

“Such a nice guy. You get off on hurting woman, don’t you? Tough guy, huh?” she said sarcastically.

It was busy. People were waiting for drinks. Two men standing next to Mickey said “Hey, what do you have to do to get a beer around here?”

Mickey turned to them and said “We are talking asshole. It’s a big bar. Go get your beer from another bartender.”

The larger of the two men wearing typical disco attire puffed up his chest and said, “Who are you calling an asshole?”

Mickey grabbed him by the nylon shirt and lifted him off the floor, then tossed him backward saying “You are the faggot that I’m calling an asshole now get out of my face.”

Mickey’s buddies moved forward between the two men as a buffer then he turned back toward Jaycee. The two men retreated to another station at the bar.

Eddie was watching intently but made no move to get involved. I watched closely but stayed back. Louie started to intervene but when the men retreated from Mickey, he thought better of it. But he was ready.

“You know that you can’t be here. There is a restraining order issued by a judge. You are not to have any contact with me.” Jaycee said.

“That’s in St. Charles County. This is St. Louis County.”

“You’re not that smart, are you? It doesn’t matter. I could be in Bumfuck Egypt, and you’re still not supposed to come near me.”

“So, what are you gonna do?” He asked.

Jaycee leaned forward on the bar and said angrily “First, I’ll have your ass thrown out of here. Then I’ll call the cops and you’ll get arrested.”

Mickey quickly grabbed her by the left wrist and pulled her forward knocking his snifter onto the floor. Eddie ran toward her and grabbed her other arm, pulling her backward. I saw what was going down, got a running start and vaulted over the bar landing in an area where the crowd had parted, just a few feet from Mickey.  

I drove my left foot into Mickey’s right leg at the knee joint and the big man grunted in pain then crumpled to the shag carpeted floor, releasing the hold he had on Jaycee. The two guys who came with Mickey were initially stunned but came toward me swinging. The crowd moved farther back and one of the men came with a roundhouse right that I deflected. I landed a punch of my own in the man’s kidney. As this occurred the second man came around on my side and put me in a headlock. I punched him in the gut with little effect then he twisted his body far enough to my right and I hit the guy with a downward blow to his balls. That did the trick, and I was released.

Mickey was standing now and scowling as he moved toward me. The two men got behind me and held my arms. With their unwitting support I kicked out both feet hitting Mickey square in the stomach and hurled him backward onto his back.

Richie, Louie and the three stooges arrived just as Mickey hit the floor. Mo and Larry grabbed the two buddies. Louie grabbed Mickey by the coat collar and Richie grabbed his leg. Initially he kicked at them, but they were able to drag him through the crowd to the foyer.

The contest had stopped, and the crowd had turned toward the commotion. I yelled “Play that funky music, white boy!” Within ten seconds Brad the DJ found the Wild Cherry album and it was spinning.

“It’s all over folks.” Brad said over the microphone thirty seconds into the tune and followed with “Now let’s get back to these fine ladies. Our next contestant, came all the way from Belleville, Illinois, please welcome Kelly.”

Kelly strutted down the steps onto the dance floor and sashayed in a circle. The crowd of mostly men showed their appreciation with catcalls and applause. She moved to the center of the dance floor, raised her left hand high in the air and blew kisses to them with her right hand. They loved it. Then she moved back behind the curtain with the other contestants.

I followed the bouncers with their squirming not-so-tough-now guys to the entrance. Mickey’s buddies were ejected into the parking lot first and were greeted by the cop who patrolled the parking lot. Richie and Louie stood Mickey up and as they did Mickey yelled “You are dead, you motherfuckers.”

Just as he was pushed out the door two police cruisers with lights flashing and sirens blaring screamed into the driveway and screeched to a halt.

“Yeah. That’s what they all say”. Louie replied. “Stay the fuck out of here. You are barred. Enjoy your night in jail, Pal.”

The cops were quick to subdue the three men and place them in handcuffs. Soon they were secured into the back of both cruisers and Richie was briefing the police.

Payback was all Mickey could think about.