I’d been in a few dives in my time, but Hal’s Bar took seediness to a new level. The lighting was dim, the air was thick with the stench of high-octane booze and sweaty flesh, and the floor was sticky, so sticky in fact that every time I lifted my foot to take a step, I could feel this gross, gooey suction effect as if the floor was trying to fight me for my flip-flop. The clientele of this watering hole could best be described as “rough.” When I first walked through the door, I could feel a multitude of leering eyes shift towards me. Hugging my purse close to my body, I made a beeline for the bar as I was assaulted from all sides by wolf whistles and anything-but-enticing come-ons, my personal favorite being, “Hey baby, I’ve got a seat for you right here . . . on my lap.” SHUDDER
“Excuse me.” I tried to get the attention of the burly man who was standing behind the bar, drying double old-fashioned glasses with a stained rag.
“He’s over there.” The man didn’t bother to glance up from his task; he just jerked a thumb to the right, where I could see a body slumped over a table. “I tried to give him some coffee, but he wouldn’t drink it.”
“How about a couple of bottled waters?”
“If you want water, it’ll come out of the tap,” the bartender answered gruffly before raising his seen-it-all eyes to mine.
Yikes! Mitch had been right about the mole on this guy’s nose. Not only was it unusually large, it was an unnatural shade of purple. I was tempted to give the man my dermatologist’s number. Instead, I smiled and said, “That’ll be fine. Thanks.”
He filled up two clean (I hoped) glasses in the nearby sink and plopped them down in front of me, sloshing a bit of the liquid on the bar.
I picked up the drinks and carried them over to Mitch’s table. When I got closer, I realized that he was facedown in a bowl of peanuts.
“Mitch.” I shook his shoulder gently after setting the water down.
He twitched before jolting up with a panicked expression. “Huh? What?”
“It’s me, Mitch, Doctor Alvarez.”
He turned towards me and I saw that he had some peanut shells stuck to his face, so I reached out a hand and began to scrape them off.
“What are you doin’ here, Doctor Alderez?” his words were still slurred, but not as badly as they had been when I’d spoken to him on the phone. Apparently, his little “nap” had sobered him up a bit.
“You called me, and I said that I would come and get you, remember?”
“Oh, yeah.” He gingerly massaged his temples as if his head was pounding, and no doubt it was thanks to the bender he’d been on. “I don’t feel so good.”
“I’m not surprised. Here, have some water.” I pushed the glass of clear fluid towards him. “You need to flush out your system.”
He gulped down the water so fast that some of it dribbled on to his stubbled chin. I offered him a cocktail napkin, but he took care of the job with the back of his hand.
“Do you want to tell me why you’ve been drinking so heavily?” I asked.
Frowning, he replied, “I dunno.”
“I think you do. Earlier, you said that you were depressed. What about?”
“Everythin’.” He sank forward on to the table, using his elbows for support.
“After our session this afternoon, I started thinkin’ ‘bout my life and how empty and meaningless it was. Is,” he corrected his verb tense.
“That’s not true.” In a comforting gesture, I placed my hands on his forearm. “You have friends and a very important job . . .”
“I’ve never even saved anyone from drowning,” he confessed.
“That doesn’t mean that you won’t . . . some day.”
“I have nothin’, no reason to get out of bed ev’ry day. It’s hopeless.” He sighed plaintively and laid his head down on his folded arms.
“That’s just the alcohol talking. Liquor is a mood-altering depressant, so it makes things seem a lot worse than they really are.”
Propping his head up on his hand, he said, “I dunno. I was feelin’ awfully low ‘fore I started drinkin’, Roctor Alda—, Alba—, Alma—. Can I just call you by your first name? It’d be soooo much easier.”
“Sure.”
“Good.” He grinned goofily. “What is your first name? No, wait, don’t tell me, lemme guess.”
If I’d let him do that, we would have been in that foul-smelling bar until daybreak. “It’s Pilar.”
“P’lar,” he repeated. “That’s pretty. You’re pretty.”
Yeah, I was a vision with my makeup-free face, finger-combed hair, holey Levis, and unironed pink tunic. The man was obviously suffering from liquor-induced hallucinations. Next, he’d probably tell me that he saw the Easter Bunny hopping through the room.
“That’s very nice.” I humored him. “Now, why don’t I take you home so that you can get some sleep? I think you’ll feel much better once you’ve sobered up.”
“Promise?” He looked dubious.
“Cross my heart,” which I did as I stood up.
“‘kay, I’ll wait right here, and you can bring the car to me.”
“I can’t bring the car in here. The door,” I gestured towards the bar’s entrance, “isn’t wide enough. You’re going to have to walk out to the parking lot with me.”
“Oh, no,” he shook his head, then stopped because the movement was obviously making him queasy. “I can not do that.”
“I’ll help you, and we’ll take it slow. Come on.” I grabbed his hands and tugged on them.
“This is a very bad idea,” Mitch predicted direfully before rising to his feet.
He teetered unsteadily for a moment, but I positioned myself next to him, wrapping an arm around his waist, and that seemed to stabilize his swaying frame.
“Okay, we’re just going to take this one step at a time. You let me know if you get dizzy or feel sick.”
It took about ten minutes of us moving at a snail’s pace, and my body ached from having to support the weight of a 200-pound (at least, that’s how heavy he felt) man, but we reached my Miata without incident. I unlocked the door on the passenger’s side and pushed Mitch down into the seat.
“I don’t think my legs’ll fit,” he mumbled as he gazed down at his long limbs.
“Yes, they will. You just have to bend them at the knees.”
It seemed to be too complicated of a concept for him to wrap his Scotch-soaked mind around, so I did it for him, then shoved his legs into the car and shut the door before he could topple back out on to the asphalt.
I climbed into the driver’s seat and buckled myself in. “Okay, tell me where you live. Mitch?”
His head had fallen forward on to his chest, and he appeared to be sleeping.
“Mitch!” I poked him in the arm, and he stirred.
“Whaddya want?”
“To know where you live so that I can take you there.”
“Ummmmmmm.” He clearly didn’t have a clue.
“Okay.” Holding out my hand, I instructed, “Give me your license. I can get your address off of that.”
“No, you can’t. I moved a coupla months ago, and the ‘dress on my license is the old one.”
Fantastic.
“But I’m pretty sure I don’t live far from here.”
“Alright, good. That’s a start. Now, think hard. Can you remember the name of your street?”
He scratched his chin while he pondered my question.
“It starts with a U!” he exulted a few minutes later.
A street that started with a U in that area of town? I couldn’t think of a single one.
“U, U, U, U, U, U,” Mitch kept saying the letter over and over in an attempt to jog his memory, “Euclid! That’s it! I live on Euuuuuuclid.”
That was just a few blocks over, thank goodness. I shifted the car into gear and steered it in that direction.
When we got to Euclid, I drove up and down the street several times as slowly as I could while Mitch hung his head out the window, looking for a familiar sight. He had me stop at an apartment building in the 1400 block, then decided on closer inspection that it wasn’t the right one.
“Are you sure about this?” I queried after parking on the curb in front of a five-story white stucco building surrounded by large palm trees.
“Oh, yeah, definitely, this is the place.” He opened the car door and staggered out on to the sidewalk.
I came around and offered Mitch a shoulder to lean on. I got him to the front door of his apartment building without much trouble, but had to struggle to maneuver his tall frame through it.
“This is nice,” I remarked conversationally as we passed through the lobby, which was decorated in a style my sister Ana liked to call “Florida Cheap” with lots of white wicker furniture, tacky watercolors on the walls, and indoor-outdoor carpet in a hideous shade of blue.
“No, it’s not,” he begged to differ. “You’re just bein’ p’lite.” He might have been smashed, but he was still astute.
We’d reached the elevators, so I stopped and hit the button with the UP arrow on it. The doors slid open, and I thrust Mitch inside, forcing him up against the back wall of the small, enclosed space. The minute I removed my hand from his chest, his body began to slide down. I caught him under the arms and with some effort, maneuvered him into the corner, where he had walls on either side to hold him up.
I was now panting from all of the exertion. Hauling inebriated men around town was better exercise than spin class.
“What floor’s your apartment on?” I asked in between labored breaths.
“The third. No, the fourth. No, the third. I’m in 3B. B for Brewchannon. Get it?” He seemed to be very pleased with himself for making that association.
“Okay, third floor.” I punched the appropriate button on the elevator control panel, and the doors closed.
“Here we are,” I said a minute later when we reached our destination, slinging one of Mitch’s muscular arms around my neck and dragging him out of the elevator by sheer force of will. Fortunately, apartment #3B was only a few feet away, so I didn’t have far to go with my cumbersome load.
“Keys?” I prompted.
“Keys?” He stared at me stupidly.
“To unlock your front door.” I pointed at it.
“Oh, yeah,” he chuckled as if his own obtuseness amused him, “they’re in my pocket.”
“Well, they’re not doing us any good in there. You have to pull them out.”
“You can do it.”
“I am not sticking my hands in your pants’ pocket, Mitch.”
“I don’t mind.”
“Well, I do. Now, give me your keys, or I’m going to leave you here in the hallway,” I said in a tone that brooked no insubordination.
“Awright.” He shoved his hand into the right front pocket of his snug Levis and rummaged around.
“Wanna Tic Tac?” he asked as he extracted a tiny white breath mint.
“No, I want your keys,” I reiterated with growing impatience.
“‘kay.” He popped the Tic Tac in his mouth and almost immediately started to make horrible, gagging noises. I was about to administer the Heimlich when he spit the mint out on to the carpet.
“Lint,” he explained, making a disgusted face.
I sighed wearily. “Try the other pocket.”
He found the keys that time and proceeded to waste several minutes trying to insert one of them in his front door’s lock.
“This is hard,” he complained.
“That’s because the alcohol is impairing your motor skills.” Nudging him to the side with my hip, I took the keys out of his hand and was able to get the door open on the first attempt.
Mitch stumbled over the threshold and would have ended up kissing the linoleum in the foyer if I hadn’t grabbed the back of his shirt. “Be careful,” I cautioned him, not wanting to spend the rest of my night in the ER while a doctor bandaged up his broken nose.
I flipped on the light switch in the foyer and got my first look at the interior of Mitch’s apartment. There was a small kitchen with a breakfast bar to the left and beyond that was a decent-sized living area, which was dominated by a huge black entertainment center. Big-screen TV, DVR, DVD player, stereo system, Playstation, Mitch had all of the electronic gadgets that were staples in every bachelor pad I’d ever visited. He was also a slob like most of the single men I knew. There were clothes and shoes strewn all over the furniture and floor, dirty dishes in the sink, and empty food and drink containers pretty much everywhere.
I put my foot down on a bag of potato chips that’d been hiding under a discarded t-shirt and heard a loud crunch.
“Are ya hungry?” Mitch inquired. “I could eat. Mmmmmm, Apple Jacks.” He noticed an overturned box of the cereal lying on the breakfast bar.
“That’s probably not such a hot idea,” I counseled, but that didn’t deter him from scooping up a handful of Apple Jacks and stuffing them into his mouth.
He was guaranteed to vomit now.
“You wanna tour of my ‘partment?” Mitch mumbled as he chewed.
“Maybe some other time.”
“I gotta view,” he made a sweeping motion towards the sliding glass doors on the other side of the room, “of the pool. I swim there ev’ry mornin’. Fifty laps.”
“That’s very impressive.”
“Thanks. I also like to— ohhhhhhh.” He dropped the box of cereal and clutched the side of the breakfast bar.
“What’s wrong?”
“The room’s spinnin’. I feel like I’m on one of those Whirl-a-Tilts. Make it stop.”
“You need to lie down. Where’s your bedroom? That way?” I indicated the hallway to my left.
“Uh huh.” He looked like he was about to toss his cookies.
“Just lean on me,” I said, once again slipping my arm around his waist.
As we made our way down the corridor, past a half-bath and a storage closet that had all kinds of sporting equipment spilling out of it, I murmured encouraging things like, “We’re almost there,” and, “Just a few more steps.” I pushed open the door to his room and saw a California King bed with rumpled black sheets and a black-and-tan comforter with geometric shapes decorating it.
“Okay, sit,” I told Mitch, and he lowered himself down cautiously on to the side of the bed, while I held on to his arms.
“Good, now I’m just going to fluff up a couple of these pillows . . .” I heard him fall back on the mattress with a groan.
“Mitch!” I crawled over to him. “Are you okay?”
He gazed up at me through heavy-lidded eyes. “My head hurts . . . a lot.”
“Hang in there. I’ll be right back.” I scooted across the bed, then climbed off the other side and went into what I presumed was his bathroom.
The smell of wet towels told me I was right before I even turned on the lights. “Yuck,” I muttered, crinkling my nose with disgust when I saw the used bath towels piled up on the floor. No doubt there was mildew in the shower, too, but I wasn’t going to look. Some things were better left unconfirmed.
I opened the narrow linen closet located in the corner of the bathroom, intent on finding a clean washcloth. There were a few of those located on the middle shelf, along with towels and sheets. The entire bottom shelf was stocked with an assortment of what else? Condoms. Outside of a drugstore, I’d never seen so many condoms in my life. He had boxes and boxes of them: Latex, Sheepskin, Lubricated, Ribbed, Glow-in-the-Dark, Spearmint Tingle, Twisted Pleasure . . . that was a new one on me. I reached for the box so that I could investigate further . . .
“Hey!” Mitch called from the bedroom, and I started guiltily, knocking several condom boxes to the floor.
“Coming,” I shouted back as I scrambled to gather up the fallen prophylactics while chastising myself for snooping and being such a klutz.
After I’d returned the boxes to their designated shelf, I wetted the washcloth in the bathroom sink. Conveniently, there was a large bottle of generic aspirin sitting out on the counter, so I grabbed it and headed back to my sloshed patient.
“Here, take a couple of these.” I placed two white tablets in Mitch’s hand. “Do you need some water to wash them down? I didn’t see any glasses or cups in the bathroom, but I can go to the kitchen and—”
“Nah, this is fine,” he assured me, putting the pills in his mouth.
“This should help your head.” I placed the damp washcloth on his brow.
He closed his eyes and a relieved smile played across his lips. “Mmmmmm, that feels good. I ruv you, P’lar.”
Huh?
His eyelids fluttered open again. “I mean, I luv you.”
I laughed uncomfortably and began to back away from his prostrate body. “You’re drunk, Mitch. You don’t know what you’re saying.”
He snatched my hand and pulled me back towards him. “You’re right. I am super duper drunk, drunker than I’ve been in years, but that doesn’t matter. I still know how I feel. I luv you.”
“No, you don’t.” I tried to wrest my hand from his surprisingly tight grip. “You’re confusing gratitude, or maybe admiration, with a stronger emotion. I’m your doctor—”
“And you’re a grrrrreat doctor. You give the best a’vice; you really do. You said I should stop sleepin’ ‘round and look for a high-quality woman. And I looked, P’lar, I really did, but nobody’s got more quality than you. You’re smart annnnnnnd kind annnnnnnd bee-yoo-tiful.”
“There are plenty of smart and kind women in the world—”
“No,” he moved his head from side-to-side, “you’re special. You unnerstand me.”
“I was trained to understand you, Mitch. It’s my job. It’s what you pay me for.”
“You said that if I opened up to a woman and showed her what was inside, I’d be pleasantly s’prised by the ‘sponse I’d get. Well, I’ve been toooootally honest with you and you’ve seen the real me, sooooooo . . .”
Oh, God, how did this happen? How did all of the sound, carefully-worded advice I’d doled out to this man over the last few months come back to bite me on the ass? This was every psychologist’s worst nightmare. I needed to reestablish my authority and take back control of the situation pronto.
“I think we should continue this conversation at your session next week.”
“But you’ll forget that I luv you by then,” he protested.
“I promise I’ll make a note of what we discussed and place it in your file.”
“Mmmmmkay, Roctor Alderez. I am kinda sweepy.”
“Can I have my hand back?” I queried as his eyes started to drift shut.
“Sure,” he said drowsily and released it. Then, I jumped off the bed and bolted for the door of his apartment as if I was being chased by the hounds of hell.