Stephanie
“I need a drink.”
Luca’s voice echoes what I’ve been thinking all day. I’m not an accountant, and spending hours trying to unwind the papers that make up my dad’s shoddy records is enough to make me feel like I’m going to have an aneurysm.
In fact, I’d prefer an aneurysm.
How do I untie my dad and I from this mess? How do I keep us going? Do I even try?
I look at the clock. It’s nearly seven. Close enough to quitting time.
“Good idea. Will you go tell Sabrina to start closing out her register? I have a few things to finish up here.”
“You got it, boss.”
It feels weird hearing Luca call me that — and I know he’s doing it just to tease me over the fact that I’ve hated every other nickname he tried to give me at Reyes Boxing — but there’s a part of me that likes it, too.
Having him here, just knowing he’s been around, has made today one of the better days I’ve had in a long time.
We close the shop in record time and the three of us head down the road to a bar called the Singapore Sam’s. It’s one of the only decent bars in this part of town. Everywhere else has steel bars on the windows and looks like it’s one bad day away from being condemned.
From the outside, Singapore Sam’s looks more like an imitation of a dive. Instead of motorcycles in the parking lot, there’s four-door sedans and even a minivan or two.
Inside, it’s not much different than your average bar. Except for one thing.
“What the fuck is this place?” Luca asks, stepping over a four-inch high pile of peanut shells. “Why is there trash everywhere?”
“Welcome to Singapore Sam’s,” calls out an overworked thirty-something waitress with frizzy blonde hair. “Sit anywhere you like. I’ll be along in a sec.”
We pick a small table back from the bar and don’t have to wait too long for the waitress to come by with three glasses of water and a few menus.
“My name is Alice and I’ll be taking care of you tonight. You all know what you would like to drink?”
“Why is there trash on the floor?” Luca says, as soon as his menu is in hand.
Alice smiles at him. “I take it that it’s your first time here? Singapore Sam’s is a replica of the famous Long Bar at the Raffles Hotel in Singapore. It’s where the Singapore Sling was invented more than a hundred years ago. It’s also where I met my husband, who also happens to be the bartender. Throwing peanuts on the floor is a tradition there.”
Luca looks like he’s about to say something — probably about the sense of throwing your garbage all over the floor — but I kick him gently under the table.
“That’s a lovely story,” I say. “I’ll have the Singapore Sling.”
Alice nods, and Sabrina orders the same thing while Luca orders a beer.
“Luca had a great day of sales today, Ms. Turner,” Sabrina says, once our drinks arrive. “I don’t think I’ve seen Ethel Rosenbloom buy as many things as she did today in a long time. Except maybe the last time Frank took her out for a sales lunch.”
I smile at him. This is one of the first days in a while where I’ve left work feeling like there’s something to celebrate.
“I know. I saw the receipts when I was signing out the register. Thank you, Luca,” I say.
Luca nods and puts his face in his pint of beer. “Don’t mention it. I’m just happy to do my part.”
Still, I wonder: why did the old woman need four dehumidifiers?
“So, um, what did you do before you started working at the shop, Luca?” Sabrina says.
I don’t think Sabrina’s even looked in my direction the whole time we’ve been sitting here. Her eyes are glued to Luca.
“I run a boxing gym,” he says.
“So you’re a boxer? Like, a pro boxer?” her eyes are squarely aimed at Luca’s chest and biceps.
Mine drift there, too. He obviously takes care of himself and his shirt doesn’t do a darn thing to actually the eight pack that leads to the muscular ‘v’ just above his hips — nor do his jeans conceal his curved, muscular ass.
But even with all that to distract me, I most often find myself looking at his face. At the dimples that pop out only when he really, truly smiles. At the way his eyes just seem to burn into me with raw intensity.
And the way his cheeks blush a little bit when a young girl like Sabrina starts fawning over him.
“No, no, doll, I’m not a pro boxer. Just a guy who got in a lot of scraps and found a way to turn it into a bit of cash.”
“So, you’ve been in a lot of fights? That's so cool. Do you still fight?” she says, putting her hand on his arm.
“Boxers tend to do that, Sabrina. It’s sort of their job,” I say.
Seeing her get close to him, even though I know it’s harmless, twinges a bit of jealousy inside me.
Why do I care who flirts with Luca?
“Oh, I know,” Sabrina says, nodding slowly. She’s three-quarters of the way through her Singapore Sling and it’s starting to show that she doesn’t drink much. Her cheeks are beet red. “Can you tell me some stories about your fights?”
I roll my eyes and Luca waves to the waitress for another round for him and I.
He sits back in his chair, throws a handful of peanut shells on the floor, and then settles into a story.
I half-listen, half just watch him.
He gets this far-off look in his eyes while he starts telling his story. His hands clench into fists and he moves in his chair as he describes every punch and slip and dodge of the fight, which suspiciously sounds less like a boxing match and more like a street fight.
Especially once he makes a passing reference to a broken bottle and a trash-can lid.
But still, the way he tells it, it’s like I’m there. I feel the rush of adrenaline as fists come up and punches fly.
Sabrina eats it all up and drinks every last drop of her Singapore Sling. By the time Luca finishes his story, she’s halfway into her second and a deep red blush is creeping from her cheeks to the rest of her face and chest.
She kind of looks like a tomato.
“Wow,” she says. “Wow, wow, that is so exciting.”
Luca grins. “Was. Those days are behind me.”
“Why?” she says.
That’s the same thing I’ve been wondering.
The way he talks about it, he enjoys the rush of whatever it was he was doing.
And he was good at it.
“Yeah, why?” I say, echoing Sabrina.
He shrugs. “Needed a change, is all. It was a good living, but it’s one of those occupations that, when the end does show up, it ain’t pretty. Most guys, doing what I did, don’t last nearly as long me. By my age, they’re usually dead. Or worse.”
I don’t know what he was mixed up in, but it was more than boxing. Maybe it was illegal fighting, or whatever the hell is popular among ripped guys who like to punch each other in the head. I’ve seen more than a few of those guys up in the ER with similar injuries and paper-thin stories about how they got hurt.
Usually, those guys are the skeevy type that make me want to get as far away from them as possible. I can’t count the number of times I was asked to step into the supply closet for a quickie.
Luca finishes the last of his beer and sets the empty glass on the table.
“I’m glad you’re still around, Luca,” Sabrina says, her speech slow and a bit slurred. “I wouldn’t want you to die.”
She’s practically fawning over him, and I’ve got two strong Singapore Slings inside me and I’m ready for my third, and it’s not like I’m jealous or anything, but I’m ready for her to go home.
Besides, she probably should go home. She has to work tomorrow.
I give her a look while Luca’s turned around waiving for Alice to bring us another round.
She gets the hint.
“Hey, so, it’s starting to get late, I’m going to head home. It was nice drinking with you both.”
Luca rises at the same time and puts his arm around her. She leans into him.
Poor girl, she’s going to be feeling it tomorrow.
“I’ll be right back once I’ve got her a cab,” Luca says over his shoulder.
Our next round comes around the same time Luca gets back and he settles into his chair. I waste no time getting into mine. These things are strong and tasty.
It’s been a long time since I’ve been out with anyone. It’s been a long time since I’ve even felt comfortable enough to do anything other than go to work, go home, and do my best to not run into Vladimir or anyone in his gang.
But right now? I feel good. Warm. Buzzed.
I do not want the night to end.
“Just boxing, huh?” I say, stirring my Singapore Sling with my straw and smiling at him.
“I had to make it PG. Didn’t want to scare her.”
“I think you could’ve told her you clubbed seals for a living and she’d be asking you what size club you prefer and if you’ve fought off any polar bears.”
He laughs. “Oh, come on, she’s a sweetheart. Don’t tell me you’re jealous?”
I make a face.
“Not at all. I’m not nearly as naive as she is. I think I grew out of my bad boy fixation by the time I graduated high school.”
“Is that so?” he says, arching an eyebrow and looking at me with a half-smirk on his face. “The good-hearted nurse is too smart to fall in with a bad boy?”
“I most certainly am,” I say, taking another drink of my Singapore Sling and realizing I’ve about finished it off and, even though it’s not the smartest idea, I’m waving for another. “Do you know how many ‘bad boys’ wind up in the ER? How many of them have some ‘tough guy’ story that begins with them telling their buddy to hold their beer and ends up with them in the hospital?”
“From personal experience, I can tell you it’s somewhere between ‘most of them’ and ‘all of them’.”
He finishes his beer and waves for another, too. As soon as it comes, he takes a big, long drink.
Once my drink comes and it hits my lips, I can sense it — this is going to be one of ‘those nights’.
I feel like I’m back where I really belong — at the hospital — just finishing a shift and kicking up my bone-tired feet with some of my co-workers, ready to stay out until the bar shuts down, sharing stories of unbelievable injuries from the job or our time at med school or our stupid teenage crushes or whatever other embarrassing personal stories we can come up with.
I can feel it, and I can tell he feels it to.
This is going be a long night. In the best way possible.
I settle in. Look him right in his green eyes.
“Who are you really, Luca?