The Hitching Post Pizza Pub
Saturday, April 19, Nightfall To Final Call
“Pizza, who would have thought an old west saloon served pizza,” said Jon, easily, finally himself at the bottom of that bottle of fine, blended, Missouri, McCormick whiskey. He felt strong and hungry as he looked up from his seat into Celina’s scandalized eyes, who looked at his lap, and the young tanned hand that rested there, a wedding band on her finger, not quite obscured by his swollen gut, the perfect arm sliding seductively under a silk blouse revealing in each clinging curve a perfect form of a woman.
Her voice whined with disappointment, as if a statue of Aphrodite complained within the sacred precinct at Elis of not having been painted and adorned, instead left to the weathering elements, “Mister Imbolden, this is the New West. Your fighter said to keep you on water—thought you might select what we have in the urinal.”
“Doll,” he said, unflappable in his renewed state, “another round for my friends here, and for Milady, dear,” nodding to the goddess holding his leg and blooming like a yellow rose in the lee of his crag of a nose.
“Oh,” Celina cooed, “Mrs. Watchford, correct,” she bowed to the beauty, whose name kept slipping from Jon’s smoothed-over brain?
“Watchfiord, honey,” spoke the goddess with the voice like satiated thirst, the scent of her hair intoxicating him, “like a Norse Fiord, after Watch. My husband comes from a line of coastal watchmen of the Shielding Lineage.”
She then paused and said slowly to Celina, “Master Watchfiord, darling, I am his youngest wife—the most beautiful. My sisters play on Friday—I, being the bell, enjoy sport on Saturday, while they work at chore.”
“Master Watchfiord,” softly chanted the dyke and the two faɡɡots, all unworthy of names to recall, raising their glasses of Sangria, and saluting their unseen patriarch.
He mused in a way calculated to be heard by his foe’s thirsty herd, ‘I feel worthy again, you spry sprats, and you, you darling lass clutching at my lap.’
Mrs. Watchfiord squeezed his thigh under his tattered jacket hem, creeping more closely to his stupid switch, as like a knowing and most-wicked bitch.
A tear creased Celina’s eye. But, due to her quality, her creasing cheek below stayed dry. Jon stood to her rescue, took Celina’s still fine palm, and kissed the back of her wrinkling hand, “Celina, I am incapable of forgetting your name. Please, wine for Mrs. Watchfiord, no more sangria, Merlot. A meat lovers pizza for me, a small, and, something good and strong to keep off the blight.”
He then slid his hand into his shirt pocket, peeled off two more traitor, mystic bills, and placed them in her dainty hand.
“Oh, Jon, I promised Dan you would get home safely.”
“I have no home, Doll. But my new friends here will help me safely roam.”
She seemed worried and cast a meek glance at Mrs. Watchfiord, the brazen swinger wife attended by an entourage of sexually forsaken shells of animate hunger. Jon pitied them for a moment, then grinned, sat back down and placed his arm around those perfect shoulders and drawled, “Doll, I shall be honored to make your Master’s acquaintance. His taste runs to the angelic, reflected beyond the pale of the mere mortal arts.”
She met his eyes. In those beautiful swirling depths of soothing ocean, he was drawn—and into he dove like Adam seeking Eve! She blinked, recoiling with a peep, but then sighing and returning to her seductive purpose, still in thrall to her Master, now slavishly fearful of disaster.
The dyke reached across the table to take the dainty hand of her mistress, eyes of hollow worry sunken in her puffy cheeks. The hand that met her’s though, was Jon’s whiskey mitten, a relative talon compared to the blunt panda paw he grasped. Seizing and squeezing, he drew the dyke’s eyes into his gaze and mused, ‘Lower than a bitch, golem witch, leave your wine and walk back to east main and howl the snitch.’
Her hand broken and limp, he let it go. She rose and bowed to her Mistress, her hollow eyes darkened with dread tears, turned and walked out of Jon’s bait cage.
The two faɡɡots were shivering in fright. But Mrs. Watchfiord was a twitter with lovey light, smiling up at Jon like he was her very Master, which he nearly was, and petting his crag of a nose with her perfect finger.
Celina returned with three glasses of sangria, a Merlot in a decorative glass, and a short glass of what smelled like rum, “Here’s some Captain in Ya, Jon, since you have turned pirate on Mrs. Imbolden and I.”
She looked questioningly at the empty seat, the glass not placed. Jon took it from her and drained it. Celina was aghast, Mrs. Watchfiord cooing like a smitten lass, and the faɡɡots shivered like reeds caught in a torrid inner wind.
Jon flushed with wineglow, having emptied the glass, and drawled, “Walked the plank she did, yon scurvy lass.”
They all saw the darkness glowering in him. The faɡɡots simpered and sipped, Angel Locks shivered and gripped his hardening thigh, hiding her shoulder under his. Yet Celina, made of some whip-like stuff, judged in voice, “Jon, you are as remarkable a drunk as you are a lovable lunk.”
“Here is to the Island of lost hunks, Doll,” raising his rum glass, a double. He shot that and sighed, “May God bless this place of lonely jest—another double load of grapeshot, Doll. The Captain commands, it!”
“Yes, Jon…”
And so Time kept on as the hunter stepped aside into his sodden hide.
“And a bowl for punch, and the bottle, two Benny’s on the barrel what to feather your dainty nest.”
He remembered to smile as the thing beneath him cooed like a dove and bared her vaulted soul. He peeled off the bills and added—a pitcher of sangria as well, for this scurvy crew!”
“I am Eve, Jon, have dreamed of you,” whispered his sweet prize.
‘Drink, faɡɡots!’ he scourged in his mind, and the two fags tilted their glasses, and mumbled, “Yes, Jon.”
Jon sat tall, felt strong of old, and kept his arm of protection around Eve as she cooed.
Doll brought the bowl, the pitcher and the bottle. The Hunter stood as Eve clung to him, and he announced, “Crew, Doll, Eve, a pact,” and he mixed the sangria from the fag glasses, the bottle of rum and the picture of sangria in the bowl.
Doll whinced and shivered, “Really?”
He shrugged to her and announced, “Doll, bring glasses for any of the other folks about who would like to join us, for the celebration of Christ’s Sacrifice, on this His Passion Eve!”
The fags shivered and Eve clutched, afraid to let him go. Sober now, Jon recalled Ochrecoke Inlet with a wince, yet forged on and found a voice out of old, “Easter Eve—punch is on me!” dipped his rum glass in and shared a sip with Eve as the good Mexican Catholics rose on the instant and gathered around, even some godless bikers asking for a glass too.
He mused harshly, ‘Belly up and drink, dogs, less I skin your hides before Dawn blinks.’
The faɡɡots dipped their wine glasses and saluted, “To Captain Jon Imbolden,” pleasing him that their Master had not forgotten his name.
He returned the salute, “Making sail for Apache Land!”
She whispered, “That’s where I was headed,” lost innocence shining through a tawdry veil.
Continued in Eve.
