Chapter 9

Peg brought out the new register for her shift at the bar, replacing the male bartender, a once lover in high school until he discovered he was gay. He was one of the few afternoon bartenders she trusted with the count of his register. She knew skimming happened, though hopefully not too much, but probably trusted Dennis more than any of the others.

Scanning the customers, of which there were few, she did a double take on a tall black woman looking at the juke box. Despite the summer dress with the hem near the top of her long, lean legs, unlike the much more provocative, skimpy, body hugging outfits Peg had seen her in, she recognized Belle.

“Dennis? Could you watch the bar for a bit?”

“Sure,” Dennis said and took his position while Peg walked over to Belle.

“Hey,” she said to Belle’s back, causing Belle to turn around.

“Peg,” Belle half smiled. “Lovely bar.”

“Thanks.”

“Interesting choice of music.”

“It’s a choice,” Peg shrugged.

“Speaking of choices,” Belle said, pulling a wallet from her designer purse and a dollar from the wallet and feeding it in. “Sammy, Billie and Nat. Let’s put some color into this place.”

Peg chuckled. “We got some Ink Spots too,” she pointed.

“Ah good,” Belle pressed the buttons. “Where’s this upstairs Merc was telling me about.”

“It’s sort of a mess. Well not sort of. It is a mess.”

“Can I see?”

“You can try. Give me a minute to find the key. Buy you a drink?”

“An old fashioned?”

“Sure.”

She ordered for her. “Anything she wants, it’s on the house,” she added.

Dennis nodded.

“You’re a tall drink of water,” Peg heard Belle say.

“Thanks I guess,” said Dennis.

“Twenty years younger and a bit more muscle and you’d have been right up my husband’s alley.”

“You can tell,” he asked, since Dennis wasn’t all that fey.

“Always. It’s a talent.”

“So how do you know Peg?”

“Cause I’m black?”

“Because I’m one of Peg’s oldest friends.”

“Sorry. Kind of automatic, especially in towns like this.”

“I guess we’re pretty white bread mostly.”

“The nearby prison doesn’t leak out onto here?”

“By and large, those released head back to the big city.”

“Doc’s an exception.”

“Doc?”

“Sorry. Harry.”

“I suppose he is. He’s made Peg happy, which hasn’t happened since ... It’s been a long time.”

“He’s a good man.”

“He is.”

“Found it,” Peg announced, and Belle followed her to a door that blended into a wall which had been put in to cover the stairs. The lock proved sluggish, but Peg managed to open it. Amazingly, the bare lightbulb still worked when Peg switched it on, the switch at the back wall just before the stairs started.

“Both the stairs and the upstairs floor were built sturdy,” Peg informed Belle.

“Another time.”

“Rumor had it some rich builder wanted it safe for his favorite whore,” Peg said. She slid things aside or lifted and carefully piled things to give a narrow pathway upstairs.

It was so piled up that Belle had to ask, “How many rooms?”

“Four.”

“Think we could see one?”

“If you don’t mind helping.”

They lifted and piled until they had access to the door, which opened out, and with a pull, gave them access to the small room. A string hung from a bare bulb, and again the light turned on. Peg noticed the corner of a bed frame. “I thought I remember us getting rid of the beds,” she said. “Maybe just the mattresses.”

“A single it looks like,” said Belle, moving things out of the way.

“Not a lot more room for something bigger,” Peg commented.

“Enough for single use,” Belle chuckled. “Help me with this. It’s heavy.”

Unlike the cardboard boxes in there, most split at the corners and some spilling out their content, this one had been built with wood, plywood, so not so heavy in itself, but its contents made it much heavier. What felt like treated canvas had been sewn at the corners so as to create a cover for the box. A flower, predating Georgia O’Keefe but with a similar reminder of a vulva, had been painted on the sides of the box and on it’s cover, along with the words, vad du vill. Peg had to see the contents.

“Holy shit,” she said.

“What?”

“Harry has to see this. It’s like a graphic history of vad du vill, and I mean graphic.”

“What’s vad du vill?”

“It’s whatever you want in Swedish, the sort of mission statement for this place.”

“Kind of like my place,” Belle chuckled.

“Harry and I noticed that too.”

“What are the cops like here?”

Peg understood. “Not incorruptible I imagine. The chief’s an old friend.”

“How much of a friend?”

“An intimate one, though it’s been a while. Probably more interested in younger flesh.”

“Nothing wrong with your flesh my dear.”

“Back at you.”

A brief gaze of interest broke when Belle looked at the window. “Think you can open it?” Belle asked.

“I can try.” Peg crawled over things and pulled. “Nailed shut. The building built pretty close to us, like there’s not much more than a walking path between us.”

“You think I could see anyway?”

“Fuck it,” Peg said and removed her t shirt of a local Minnesota band given to her. She spat on it and rubbed, creating a blurry peak through.

“Could be worse,” Belle decided.

“Early twenties brick. No façade of course, but it’s quality work. Best of all its got air ducts rather than windows.”

“Peeping toms,” Belle chuckled.

“Yep.”

“So what do you envision?”

“We should probably bring Harry into it.”

“Humor me.”

“Chrissy, whom you met...”

“Which one?”

“The more petite one.”

“The spinner.”

“That’s the one. She’s a chef, and a very good one. I’ll show you my office and what we can do with it to make it a kitchen.”

“Go on.”

“So the Vaudeville will start serving food, along with catering. I was thinking of using these rooms as a sort of deception.”

“What sort?”

“Ostensibly it would be like having a special food thing with the bed with some sort of table on top, like you’re eating in a Wild West whore’s room. Like the server would be decked out in old fashioned whore costumes or something.”

“But?”

“But it could also actually be a bed, and the faux whore could actually be a whore. And not even being dressed old fashioned, but in whatever lurid sexy outfit she wants.”

“I wonder how much soundproofing we’d need so it could be both.”

“Probably not enough, but the actual whorehouse could be later or even earlier, just dinnertime it would be the faux thing, maybe 5:30 to 8:00 or something.”

“Interesting. This whole wild west motif...”

“Yeah. I’m not into transforming the bar into a wild west thing with fucking tinkling pianos or fucking My Darling Clementine on the juke box.”

“So up here would really be the theme part.”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe that box holds the answer.”

“Just art on the wall. Maybe that’d work.”

“You could place it on the wall in front of the staircase, and along the stairs.”

“Like this part is the museum part.”

“Yep.”

“That’ll work. You want an estimate?”

“Get a contractor to help with all the bullshit government crap.”

“Of course.”

“Make sure you get the licensing for food.”

“I will.”

“And spend whatever you want.”

“I’m sorry to ask this, but partnership or are you looking to own.”

“Strictly silent partners. My kid will set up the shell that gets you the money. For obvious reasons you’ll always be the face and the owner. I’ll look into a contract, if it’s necessary, but I’d just prefer a handshake.”

“You have one,” Peg lifted her hand and they shook until Belle pulled her into a hug and kiss which lasted long enough to excite both of them.

“I have an apartment over the bar,” Peg told her.

“Let’s see this future kitchen first.”

“It’s along the way.” Peg grinned.

“You might want to put your t shirt on first.”

Peg chuckled and did so.

She stopped to ask Dennis to stay another half hour or so. “Let me let Brian know,” he said. “Go on,” he chuckled.

Peg showed Belle her ideas transforming the office space. “Have an architect draw it up,” Belle recommended.

“I will.”

“Apartment?”

“Follow me.”

Reestablishing the kiss from earlier, they left the proverbial trail of clothes leading to the bedroom. Belle ended up being the best cunnilinguist Peg had ever experienced, and like Harry often did, ignored the sensitivity to drive her to a second orgasm, but added a third before Peg demanded a turn. Belle became a vociferous guide to the maximizing of her pleasure, which Peg didn’t mind in the least because it enabled her to return the favor of two intense orgasms. Belle decided to beg off a third. “I should probably go,” she said.

“Shower first?”

“Sounds good,” Belle grinned.

Despite several kisses, including breasts and some suckling of nipples, they managed to wash away the sweat and pussy juice they’d generated without lingering all that long.

Once dressed and after a brief hug and kiss, they headed down, separating at the bottom of the stairs, Belle to her car, the usual Escalade, though Peg didn’t know if it was the same one, and Peg to her bar to finally relieve Brian.

A brief rush had Brian stay a few minutes longer, and after, he asked, “Who was that?”

“Intense, wasn’t she?”

“Just a tad.”

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to be mysterious about her, the less said the better. Is that okay?”

“Mums the word. Can I tell Brian?”

“About the crazy, hot black lady? Sure. Maybe don’t mention the tour.”

“Something about some changes.”

“The less you know the better.”

“That concerns me.”

“Don’t be. She’s lending a helping hand.”

When Dennis nodded and smiled, Peg patted his shoulder. “Thanks.”

When things quieted, she called Harry. “Good news.”

“Tell me.”

“Busy?”

“Just drawing some self-portraits.”

“Really?”

“For the film. Old me, or me me I guess, and younger me which takes a bit more imagination.”

“Any photos when you were a kid?”

“Frances might have some. You?”

“There’s a box. My family was never into albums. And speaking of boxes, Belle stopped by, and she’s in.”

“No Lizzy required?”

“Thankfully not.”

“Great. Something about Belle’s box?”

Peg laughed. “If you mean her pussy, it was rich and flavorful.”

“Ah.”

“And she outshone you I’m afraid with what she did to my box.”

“Perhaps you gleaned some lessons.”

“It might have been her endless tongue.”

“Well I do have something even longer.”

“True,” Peg laughed.

“Uhm, you at the bar?”

“No one this side of it.”

“Good.”

“Anyway, we checked out upstairs.”

“The whorehouse upstairs.”

“Yep. And there was this box you have to see.”

“Tell me about it.”

“There’s stories and like comics and maybe some newsletter type thing that the vad du vill must have had at some point.”

“Tijuana Bibles,” said Harry.

“What’s that?”

“Dirty comics from the thirties or around then. But this sounds earlier.”

“There’s some historical stuff in there too.”

“Cool. I’ll come down when I’m done staring at myself.”

“Maybe Chrissy can cook something for us?”

“You want her to come to?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll let her know the good news.”

“A new kitchen with bad guy money.”

“Yep. See you soon.”

“Can’t wait.”

Harry finished his drawings and went looking for Chrissy to tell her the good news. He found her in the basement doing some dusting, mostly taking down some cobwebs with a duster on a stick while waiting for a load to finish drying. “Need any help?” he asked.

“Just doing the job I’m hired for as long as I have it,” she said.

“Your diligence is noted,” Harry grinned. “You’re hired.”

“For what?” she smiled back.

“Running the new kitchen at the Vaudeville. Belle stopped by and she and Merc are in.”

She tossed aside her duster and hugged Harry. “That’s great!” She hopped into his arms and the hug became a kiss, while she ground her jeans covered groin into his emerging erection hiding in his khaki slacks. She loosen her grip at the end of the kiss and he let her slip back onto her feet.

“Sorry, I just started my period,” she told him.

“It would be a bit messy here,” he said.

“You’d fuck me while I’m on the rag?”

“It would leave cunnilingus out, but my girlfriends would still get horny.”

“Best lover ever,” she grinned. “Maybe I’ll take you up on it sometime.”

“Anyway, Peg found some box with some cool stuff from the early days of Vaudeville.”

“Just what you wanted!”

“Yep. So I’m going to head over there and I thought maybe you could cook us something to bring over.”

“Sure. I can make some for Tom before we leave. I’m invited aren’t I?”

“Of course.”

“Oh man, that’s amazing. I should bring something to draw, to start thinking through how I want it set up.”

“You can use my pad.”

“Good idea. I saw you drawing in your room. I didn’t want to disturb you to pull off your bedding, so...”

“You could have.”

“I had enough to fill the washer.”

“Then you can wash the stain out,” Harry smirked.

Chrissy giggled. “So what were you drawing?”

“Pat wanted self-portraits to work into the movie, me now and me when young. I guess I’m supposed to scan them and email them or something.”

“I think Frances has a copier that would work, but you’d need her password to access her computer. Maybe you should get a setup like that so you could copy your drawings into a computer file, maybe put a book together or something.”

“Merc said the same thing, and I told him I mostly gave my stuff away. He has some, and Frances has a bunch with the writings on them which I guess influenced this whole movie. I’ve still got a few...”

“And you’re creating more. And also you’re talking about writing a screenplay. You need to get yourself a computer, and with a copier and a printer you’ll probably want something beyond a laptop.”

“Sounds like I need an office.”

“It’s not like this house is hurting for rooms.”

“Peg’s got a guest room, but you’ll probably end up using it.”

“I wouldn’t mind sharing with your office.”

“You’d be distracting.”

“I would!”

They laughed.

The drier buzzed.

“Let me help you fold,” Harry offered.

“Thanks.”

They folded and brought things up to their proper closet. Chrissy showed Harry Frances’s office. “Why don’t you go ahead with your meal and I’ll call Frances,” Harry suggested.

“Sounds like a plan,” Chrissy grinned, giving him a kiss before skipping off downstairs.

It didn’t surprise Harry that he had to leave a message for Frances, figuring she’d be busy at her shoot. He didn’t even bother bringing in the drawings.

Chrissy shewed him out of the kitchen so he knocked on Tom’s office, hearing his music, some demented folk music this time. Tom had an affinity for everything sixties, including folk, blues and some out there rock, along with what he called cowboy music, which was mostly country but more Texas than Nashville. Oddly, though his first impression was Tom was an asshole, since then they jibed more than expected, including the music.

Tom was leaning over a coffee table appropriately reading a coffee table sized book. “What’s that?” Harry asked.

“You got me thinking about history, not the official shit but all that shit underneath,” Tom explained. “I did a lot of that kind of exploring regarding my home area.”

“Some of your plays reverberate with that,” Harry said. “Like modern settings but with like ghosts of the past. And not the past of like gunfights and cow drives or rustling or whatever. More like the loneliness of settlers out alone in their little homes trying to scrape a living from the dry earth.”

“You got that hunh?” Tom chuckled. “I was actually checking out old whorehouses around Minnesota.”

“Planning to steal that too?” Harry smirked.

“Honestly I like working with you.”

“I get top billing this time.”

“You know my name is getting this made.”

“I do, and I’m only half kidding. I imagine you have an inside in publishing.”

“Nothing recent except new editions of my plays. I get more from residuals from putting my plays on. None of my plays recently have had much legs to get published or for residuals for that matter.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“You’re interested in publishing.”

“A couple people have suggested putting my drawings into a book. I thought maybe I could tie something to the movie.”

“That might just work. I have the originals in a file and a computer file of them copied.”

“Using Frances’s copier?”

“I’ve got my own, but Frances’s is better. It’s wider format and designed for copying art instead of a manuscript or something. She actually bought it because of your drawings.”

“Sorry to put her out.”

Tom chuckled. “It’s not like she can’t afford it. But no, she thought she’d keep things fresh that way in case something were to happen to your work. Anyway, let me show you this.”

Harry sat beside Tom on the sofa and Tom slid the open book in front of Harry. It showed what must have been an earlier incarnation of the vad du vill, wooden instead of brick.

“I bet those are ancestors of Peg!” Tom exclaimed.

“And their whores,” Tom added.

“The place must have burnt down and replaced.”

“Probably got burnt down.”

“Probably. What’s it say?”

“Not a lot. Mostly saying there was whorehouses back in the settler days. The book’s mostly about some whorehouses in the Twin Cities around the early part of last century. I found this podcast about historic Minnesota crimes and they talked about the whorehouses and this book, so I ordered it. It’s published by the Minnesota Historical Society.”

“Interesting. What’s a podcast?”

“It must be weird, like waking up two decades later.”

“It’s been a major culture shock to be sure. I’d get magazines, like gossip magazines just to keep up with Frances, those I scanned through and gave away, and Wired so I’d keep up with Tech.”

“I don’t think Frances was much gossiped on.”

“I found that out, and stopped that dreck, but anything more high minded that your plays might be discussed or something would have made me too elite to bear. Something like Variety might have been okay since everyone digs Hollywood, but a trade like that was too expensive. Frances finally got me a subscription to the New Yorker and that had reviews that kept me up to speed to some extent.”

“A podcast is like a radio series about something in particular,” Tom explained, “or it can be like Sixty Minutes with some variety, but it’s almost always about true things rather than fiction. One of the better ones is This American Life which also broadcasts on public radio.”

“Like Prairie Home Companion?”

“Except that was more of a variety show with Garrison Keillor’s stories, like a more old fashioned radio show. Most people seem to prefer facts rather than hear, like the old radio programming like the Shadow. Not actually seeing things and not stimulating the imagination with sound effects goes beyond our abilities. We can watch shows now, and most radio is a variety of music, so...”

“I think I get it,” Harry replied unconvincingly.

“Let me play the podcast I was talking about.”

“Okay.”

Tom got up and went to his laptop on his desk. He found the show and played it, Harry finding it a bit dull but listenable.

Sometime into it, his phone rang. “Frances,” he reported, answering it while heading out of the office, glancing back at a sad faced Tom.

“Hey,” he said. “Can you talk?”

“I’m sitting and waiting as is the norm,” Frances chuckled. “How’s it going?”

“Good. You?”

“Enjoying the evil bitch, and you’ve made your comment.”

“Then no need to repeat it.”

“Asshole,” she laughed.

“I’d like to use your copier. Pat wants me to send some of my drawings via email. I have no clue how things work and I guess I need to get your password.”

“We’ll have to get you computer literate. Max can help you out when she gets home from school.” Frances and/or Tom had assigned what could be gender neutral names, Maxine becoming Max, and Robin for the son, though he insisted he be called Rob. “She’s the hacker in the family.”

“I thought hacking wasn’t a good thing.”

“Then it’s good she’s into graphic art. But she knows how to cull things from surprising places for her animations.”

“Like collages?”

“Yes, just like that.”

While they talked, Harry collected his drawing pad from the “sunroom” and headed with it to her office.

“Rob still not got the creative gene?” Harry asked.

“Still got plans to become president, something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, some of whom have been presidents. But he’s becoming a jock too.”

“Baseball?”

“Soccer and Lacrosse. I made it clear he’s not bashing his precious head in for football. I guess he figured a president with a bashed head wouldn’t work. Turns out he’s a pretty gifted athlete.”

“Is that a mother talking?”

“I guess he scores a lot.”

“On the field.”

“I don’t know about off the field.”

“He’s a good looking kid.”

“Just a year into finding out girls are interesting. Maybe starting to find out politicians like their mistresses.”

“Power seems to have that effect on guys, and girls find it an aphrodisiac.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m ready,” Harry reported.

Frances guided him through copying and sending the copies to Pat.

“I’m going have to get me one of these,” Harry sighed once they finished.

“Maybe wait for Max unless Peg knows her way around them.”

“I’ll ask her.”

“I should go.”

“Thanks.”

“Always, little brother.”

When Harry came down with his pad, Chrissy was bringing Tom his food. Returning to the kitchen, she divvied out the meal into three containers.

“Ready?” Harry asked her.

“Yep.”

Harry drove them down to the bar in his new car. Early in the drive, Chrissy told him, “Susie called me last night.” It had been a couple days since Harry had met Chrissy’s youngest sister. “I think she’d been contemplating all those confessions we made. We hadn’t really talked much before, at least at that depth. When I still lived at home I guess I played her mother, asking about school and volleyball and things like that. When I moved out, I called every once in a while just to keep in touch, or she’d call me about a recipe or something. But we never talked about sex, and that was the topic. She wanted details, from how I zeroed in on a guy, to negotiations, to the actual sex. In turn I asked her about her experience which ended up to be slight, just one of her fellow volleyball players at the beginning where they experimented to the point that they gave each other head. It turned out the young woman was bi and a senior and wanted to bring her jock boyfriend into things and that broke them up since Susie wasn’t interested in the guy, finding him crude joking with his jock friends about nailing girls, including her, and thought her temporary girlfriend was probably using her as a lure to get on the guy’s good side. So she went after the class dyke who’d been eyeing her for awhile and that went better. But that too got weird with the girl wanting to get clingy at school after Susie told her she didn’t want to be outed. She felt guilty about that because she liked the girl, and the sex had been amazing, although part of that, the girl wearing a strap on and fucking her, she figured out maybe she liked getting fucked and maybe the real thing would be better. The breakup had been recent.

“So then the conversation shifted to you and Peg with even more details. I told her before about older men and older women, how sometimes it took focus to let how age, the softening of the belly, the flabbiness, the stretch marks, not be a distraction, instead focusing on the benefits of a longer lasting fuck or some skills at cunnilingus or the thrill on their faces to get to fuck a young attractive chick. She wanted to know how it was in your case, and I told her I found both of you purely attractive, nothing about either of you disrupting that attraction. I went through our first time, and I could hear that she must have been masturbating and I decided to just send her the video of it.”

“And you being her sister didn’t bother her?” Harry asked.

“Apparently not. She called back a few minutes later, recovery time I think, and asked when she could come over! Then she apologized realizing you’re my boyfriend and girlfriend, so I told her how hard you got just checking out her body, and how I rode you in the backseat when we headed home.”

“She’s sixteen,” Harry reminded her.

“Going on thirty, and she’ll be seventeen soon, in fact around Memorial Day. I invited her to Frances’s place to celebrate.”

Harry shook his head. “With Bob and Dave there. They know I’m an ex-con. What would they think of me going for jailbait?”

“What I think is it’s none of their fucking business.”

“You really think this is a good idea, because...”

She settled her hand on his growing erection. “A part of you thinks it is,” she giggled.

“The devil in me,” Harry muttered. “Tell me why you think it’s a good idea.”

“Having you as her first male lover, and with Peg there? I just wish Lizzy had you instead of Tom, though I guess that went well. I was even thinking of inviting Lizzy, but of course Frances will be there.”

“Along with her kids who are about to be confronted with their separation. But that brings up another possibility.”

“What?”

“Maybe Susie and Frances’s kids get along. Robin’s about Susie’s age.”

“The son? What about Max? You think she might be into girls?”

“I have no idea,” Harry chuckled.

“From the pictures she’s cute.”

“They’re both good looking kids. And no, I’ve only seen pictures too.”

“You want to pawn her off on Robin? The point is for her sexual education, and even she thinks it’s what she wants. Boys her age don’t interest her.”

“I guess Robin’s a bit of a jock, but Frances says he’s very serious about his studies and generally.”

“Serious as in no sense of humor?”

“It’s a concern. She kind of wishes he’d lighten up.”

They arrived at the bar, parking on the side street a half a block down. It was fairly busy for an early Friday evening, payday Harry figured with older middle class workers drinking at least some of their earnings, mostly men, but an occasional lone woman and a sprinkling of couples.

Frances invited her lovers behind the bar and got a quick kiss from each, Chrissy handing off the container of chicken Caesar salad with crusty bread dampening in the dressing. With Frances nodding permission, Harry grabbed an Old Style and poured a Leinie for Chrissy before heading back to the office. While they ate, Chrissy scanned the space and once done wandered about, exploring. Harry left her the drawing pad and, grabbing the key with a post it note on it, went back into the bar.

“You should finish training me so you can take a break,” he said to Peg.

“It’s my job,” she smiled. “Go on upstairs.”

He nodded and gave her a kiss before going to the door leading to the stairs and working it open.

He made a space for himself on the dusty floor, taking the canvas cover off the wooden box and went through its contents as if glorying in a pirate’s treasure. He thought he could make piles for things he was interested in and things he wasn’t, but he ended up interested in everything. Instead he divided it into writing, photos, drawings and comics. The last thing seemed to be something the vad du vill sold, pornography to take home after a visit. The photos and drawings looked to be similarly available as well, and there was a set of slides, the images all depicting what he figured were the whores there in sexy dishabille, the clothing not covering the important parts, the tits and the pussies. A few were even stereoscopic! There was fucking and sucking in some, the faces of the men often not seen, though an older man with a substantial belly was less shy, and a rather handsome young man.

The picture he had seen in Tom’s book was also there, this time labeled, the older man in the pornography ending up being the owner and the younger man his son! It seemed the son, Nathaniel, had been a creative one, his initials on the comics and the photographs. The drawings had different initials, and he matched them possibly to a handsome woman in the group photo, dressed much more properly than the whores who were labeled by first names only and probably their whore aliases. Both father and son looked younger than in the pornography, the father not nearly as stout and the son in his early teens.