Chapter 19

Waking up to kisses is very nice. Waking up to kisses from three women is extremely nice. Zena, Shannon, and Georgia were all kissing me. Zena said, "You were our perfect man last night. You loved each of us just right. It was perfect."

Shannon said, "Georgia and I don't have to get up yet, so leave us so we can get another forty winks. Too bad you and Zena have to go to work so early."

I grumped at the teasing and went to the bathroom to take care of business. Twenty minutes later, Zena and I were dressed and ready for breakfast before going to work. Zena said, "Let's go to the family place and have breakfast this morning before going in."

We took Zena's car and were having some French toast when who should come in but Bert. He said, "Fancy meeting you two here in the morning."

Zena looked at Bert with a sly look, "You're just leaving the park, aren't you? You've been spending almost every night out here with Betty, haven't you?"

"Happily guilty as charged. I think I've found a reason to be a happily married man for the rest of my life. Betty has been everything I didn't think I would ever want. She's so full of life and love, that she makes me crazy in love with her."

Bert joined us having French toast and continued to extol Betty's virtues. He looked at me and said, "Now I understand how you and Zena just melded together. Neither one of you were looking for a permanent or a temporary relationship other than living out at the park. You two fit perfectly, just like Betty and I do. When she asked me if I had any women that were going to be disappointed that I was off the market, I told her the only unhappy people would all be male. She not only understands, but also is fascinated that I've been a practicing homosexual all my life. I don't even know whether I'm even bi-sexual now. All I want is Betty."

I asked, "So you've asked her to marry you already?"

"Nope," Bert smiled, "She asked me, and I said yes."

Zena said, "You cautioned me about going too fast but you're beating my time by months."

"That's alright, Betty insisted on a pre-nuptial agreement so she may have money. I don't care one way or the other as I think this is it for me."

"Are you going to keep your condo or move out to the park?" Zena was curious.

"I'll keep the condo for right now, but we'll see what the future brings. Betty has a nice place on one of the big lots like Tommy has. Since we're going to have the clothes cleaning building up by the gate, there will be more space for us now. I might even build an office for me out there. I'd like that."

We went to work diving into a variety of projects. I finished up the jobs pending for the company and later loaded the Harper's project into the CAD program. I checked off "residential" that has all the features I was looking for, and let the program fill in the blanks and dimensions. I printed out the plans, made a copy, and gave them to the mailroom so a courier could take them to Sam and Martin.

Zena came to my office to get me around lunchtime. She wanted to get Subway sandwiches for everyone at the bar and go there to eat. I called to get the orders before Zena and I headed out.

Shannon and Joanie had some surprises. They had a new bartender and two new waitresses that had been sent over by Sandy. I had to say something dumb so, "Funny how every woman in here, except Jean, likes or used to like women a hell of lot more than guys."

One of the previously hired lezzies said, "We have good taste, don't you agree?"

Zena said, "Well, you'll have to convince these four to change to be bi-sexual. You convinced Shannon, Joanie, Betsy, Maggie, and me, so there must be something good about it. Work on them, Stud, you never know, they might come to our side."

Jean had been listening and said, "You were wrong, Tommy, I was definitely one hundred percent homosexual. It took a cousin to make me a happy bi." Then with a sexy smile, Jeanie said in husky voice, "But then I haven't tried you on for size, Tom, perhaps I should."

Shannon said she was getting everything lined up so her deliveries would start coming between noon and one thirty and soon no one would have to come to the bar until noon. She said she wanted the shifts to be as easy and smooth as possible. She said, "Last call is going to be at seven twenty and I'm kicking people out at seven thirty.

We left the bar and went back to our office to find out Bert was having a meeting of all his key people at two. This left enough time to clear all my other projects, to head by Zena's office on the way to the conference room.

There was a surprise guest. Veronica was sitting in a chair next to Bert at the front of the room. Veronica wore a very tailored suit that gave her an extremely conservative business appearance. It was a very stark difference from her usual flowing, revealing apparel. When two o'clock came, Bert stood and introduced Veronica and began explaining how Veronica and Bert were putting their companies together. The purpose was to not only to increase both of their general holdings, but also to increase the opportunity to increase their occupancy rates. With Bert's management and construction teams and Veronica's sales staff, it should be a win, win situation.

The rest of the meeting was on the logistics of merging the two companies. It had been decided that Veronica's people would integrate into our office area, primarily the sales and marketing group, under Zena's new command. Veronica and Bert both said they were planning on taking more time to be with their families.

Zena and I snickered; knowing that Bert was catching up on a lifetime of lost heterosexuality. We didn't know what Veronica was planning for her "more time with the family."

When it was Veronica's turn to speak, she was very glowing in her praise for the way Bert had managed her properties for the past many years and was ecstatic to now become an active participant of that management. She said her primary function was to bring more capital into the organization and to assist with marketing contacts.

When the meeting adjourned Zena and I was leaving when Bert asked us both to stay for a minute. Soon it was just Bert, Veronica, Zena, and I. Bert told me, Tommy, you own some property connected to a parcel now developed by an established company in the area. Their attorney, Ben Phillips, has approached me to see if you might be interested in either selling the land or entering in a build to suit agreement.

Without having to think about it, I stated, "Considering I want to invest in a restaurant out at the park, I would probably rather sell the land rather than have to make an additional capital investment. Is the property important to me for any other reason?"

Veronica wanted to comment, "The parcel in question is on the other side of the large parcel that you own that adjoins the naturist park where you live. Pauline bought the property in the early nineties when you could steal unimproved land from failing savings and loans. She held on to the two pieces of property for possible growth of the park. The Franks' original purchase surrounded three quarters of the lake and was about fourteen hundred acres. As you know, a tree farm and paper company owns the rest of the land on the backside of the lake. To date, the main building area of the camp has expanded more to the east and north with the trailer and camper area up next to the outer wall bordering the highway. The permanent residents are mostly near the lakefront and on the east side of the recreation area and then there is your group of homes on the near west side. Franks wants to keep the land to the west of you that continues around the lake untouched in natural forest with the existing trails that wander through the area all the way back to Frog creek that spills into the lake and separates his property from the timber farm. You will still own two hundred acres that is directly behind your original lots. The company offering to buy the other parcel will build a fence between the two properties for their security, but it will also ensure the park's continued privacy."

"What kind of development will be built on that land? How might it affect the land that I would still own?"

Veronica seemed to know more of the details, so she answered again, "The company, Quality Wear Clothing, has expanded right up to their property line and needs additional manufacturing space. I don't know how they are continuing to maintain their volume, but they are becoming one of the largest employers in the area. I understand they sell to most of the major companies but have consistently won government contracts for military uniforms. They do a substantial export business in uniforms too. You should know these people because they also own the big golf cart company that makes the funny looking patrol vehicles for the city. It's all sort of part of the big S&S Enterprises."

I thought out loud, "So the property wouldn't house a noisy manufacturing facility and it wouldn't have a lot of people swarming around with their faces pressed up against the fence to see naked people. That might be a good way to get the money for our idea."

Bert asked me, "How much will it take to build and open the restaurant you're talking about?"

"That's the tough part, Bert, I don't know yet. It just became an idea that I'm trying to figure out how to do, as well as get all the numbers together. I'll have to hire some additional outside help, but I have the key people necessary to be successful."

Veronica asked, "Are you going to look for others to invest in the project or are you planning to hoard the entire project?"

"Oh, Veronica," I laughed. "You make it sound like I won't let you play with my ball. Because of the concept, and the treachery of the food and beverage business, I didn't think there would be too many people willing to invest in a project like this."

"You know, Tom," Bert said with a smile, "so far everything you've done that's been an investment has turned out very nice. Your plan to help Betty by building a laundry and dry cleaning facility is a great idea and Franks is already trying to figure out how to build and open a couple of more stores making that almost a strip mall."

Zena had a comment, "The key to anything that is opened inside the park is that it must have a big appeal for the permanent residents. The community isn't big enough to support many stores since everything is available close by outside of the park. A naturist park is not going to have a successful T-shirt or swimming suit shop. It might support a convenience type store that sold some food items, over the counter vitamins, drugs, and first aid supplies.

Zena then added to the ideas, "Actually, I was thinking that I might figure out how to have a suntan and sunscreen lotion vending machine and put it in or at the rec center. If I could find a manufacturer that had a consistent size bottle for all varieties of lotion, then I could get a vending machine manufacturer to build some for me. I could put them at all the naturist parks and at all of the beaches in the area."

Veronica gushed, "Zena, that is a fantastic idea. I wonder why no one ever thought of it. I'm sure there are some of the convenience vending machines that can sell tiny bottle of sunscreen but no machines that are specifically for sun lotions. You could have some scarves and possibly even cute little slouch hats in there too. That is a great idea."

Zena punched me and said, "Take a note; we have to work on that idea."

Bert said, "That hasn't answered Veronica's original question, Tom. Will you consider letting others invest in this proposed restaurant?"

"Since I haven't considered that yet, let me think about it and how it would work. I need to work on the public side of the building and operation some more to figure out how we will operate."

"Your restaurant idea is good as there is going to be some high density housing built across the highway," Veronica said. "S&S is building about a thousand townhouses directly across the highway, and they will have a large condo development just north of there. It's being built mainly for their employees so it will all be local traffic. You'll draw from there plus the other residential areas are all nearby. You should have good traffic."

"Hmmm, maybe I need to think of a more expanded idea for the public side. Perhaps an all day restaurant between a specialty restaurant and a bar/lounge sitting on the other side."

Bert said, "Whatever you end up doing, think about letting some others invest in what you do. There are not many good investment opportunities right now, so we are all looking for a place for any extra capital."

"Okay, Zena and I will do that. Nothing is cast in stone yet."

Veronica said, "I've looked at the projects you've supervised, Tom. You have done a remarkable job. Your two main contractors tell me that they are able to bid jobs a lot closer and considerably cheaper since you've taken over the supervision. They all said your directions and prints are dead on, exact. Bert tells me it's now easier to get additional money out of the lessees when they ask for something extra after we have begun."

"That's my job, Veronica. Bert brought me up here to help Zena with her customers. I hate to say so, but Bert hardly ever gets a real day's work from me except when we're held up on a job over inspections or customer changes. It's a great job."

"So I'm paying you too much, huh?" Bert asked with a smile. "Well, I'm okay with it because I haven't had to ask you for anything a second time since you've been upstairs. You've done a good job settling down the group downstairs as well. Hell, you could work from home if you wanted to; just keep doing what you're doing."

Zena bragged on me, "Veronica, since Tom's been doing the finals for all our build-outs, our vacancy rate has gone from about seventy-six percent to where we are right at eighty-nine now. If I get these next two big deals, we'll be about ninety-five and that will be unheard of. The other major management firms are all complaining that they are all way under seventy percent occupancy."

"I'm happy to be a part of your company now," Veronica said. "Now perhaps I can get some personal attention from your senior engineer."

Bert defended me, "Tom's always been a little stand offish since he's been upstairs. Zena, Bruce, and Andrea have all tried to distract him, but he keeps putting out good work in spite of their efforts."

Zena said, "Come on, Tommy, let's get out of here. It's getting deep. It's time to clean up our desks and for you to get together what ever you need to get everyone busy with numbers at home."

On the way out the door, Bert said, "Did you see the flyer? The Office is having a quarter Bud draft night. I was thinking of stopping by for a beer or two and some popcorn. I wonder what kind of snacks they will have tonight."

Veronica said to us, "I'll stop by for a beer with Andrea."

I cleaned up the last of the work I was doing and straightened my desk. I put everything for the park into my briefcase and headed down the hall to see if Zena was ready.

She was turning off her lights as I came up, so we walked to the elevator and pushed "one." We walked over to The Office after dropping off our briefcases in Zena's car. It was early, not even four yet, so we were astonished when we opened the back door. The place was packed wall to wall.

When we made it to the bar, Joanie, Shannon, and the new bartender were busy. Sometime today, someone had installed a new group of draft dispensing nozzles. There was now a second row of draft handles. Eight more Bud and eight more Bud Light draft handles. Wow, that represented sixteen additional kegs of beer. Joanie was lining up eight mugs at a time and pulling the handles to lock position. Since the glasses were cold and the beer was ice cold, there wasn't as much foam. By the time she was done turning the tap on for the last mug she could turn off the first one off and each one down the line, having filled eight mugs at once. Jeanie was helping Joanie pull the full mugs and delivering them to the waitress service stations.

Jake was good at getting the beer to flow with just the right amount of pressure. It looked like he had sixteen extra kegs tapped for this event.

There were a couple of the big shots from Bud, plus the driver that I recognized from seeing him on a delivery. The Bud people were scarfing the salty peanuts and sucking down the beer. I wonder if they put together that we encouraged our customers to enjoy our snacks.

I also noticed another anomaly. Even though we were near giving the Bud away in our regular twelve-ounce mugs, Shannon and the new bartender were both busy mixing drinks. That means we were making up in booze sales what we were missing in Bud sales.

Zena and I found a place at the bar near the Bud people. Shannon saw us and blew us a kiss, then grabbed two mugs and gave Zena and me each a mug of Bud light. I was really amazed to see the bar so packed at three-thirty on a Monday afternoon.

Shannon leaned across the bar and said, "Talk about good timing, a big brokerage house just announced a big deal and let most of their people out early today. The IBM training center is jammed this week and they just got out of classes to. Hopefully some of these folks will clear out by the time our regulars start showing up. I had Jake bring in two more of his cousins so he has four people plus him working the kitchen and he still isn't catching up because he's swapping kegs almost continuously. He's been in the cooler so much he's wearing a coat and gloves. Hope you don't mind that I put the two on in back, and I've also borrowed two more from Sandy."

One of the Bud people came over to Zena and me while Shannon was talking to us. He said, "Shannon, introduce me, this is your boss, right?"

Shannon said, "Zena, Tom this is Tom Peppin, the distributor. Tom, this is Tom and Zena Parks the owners."

We shook hands and I said, "I only own the place. Shannon is the manager here. She has free reign to do business as she sees fit."

"She's doing a great job, Tom," Tom Peppin said. "She talked the driver into a special promotion and from the looks of things she promoted it just right. I hope we can help you guys do something like this more often. With how we're doing this, you and I are splitting a dime a mug. You won't get rich on Bud sales tonight, but you'll have pushed yourself into a better discount rate for volume. You should plan on a promotion like this once a month to keep your discount rate high. That's what will make you money. I've noticed you're still doing a good LBJ business. (Liquor by the Jigger) Plus, your kitchen is really putting out a lot of food."

While we were talking, more and more people kept coming in filling every chair, with more people standing behind those sitting. Overcrowding could become a problem.

Finally about quarter to five, it seemed like most of the people began paying their tabs and leaving. While one group was leaving, early out office people, our regulars, were arriving. Zena and I helped bus glasses and mugs from the tables, taking them to the back to let the big dishwasher do a quick job.

One of the new girls in the back was taking the freshly washed mugs from the washer tray putting them on a belt that flowed through the big freezer. The mugs came out a little door in the bar one at a time as they were used. Someone had created a great scheme as it was like the conveyor at the grocery store. When a frosty mug came through the little opening it broke the light beam and the conveyor stopped. There was a switch that would let one at a time break the beam and stop until you pushed a button for the next mug or the switch was set for another mug to come as soon as the obstruction from the light beam was removed.

I told Zena I was going to see if the kitchen needed any help and she said she would bus tables for a while to help the waitresses catch up. In the kitchen I was introduced to Jake's other two cousins Melda and Kiesha. They had a pretty good production line going. The waitresses were taking the orders and writing the table number on the order. That way, either the waitress or one of the kitchen people could take an order to the table when it was ready. On the wall next to the big swinging doors was a diagram of the floor with table numbers on it. I washed my hands and when an order came up I grabbed the order ticket and carried the tray with three plates to table twenty-seven. There I asked who ordered what, and was able to give each plate to the right person. One of the other people at the table said, "I didn't think I wanted anything to eat, but could I get some of the tamales?"

Using my pen, I wrote tamales and added "add on" and went back to the kitchen to hang the order on the wire with clothespins. I asked if I should get tamales from the freezer, but Kiesha said, "The big pot on the left has tamales, just take one of the six inch plates, put two tamales on it and take it to the table. That's a fast order."

Since another order came up, I took the next order and the add-on out. I gave table twenty-seven the plate of tamales and went to table fourteen with the multiple orders of chili cheese fries. By the time I got back, two more trays were ready because there were now three people filling orders while Jake was busing tables and filling the dishwasher and the mug conveyor. Before I could pick up the trays, little Jean told me to wait a second. She pulled a giant smock from a stack of clean ones and put the loop over my head then had me turn so she could tie it in the back. She turned me around winked at me and pinched my cheek. We both laughed.

Zena soon had a smock on delivering orders. All of the waitresses loved the fact that Zena and I were busing tables and delivering food orders as fast as they could take orders and serve drinks. This continued until about seven fifteen, Zena took the only pending food order out while I was busing tables for plates, glasses, and mugs.

It seemed that there were fewer people in the bar every time I went back out to clean more tables. Zena and I began washing tables and chairs as we bused the tables, but we didn't put the chairs up.

I heard Shannon calling "Last call" to the last big group near the door who suddenly realized that it was seven forty-five already. None of the group wanted any more to drink or eat, so I could see the three behind the bar working on cleaning up back there. The waitresses had been busy collecting tabs for the tables as people were ready to leave and were now helping clean tables.

I had not noticed that Betsy had come in, changed, and had been serving since before five. She was now working her way from back to front with a long handled duster, cleaning ledges and wall hangings.

The last group left with both Zena and I attacking the tables to clean them. I took both of the bus tubs back to the kitchen and Jake snatched them and loaded the plates, glasses, and mugs into a dishwasher basket and hooked it to the pulley that pulls the baskets through. I asked what I could do and he told me to begin stacking the freshly cleaned glasses in a bar tray and put the excess clean mugs on a large group of shelves for mugs. The place for the clean dishes was obvious. That didn't take long as the dishwasher cleaned and pushed the baskets through quickly.

I noticed that Jeanie was now scrubbing shelves back by the big eight-burner stove and grille while the other two girls were washing over the top of the hood. Jake had taken down the hood filter and was cleaning it with steam from a boiler near a back door.

My next chore was to begin hauling out trash. Even though draft had been a near giveaway, there were eight big bins of empty bottles and other trash. Thank goodness the bins had wheels or I would have had to drag them, as they were so heavy. Straight out the back door there was a small loading dock for deliveries with a dumpster on one end. I was able to just tip the bins over and dump them. Jake had told me to leave the bins outside so he could steam them out before bringing them back in.

The four people in the kitchen seemed to be working well together and I was about to get in their way, so I moved out to the bar area. It looked like it was just about done as they were stacking glasses from the bar trays. Betsy and the girls were finished with the lounge, including the vacuuming, and mopping and were now going over all of the tickets with Shannon and stacking up piles of money from tips.

Zena pulled a couple of mugs and drew us each a beer and came to sit next to me at the bar. She said, "Can you believe how busy the bar was? How many people there were was unreal."

Jake came out of the back and said, "No one will believe this but we went through over forty kegs of beer. We'll have to have a delivery tomorrow. We'll never last the week with what we have left. Even Miller and Bass went through multiple kegs. Miller Lite did three kegs, Bass two kegs, and Guinness even had to have a new keg." He told Shannon, "I made up the food order to fill us up. We're really low on some items like nachos and the stuff that goes with them."

Jeanie was now drinking a beer too and said, "I made up so many of those nacho plates that my fingers are still burning from the jalopenos.

Jake served Melda and Kiesha each a beer and made up drinks or drew beer for the waitresses as they were counting. Shannon had finished "Z-ing" out the registers and had gone into her office. She came back and handed me register tapes with an adding machine tape stapled on it. The total from two bar registers and three waitress station registers was just over fifteen thousand dollars. I showed it to Zena and asked, "How can that be? How can it be so much?" Zena said, "Let's try to figure it, the place has a capacity of three fifty and it was over capacity from the time the girls opened until seven. There seemed to be a good turnover in the crowd, so from three to seven say we had three separate groups of nearly four hundred. All of them didn't spend fifteen dollars or we would have had an eighteen thousand dollar day."

I asked Shannon, "What was a big day when Rita had the bar?"

Shannon grinned, "She always felt good when we did four grand from eleven AM till three AM. You did six the first day in business and have done over four every day with that one day we did about sixty-five. The key to the business is the specials and letting people know about them. Tonight, because we were serving food so fast, people were ordering more. The hard liquor crowd was out in force tonight too. We served a lot of the drinkers a mug of beer and a mixed drink at the same time."

Betsy counted noses and looked at Zena and me. I shook my head no, and then she began counting out tip money. She handed Jake his first, then Jean, Kiesha, and Melda. Next she handed out tips to Joanie, the new bartender, and each of the five waitresses. Betsy said, "I only worked from five thirty to close, so I only took a half share. Are you girls all right with that? Tom and Zena passed on taking a share." They all were standing there trying to fathom how much they had made.

The one girl from Sandy's place said, "This is unreal. We worked five hours and made two hundred seventy-five a piece. If we make a hundred on Friday night either at the P-club or Sandy's lounge and restaurant that's a good night. You even split it evenly with the kitchen and bar backs."

The other girl from the P-club came over and winked at me and gave Zena a nice kiss and said, "Thanks."

Jake and Jeanie were smiling while their two cousins were ecstatic. Shannon said, "If you want, you can all come back tomorrow. I'll have a special but I don't think it will draw like this one. We need everything, even popcorn if you can believe it. I'll come in early and make sure I get the deliveries before three. If you two girls from Sandy's are going to work tomorrow and after that, I need to order you some of our sexy stuff to wear. Oh yeah, all you waitresses go buy a garter so the customers can stick money in them as you go by. Put them as high as you dare. You know some of the guys and girls are going to be feeling around wherever that garter is. So what are you gonna do, girls, continue here? I still owe you fifty for the shift but I have to take money out of it and pay you by check."

Melda spoke up, "So, you mean to tell me that you be payin' us fifty dollars for maybe six hours, plus we gets tips like this?"

Shannon told her, "No, cooks and bar backs make seventy-five a shift because what you do is really hard work. You guys did a good job tonight and probably helped us sell more food and get more tips. We may have too many people for a slow night, but we've been knocking down some big numbers lately. If we have too many people then our customers get served faster and we get the place cleaned up faster. It's all of your choice."

Melda asked again, "You really want us back tomorrow night?"

Shannon said, "Let's try you four to help Jake back there for this week. I may only need two or three of you some nights, but on special nights it takes at least four. Keep in mind, Tom and Zena were waiting tables too. I noticed that Tom was doing all of the food service from before five till close. That helped in the kitchen and the floor. Zena was busing tables and even serving beer. It would be nice if we did this much every night, but it won't happen. We can hope for three big nights a week and work for it, but the other nights there won't be that much."