“Sure suit yourself.” She acquiesced. “Where’s Mel?” she half queried
“She was right behind me, a moment ago, I thought she had slipped past me and was you, standing behind the bar.” Arleen answered, grinning.
“We don’t normally do the ‘twin thing’ wearing the same clothes, it confuses the heck out of people. The last time was at varsity a few years ago. I guess we just chose to wear the same things today, sorry if it confused you. Oh there you are Mel, are you ready to hear Arleen play?” She asked her sister.
“Do you want John to come too?” Melody asked in reply.
“No it’s ok, I’m sure he’ll come when he hears the music.” She said to her sister before continuing her conversation with Arleen. “Plug yourself in and start whenever you are ready.” She said, while hopping onto the bar.
Arlene plugged in her amp, and set up a mike, and began a few sound checks, noting the readings on her mixing board, and dragging the sliders up a little until the clippings were registering better and making for allowances for the room size. She flicked on the drum machine and set it before launching into of Gretchen Wilson’s ‘Redneck woman’ and followed up with her own bawdy version of Heart’s ‘Barracuda’. She switched to her Hohner and did tribute to Patsy Kline with “Crazy” all the time looking into Melody’s gold-flecked green eyes. She flowed it into Shania’s ‘No one needs to know’ but unconsciously changed the he for a she in the lyrics, for no reason she could fathom. She continued straight into Jennifer Nettle’s and Sugarland’s ‘Baby girl’ Finally she chose the Fender again and ended the set by using her unique talent for mimicking voices to do a flawless rendition of Melissa Etheridge’s ‘I’m the only one’, that, if the artist herself had heard it, would have sworn she had just sung it.
There was a stony silence from the audience of three, a man, who must be John that Melody had asked about, was standing alongside Thelma, they were holding hands. He was well over 6′ with wide shoulders, heavily muscled arms and a narrow waist; dressed all in black, above brown eyes and spectacles, he was wearing a pink baseball cap with Rosécliffs Tavern emblazoned across the front in burgundy. He looked tough and confidant enough of his manhood to wear a pink baseball cap.
Then simultaneously the three clapped. “You are hired!” Thelma said.
Arleen stepped off the stage, and walked towards them, it was Melody who asked. “That was awesome Want a beer?”
“Coors Lite, if you have it?” Arleen answered.
“Canned, bottled or draft?” Melody replied.
“As long as its ice cold, any way it comes.” Arleen answered her.
“Here ya go.” Melody said, holding out a dewy cold bottle.” It’s colder than the draft.” She said pointing to a digital temperature gauge on the draft tap that read 3.5 degrees.
Thelma was all business. “Can you do a six month contract, this summer? Say from the beginning of July? Can we agree to $500.00 a night with three one hour sets, Tuesday to Thursday and $750.00 for Friday and Saturday? Three to four one hour sets from 10.00 PM depending on amount of people et cetera, until we close at 2:20PM, the last call is 2:00PM we can renew it after six months if we are still happy with each other.” She stated before continuing, “Oh by the way, this is John Tompos, our muscle, he’s in charge of security.” She said, punching him left-handed on his enormous bicep, by way of introducing the man holding her hand. He smiled at her, his teeth slightly skew.
“Um sure, six months is fine, and ok, after that, if we can get along, we can talk about an extension. I don’t see a problem with starting then either; it all depends on your Canadian Musician’s Union agreeing to the contract, and their fast-tracking a work permit for me. I have the documentation and a standard contract for us to sign, we can fax them today with it still, but we’ll probably have to wait for any answers. In the mean time I can fly back get things in order back home. If Canadian authorities give us the go-ahead I can be here ready to sing Sunday July 1st, if that’s ok with you?” she said.
She, Thelma and Melody filled in the blanks and signed on the dotted lines, after which John and a blonde barmaid, who had just walked in, signed as witnesses. Thelma and John went off to the office to fax the documents, leaving Melody and Arleen once again together in an awkward silence. “Um John is more than the bouncer, he’s Thel’s boyfriend, and he does a lot for us.” She said “Can I get you another beer? I want one myself.”
“Sure I’ll have one more. If you’re buying” Arleen answered, her words sounded wrong to her, she was dry mouthed and tongue-tied, she hadn’t felt giddy like this since high school…
Melody popped the tops off two icy cold Coors Lites and handed one to Arleen, “It’s my bar.” The exchange took a little longer than necessary, their fingers touching briefly during the exchange. “You sing beautifully.” Melody complimented her while holding the bottle out to her and gazing into her eyes.
Arleen blushed. “I was trying very hard to impress.” She replied softly, while her face turned different shades of red…
“You succeeded, I wanted to sign you after we heard the first Shania Twain song you did, you copied her almost exactly. Come; let me show you the place.” Melody took her by the hand and showed her behind the bar, the kitchen, and both the rest rooms before taking her upstairs. Melody’s touch was electric, her hand was warm and soft,
Arleen found it hard to breath, and she followed dumbly.
The upper floor consisted of a large office at the top of the stairs and what appeared to be two apartments. As they entered the office Thelma and John were definitely not faxing any documents, they sprang apart, hastily, John pulled his hands out from under Thelma’s t-shirt, while Thelma snaked her hand from the front of John’s pants, and pulled down her top blushing profusely. Melody apologized, backing out of the room. She turned bright red and stammered, “I can show you my apartment, if you like, Thel and John kinda like their privacy as you just saw.” She said while unlocking the door to her part of the upstairs living space.
Her apartment was spacious, everything was new, the sitting room was furnished with a burgundy leather suite, and an acoustic guitar was set to one side on a chrome stand. An expensive black faced stereo and surround sound speakers stood alongside a big screen plasma TV that filled a wall. The kitchen and bathroom were neat and functional. Her bedroom was dominated by a huge bed. Altogether it was orderly and clean. It appeared she lived alone in there. They returned to the sitting room, Arleen pointed to the guitar.” A guitar I see, do you play?” She asked as Melody finally let her hand go.
Melody chuckled.” Not as well as you.” She answered. She looked at her watch, “Oh lord! It’s six already, would you like to stay here tonight…?” She turned red. “I mean will you like to hang out tonight, perhaps have supper with me, I mean us, me, Thel and John?” She stammered.
“That sounds nice; sure I’ve no other plans, what’s for dinner?” Arleen asked.
“I was thinking of a fresh salad followed by sorbet ice cream. That’s normally the summer fare around here, you’ve already had your daily burger, or we could send John for subs from Subway or for a pizza if you’re really hungry.”
“Salad and ice cream sounds perfect, need any help getting it ready?” Arleen asked.
“Oh no its fine, it only takes a few minutes, I’ll take it down to the bar, and bring the two love birds down with me, if I can pry the two apart. Normally a few of the regulars drop by even though we aren’t officially re-opened, we never really closed down, if that makes any sense.”
Melody went back into her kitchen, Arleen, a little confused, went back downstairs to find more than a few people had entered as had two pretty servers, wearing the prerequisite pink Rosécliffs Tavern T-shirts. A blonde haired server was popping caps of beer and pouring shots of Bourbon, Vodka and all kinds of spirits as fast as she could, while a pretty red head bustled between tables with a tray full of bottles. Arleen sipped her beer, walked up onto the stage, picked up her Hohner and began the poignant ‘Travelin Soldier’. That particular song always made her feel kind of melancholy and she stayed in that mode by doing a cover of Gary Allan’s ‘Smoke rings in the dark’. She followed it with Juice Newton’s ‘Angel of the morning’ before shaking her self out of an emotional slide by changing to the electric Fender and doing an upbeat cover of Alison Krauss’ ‘You say it best’. By that time the bar was almost full, the crowd was not limited to the young generation, Arleen saw a couples in their thirties and forties and gray haired men in sweaty coveralls standing alongside casually dressed guys in their twenties.
She leaned into the mike. “Hi and welcome to the Rosécliffs Tavern, I’m Arleen Armstrong, I’ll be entertaining ya this summer, so ya’all dance, listen, drink up and have a great time. I don’t mind requests so let me know what you like, if I know it, I’ll play it.” She said to her audience, and seeing Melody beckoning her to a table where her sister and John the loving bouncer sat. She rocked back on her heels a second before picking the Spanish beginning to the Eagle’s ‘Hotel California’ on the Hohner, and substituting Rosécliffs Tavern in the lyrics for Hotel California, her southern accent making it sound like roh-zay k-liffs-ta-verrr-na, instead of hoh-tel cala-forrr-nia and then stepping off the stage and sauntering to the table while the crowd clapped and cheered.
She sat alongside Melody and opposite Thelma and John. “That was really cool, Arleen, thank you.” Thelma said. “It wasn’t necessary, but it’ll be great publicity for when we open. I’ll put an ad in the paper confirming you as our entertainer, if that’s ok?” She asked before continuing, “I like how you changed the words to Rosécliffs Tavern, instead of Hotel California, can you open with that, the way you sing it, fits in perfectly with the tune. You are really talented. Sit and chill with Mel, she’ll get ya back to the motel whenever you like, if that’s ok?” She said.
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