I had a conversation with him once when we were both still sober that went something like this:
“If I see something I like in a bar,” he said, something his pronoun for the girls, “I tell her I want to bar fine her. If she says no, I turn to her friend, because they always got friends around, and I offer to bar fine the friend, and promise her an even bigger tip than I would have given the first girl.”
“And that works?” I asked, knowing that it probably would, but disapproving of anyone who would try it.
“Nine times out of ten the friend’s sitting in my lap two seconds later.”
“Good for you,” I said, unable to hold the sarcasm from my voice.
“Look, it’s their job, right? So if they don’t want to do their job, fuck ’em.”
“You’re an asshole.”
He shrugged. “I’m here to have fun and get laid as many times by as many girls as I can. If a girl doesn’t like my sense of humor or the way I’m treating them, someone else will. I’m not trying to win any nice-guy medals. This is my vacation, and when I’m on vacation, my heart stays at home.”
I doubted he had a heart at home, either, but the sad thing was, he was right. There was always a girl who would take his money. Most of them knew what he was like going in, so they didn’t care. But occasionally he’d hook someone who expected him to come back for her, and she’d stare in shock when he came back to her bar and took someone else.
“Ladies, ladies. There’s plenty of Rudy to go around,” he said.
He was still surrounded by the mob. No matter how big an asshole he could be, he still fascinated the girls. Several of them were squeezing the muscles on his arms while others grabbed at the bits of chocolate candy he was handing out.
I glanced around the room to make sure no other customers were being ignored. The only other guy in the place was sitting in one of the booths, cuddled up next to Wilma. So I put on a big smile and walked up to the crowd.
“Rudy,” I said. “Welcome back.”
“Hi, Jay.” He thrust a hand at me, nearly taking Rochelle’s head off as he did. I grabbed it and gave it a quick shake.
“I heard some screaming and thought maybe we were having a riot,” I said.
“Everywhere I go is a riot.” Rudy laughed at his own joke. “I was just giving a couple of these little beauties bicep rides. Come on, girls, let’s show him.”
He held his arms out, angled slightly downward. Two of the smaller girls, Tessa and Noreen, wrapped their hands around his biceps, Tessa on the right and Noreen on the left. Slowly, Rudy moved his arms upward until both girls, their legs bent at the knees, were dangling above the floor. Rudy continued raising his arms until he looked like a bodybuilder holding a pose at a contest. Both girls screamed as he began twisting at the waist, moving them back and forth.
After he set them back down, I led him over to a booth. Several of the girls followed, piling in around him on the bench. Isabel appeared beside me ready to take his order, so I asked, “Something to drink?”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“Any preference?”
“This is the Philippines, so a San Miguel, of course.”
Isabel was about to turn and retrieve his drink when Rudy said, “Hold on there. Not so fast.”
She turned back. “Yes?”
“Let’s see.” He looked at his temporary harem. “Lady drinks for her, her, her and her.” He pointed at a different girl each time. “But not for her,” he said, gesturing at Lamie. “You stood me up last time. So you’re out.”
Lamie gave a halfhearted laugh and looked around, uncertain.
“I’m serious,” he said. He flicked his hands in an outward motion. “Shoo. Find someone else, because you aren’t drinking from this well.”
One of the girls, Veta, leaned over and whispered something in Lamie’s ear. Lamie looked past her at Rudy, then got up and left.
“What did you tell her?” Rudy asked.
“I told her she should just go,” Veta said. “That you weren’t interested.”
“Good girl.” Rudy looked back at Isabel, pointing his thumb toward Veta. “She gets two lady drinks.”
“Anything else?” Isabel asked.
“Get yourself a drink, too,” he said with a wink.
“Thanks,” Isabel said. She turned and headed for the bar.
“Who’s that?” Rudy asked me, as if none of the other girls were around.
“Isabel?” I said. “You never seen her before?”
Rudy started to shake his head, then stopped. “Didn’t she used to be a dancer?”
“For a while.”
“She’s fine,” he said.
“She have boyfriend,” Veta said.
“Really?”
“Yeah. She no go out on bar fine.”
“That a fact?” he asked, looking straight at me.
“Afraid so,” I told him.
“Too bad.” His eyes lingered in Isabel’s direction a bit longer than I would have liked.
Rudy stayed for another hour, judiciously handing out chocolates and occasionally starting tickle fights with Veta and the other girls. But when he left, he left alone.
“I don’t like him,” Isabel said to me.
I was standing near the bar, talking with Cathy and keeping an eye on our meager crowd, but I didn’t have to ask her who she meant.
“Something happen?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said in a way that told me the opposite.
“You gonna tell me?”
“Not important.”
“Tell him,” Cathy said.
Isabel frowned, then told us how Rudy had offered to bar fine her. She told him no. But ten minutes later, he asked again. When she told him no for a second time, he said he wouldn’t accept no for an answer, and that before he left to go back home, she’d go out with him.
“What did you say?” I asked.
“I said that I was sorry but I don’t go out with anyone. I am just a waitress, I tell him. ‘You cherry girl?’ he ask me. I tell him that is my business. Then he laugh and not bother me anymore. See, it was nothing.”
Isabel smiled confidently, then left to get drink orders from a new group that had just arrived.
“I think maybe it was more than nothing,” Cathy said.
“So do I,” I said.
It turned out to be a slow night all around, and by three a.m. we’d seen the last of our customers. I waited a half hour before officially closing, then told all the girls who remained to head home and get some sleep.
By this time Cathy was basically living with me. She still shared an apartment with a couple of girls from her province who worked at the Bang-Bang Club, but she was seldom there. Our routine was to close everything down, make sure everyone was gone, then lock up and take a trike home.
I’d gone into the back for a minute to turn off all the lights. When I returned, I found Cathy talking to Isabel and Noreen. The tone of their conversation seemed serious.
“Everything okay?” I asked as I walked up.
They immediately stopped talking and looked up at me.
“Well?” I asked.
Cathy glanced over at Isabel, as if she was waiting for her to say something. But Isabel remained silent, so Cathy said, “He’s out there.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. It had been a long night and I wasn’t connecting the dots.
“The big guy,” Noreen said. “You know, from earlier tonight.” She held her arms out like a bodybuilder.
“Rudy?” I asked.
“Yes,” Noreen said. “I see him out there. He ask me if Isabel leave yet. I tell him yes, but I don’t think he believe me. So I tell him I go back inside and check.”
I looked at Isabel. “Have you gone out there yet?”
“No,” she said.
“Okay. Noreen, you come with me,” I said. “Let me do the talking.”
“What will you tell him?” Isabel said.
“That you’re gone.”
I put a hand on Noreen’s shoulder and could feel her trembling slightly under my touch. “It’s okay,” I said. “I’ll deal with him. You can just go home.”
Cathy unlocked the deadbolt for us and opened the door so we could exit. Manny Aznar, who’d appointed himself my personal ride-home driver, had parked his trike right in front of The Lounge, just beyond the sidewalk. He jumped off his seat the minute he saw me.