What’s in a Name?

Looking back, I’m not sure how the friendly challenge began. My first guess would be the night of my thirtieth birthday. The night I asked a question one too many times. My outgoing boyfriend had promised me a “special surprise”. Then we ended up at Stonewall Saloon as usual. That night, I’d been abandoned by my best friend and business partner, Felicity, who was working. Our gang of friends from the Bay Area was also absent. I was in a funk sitting at the bar teasing the big, bald bartender and playing Poor Me with shots and pints. So I’d asked the one question that had been bugging me for a long time. “What’s your name? Your real name?” “If I tell you, I might have to kill you,” the bartender with the tag proclaiming him to be “Alex” said. He wasn’t smiling. He hardly ever smiled. Wait a sec. This was a new answer for him. I wasn’t as quick on the draw as I’d been earlier in the evening. I blinked at him and probably looked like a baby owl. A baby owl who’d soaked up a brewery or two. What he said was a joke, right? He wouldn’t really kill me, would he? Or wait. Were we playing “Who said this famous line”? I was too far gone tonight to be absolutely sure if what he’d said was a joke or a game—or if he was serious. All I knew was I was here and confused. And drunk. So very, very, very, very drunk. Over the past year or so, I’d seen this handsome bartender wearing numerous nametags, all with different first names on them. At first, I thought I was imagining it. Then when I was sure, I asked him his real name. He always reflected. Deflected. Whatever. Tonight, deep in my misery, I’d asked because I really wanted to know what his real name was. Again, he turned it into a joke. It didn’t look like my wish to learn his name was getting granted. Even if it was my birthday. Didn’t he owe me something as the birthday boy? “Right, Alex.” I sighed into my beer. “You know what? You’re already killing me.” I took a breath, letting the alcohol fumes go from my mouth back through my nose. “Alex,” or whoever he was, had become my only friend tonight like he’d been a lot of nights for the past few months. I’d come in happy and ready to celebrate. Now a few hours later, I was wallowing and throwing the biggest pity party on the planet. “Alex or whoever you are, I’ll have another one.” Alex glared at me, like he wanted me to wake up and smell the…well, not roses. Not here. “Jimmy, my friend, he isn’t worth it.” Tell me something I didn’t know. “Yeah, I got it. You’re right. So can I have another beer? No, wait. Make that another shot. Let’s party.” His glare turned a little soft. He shook his head. No more beer? No shot? Or maybe no, he didn’t know what to do with me? Or no, he didn’t get it. Yeah, well, join the club. I didn’t get it either. A beer would help clear things up. A beer and his super secret name. I couldn’t forget my goal. My birthday present to me was finding out his first name. Tonight he wasn’t playing. He wasn’t in a chitchat mood. Something was bugging him. He was being surly, a big meanie. Well, that made two of us. Dammit, after all this time, sitting in front of him at the bar and chatting, I was getting seriously drunk and seriously serious. I sighed. The alcohol fumes made my stomach rumble. I got it. He didn’t take me seriously. Nobody did. In this whole bar filled with gigantic, hairy, rambunctious guys, I looked like a matchstick. People say I’m a lightweight, a twink I guess they’d call me behind my back. I’d just been publically dumped by my boyfriendoommate or at least left hanging by him. On my birthday, no less. I was feeling very naked, very vulnerable. All I wanted was to know something real about my only true friend tonight. My s**t ex-boyfriend’s name was Alex, which was what made me ask bartender Alex what his real name was. They couldn’t be both named Alex, could they? Alex, Alex, Bo Alex, ALEX. God, I hoped not. For a little over a year, Alex the s**t and I had been coming to Stonewall Saloon. While we were here, we always seemed to end up fighting. He would sit with me at the bar, we’d order drinks, and then after a few minutes, he’d turn to me. “So who do you think’s the best looking tonight?” “Why? What does it matter?” “It doesn’t. I’m just wondering.” Most of the time, he’d wink at me at that point. “You always gotta keep your options open.” Then he’d get up and wander away. Most of the time I’d sit at the bar and talk to the bartender, the guy in front of me now. Most of the time, Alex the s**t Alex would find someone and cozy up to him. He’d always go home with me, but still. My boyfriend said I should be friendlier, get to know the natives, show them what city guys were like, on and on. I sighed. No love hit me in the face, only alcohol fumes. I focused on the bartender who said he might have to kill me. He’d never threatened me before. Usually we got along real well. So it had to be a joke. Right? Why wouldn’t he share his first name with me? He’d carded me before. He knew I was aware some people had shitty given names. After all, my real first names are King and James. But I just tell everybody to call me Jimmy. Bartender Alex was a real cutie—a bear, a bear wearing his uniform of a leather vest over a white T-shirt and ass-tight jeans. Tonight he’d added a scowl, though. He was acting like he didn’t want to serve anyone, even harmless old me. He had a really bad attitude going as he kept glaring over to where Alex was tonguing somebody who wasn’t me. My usually friendly bartender would look at me, sigh, and shake his head, which didn’t help my heartache any. This old-timey bar was located in a Northern California foothills nowhere, a suburban oasis east of San Francisco. A cluster of old mining towns circled a fashionable oasis of Home Depot and a mall with clothing boutiques, ear-piercing kiosks, a food court, a movie complex, and other gotta-have things. The mall sat in a ring of a gazillion look-alike housing complexes that were sprouting up like mushrooms around it. The mall also serviced four dying mining towns and tiny Stone Acres, all left over from the Gold Rush and passenger train days. Stone Acres was different because it had turned the wood and brick buildings along its main street into a touristy “Old Town”. A couple of restaurants, a few souvenir shops, some essentials like a hardware store, hotel, farm and ranch supplier, sheriff’s office, municipal park with a bandstand, post office, barbershop, and this old saloon looked almost like they had during the late 1800s. Stonewall Saloon had been in the bartender’s family for generations. Or that’s what someone told me. Maybe the bartender. My best friend Felicity and I had moved here from the Bay Area and got a good deal to open a coffee shop called Penny’s in the mall. Speaking of which, where was Felicity tonight? Shouldn’t she be celebrating my birthday with me? I looked down at my phone to see the time. Oh, yeah, the last movie hadn’t let out yet, so Penny’s was still open. “Just one more,” I begged the bartender everyone called Stone. I refused to call him by the saloon’s nickname. “I won’t even ask about your name again,” I added with a slight burp, or maybe a hiccup. He just stood there, shaking his head and frowning. I gave him sad cat eyes, you know, the kind Puss in Boots gave Shrek. My friends say I do it really well. It didn’t seem to be working on him. I sighed. The alcohol stench again went from my mouth through my nose. My stomach rumbled louder. Nobody and nothing was a happy camper tonight. “Aren’t we friends?” I asked. “I thought we were friends.” Okay, maybe I was whining now. “Can I see your keys?” he snapped. “Huh?” “Your keys? Let me see them, Jimmy.” I fumbled with my pockets. My wallet and a couple pieces of paper fell on the floor. I bent to pick them up while trying to dig out my keys. I tripped and landed on the floor. I grabbed my wallet just as my keys popped from my pocket. Both went flying. The bar floor smelled worse than my breath. My stomach was getting unhappier by the second. A sturdy hand under my arm helped me up. “Alex?” I asked. “Yeah, sport. Let’s get you a ride and on your way home.” “I can drive. No problem.” My words came out a little mushy but, I thought, understandable. Maybe not. Wait. Did I even have my car or had Alex driven us in his? I looked around, trying to find him in the crowd. Had he left with the other guy? Just like that? Would he leave me? The hand under my arm was gripping me too tight now. I tried to shake it away. Did I really want to go back to the apartment Alex and I shared? The one I’d been paying most of the rent on recently? Alex’s big surprise was to dump me at a bar? What the hell? “I need just one more beer. Juss one more.” I blinked up at the bartender. “Oh, yeah. And your name, plish. Um, yeah, pleash.” “Not happening, Jimmy, my friend. You’re going home.” “Can’t go home. I don’t wanna see Alex. I’m done with him,” I said to the hand that had pulled my arm next to my mouth. “Going to sleep in the car. Sleep it off. Off it sleep, A2.” I had a car somewhere, right? I could just sleep in it. Off it sleep, I will. I giggled at how Star Wars I sounded and repeated it. The hand got me pulled up onto the barstool. I tried to sit on it but overshot, almost going down again. My stomach gurgled. I giggled. “Whoa! The barstool shrank, uh, shrinked. No, um, shrunk.” I glared at it. “Naughty barstool. Don’t do that.” With a little help from the hand, I tried a third or fourth time, but the barstool was even smaller each try. I turned and looked at the guy, who was still holding me by the arm. He was out from behind the bar and standing next to me. I couldn’t remember seeing him without the bar hiding his body from his waist down. He was quite a bit taller than me. The hair poking out of the top of his T-shirt was nearly in my face, but since my head hung down, his tight jeans and his prominent bulge were all I could really see. “I could blow you,” I muttered, watching his bump jump. Then I giggled again. “Your d**k jumped.” I started laughing. The contents of my stomach were even less happy with laughter. They took offense and rose to punish me. “Oh, God, I’m gonna….” Then I was zooming across the nearly empty bar. My head was pushed over a toilet, where everything let fly. Not better. Definitely not better. In fact, I felt worse, much worse. A hairy hand roughly swiped a wad of toilet paper across my mouth. “How’re we feeling there?” I started to shake my head, but more beer left me. A nap sounded good afterward, so I started lowering my head. Only the hairy hand again swiped across my mouth. Then I drooled, and the hand with toilet paper was back again. “I gotta go,” I slurred, trying to stand. “Sleep in car.” The toilet next to my head flushed. I winced. Were all toilets so loud? Jeez, where was a silent toilet when you needed one? “I gotta go,” I repeated as the hand and his friend, another hand, lifted me under my arms. I stood and stared at the guy’s hairy chest. His n*****s were erect, so I swiped my tongue over the closest one. “Oh God. Yuck. Stop.” He dropped me with one hand as he started swiping at his n****e with the toilet paper. “Jeez, Jimmy, that’s gross.” Oh, yeah. I’d just vomited. He was right. I was being gross. “Sorry,” I said, trying to wipe away the saliva on him. “Gross, gross,” I muttered, missing his n****e and running my fingers along his chest hair instead. “Sorry. Too gross.” Then I purred because his hair was so soft and cuddly warm under my hand. I peered up at him. He was still scowling, but this time he looked gorgeous. “You’re beautiful.” I brought my hand up to his bearded face. He reared back as if I were going to spit on him. “Oh, no you don’t, Jimmy. Not until you’re cleaned up and sober.” He straightened me to nearly standing and pushed me along, letting me stumble away from him and back into the sink area of the bathroom. He turned on the water and grabbed a couple of paper towels. After wetting them, he ran them over my face. The cool water felt wonderful. So I purred again. When I opened my eyes, his n*****s were rigid. This time I didn’t try to touch them, though. He tossed away the paper towels without looking at me, grabbed another couple, wet them down, and ran them over his face, then his chest. Before I could say anything, he was marching me out of the bathroom to one of the tables. The bar had only a few people left in it. The quiet of closing time sounded weird. “Sit, Jimmy.” He pushed me gently into a chair. I did. Or maybe I collapsed. I was so tired. So very, very tired. “Stay, Jimmy.” His voice came from a long way away. He put my arms on the table. I tried to nod, but my head thunked down onto my arms. A nap. A little nap seemed like a good idea. I wasn’t going anywhere, not until after a little nap. * * * * Is there anything worse than waking up with a really bad hangover? The answer, I found out that morning, was a solid yes. My particular hell was waking up in a strange bed with someone lying next to me, who was snoring away so loud I was surprised the neighbors weren’t complaining. What made it all worse was I had to pee really, really bad, and I didn’t have a clue where the bathroom was. I lay on my back taking stock. I was naked, covered with a beige sheet and navy blue comforter in a huge bed, my head taking up most of the California king space. Where the heck was I? I had no clue. I really didn’t care because I was hurting so badly, it’d probably be better if whoever lived here would just shoot me and put me out of my misery. Still, I had to pee, so I slowly swam to the edge of the bed, trying not to move any body parts. Which was a complete failure. I ached all over. Had someone beaten me up? As I reached the side of the bed and peered over the edge at the floor a few stories below, I groaned. Where was the ladder to climb down to the carpeting? I clutched the edge of the bed with one hand and rolled to my side. “Hey, where you going, Jimmy?” I hadn’t noticed the snoring had stopped until the voice boomed in my ear. Carefully, I turned my head. The Stonewall Saloon bartender with the nametag of Alex last night was peering at me over his chest of hair. His eyes were squinted. A slender beam of light from a gap in the curtains was aimed at his face. “Bathroom. Pee.” I sighed. “Gotta pee.” “Right.” He groaned and caused a tidal wave on the mattress even though it wasn’t a water bed. My body reacted to the seismic quake and my stomach protested. I swallowed back the rising pain even though I knew my gut had nothing left in it to come up. I felt large hands under my arms. “Right this way.” His voice clanged from one of my ears to the other. He turned me, and we marched to a doorway and into the bathroom. Carefully, he lowered my nude body down onto the toilet. “No spilling.” He turned away and walked into the hallway. I pushed my limp d**k between my legs and did my thing, not spilling a drop on the bathroom floor or the toilet seat. Then I rested my arm on the sink counter next to the toilet and put my head on my arm. “Nope, no snoozing here.” His voice boomed. “C’mon. It’s way too early for this shit.” Again arms lifted me. After I balanced myself, one hand left. The toilet roiled. The hand returned. “We’d usually wash our hands,” the voice murmured through me, “but I think we’ll skip it this time.” Back in bed, covered, dry mouthed, I decided it was again nap time. * * * * The next time I woke, I was awake. Awake awake. Oh my God, where in the hell am I awake. s**t, I’m in big trouble awake. Where are my clothes awake. I took inventory. No pain in the ass. That was a relief. No smell of semen. Check, and another sigh. No aches and pains that weren’t directly related to way, way too many shots and beers, check. No clothes. No clothes? I was okay, pretty much, other than naked, hungover, and in a stranger’s house. Damn it, I was thirty years old, naked in a stranger’s bed, with only a hazy recollection of what happened after my now former boyfriend Alex stranded me at the Stone Acres’ historic saloon. I had a hazy memory of the bartender helping me to the bar bathroom the night before and this morning. So was I at his house? If so, how’d I get here? “Um,” I tried to say, but my mouth was glued shut. I reached over to feel the side of the bed. Still there. Then I reached over to the other side. Nothing. No one. Okay, I was alone in a strange bed as my memory filtered back online. I had been an ass, and the bartender with the faux name of Alex had taken care of me anyway. I owed him my firstborn child, should such a thing happen to me now in my boyfriendless state. I owed Alex the bartender everything, including my pride and gratitude. What I really needed to do was apologize for causing him so much trouble. Slowly I sat up and then stood. My knees protested, so I sat back down and then tried again. This time my knees cooperated. I walked around the room, looking for my clothes. Even my underwear would do. Seeing nothing and not wanting to open the drawers of the chest against the wall, I snuck to the doorway. I heard a faint rustling sound from down the hallway. I shuffled toward the noise as quietly as I could. Alex the bartender was sitting on a huge leather couch looking at a magazine. He wore sweats but no shirt and looked so damn hot I had to blink. “Good afternoon,” he drawled. “How’re you doing?” “Thank you so much.” I wondered for a second if I was getting my words backassward. I continued anyway. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how I can repay you. I’m really sorry. Thank you. Thank you.” I looked down since he was staring at me with rapt attention. I was still naked. My hands went to cover my junk, but it occurred to me that he’d obviously seen all of me. So what was the point? Instead, I stood as tall as I could, given the hangover headache. I probably looked like I was facing a firing squad. “Thanks. I owe you big time.” “Yeah, not really.” He put the magazine on the coffee table in front of him. He stood, making me flinch back and hang onto the wall. “You don’t look like you feel so good. How about something to drink?” “Water?” my reedy voice pleaded. “Coffee?” He gave me the once-over, a little smile hanging around his lips and eyes. “Yup, water. Lots of water,” he answered. “Maybe a little electrolyte boost, too. Let’s see what I’ve got.” He walked past me, grabbed something, then doubled back to wrap me in an afghan. While my shivers subsided, he helped me sit in a huge Papa Bear recliner. I leaned back, closed my eyes, and heard him rustling around in the kitchen behind me. As I sat there and relaxed, memories of the night before began to flood my mind. All the hazy images filled out and bloomed in living color. I saw Alex dump me for some beanpole stranger. I saw the guy sitting on the stool beside me telling the bartender I was about to hurl. I felt the bartender whisk me away to the bathroom so I could upchuck there and not on his vintage bar. Finally, sitting at a table and putting my head down on my arms. Then nothing until I woke earlier this morning. I was thankful, very, very thankful. If it hadn’t been for the bartender, I don’t know what I would have done last night. My supposed boyfriend and I were sharing a two-bedroom place neither of us could afford to rent as a single person. The apartment overlooking the pool would have to go. I had to find a one-bedroom for myself. Not in that pretentious location. Maybe somewhere in town here. A small house to rent maybe. I opened my eyes and looked around the bartender’s place. Minimal but nice. He was into modified Harley guy living. He had a huge screen TV, a leather couch and matching recliner, a coffee table, two end tables, a rag rug, a couple of lamps, all the necessities. His bed was really big and really comfortable. My apartment in San Francisco could have fit in his living room. At the repeated sound of clinking glass, I clutched at the afghan and stood up. I shuffled into the kitchen, looking around, and collapsed in a chair at the table. Again, the room was minimalist but nice. Older appliances, wooden table, four chairs, and an outdated coffeemaker. A great looking butt was in the air as the bartender dug through his refrigerator. I still didn’t know the guy’s real name. It annoyed me even though I knew I didn’t have a right to be annoyed by him. He was my savior after all. “Um, yeah. I hate to be a bother.” He snorted like he was holding in a laugh, but he didn’t stand up. I was staring at his sweat pants-covered butt crack and getting just a little hard. I had a thing for bears, and he was the most luscious one I’d seen since moving to the foothills. “Look, I was wondering if you have any French dark roast? Actually, French pressed would be better.” He stood, turned, and stared at me. “I shoulda known. You’ve told me enough times you’re a barista.” He handed me a cold bottle of water. “I can’t find any power drinks. You’ll have to start with this.” “No French roast?” “I don’t know. Does your coffee shop deliver?” I laughed. “I’ll put that on the list of things to do. Thanks for the water. You really don’t have to do this. If you’ll just tell me where my clothes are, and my phone, I’ll get dressed and call a cab.” “A cab? Here in Stone Acres?” He laughed. “Good luck with that.” He looked down at my d**k as it made the afghan rise. He grinned a wickedly sinful smile. “Kinda like your reaction there. I guess you’re starting to feel better.” He walked toward me, and I knew I was in the best kind of trouble. I gulped down the bottled water, liking where I thought his intentions were going. I’m not against hook ups—at least I hadn’t been a couple of years ago in the city before I moved out and started hunting for love instead of lust. So far love hadn’t worked out. Maybe I should be going back to lust for a while? I gave him the once-over again. I stood, letting the afghan fall. “See anything you like, baby?” he asked. I c****d my head as my d**k pointed to its preference on its way up to full mast. “Yeah.” I peered at him from eyes to crotch and back again. “But you don’t want this body until it’s showered and my teeth are brushed.” He looked momentarily surprised. But his d**k seemed to be taking everything in stride, filling out the front of his sweats and then tenting them. “Okay,” he said in a voice that challenged me, “you’re on.” And we were.