…
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet--and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
…
The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, T. S. Eliot
*
Vegas, for me, is a necessary evil. Three or four times a year, for too many years than I care to remember, I have schlepped west to participate in trade shows and conventions. I go, I give my talk, I press the flesh, I grip and grin with the rest of the people in my business, and I come home. But it is tiresome and if I don't appear too enthusiastic, it is because I am not.
Having made arrangements for this particular show rather close to the deadline, I found myself staying at one of the less elegant hotels. Ah, but it's just a place to sleep. In this case, a place that is somewhat convenient, being located at the end of the monorail line.
It was Thursday about 9PM. I was getting off the monorail at my hotel after returning from an early dinner with a client at Le Provencal at the Paris..
One my way across the ramp I saw two thirty-ish ladies walking together toward the train entrance - one little mousy girl in jeans and the other, a very sexy dark woman in a dress. The dark, thick, lady was staggering badly. I instinctively thought they were together.
The dark girl with the short hair really could not hold herself up. She staggered into the fence a couple of times, spilling a little of her drink on herself with each stumble.
So, being the meddlesome asshole that I am, I asked the mousy chick if her friend was ok.
"She's not with me," the mousy chick snapped as she sped away, stepping on to the train just before the doors closed.
I approached the drunken lady and asked her if she was ok. She nodded, stumbled, and looked down in disbelief as another splash of her drink landed on her dress.
No. She was not ok.
I asked her where she was going.
"With you." She slurred.
This woman was not doing well. I was thinking drugs and alcohol at this point. Her lips were thickened and definitely turning blue. I tried to see if her nails were blue as well, but her nice French manicure obscured any evidence of anoxia in the nail bed. But don't misunderstand here, I am not an expert in this kind of thing anyway.
I walked her to a bench and asked her to sit.
This was serious. This lady was in bad shape and I was offering assistance. Dumb, I thought. Where is my street-wise Jersey-boy common sense? I got nervous. I should not be involved.
My fucking B/P was soaring. I could feel my heart pounding and I broke a sweat. My pits were soaked.
I pulled out my cell phone, stared at it a moment, and finally decided that there was no one to call. Hell, I was certainly not going to call 911. I put the phone back in my pocket. There were two security guards at the turnstile where you walk into the station. But they are just geezers - so I figured not even to bother.
I just stood there thinking for a while. I could not just walk away and leave this chick. But she was fucking hammered. I could call the cops. But if I did that, she would get arrested. She didn't need that crap. This was a well-dressed, well-groomed, classy lady who just happened to be drunk, maybe more. She didn't need to get arrested. I couldn't sleep if I got her into that kind of trouble.
So I thought. I stood and I thought.
She was taller than me. But hey, at my majestic height of 5 feet 6 inches, everybody is taller than me, right? She had dark olive skin with thick features; black (almost black), very short hair, cut nicely close to her head. I am probably dating myself but I would call it a pixie cut. Having once, for a few miserable years, been married to a hair-cutter, I can identify an expensive cut when I see it. She wore a light gray dress with shoulder straps that were sagging, probably because she was drunk. Her boobs were small, but overall, she was a little chunky ... just plump. She wore black, open-toe platform shoes ... which made her stagger more - and that's how I noticed them.
I looked at her, but I did not stand too close to her, just in case her boyfriend came ... or the cops. Hey, ya never know.
I kept asking her where she was heading. And every time I asked, she said the same thing: "with you," or "wherever you want," something like that anyway. I asked her if someone was waiting for her somewhere or if could I help her get a cab. She smiled.