What a memorable evening for a one night stand.
It was mid eighties and I was tour managing a new band for Warner Bros. We were playing a showcase club in the midwest and the club manager and I had been trading teasing lines and double entendres since load in. I think her name may have been Donna. She ran her venue well, was a sharp operator with a quick wit.
As the day and evening progressed a joking semi sexual tension was developing between us. She was definitely not what one would call pretty but she had plenty of vibe and I was intrigued. And yet the band and crew commented repeatedly on the "dyke manager".
With jeans, a Dickies work shirt and short hair cut, there was a bit of a dyke vibe to her look, so I might have been misinterpreting everything. With the band on stage, we closed the box office, and proceeded to settle the show. Turn out was good and both club and artist went into percentage. As I was counting out the overage and separating bills, she came around the table, turned the office chair I was sitting in, until it faced her, then put her hands on my knees and leaned her face toward mine.
"It takes about an hour to clear the house. Can you get your band back to the hotel and be back here by then? I want to take you home........................"
AIDS is a troubling reality at this time and I paused, I also can't quite believe this a the conversation during a show settlement............ Not to mention the way it was delivered. No kiss, no surreptitious rubbing against me, just an invitation with an assumption on my end. The long pause in response, causes her to elaborate.
"Look, drive yourself, you can leave anytime, but I am clean, safe, have very few partners and when you see why, you will understand. I am not a lesbian, but most cock is not enough for me, which means that most men don't like being with me as they get intimidated by my love of big toys".
"Fair enough" I declared, a bit deflated about the size thing and certainly intimidated, but aroused by her direct and open manner and all that was left unsaid.
I lean forward to kiss her, but she avoids my lunge, laughs and pats the top of my hand as she stands up and returns to her desk. Okay, this one is going to be different for sure. This show is a fly leg and we have two town cars for the band and a 15 pax van for the crew. One band cat opts to stay, trolling for pussy at the bar before they do last call.
The crew are on their own, packing up our travel gear and leaving the local rental rigs onstage. I ferry my carload back to the hotel, grateful we have a late wake up tomorrow. Dropping my briefcase in my room, I lock my cash in the room safe and head back to the venue. Back at the club, the band member is gone and the crew are finished and piling into the van. I
respond to their quizzical looks with "Just a few issues to resolve on settlement. See you guys tomorrow" and I head back in the stage door.
While it is a 1,500 seat showcase club, that does not change the fact that deep in it's DNA, it's just a bar........... Even though I had only left 40 minutes earlier, the smell still smacks me in the face -- stale beer, cigarettes, body odor, mildew -- just a dull, dead scent that I am so grateful is not a daily part of my life.
The door to the office is locked, so I knock. Donna opens the door, her jacket on, a bag on her shoulder. "Let's go" she says as she double bolts the door. A security guy and two bar backs wave goodbye to her and I think I see knowing smirks exchanged by them all.
"Follow me, it's about a 10 minute drive."
She gets into a nicely restored El Camino with Cragar mags and I shake my head as the woman grows more complex each moment. Driving behind her barely muffled V8, I can hear that it is in fine fettle and obviously more than just a cosmetic restoration.
In the middle of a typical suburban sprawl, we drive into a two block section of old storefronts. A few are boarded and vacant, a few have old, faded signs and occupants (a dry cleaner, a stationer), but most are hip little boutiques, mostly clothing outlets. It's a semi gentrified, boho rejuvenation of what was probably a waste land 5 years before and a thriving ethnic neighborhood 20 years before that.
The buildings are brick and look to have been built in the 30's. Each side of the street is 4 stories tall. Pulling around back, she parks up behind a yoga studio and waves me into the spot next to hers. An exterior wooden staircase, with little landings on each floor sits against each of the semi detached buildings.
Without me asking, she opens the hood of her El Camino.
"It's not even close to stock, 454 box motor and a 4 barrel Edelbrock as you can see. Inside, everything is balanced, polished, ported etc etc -- she's my baby. I do some of the really basic wrenching, but farm out all the important shit."
With that she lowers the hood until it rests on the latch hook. Making sure I am watching, she takes two finger and pushes it shut with a simple thunk.
"That took forever to get right. The arms on this hood were so jacked up that we had to search every junk yard in the state to find replacements and even then, it took repeated adjustments."
Her pride is obvious and I am impressed. I follow her up to the third floor into a large sort of railroad flat. We enter in the rear through the kitchen. Then there is a hallway on the left. A bathroom opens on the right side of the hallway and appears to run its length.
The front flairs back out to the full width of the apartment with a large, open area serving as bedroom and living room. A pair of Japanese reed screens shield the sleeping area from the living area.
Donna is most definitely not a housekeeper. The bed is unmade, assorted clothing is thrown on the couch, bed and floor. It's not really dirty, but it is messy.
There are four Japanese woodblock prints on the wall. They are all framed and to my eye of high quality. The largest is Hokusai's famous "Great Wave". I know a bit about ukiyo-e art and decide to show off, complimenting her on the Hokusai and asking her if she is familiar with other ukiyo-e artists. Smiling, she points to one of them.
"That's a Yoshitoshi, from the 100 Aspects of the Moon series, but the others are all Hokusai."
The Yoshitoshi print is almost monochromatic, with a large, full moon anchoring the bottom left hand corner, a rock cliff in the foreground, a warrior, struggling to climb it's outcropping, while tall grasses before and behind him pull incredible depth from the print. It is truly remarkable work.
The next Hokusai is a burst of color, showing a river scene, filled with activity both on shore and on the water. Kites fill the sky, and every group of people seem to have a story. Moving to the last one, I can feel Donna watching me as I take it in.
"Shunga" she says. "It means picture of spring, a edo period euphemism for sex. Most of the ukiyo-e artists did Shunga, it was very popular and people would hang the prints in their homes."
A woman is lying astride a boy, her disproportionately large vulva spread open and his rather immense cock, veins bulging, is half buried in her while semen drips out of her and down his shaft. One of her breasts hangs free, but the rest of their bodies are covered in kimonos or robes.
But certain things are a bit off. Feet are smaller than hands. Thighs are the size of torsos, with stick like calves. Each of their heads are twisted at unnatural angles. And yet the key pattern on the bed covering is perfect, it's intricacies laid in with architectural accuracy. The cherry blossoms on her kimono are just as detailed and accurately flow as the material wraps her body.
When one steps back and simply takes it as a whole, everything falls together and you literally can feel the ravenous, lust of the woman as she pleasures herself on the listless young man's penis. Hokusai has been meticulous with the folds of her labia, using color to give it depth, the same way he details the veins bulging from the shaft of the boy's penis.
My throat constricts a bit and I can feel a slight pressure on my chest as my arousal blooms.
"So what do you think?"
