My name is Anne. This doesn't actually matter for the story, but I'm not a good writer. Right now it's just a hobby to fill time while everybody seems to be having a life. I tried hard at poetry but I really suck. Short stories are my next step towards that ultimate big novel that will never be.
I'm a barista. At least that's how I call myself when I attend high-school reunions, like later tonight.
Let's be honest: I work as a waitress in a service area. People always passing by, crappy shifts, and tons of routine had me commuting by bus daily. The glamorous life of barista [sic].
I'm the only child of two British expats that, fed up of grey skies and cold days, moved down south to enjoy the Mediterranean life-style when I was a toddler.
I was never a good student. At least, being good at several languages provided me easy access to shameful jobs like this one. That's why events like tonight's give me so much anxiety (successful entrepreneurs, happy marriages, and the rest) but now that feeling is gone. Because today... today I feel I lived something important and my mind can't help going back there.
The staff at the area is short and quite unfriendly. The only other regular around, besides the manager's aunt working as a cook (if you can call unfreezing cooking) and three more waiters to cover 24-hours shifts, was the parking lot prostitute.
Like all of them, she didn't chose to be a prostitute. But she's a damn good one. Her habitat are national coastal highway service areas. Her preys: tourists, salesmen, maintenance crews, retired widowers in bus excursions, but mostly truck drivers.
Our area is always busy. Its restaurant spans both sides of the road, and it acts as a walkway between the two sides. Rows and rows of trucks would be constantly parked outside. Our setting is ideal for stopping, but I wouldn't dare to say she has nothing to do with that success.
This highway connects the main ports south with northern Europe so her clientele spanned from bearded German truck drivers to local ones who'd get blowjobs in front of their family photo or some religious image. Men... I always believed it was because this culture was late to modern times; until I found a stacked pile of tabloids that my dad kept in the attic, with all those third page models.
As a survivor from the old days when secondary roads were full of brothels, she's been around long before any of us. When the old bar owners went franchise she survived the cleanup by giving head to the new manager from time to time. I know because that fart always leaves his office door ajar and I've seen her several times bobbing head up and down his lap. She confided me once that he's a rapid shot. Win-win for her: easy toll and no need for pimps.
I was serving on the side facing south direction. Some days, like today, she'd make it early afternoon to pick up some guys in the restaurant area before she got out to do her business in the parking lot. She wasn't supposed to be in here, but she was really discreet and I looked the other way. I mean figuratively, because I loved to secretly follow her incursions. She must have developed supernatural intuition because I had seen no one resist her charms.
If you wanted to buy, you could really tell what she was selling. Today her soft hair was collected with a long pony tail. A tall, slim woman on high heels, with a suggestive cleavage. She looked ravishing with that summer dress that looked as if it was designed just for her.
"Face it, tiger... you just hit the jackpot!" She hit on this dull guy without hesitation and with the sexiest of the smiles.
He stopped looking down and answered, "Oh, so I really look so much like a nerd, right?" identifying her line from one of his favourite comics.
If it's me judging, darn he did: trunks, sneakers, a galactic wars movie t-shirt, and the first ever adult client who asked for a glass of cold chocolate milk.
"Sorry ma'am. If you thought I'm a family man and if you push me too far I just might, like that song... in the all or nothing, you got the nothing." He continued, proving he really was one and also that he had no clue about gambling lingo. That song was on the old-pop radio station we have in the background minutes ago. He tried to sound witty but totally failed.
"Where's she?" She asked while I was thinking how constant exposure to one-hit wonders mess up with your brain.
"In the restroom. We're way home, in the middle of a long trip." This guy wouldn't survive an interrogation.
She huffed and asked if the stool in front of his was free. He nodded. They were close to the counter and I had a first row ticket to the play.
"You sure, babe? My breasts can be your paradise," she whispered in a sultry way, while caressing his shin with her bare one under the high table.
He was legs wide open with an exhausted pose and repositioned himself a little bit more elegantly. "Really sure. No intention to offend."
She noticed no hesitation and accepted. "I'm about to start my rounds. Would a gentleman at least buy me a coffee? I won't stay long, I need some energy refill."
"Sounds fair. I'm pretty sure you'll make a lot of money. Sorry, name?"
He caused no blushing at all. Too much life on her shoulders and groin to feel anything close to that. "Alicia." She was introducing herself when I bought her coffee.
He was, as expected, the quiet type and she had to force a conversation out of him.
"So... you said no, huh? You know I go all the way, all the ways. I'm a very committed lady." She sounded naughty but truly, not being used to rejection, she was a bit annoyed.
"Never doubted that. I'm more than well served, thanks." He replied.
"The missus must be the real deal then. Can you convince me of that before she gets out?" She challenged.
"We're not talking about love and companionship here, right? You expect dirty stuff." He asked. She simply nodded while stirring her coffee.