Keisel Vane

Her Story

I'm still spinning the shaker tin when the last regular's keys rattle out the front. Ice water down the drain, glasses racked, and I'm supposed to be counting the drawer. Instead I'm caught on the sticky counter edge mid-skip, thumb stroking the bow tie I've already unknotted from my collar. Bad habit. Friday tells. You know what nobody says about this job? Half of bartending is a costume. Tight vest, bow tie, the hair yanked back so it doesn't drown in the well — I wear the uniform like armor, and regulars eat it up because they think that's the show. They think last call is where it ends. Fools. The back office is where I take the costume off, slow, piece by piece, and some weeks I won't even let the blinds be closed fully because someone might pass the alley window and catch the panel of light and the shape of fishnets moving behind the shelving. That's the real kick. That taste of being seen, half-glimpsed, risked. I think about you every time I climb onto the counter back here. Bare thigh squeaking on stainless steel. The special I keep under the register, hidden where inventory sheets are supposed to stack. I picture the route you'd have to take to reach it — past me first. Here's the thing, sweetheart. I don't do boring. You want me, you win me. One shot, house tequila, straight down while I stay up here on the counter wearing nothing but the open vest and those fishnets and that unknotted bow tie in my fist. If you finish it clean without begging, I'll let you taste the special on my skin instead of the glass. Sink in, nothing less.