"My eyes are saying get out of here so I can finish eating my muffin."
"I'd stay to watch you eat your muffin." And then he winked.
I looked around for something to throw.
"Get the hell out of my office, Razer and never say anything like that again." There was nothing in reaching distance that I didn't need. Maybe I should start stocking things in my office just for throwing at Razer. Like bricks or something. That wink hit me hard.
He left and suddenly my office seemed a lot emptier. I couldn't focus on work. I got up and threw those stupid dead flowers in the bin. They'd been stinking up my office for too long. Then I tidied up. It was just a need to do something, anything, and had nothing to do with the way my stomach had fluttered when Razer winked at me.
That stupid pink, floral umbrella leaned against the side of my desk. I sighed as I picked it up. I'd meant to put it back in the lost-and-found box but had never gotten around to it. So much had started with that umbrella, I couldn’t get rid of it that easily.
Stupid umbrella. I wanted to get that night out of my head, not cling on to reminders of it. I put it back in the corner, out of sight. I’d deal with it later.
Chapter 16 VIOLET
ANOTHER FRIDAY NIGHT working on the door for the bands. Although it was not exactly busy. Definitely not the usual Friday night crowd, that's for sure. I wished I'd grabbed a book to read so I had something to occupy myself with. Instead, I was stuck at the door with nothing to do while only a few people trickled in.
"Is there something else on tonight?" I asked a couple of girls coming in the door.
I usually keep track of those kinds of things. A big band touring or a festival could explain the poor numbers.
"People think you're closed," one of the girls said. "We thought so then the guys said they were playing here tonight."
Shit, Chuck would have a heart attack if he found out about that. That was his worst nightmare and it'd do nothing to discourage him from selling the place. I thought he'd just been being a big baby about that newspaper article but maybe he'd been right. He'd have a hissy fit when I told him how crap the night's takings were.
I stamped their wrists and waved them through.
Those poor bands, playing to an almost empty room. And poor me. We'd had dead nights before but this was something else altogether. If it was a Monday night, this would be bad. For a Friday it was a disaster of epic proportions. These were good bands that normally drew decent crowds.
We had to dispel any image of the club sinking into the shit. I’d been working on making sure we had the best line-ups possible. I’d done all the promo I could for free, working the hell out of our social media.
If people saw us spending a lot of money on promotion, they'd know it was just a stupid rumor. But how to get Chuck to spend money? I buried my head in my hands, my brain strained from trying to sort the whole mess out. It was becoming too much for me. Maybe I should agree to the stupid competition and be done with it. Maybe everyone was right and it was just a few hours of my time. It's not like I didn't have both of them hanging around bugging me anyway.
Maybe, at least with this competition, I'd get rid of one of them. But which one did I want to win?
"What's the problem?"
I put my head up as Razer walked through the door.
"Hey, it's fifteen bucks!"
"You aren't making me pay, are you? I just turned up to see you, not the bands."
"Those guys need to eat, you know. You wouldn't want some bum freeloading on one of your gigs."
Then I grinned to let him know I was joking. But he pulled out his wallet and handed me a tenner then fumbled through his change, counting out the coins.
“I was kidding. You don’t have to pay.”
Razer slapped the money on the table. “No, you’re right. It’s the band’s money and I can’t rip them off.”
"Well, since you're so broke, go to the bar and get me a drink. Tell them to give you one too."
Razer grinned. He’d have spent that fifteen bucks on drinks anyway and, if I was going to give him freebies, far better it came out of Chuck’s pocket than the band’s.
Chuck's ban on free drinks had so never stuck. This was a bar. Why would people come if not for free drinks? Why would we work here? Chuck paid us peanuts. Barely enough to survive on. Even my rat hole apartment was hard to afford on my wages. And I had to dress right for work. I couldn't turn up looking like shit. If I didn't love my job, I'd have quit long ago.
Razer came back with beers for us.