That didn’t last long, though.
“You know what?” Ryan said when the waiter approached with the check. “Keep this open. My brother and I still have a lot to catch up on. We’ll take this over to the bar.”
The waiter took back the billet and said, “Certainly, sir. As you wish.”
“Ryan,” I started protesting, but he was already halfway across the restaurant before I could finish.
And now here I sit, at this mahogany bar listening to Ryan try to impress two young flight attendants. Heaven help them, but they are just too polite. I can tell from their body language that they’re ready to leave, but Ryan keeps talking, ignoring the hints they keep dropping. It took them only a few minutes to realize I wasn’t interested in anything more than conversation, and occasionally mentioning how late it’s getting. I’ve been sitting by Ryan’s side, sipping a forty-year Macallan because an hour into this, I decided Ryan’s going to pay the bill.
“Tell me a secret,” he says to the blonde, his voice thick from the red wine we shared at dinner and the countless drinks he’s had at the bar.
“A secret?” she asks, smiling. “Well, I hardly know you, but I can tell you this. I’ve just received my student pilot certificate and I’m going to start flight training lessons next month.”
“Wow,” I pipe up. “Congrats. I’ll raise a glass to that.” She smiles at me, and she and her friend raise their glasses to meet mine.
“Thank you,” she says. “It’s taken me months to get the hours, but I’m determined. One day I’ll be flying the plane instead of just handing out bags of nuts.”
Ryan chuckles low in his throat. “I have a great idea,” he slurs. “How about, you two come back to the hotel with me, and you can play flight school on my stick while your friend handles my nuts?”
Ryan’s laugh is filling the bar, and he’s oblivious to the looks of disgust on our faces. The other few people at the end of the bar are staring, and I motion to the bartender for the check. This night’s only heading downhill from here.
The women are gathering their purses, mumbling to Ryan that he’s a pig, but he’s still laughing, pleased with his joke. They go to grab their tab, but I wave them off.
“Please,” I say, walking them toward the door. “Let me take care of that. I apologize for my brother.”
The blonde looks up at me kindly. “It’s a wonder you’re even related to him. Make sure he gets home safe. I relish the thought of the hangover he’ll have in the morning.”
Laughing, we say goodbye, and I walk over to Ryan, who’s wiping his eyes with a handkerchief.
“It wasn’t that funny, asshole,” I say, and reach into Ryan’s jacket pocket for his wallet. I take out his card and throw it to the bartender.
Ryan’s completely unaffected. He’s finishing his drink, and I can tell by his posture and expression that he’s looking over the bar’s patrons, trying to see if there’s another woman he can hit on. He really disgusts me, in part because he reminds me of myself, once I graduated from college. I went right to work for my grandfather traveling, under my older brother Martin’s supervision. Martin was already dating his wife at the time, but I always found a client or an old college friend to hit the town with no matter what city I was in. London, New Orleans, Vienna. I’d black out and wake up in bed with a different woman in each city. Luckily that lifestyle didn’t even last a year before I realized it was a miserable existence. So often, I realized in retrospect, I thought I was the big man of the night while the women I was with thought I was a fool: racking up drinks on my tab and sniggering behind my back at the pipsqueak who thought he was God’s gift just because he had an unlimited expense account.
After I gave that all up, I started spending more down time with Martin, and he taught me more about the business, and got me to a level where I was traveling on my own to meetings by my second year. He also helped me discover my love of the outdoors, and the time I spent with him and Millie hiking, skiing and fishing, gave me lots of hobbies to replace drinking and women.
Now that I’m thinking about it, I guess I’m moving into another chapter of my life again. I’m ready to find someone to share my life with. Maybe it’s time to curtail the traveling, and settle down, like Martin did with Millie. I wonder if my attitude shifted because I met Weaver, or if it was just the right time, right place.