Delilah's

by John Maley

  ‘I need some air,’ she said.

  Joanie and Mama walked arm-in-arm like sisters, through the falling snow. They moved slowly through the shoppers, the blasts of Christmas muzak from the stores, the buskers, bible thumpers and beggars. They found themselves at George Square, admiring the Christmas lights. They watched children playing in the snow and Mama said a prayer for her daddy, her sweet daddy, who had built a beautiful snowman all those years ago, to surprise his daughter.

  Joanie and the Three Bears

  The three bears came in on a wet Wednesday afternoon to an empty Delilah’s. Joanie, who was sitting on a stool behind the bar, was reading a free sheet wank rag. There wasn’t much reading in it – just a collection of garish photographs of young muscle Marys and adverts for everything from cock rings to escorts. The bears saw only the dress and Joanie’s blonde wig framing the free sheet. One of the bears chapped on the bar and Joanie looked over the paper at them.

  They were quite a trio. The youngest was about thirty with cropped blond hair and blue eyes. He had no facial hair but was a sturdy big bear for all that. He wore a denim jacket, a tartan shirt and jeans. The middle bear was dark, forty-ish, a classic clone with a magnificent moustache and goatee beard. He had a nose ring and a small silver bar through his left eyebrow. Joanie noticed his dark eyes, which were sad and haunted, and his thick, strong arms, bare on the bar. He wore a white tee shirt, black leather waistcoat, and jeans. He was heavier than the younger bear, and paunchy. Last but not least was the oldest bear. He had silvery grey hair, cropped, a moustache as white as fresh snow, and wore a black leather biker jacket with a tee shirt and jeans.

  The older bear looked at Joanie, smiled, and turned to his friends ‘Now that is one pretty girl,’ he declared in an American accent. They laughed.

  ‘How can I skelp you?’ asked Joanie, slightly rankled by the bears laughter. They ordered three beers and began chatting to Joanie. The silver haired bear introduced himself.

  ‘I’m Paul,’ he said, proferring a hand to Joanie, who shook it.

  ‘I’m visiting from New York. These are my good friends, Andy and Clay, the man with the metal in his face. Andy’s from Fife and Clay is from –’

  ‘– Manchester,’ interrupted Clay, proudly.

  ‘I’ve never been to Glasgow before so this is a first for me,’ continued the older bear. ‘People seem real friendly here.’

  ‘People are and I’m Joanie,’ said Joanie, charmed by the bear’s easy manner. He listened to Paul intently.

  ‘I’m an engineer,’ said the bear. ‘My work takes me around the world. I’ve worked in Canada, Germany and Argentina. I really got the travel bug. I met Andy in New York and Clay – I met Clay through the Internet.’

  ‘We’re bears,’ said Clay, by way of explanation.

  ‘And I’m Goldilocks,’ quipped Joanie.

  ‘We like heavy, hairy guys,’ said Andy, in a soft, slow voice.

  Joanie didn’t really like it when guys got too specific. He didn’t like to feel excluded. Joanie himself was a poof for all seasons and had slept with guys that weighed eight stones and guys that weighed eighteen. He wasn’t a great one for types, never wanting to narrow his options.

  ‘Size isn’t everything,’ said Joanie.

  The older bear shrugged.

  ‘It’s just a preference,’ he said, apologetically. He told Joanie they were going to find a seat but asked him if he would come and join them. Joanie said he’d do that. But he stayed at the bar for a while, in the vain hope that more custom would arrive. In between replenishing stock and wiping the bar down a hundred times he stole occasional glances at the bears. They were so masculine, but so queer at the same time. He was intrigued by them, by their different nationalities and the way they interacted with each other. Joanie wondered what the proper name was for a group of bears. He thought it might be a pride, but that was what you called a bunch of lions. Then he thought it might be a set, but wasn’t that what you called several foxes? It wasn’t like he had never seen a bear, but in Glasgow they tended to go to other watering holes like the Waterloo.

  After twenty minutes of prevarication Joanie went nimbly over to see what the bears in the backroom would have.

  ‘Would any of you bears like another beverage?’ he enquired.

  ‘Sure,’ said Paul. ‘Get yourself one too and come and join us.’

  Joanie returned with the beers, and a Coke for himself, and sat beside the bears.

  ‘I do hope I’m not intruding,’ said Joanie. The bears assured him he wasn’t. Joanie asked Paul about his travels. Paul said that he’d once come face to face with a real bear, in Canada, and had escaped through the woods and back to his car. He said he was shaking like a leaf and the steering wheel nearly came off in his hands.

  ‘That’s just the sorta impression you bears leave on some of us guys,’ joked Joanie. He told them about his childhood memory of a bear that gave him sleepless nights. Joanie asked them if they’d heard of a TV show called The Singing Ringing Tree. Clay, the Mancunian, was the only taker.

  ‘D’you remember the bear in that?’ asked Joanie. ‘I was so scared. It was the eyes. I know it was a man dressed up as a bear. But there was something so scary about the fake fur and then those real eyes, it freaked me out.’

  Clay was looking at him across the table, concerned. Joanie looked into his sad, sweet eyes and felt a tingle down his spine.

  Paul told some stories of his travels. He said he’d had a fling with a psychiatrist in Argentina. ‘This guy was rich. He was also the hairiest guy on the planet. It was like making out with a werewolf.’

  Clay made a joke about a full moon.

  Joanie heard a tap at the bar and went to serve a businessman in a sharp suit. He had a tongue to match.

  ‘I thought I was in the Marie Celeste,’ he snapped. ‘Is this dive open or not?’

  ‘I beg your hard-on,’ retorted Joanie. ‘Now name yer poison’.

  ‘I’ll have a white coffee,’ barked the punter, like he was telling Joanie to open the till or he’d shoot. Joanie quickly made the coffee and charged the catty customer.

  ‘Fuck you very much,’ snarled the creep, shoving his change in his pocket. He wandered to a seat. Joanie was tempted to order the guy out but decided to let it slide.

  ‘Bad day at the orifice?’ quipped Joanie, as he shimmied past, back through to the booth and the waiting bears.

  ‘You okay?’ asked Andy.

  ‘Did ye hear that?’ asked Joanie. ‘Some people wurnae brought up, they were dragged up.’

  Andy offered to throw the guy out but Joanie assured him he could handle any trouble. Paul then regaled them with a story of a bar-room brawl he’d got caught in the middle of. It was in some saloon in Texas and Paul said it was just like in a movie, tables and chairs flying, guys hitting each other with bottles. Andy and Clay completed some of Paul’s sentences, like they’d heard the tale twenty times before.

  Of the three, Paul seemed to be the raconteur, spinning yarns of mud-wrestling in Mississippi and fellatio in Frisco. The smash of a coffee cup rudely interrupted them. The four of them turned to see the businessman glaring at them.

  ‘That was the worst coffee I have ever fucking tasted!’ he barked. He turned and marched out of the door.

  ‘Temper, temper,’ said Joanie. The bears sympathised with him, saying how hard bar work must be.

  The bears declined another beer; they had lots to do. They said they were travelling up to the North of Scotland, sightseeing, but planned to be back in Glasgow on Saturday. They were renting a flat and invited Joanie up for dinner. Before Joanie could answer yes or no the address was scribbled on a beer mat and thrust into his hand.

  ‘I’m not sure I’ll get Saturday off,’ he explained.

  ‘You will,’ said Paul, emphatically, at the door of Delilah’s. ‘And get Sunday off too. We’re having a picnic.’

  The bears had rented a place slap bang in the middle of Merchant City. It was one of
those refurbished tenement buildings with a hi-tech entrance – hi-tech to Joanie at any rate. There was a video intercom system so the occupiers could clock who was calling. Joanie pressed buzzer 4 and waited. Ten seconds later a voice came through the small metal speaker.

  ‘Paul here, who’s calling?’

  Joanie leaned towards the speaker, pressing a button marked ‘Speak’.

  ‘It’s Sister Joanie of the Blessed Order of Lewd Vagrants. Will you pray with me, sir?’

  ‘I’m on my knees already, sister,’ replied Paul and a sudden buzz at the door signalled Joanie’s opportunity.

  The small neat flat was filled with a delicious spicy aroma. Paul told Joanie he had made a Mexican bean stew. The three bears looked very smart. Clay and Andy still wore jeans but both wore crisp, fresh plain shirts. Paul wore chinos and a bright yellow shirt. They all wore aftershave. Paul showed Joanie round the wee flat. There were two bedrooms, each with a double bed, which made Joanie wonder who was sleeping with who. The bathroom was really a shower-room and there was a separate WC across the hall. The lounge was a small square, seeming smaller because of the size of the men in it. The guys had rented the place for a week, although they’d been up North for a few days.

  They ate the delicious stew with fresh crusty bread and worked their way through a crate of bottled beer. The bears told of their adventures in the Highlands. Their conversation roamed from the beauty of the mountains and glens to the perils of midges. The bears liked fishing and camping.

  ‘You bears are real outdoorsy types,’ observed Joanie. The guys agreed. Paul told Joanie about bear picnics he went to in the States. Bears would strip off by the old campfire and give each other backrubs and blow jobs. There were teddy bears, grizzly bears, and he himself was a polar bear on account of his white hair.

  The empty beer bottles multiplied around them. They were getting drunker and rowdier. Paul told his story about his encounter with the bear in the Canadian wilds again, only this time he didn’t run – he fought the darned creature bear to bear, wrestling through the woods, bouncing off trees until they careered into a river where a passing tugboat plucked Paul to safety. He promised Joanie he’d show him his scars later. The bears told of their trips to leather bars; to dark rooms, where they witnessed everything from fisting to whipping with a cat o’ nine tails; camping trips where they’d seen the most beautiful countryside and had felt like the last three men on Earth; and a boat trip with a seafaring S&M bear which involved rum, sodomy, the lash and, finally, a mutiny. Joanie got as drunk as a skunk and fell in love with all of them.

  By midnight Clay and Andy were grunting in a bedroom and Joanie was sitting in Paul’s lap in the lounge. He closed his eyes and felt the brush of Paul’s snowy moustache, tasting beer, bean stew and bear.

  ‘Who’s been sleeping in my bed?’ said the rumbling voice. Joanie opened his eyes and saw Paul buck naked on the edge of the bed. He was in good shape for a big guy and his face was sweeter than candy. He climbed back into bed and drew Joanie close to him. He looked at Joanie’s face and smiled. ‘You look just as good as a man,’ he said. Joanie’s dress and wig lay on the bedroom floor.

  ‘The lady vanishes,’ said Joanie.

  The bears were very organised. They wanted to pack as much as they could into their vacation. They had scheduled a trip to Loch Lomond and had already bought in provisions for a picnic. Andy drove their hired car first to Joanie’s place, where he nipped up and got changed, then onto Loch Lomondside. They threw a blanket on the ground and spread out the provisions: bread, olives, cheeses, grapes, cold meats, mustard, mineral water, wine, beer, flasks of coffee, fruit, nuts and cake.

  It was a dry, spring day, but cloudy. The guys decided to ignore the clouds in the hope they’d go away. Eventually they did. The provisions slowly began to vanish from the blanket, the four of them sitting side-on like attentive weans. The bears wore their denim and leather and Joanie wore his Goldilocks wig with a light summer dress, a cardigan draped across his shoulders when he felt cool. They could hear a speedboat zipping back and forth across the loch, and see it too, a small white tooth biting clean through the blue water.

  Andy was confined to coffee and water as he was driving, but the other bears had a few beers and Joanie drank red wine out of a paper cup. It wasn’t too long before the four of them were belting out a rousing rendition of Blanket On The Ground. A large wasp took a fancy to Joanie but the feeling wasn’t mutual. He ended up whipping at it with his cardigan sleeve and yelling ‘Get tae fuck!

  Later, Joanie stood in the cool water up to his knees, his dress hitched up to his thighs. The sky had cleared and more boats had appeared on the loch. From their secluded spot they could see two sailboats, another speedboat, a skier leaning backwards and zooming across the water. Joanie liked the feel of the water on his feet. He turned inland to check the bears. They were rolling around on the blanket, tickling and nibbling and petting each other. They were like pups, thought Joanie. Cubs.

  Periodically Joanie would receive a postcard from the bears. One came from Alaska, of Paul in a tour truck with a polar bear standing almost nose to nose with him. Another was a picture of a Norwegian fjord with a note on the back hinting at some serious campfire action. Another card was a picture of Marilyn Monroe, her dress blowing about her thighs. The bears wrote it reminded them of Joanie in the water at Loch Lomond.

  ‘What d’ye call a bunch of bears?’ Joanie asked Papa one night in Delilah’s.

  ‘A bunch of bears,’ said Papa.

  ‘A bunch of bears,’ said Joanie.

  Bobbie Dazzler

  ‘It’s about time somebody fell in love around here,’ said Mama. She was having a coffee with Joanie, discussing Bobbie’s forthcoming wedding. It had all happened so fast. Bobbie had been at a party in Shawlands with an old friend and had met a woman called Rae. She was an architect and had gone to private school. She was skinny with a bob of black hair and a funny voice. She reminded Joanie of Olive Oyl but he didn’t tell Bobbie that in case he hurt her feelings. It seemed such an unlikely combination. She just didn’t seem Bobbie’s type. She was too thin and too middle class and too plain for Bobbie. That’s what he told Mama.

  ‘There’s nothing more surprising in this world than love,’ explained Mama, like she was the expert. ‘It can creep up on a person before they know it. I’ve seen this girl and I think she’s pretty. They’re happy together. Maybe you’re just scared of losing her.’ Joanie did have mixed feelings. He would never stand in the way of a friend’s happiness. But he would miss Bobbie. Something happened when people got hitched. They weren’t the same friends anymore. A single person could give you their undivided attention but once they were in a couple they could be downright antisocial. It was like they had been placed under house arrest. Joanie had lost a few pals that way. One old pal had gone from poppers and high heels to pipe and slippers in a matter of months. Another pal had made brave attempts to be sociable but Joanie had hated his partner. He expected Bobbie would go the way of all flesh.

  Mama seemed to be full of good advice on the subject. Joanie had wanted to trash Rae but Mama was having none of it. She seemed to be getting her rocks off on this love match and made Joanie feel like a party pooper.

  ‘It’ll be wonderful,’ she crowed. ‘A June wedding in Delilah’s.’

  Joanie was wishing he hadn’t agreed to the event being held in the pub. It meant there was no escaping it. As far as he was concerned Bobbie had simply let desperation get the better of her and had chosen a woman who should really be marrying Popeye. There was no way around it though, Bobbie had set her heart on marrying in Delilah’s on a Sunday in June. Not only had she insisted on the venue being Delilah’s, she had asked Joanie to be best man, Mama to be maid of honour and Papa to be a page. She had invited her friends and family. Her sister and brother would be attending but her parents had declined.

  ‘We don’t mind you being gay,’ they had lied to her, ‘but why d’ye have tae tell the whole w
orld?’

  By day Bobbie was positively bubbly. She was radiant and seemed determined to be happy. By night she seemed to transform herself into a nervous wreck. Joanie fielded a stream of paranoid phone calls from her. Once she had called him at two in the morning and hissed in a crazed whisper that she thought Rae was having an affair.

  ‘There’s someone else,’ she gasped.

  Popeye or Bluto, thought Joanie. Aloud, he reassured her. ‘She’s having an affair? Of course she is. With you. Now stop bein’ yer own worst enemy and get some sleep. Fuck knows I could use some.’

  Another night she had called Joanie to say that Rae had left her and had taken all her credit cards. Later she called back to say that Rae had been stuck in a traffic jam and she’d found her credit cards in her purse at the bottom of her bag.

  She made a marathon call to Mama in the wee small hours of the morning. ‘I’m straight,’ Bobbie told her. ‘I can’t marry a woman. I want a husband. I want children. I’m calling the whole thing off.’

  ‘It’s nerves,’ Mama had said, soothingly. ‘You’re going to be a June bride. It’s so wonderful.’

  ‘It’s you I love,’ replied Bobbie. ‘Be mine!’

  The crazy thing about these calls was that Bobbie never mentioned them when they met at Delilah’s. It was as if she was making them in her sleep. Joanie told Mama he was worried about Bobbie’s sanity.

  ‘She’s like Jekyll and Hyde,’ he sighed. ‘She’s not of sound mind. You cannae enter intae a marriage if yer not of sound mind.’

  ‘She’s in love,’ said Mama. ‘Love drives you crazy. You only have to look at her to see that. She’s blooming.’

  Bobbie was blooming. She looked smarter, sexier. She had lost a stone as well as her mind. You had to admit it.

  The girl was in love.

  Papa joined them at their wee table outside the café. He ordered more coffee for them. ‘What does a page do anyway?’ he asked.