Of Poison...Cologne and Old Money. 🎷🎷🎷🎷

The faint sweetness of spilled bourbon envelopes the senses ~ the air is thick with the ghostly haze of cigarette smoke, incense, and a slight hint of clandestine promised sin. The atmosphere smolders beneath the low amber bulbs secreted behind frosted glass, a few red lamps glow like cat's eyes in the dark, and candles sputter in unmatched holders. Shadows pool in corners, watching...listening.

The smoky speakeasy feels like a seductive haven which I had covertly stepped into for a tryst, rather than a place I had simply entered for a drink and the hope of ... maybe...

🥃 The Bar is a long, scarred slab of dark wood, polished by decades of elbows and naughty wicked confessions. Bottles line the back wall - jewels of deep greens, smoky ambers and crystal decanters catching the dim light. The bartender moves with the quiet precision of someone who knows every secret ingredient and every secret story.

🎷

A jazz band plays in the corner, half‑hidden behind a curtain of smoke. The trumpet is sultry and low, the piano soft as a lover’s breath, the bass a slow heartbeat. Conversations rise and fall in murmurs, punctuated by the clink of ice and the occasional burst of laughter that feels almost illegal. But aren't we all illegal here.

🖤

Patrons lean in close to one another, silhouettes in classy teardrop and center-crown fedoras, women in knee-length flapper dresses - some in loose drop-waisted styles, men in chic hats and tailored suits. Everyone looks like they’re hiding something ~~an affair, a dream, a crime, a heartbreak. No one asks questions. That’s the rule.

🚪

Outside, the world seems ordinary. Then. A nondescript door in an alley. A single knock, a sliding peephole, a password spoken low...the door opens, and the world shifts ~~ time loosens, rules blur, and the night becomes a place where anything and everything might happen.

Inside...🎷🎷🎷🎷🎷

He walked by me...smelling like expensively blended old cologne and old money. The kind that drives your senses wild. Yet... danger was written all over the rugged and love-worn soul beneath the obvious hint of wealth.

He is definitely poison...to be avoided at all cost. The type your mother warns you will break your heart. But we never listen. The allure of mystery and romance hangs too thickly in the air.

I moved quietly to the back of the smoky Speakeasy joint - watching, wondering ... observing. But...Lonely souls can sense one another across any distance.

He was not very tall, not short either, maybe five nine- five ten, quite handsome and just a tiny bit rugged in a tortured sort of way. He looked around, weighing the room, I could tell he was trouble. His uncertain demeanor, his mode of dress completely gave away the fact that he did not come here often...did not get out much, was my first intuitive thought.

His dark greyish hair was cut in a devil may care, whimsical style ~~wisps of hair hung over his eyes. The clothing was delicately cut and fitted well, it had the fine lines of tailored gentry, not store bought. Yet they were a bit outdated, like he had not been outfitted for a long time. Something had been distracting him, or maybe money had become an issue of late.

The dancefloor was neon lit. Dark and light juxtaposed themselves betwixt the gyrating, twirling, ever moving partially clad figures of the swaying bodies. It was impossible to pinpoint any person specifically in the continuous back and forth of writhing forms.

His eyes surveyed the room, they stopped for a few moments on each female form, then they moved on to the next, and the next. I saw him when he surreptitiously removed something from his left ring finger. Ah! His wedding ring, I thought to myself, smiling at the luck of some woman somewhere. But not tonight, tonight he planned to cross over that line of "till death do us part". I got to wondering about what had happened to push him to taking what seemed for him, such a drastic step.

Those dark troubled eyes moved to the bartender and the generous array of many shaped offerings of alcoholic beverages. He licked his lips like a parched man long lost in the desert, one who had not had a drink for many days. But I suspect he had. He touched the pocket with that guilty ring which he had just placed there.

He still loves her. I thought to myself. For that guilt was eating away at his heart and his conscience. If he stepped over that line tonight, he would live to regret it.

The eyes kept on moving again, to the women, until they alit upon me. His eyes lingered, moved on and came back to me. I was not now directly looking in his direction, his form was framed in the large mirror atop the counter of the bar. I know that he had seen me when I turned around though, he knew that I had been watching him.

He now walked purposefully in my direction, I got up to leave as he approached. We both stood facing each other, both actions synchronized to coincide at the same moment with each other's movements. Again, that seductive smell of expensively blended old cologne.

I smiled knowingly... He leaned close to my ear...whispered...can we talk for a while. The music was smooth, not too loud for wanton conversation.

I said...About the ring in your pocket?

Ah, he replied. You saw that. I nodded my head solemnly.

No romance tonight between me and the handsome prince.

He sat quietly for a while, then he spoke of the years, her quirky habits, how she must have grown bored with the life they led, the children - they had everything money could buy...but he had begun to stagnate and she wanted the type of excitement he no longer felt.

You could change for her...if not for you, try new things...meet her halfway. I advised...as if I knew what that life he spoke of was like. I was a single mom...finally out for a weekend drink after many tired nights of work and responsibility. What did I know.

He smiled sadly. What if it's too late.

It's never too late, I advised sagely. I felt like a hypocrite...for I knew nothing of such things. Still ... He nodded his head in agreement.

Then...suddenly his body stiffened...his face swiveled to the entrance. The instinct of love can be so strong, kind of like the highly evolved sensory system of a bloodhound. Agony registered upon his face. She had walked in with 'him', she clung tightly to his arm, as she kept her face riveted to the floor. Yet I knew that he knew her by the elegant arch of her back, the way she touched her ear when uncertainty overcame her. All of the things he had agonized over earlier...Unconsciously, he grabbed my arm as grief overcame him.

Gently, I detached his arm from mine, bringing his attention back to the present situation. I smiled at him, nodding in the direction of the couple by the door. I looked at him meaningfully, then nodded again in the general area in which they were slowly meandering towards the bar.

"Go on now". I said a little sadly, my smile now wistful.

He got my drift, smiled back, a tight fear induced smile, debatable, unsure, yet grimly determined.

He hurried over to her, wading unceremoniously through the crowded bar. She did not see him as her eyes were still downcast, as if wishing she were somewhere else, anywhere else but here.

He stood for a moment, then touched her arm uncertainly. She looked up, 'he' looked at her, then at him. He reached for her hand. She let go of 'him' and took his outstretched hand without hesitation.

He turned for a moment to nod imperceptibly in my direction, I nodded back, smiling...before they both walked hurriedly out of the bar, into the cool night to try to work on the rest of their lives.

I walked over to the other rather perplexed 'him', as he stood lost and forlorn, wondering what had just transpired. I motioned towards the bar. He too nodded, walking behind me in a dazed fog.

Maybe we could keep each other's company and wile away the night in quiet contemplation of a near disaster averted by fortune's lucky chanced encounters.