Read Online Jabberwock Jack by Dennis Liggio - Free Book Online

with members of the opposite sex... or the same sex too. Sorry, Lem."
    Lem shook his head with a smile. "It's fine, Szandor. I know you're typically only thinking about your own dick."
    "But why shouldn't I? He's right here!" said Szandor, grabbing Dickie's arm and pointing with a huge smile. Then he laughed.
    So when you're around Dickie, there are dick jokes. Dickie's typically the first to make them. It sounds cheesy and lame, but after the first five thousand times, it becomes endearingly funny.
    "But seriously, friends," said Dickie. "We're all suffering a shortage of bedroom companions. I propose we go on the hunt! I can think of no finer wingmen!" Dickie raised his glass in a toast that only Szandor answered, clinking his own nearly empty pint glass.
    "So you just want to go pick up girls?" I said. "Then go, nobody's stopping you."
    "Here?" said Szandor. "There are no hot girls here. Sorry, Maybell, no offense."
    Maybell, the fifty year old bartender who had worked at Twin Eagles for longer than any of us had been alive, shrugged. She stood at the bar not ten feet away cleaning a glass. "None taken."
    I'm not sure why I was being the downer tonight. Maybe I hadn't drank enough, or maybe I was hiding my own reluctance to go out on the prowl. Maybe it was the thing I was avoiding. I looked around the club, noting there were at least a few younger women.
    "What about them?" I said.
    "We were thinking of girls that we hadn't known since elementary school," said Dickie.
    This was a fair point. Twin Eagles was a neighborhood bar. It wasn't a ritzy Midtown bar or a trendy Southend dive, keen on attracting new customers. It was just a neighborhood bar, focused on neighborhood regulars. We knew about half of the people in the bar by name and the other half were related to someone we knew.
    "Fresh blood, Mikkel, fresh blood!" said Szandor with relish.
    "So you're looking for girls who have no idea who you are," I said with a grin. "Good move. The Szandor Mystique usually drives them in the other direction."
    "Ha ha," said Szandor sarcastically. "But Dickie and I were thinking... Southend! " He threw his hands up indicating sparkle or a boom.
    "You want to pick up college chicks," I said.
    "And college boys. Right Lem?" said Szandor, looking for support where he could find it.
    A large portion of southern New Avalon had been dubbed Southend, the way Midtown contained a huge chunk of central Avalon. Southend covered the area from Avalon University south to nearly the lake. It came east as far as the border of Five Points. It was the bohemian part of our town. Artists, pretentious people, coffeehouse denizens, and musicians. Dickie actually had an apartment on the east side of Southend. But the other important and common residents of Southend were college students who lived off the Avalon U campus. And those that didn't live in Southend often came to the neighborhood's bars to drink. Lots and lots of students.
    None of us went to college. But we were college aged, so those students were technically our peers, albeit more educated ones. I had even dated one particular student...
    "So we're thinking we hit up a Southend bar, dressed to impress, and then we all have a great night," said Szandor. "That works for Dickie all the time."
    "I live around a corner from one that is quite the place," said Dickie. "On the weekends I go in, talk about how I'm in a band, and usually take one home."
    "So you're the one night stand king," I said.
    "Not to be a Dick," said Dickie with a chuckle at his familiar quip, "but you are known to have quite the revolving door for girls."
    "That's not really true - " I said, but Szandor cut me off.
    "Gentlemen, gentlemen, let's not be divisive," he said, putting his hand on each of our shoulders to reassure us and keep us separated. His voice took on that of a drunken politician trying to cut a deal. "This is not the time for judgment or recriminations. Let us not focus on the past, lest we drown in it. Let us