I’m a regular at Encore Lounge, a piano bar in downtown Boston. You can find me there any time that Steve and Rob are hosting. It’s good, clean family fun, but with booze. Steve has a great rapport with the crowd, he’s funny, he lets my theater nerd friends and me sing during the open mic part of the night, and he’s even featured several of my friends, letting them share the stage with him for the evening.

As per yooge, me and the group of quaids were there this past Thursday. Steve and Rob finished up their set around 12:30, but we stuck around for a little while longer.  This post is about to take a dramatic turn. Do not associate the content that follows with my prior ringing endorsement of Steve and Rob, who you should go see wherever they may appear.  Steve and Rob are good people, a sharp contrast to what follows.

The only bar patrons at this point were about 25 twentysomethings and one older couple.  This is a usual occurrence – the bar, being attached to a Marriott and right next to two dance clubs, tends to attract a diverse age range – business travelers, foreign tourists, and college students.  Then, there was a less than usual occurrence. Indeed, I would go as far as to say that it was an unusual occurrence. The older couple was handjobbing. Hand. Jobbing. Right at the table, right in front of everyone, right in plain sight of my impressionable, naive, society-trusting eyes.

Oh my, I said to myself.  I have hit the Are you this person? jackpot. Us suddenly unintentional voyeurs were hooting, hollering, cheering, screaming in fear, squealing in disgust, vocalizing the entire gamut of reactions possible when abruptly being unwittingly thrust into a couple’s Private Time. They acknowledge the crowd with a little wave and a smile, then get back to business.  Cameras flash.  They don’t stop.  They are very clearly enjoying the spotlight.  There may or may not have been a cell phone with video capability shining a very bright LED light on them for holy-shit-that-just-happened posterity purposes.  (A video which may or may not be located here. You can’t see anything, other than be able to confirm that the arm is going up and down.  It’s very grainy, so step away from your screen and squint.  It’s solely to prove I’m not a liar about this, and also some of the screams are quite entertaining as people realize one by one what is happening).  She says, “Send us over a drink, at least!” and HOLY FUCK SHE’S GETTING ON HER KNEES. My stomach and repressed, discretion-valuing Catholic upbringing can handle it no longer.  I go to the other side of the bar, back turned, hands around my eyes like horse blinders.  A minute or two later, they exit the bar and go into the hotel.

In the next 5 minutes, the phrase “That just happened.” was spoken no fewer than 642 times. People wept, people laughed nervously, people sat in corners rocking back and forth.

Then! The woman came back! She sat at the bar! And ordered a glass of wine.  I went over to her and chatted up the Susan Boyle of hooking up.  Here’s our conversation, reproduced to the best of my trauma-blunted hippocampus’ ability. (for best results, read her lines with a Long Island accent, and every time there is a vowel sound, hold it out for 50% longer than you would think is necessary. Also, add a smidgen of MadTV’s Stewart’s mom’s intonation)

Me: Wow, that was quite the performance.  Can I take a picture with you??

Nelly: Of course, darling.

Me: Um, my name’s Steve.

Nelly: Well, it’s very nice to meet you Steve.  My name is Nelly*.

Me: So like, who was that dude?

Nelly: His name is Robert*.

Me: Where did you meet him?

Nelly: At a gay bar.

Me: A gay bar…?

Nelly: Yeah, a gay bar.  It’s right around the corner.  My gay friend was like “Let’s go out! To the gay bar!” Well, it’s not so much a gay bar. It’s more of a whorehouse.

Me: Oh, a whorehouse.

Nelly: Yeah, a whorehouse.  Anyway, I met Robert, and then we went to this patio of this restaurant around the *other* corner from here and we did it on the patio.

Me: So this is your second public encounter tonight?

Nelly: Well yeah! I went out to lunch at this nice restaurant that had a nice patio, so I brought Robert there and we had sex on one of the tables, and then we came here.  He has a room in the hotel tonight, but he wants me to come back to his house.  I don’t think I trust him enough for that.

Me: … (short inhale, squint) …

(Robert enters the bar)

Me: Nice to meet you, Robert.  Well done today.

Robert: Thank you. That was a nice tribute to Michael Jackson that you sang tonight.

Nelly: Robert can speak Italian!

Robert: Something in Italian

Me: You guys know that there were people that saw you, right?

Nelly: Oh yeah, what’s the big deal?

Me: Did you notice the camera flashes?

Nelly: Ya, we put on quite the show, didn’t we!?

Me: You guys make such a cute couple.  Can I take a picture of you two?

Robert: Please do!

Nelly: Here, take my business card! Email it to me! Hold on, let me write down my personal email address for you.

Me: Oh, well thank you! I’ll be sure to send it!

Click. (Beep, rather. It’s a camera phone. But “click” is a word more strongly associated with the sound a camera shutter makes. You get the damn point.)

Me, mind collapsing from the gravity of the situation I have experienced: Okay, well I’m going to find my friends. You two have a good night…

***

I hate straight people.

*This is a morally ambiguous post at best.  I at least changed their names, because I have at minimum 0.002 souls.