
It’s slow around the holidays as if folks want to be seen by god as good blokes, so they slow the party aspects down. The staff kept the fires burnin’ for the local loyal customers and folks who don’t have anywhere to go but the Cantina during the holidays. Clay’s rolled in everyday to sip beers even as the cool winter wind whipped across the harbor. Buster arrived from time to time to dodge his wife and three screamin’ kids. The girls, Nyla, Mandy and Tina bounced around in a daze enjoying the R&B tunes and flirting with one another.

It was one of these quiet nights when a tall biker rolled up on a basically stock Softail packing a 5’6″ brunette. They were cold and she was bundled from head to toe. Marko eyed her sleek figure inquisitively. She carefully unwrapped the bandanna layers used more for facial protection than the cold. She was as bandaged as the invisible man.
Her male escort was tall, maybe six and a half feet, with acne features against a coarse face. He didn’t appear to have much going on. His bike was plain, to class or pizzazz or extra touches. He was obviously a part-time rider. It wasn’t really his thing. Even his leather didn’t fit him well. The chaps were too short, high-water and his jacket sleeves didn’t reach his wrists.
They sat down at a Cantina table near the Christmas tree and Mandy delivered the warm chips and fresh salsa in a Mexican pottery bowl.
Marko curiously watched from the corner of the bar. She was staunch with a sexy air, and her man was as dead as a telephone pole. They hardly spoke. He grabbed chip after chip and she massaged one as if it would age her lips to let it pass.

The red and white checkerboard table cloth caught the multi-hue Christmas bulbs and reflected their light in her angular, but excellently soft cheeks. She removed her jacket without gentlemanly assistance from her husband. Marko spied the matching wedding bands. Mandy offered them drinks and the dark wavy hared rider declined. “Just black coffee,” he said. But the brunette with thinning straight hair, ordered a gold Cadillac Margarita and her eyes sparkled, or was it the hint from Holiday lights?
The husband scowled at his wife as he perused the menu. Mandy brought the drinks on flattened feet. The couple’s demeanor slowed her jubilant pace. Marko was distracted by the sound of another motorcycle outside in the damp cold. He immediately picked up on the loose solid lifters of an early model, perhaps a flathead. It had to be Indian John.
John tossed open the door wearing his all black uniform and scoffed into the dimly lit room and check out the quiet digs. An old Four Tops tune warmed the Cantina in addition to the fire in the pit. His eyes were cherry red from riding along the coast and he smiled and gave a thumbs up to Marko. John couldn’t speak due to a throat cancer operation, the scars covered by his long, constantly massaged, graying beard. He pulled on it and looked toward the Christmas tree. The girl turned and spotted John and her eyes blazed. She stood immediately and beckoned John to their table.
John was a San Pedro motorcycling pirate. He loved the night, the dark coastal city streets, the bar life and the women. He turned to Marko, who stood quietly observing in a darkened corner of the room, and their eyes met. John’s eyes sparkled like those of the devil’s after he’s spotted a mark. One long curved eyebrow raised as if a signal that the door to hell was comfortably open.
Without a word he danced across the floor to hug the tall one with giant tits. The gesture was electric. The curvaceous woman switched for being a taught concubine to a free sexual spirit. The grouchy husband remained seated and only nodded and shook hands as if obligated.
The Chinaman was heard scolding his south of the border help in the galley as Mandy made trips back and forth to the single table. A side of guacamole, another Cadillac Margarita, a rum and coke for John and hot coffee for the dower husband.
As the second margarita drained the body language intensified. She questioned John and his eyes sparkle as he quickly jotted notes on his napkin. She didn’t seem interested in his response, but stared deeply as if his eyes would tell her more. The husband, the third wheel at the table, said something politely and removed himself. He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his jacked and made his way toward the door.
No sooner did the big Oak porthole shut with a whoosh of cold night air, than this broad turned ardently toward scrawny Indian John and shouted, “Where the hell is he?”
John turned his broken pencil toward the soiled napkin, but she snatched it off the table, crumbled it, her face a hard mask of frustration and anger. “Don’t write your gibberish,” She spat, the color rising in her cheeks. “Just tell me where he is?” She ground her teeth as she glared at the old outlaw.
John looked at her directly, sipped his rum and coke and set the metal cup he carried constantly on the rickety table and back-handed the babe with a five-finger load of jagged silver rings. She spun and fell out of her chair to the peanut shell deck. As quickly as she hit the concrete surface, she jumped back to her feet dusting herself off. Blood slide down her soft cheek and tears welled up in her lower eyelids. She was counting the seconds until her husband returned. Her time was running out and desperation heightened. She opened her form fitting black leather shirt and her soft round mounds pushed at her fabric trying to escape as she reached in for a hanky to dab the blood on her cheek.
John stood up abruptly. His voice box was shot, but if someone listened damn close in a quiet room, his words were recognizable. This time he had nothing to say.
Marko had never seen the old Indian rider mad. He had never seen this broad before either, but she was mesmerizing in a difficult fashion. Her body pushed all his buttons, but something about her face was unfriendly, unkind, inconsiderate, even nasty. She glared at John, grabbed her things and disappeared into the head.
John picked up his stainless steel canister and strode over to where Marko stood. He pushed himself up to full height to bring his beard framed mouth up toward Marko’s ear. “She’s looking for Bandit,” he said and gave Marko a knowing gaze then went to the bar.
The woman stormed out of the bar, passing her husband entering the Cantina, a mist of cold night air lingering around his eyes. “Let’s get out of hear she snapped and walked out the door. Her tall angular husband walked to the table to retrieve his riding gear. He sipped his coffee once more, set the cup down and left without a word.
Marko watched the big man leave and followed him out the door. Silently, without comment, or emotional gesture the couple mounted their late model Softail and rumbled out of the parking lot.
Another quiet Holiday night. The hours passed uneventful, the girls giggling and playing grab-ass with one another. Indian John jotted notes on his napkins and shared his old school lingo with Clay and Buster. As the night lingered and John headed out to his Indian he paused and got close to Marko again. He slapped his hand against his chest, the portion that guards a man’s heart. Each time he did it he pointed toward the stairs and Bandit’s apartment. He shook Marko’s hand heartily with an old school brotherhood grasp and leaned in. “Bandit does something to women,” he said and made another hand gesture that Marko didn’t understand. He winked and strode out the big Oak doors.
Two Kicks and that Indian with the highbars and the rubber chicken dangling from the sissybar fired to life. Marko listened to the flathead rumble out of the parking lot and into the misty harbor night.