The Surprise
April Heater was a knockout. We worked together at a roadhouse bar that had once been the restaurant and dance floor in a faded palatial hotel on the beach in Santa Barbara, California. It was the summer before I went to graduate school in England---1972.
I was married at that time and so April was clearly off limits but we did become friends in our funky workplace over those few short months and shared some laughs and talked about the future we hoped would unfold for each of us.
She was so striking, so physically beautiful in so many ways. But what made her really captivating were her eyes---big green eyes which, like Brigitte Bardot’s, were sort of out of alignment. When she looked at you one looked straight at you, almost straight through you, and the other looked slightly to the side. I believe there’s a French colloquial phrase referring to that condition which translates something like “one eye on your wife and one eye on the street.” When April did look at you, you stayed utterly focused on her face and those beautiful, strange eyes.
The roadhouse was a pretty rough place, frequented by a clientele that included folks like the LA Thunderbirds and the Australian Kangaroos---roller derby guys, all from the Los Angeles area really. It was the preferred hangout for a Latino motorcycle gang called The Bravados, and other assorted tough guys and riff-raff showed up regularly. There were fights nearly every night and our biggest bouncer, Izzy, a 300 pound dude from New Jersey, dealt with the worst of them. We had two armed security guards on duty every night as well as three bartenders per shift, a few waitresses, three additional bouncers, the two proprietors (one a guy I knew from high school back in Ohio who’d just returned from Vietnam) and a full tilt roadhouse band called The Whole Thing who played covers of all kinds of Rockabilly stuff. They were pretty good actually. Except for the security guards none of the employees were over thirty. April and I were both 24. My job was to check IDs at the door and collect the cover charge with one of the security guards on hand, and April was a barmaid.
In earlier days the facility, with its sprung dance floor, had entertained wealthy patrons with the big bands of the 20’s 30’s and 40’s. The restaurant served first class meals and the beach house, across the street from the hotel, hosted bathers, beach combers and tennis players daily. Now the restaurant was shut down---not up to health standards of the day. The beach house was boarded up and the tennis courts were derelict. The hotel was also run down and its residents were definitely not the same as those in earlier years. In a way, though, it was a perfect venue for a roadhouse bar in that era.
Guys hit on April every night, whether she was working or on her break. It would start as soon as she arrived. They’d keep it up all night, following her to the bathroom and to her car at 3:00 AM where she was always escorted by one of the security guards. It was relentless and, frankly, I often felt bad for her.
Occasionally, especially later in the evening, I’d fill in for barmaids and bartenders when they had their breaks, usually 15 minutes or so two or three times a night. One evening in early August April asked me to cover for her while she took her break.
“No problem”, I said.
I stepped behind the bar and she stepped out in front of it, sat on a stool, lit a cigarette and asked me to pour her a beer, which I did. In a couple of minutes yet another hopeful suitor planted himself on the stool next to her and started his pick-up lines. I could see she was annoyed but trying to stay cool. After about three minutes worth of his advances and her doing her best to ignore them she looked at him and said, “Excuse me just a minute”.
With that she bent forward over the bar, put her hand on her face and shook her head. When she came up she placed a glass eye on the bar, turned and faced the guy, and blinked an empty eye socket at him. He left abruptly.
And so April revealed the secret of her peculiar gaze that night. Even so it didn’t spoil the mystery of her unusual beauty.
The hotel was restored in the 1990’s and is a five star destination again. I don’t know what ever became of April Heater.
© Kent Jones 2016
April Heater was a knockout. We worked together at a roadhouse bar that had once been the restaurant and dance floor in a faded palatial hotel on the beach in Santa Barbara, California. It was the summer before I went to graduate school in England---1972.
I was married at that time and so April was clearly off limits but we did become friends in our funky workplace over those few short months and shared some laughs and talked about the future we hoped would unfold for each of us.
She was so striking, so physically beautiful in so many ways. But what made her really captivating were her eyes---big green eyes which, like Brigitte Bardot’s, were sort of out of alignment. When she looked at you one looked straight at you, almost straight through you, and the other looked slightly to the side. I believe there’s a French colloquial phrase referring to that condition which translates something like “one eye on your wife and one eye on the street.” When April did look at you, you stayed utterly focused on her face and those beautiful, strange eyes.
The roadhouse was a pretty rough place, frequented by a clientele that included folks like the LA Thunderbirds and the Australian Kangaroos---roller derby guys, all from the Los Angeles area really. It was the preferred hangout for a Latino motorcycle gang called The Bravados, and other assorted tough guys and riff-raff showed up regularly. There were fights nearly every night and our biggest bouncer, Izzy, a 300 pound dude from New Jersey, dealt with the worst of them. We had two armed security guards on duty every night as well as three bartenders per shift, a few waitresses, three additional bouncers, the two proprietors (one a guy I knew from high school back in Ohio who’d just returned from Vietnam) and a full tilt roadhouse band called The Whole Thing who played covers of all kinds of Rockabilly stuff. They were pretty good actually. Except for the security guards none of the employees were over thirty. April and I were both 24. My job was to check IDs at the door and collect the cover charge with one of the security guards on hand, and April was a barmaid.
In earlier days the facility, with its sprung dance floor, had entertained wealthy patrons with the big bands of the 20’s 30’s and 40’s. The restaurant served first class meals and the beach house, across the street from the hotel, hosted bathers, beach combers and tennis players daily. Now the restaurant was shut down---not up to health standards of the day. The beach house was boarded up and the tennis courts were derelict. The hotel was also run down and its residents were definitely not the same as those in earlier years. In a way, though, it was a perfect venue for a roadhouse bar in that era.
Guys hit on April every night, whether she was working or on her break. It would start as soon as she arrived. They’d keep it up all night, following her to the bathroom and to her car at 3:00 AM where she was always escorted by one of the security guards. It was relentless and, frankly, I often felt bad for her.
Occasionally, especially later in the evening, I’d fill in for barmaids and bartenders when they had their breaks, usually 15 minutes or so two or three times a night. One evening in early August April asked me to cover for her while she took her break.
“No problem”, I said.
I stepped behind the bar and she stepped out in front of it, sat on a stool, lit a cigarette and asked me to pour her a beer, which I did. In a couple of minutes yet another hopeful suitor planted himself on the stool next to her and started his pick-up lines. I could see she was annoyed but trying to stay cool. After about three minutes worth of his advances and her doing her best to ignore them she looked at him and said, “Excuse me just a minute”.
With that she bent forward over the bar, put her hand on her face and shook her head. When she came up she placed a glass eye on the bar, turned and faced the guy, and blinked an empty eye socket at him. He left abruptly.
And so April revealed the secret of her peculiar gaze that night. Even so it didn’t spoil the mystery of her unusual beauty.
The hotel was restored in the 1990’s and is a five star destination again. I don’t know what ever became of April Heater.
© Kent Jones 2016