Then We’d Sit and Drink.
Things started getting a little better when we started going to bars in Florida. This afforded me the privilege of hanging out with people who weren’t Larry, some of whom weren’t even bikers. I was unbelievably glad to get out of the house and sit in the dark with loud music giving me an excuse to stay silent.
Sometimes, when there was live music, Larry would ask the band if he could sit in – and sometimes they’d let him sing. It reminded me that he was hot as heck with a straight-stand mic in front of him and a guitar in his hands.
Larry often chose to perform a Willie Nelson song called Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground. Larry said the song was written about us: a guy who discovered a fallen angel and healed her through love.
The lyrics are touching, which made me believe Larry was a romantic. (In actuality, Willie Nelson must have been a romantic.)
I patched up your broken wing and hung around awhile
Trying to keep your spirits up and your fever down.
I knew someday that you would fly away
For love’s the greatest healer to be found….
When Larry sang, “So leave me if you need to …” I wanted to crawl onto his lap and never leave him. The song reminded me that I was safe, that Larry loved me, that I would always be protected by the man who saved me from my imminent crash.
I completely forgot that Larry was actually the man who picked me up at a gas station in the middle of the night, someone I didn’t trust to pronounce my real name.
Larry would come off that stage and I’d gush all over him, believing so wholeheartedly in our love.
Then we’d sit and drink and chain smoke until the bar closed, and I’d look around at all the really old people, contemplating what I should do about my life.
As the bar was closing, I would invariably start complaining.
“I don’t want to fuckin’ go home,” I’d slur. “I need another beer!”
“Bars in Tampa don’t close until 3:00,” Larry said. But we were not in Tampa; we were in St. Petersburg. Larry grabbed my hand. “C’mon. If we shoot across the bridge, we might be able to fuckin’ make it.”
So we’d hop on the bike and “shoot” across the bridge into Tampa, just in time to squeak inside before 2:00, so we could drink for another hour. The Tampa bar seemed built at the end of the bridge specifically for the purpose of allowing St. Petersburg drinkers another hour of alcoholic bliss.
Plus, Larry was teaching me how to play pool and they had a ton of pool tables there. I loved that Tampa bar, and the pool tables, and staying out an extra hour.
And there was nothing quite like the feeling of going over that bridge: completely wasted, believing I was invincible, arms outstretched, boots locked on the foot pegs, breathing in the salty air and anticipating more drinking….
It was the best feeling in the world.
An hour later, we’d drive back across that bridge to go home, which was nowhere near as fun.