Doll of silence

Max Club

Max Club was located on the riverside at the East edge of a tiny town called Laxity. The Blue Moon River tenderly hugged the town with its peaceful flow and joined with an aggressive flow from the upstream at the East where Blurr Mountain isolated the town from a bigger city. There was a rumor that they would build a tunnel through the mountain. It had been told for years already but no one had ever seen any constructing machine coming around. Well, it was quite expectable. So far, Max Club was the only place available overnight for people in this town. The police station was supposed to be open 24/7, but this town was so small that those “respectable cops” hardly had a case to work on. Consequently, they ended up hanging around Max Club every night. So, this club was probably one of the most successful businesses in the area and working as a waitress here was not such a bad job. Jane even found it interesting. She was 17, high school in the morning, bar at night.

But that day, she wasn’t in the mood for a night. "Did you have a bad day?" A cleaning girl asked her. "You look exhausted". In the morning, this place was a restaurant and its staffs were hired to clean up the place before they left. Jane often came here early, just as the night fell, to avoid her parents. That gave her a pretty good chance to get to know many people there. "Yeah, kind of. I see those so called customers are giving you a bad night too." She replied, and the cleaning girl just tiredly smiled. That was how it was, a soaked head-to-toe couple came in and brought some dirt footprint to help decorating the floor, what else could you do except for smiling? "I think I would go to the restroom now. Could you take care of the bar for me?"

The corridor was dark like hell and her head felt dizzy. The bulbs on the ceiling had been broken for who knows how long, leaving a small, flickering sign above the female restroom, weakly emitting a scarily red light. Jane slowly dragged her body on the floor to the door and opened it and found herself rushing to the nearest toilet for an awful vomit. A disgusting smell busted in to the air, made her want to urgently throw up but there was nothing left in her stomach. Tears filled her eyes, blurred her vision and washed her new layer of mascara away, leaving a clown face. A dark shadow covered her.

"Poor girl, nasty throw up." An undeniably male voice from behind her made her startled, but she calmed herself pretty fast. That’s the result of a short training in serving at the bar.

"It’s female restroom, what the hell is a man doing here?"She said, didn’t even bother to turn around. "If you wanna have fun, we have rooms for that." Yes, they did. Boys and girls didn’t come here to drink and dance. Well, they did drink and dance for a while, before they found some place to hook up. "Don’t drive while you're drunk." That’s what the boss said.

"I’m not looking for fun, but it would be so nice of you lending me your great body for a night."

*

At a far corner, where the neon lights had not yet been able to spread its glory, there were two figures sitting still. A weak light shivered slightly on those figures, created perfect silver shapes representing a man and a woman. The rain had stopped. A silver shape cracked, followed by a rhythm that formed a voice.

"Don't you wanna know my name?" James sensed some teasing in her voice. He stayed silent for a little while. After a sigh and several sips of water, he slowly murmured an answer.

"People like you and me don't own real names." He used a finger to push his glass. It lost balance and started falling. "Or would you mind correcting me?"

The girl just smiled, or that was just what we might assume by watching a silver shape on her face, where a crack just closed a moment ago. And as one of her finger reached that shape, the glass suddenly got its balance back like a tumbler, just before a waitress approached. "Yes, I do mind. May be you would like to ask hers instead."

"Are you ready to order?" The waitress looked amused. "How can I please you?"