I helped her with the luggage into the hotel.
I had a couple of friends with me.
While she was in the shower, I unpacked her clothes. Expensive dresses and coats. Then I sat with my friends and talked a little bit.
She came out of the shower and put on a white bathrobe.
Striking up a conversation with me she asked, "Do you still sing live?"
"No, but I was doing poetry readings on occasion," I replied.
"You should give it a rest," she said, brushing her hair.
"Which one?" I inquired.
"Whichever," she said.
She put the brush down and started checking messages on the phone.
"Do you still drink in lounges?" she asked, making a drinking gesture by pointing at her mouth with her thumb.
"You mean bars?" I asked.
"A matter of semantics," she said.
"Yes," I confessed, "but not every single day; just most days."
"Writers are a bunch of drunks," she retorted, while continuing to check her messages.
"That's a stereotype," I said, "the same as musicians all being drug addicts."
"Then I suppose we are both stereotypical," she said with a smile.
Her smile always took my breath away.
"Which club are you performing at tonight?"
I asked, adjusting myself on the bed.
"Cherry's," she answered.
"Is that in East Hollywood?" I asked, "near that other place you used to work?"
"A few blocks from there," she responded.
Her name still draws a crowd, I thought. Music was always her first love.
She answered a phone call and began a long conversation with someone while curled up with me on the bed. I asked one of my friends how he was doing. He just smiled.
Part 1 is here: http://forbiddenpoetry.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-dream_829.html
