don’t tell my wife
asked the birthday boy
he said he was 40, but looked 30.
smelled 21 like he had just gotten out of the gym.
fellas, never skip a day of showering and get in a car. dudes think, who would notice? a little brut under each arm and alls well?
alls i can assure you my friend, is not good.
the fare was good, so i cracked the window and stopped mentally whining.
his name was marcus, forgettable features and style. dressed to fit in, not to stand out. my goal too.
he smelled funky because he had just helped inhale an eight ball of blow, downed ten shots of jameson, and dont tell his wife, but he rubbed the legs of a red-headed hooker who sat on his lap for two hours. it was his birthday and his boys wanted him to enjoy turning the big 4-0 in k-town.
since marcus was korean, that meant kbbq, karaoke, bottomless soju, and npg girls. npg? he used a three letter term i couldn’t make out. he was slurring words. did he want to go to sleep back there?
whats that, i asked?
they’re girls who will hang out with you in the karaoke rooms, and with your friends, he explained. there’s a knock at the door and five or six girls line up. if you like one of them you choose them. it was my birthday so i chose first. i took a white girl. not the prettiest. not the fittest. one that doesn’t always get picked. but pretty. they cost $100 an hour, 2-hour minimum. no sex, but you can rub their leg.
no sex, I asked? what an interesting culture.
some places you can have sex, he said, places that have private bathrooms in the room. but in most places, the girls give you their phone number and you can call them in a few days for sex, or a bj, or whatever, he explained.
are they topless?
no.
why not?
thats not how it is.
what if you tipped them? i mean, i dont mind not having sex with them, in fact im not sure i want that at all, but if theyre there to look pretty, lets all take our shirts off and sing ozzy ‘til the dust settles.
ive never seen that happen, he admitted.
marcus, if it was your birthday and i was one of your boys, and we all had npg girls, i’d make a rule where we all changed clothes after every song, like what the replacements did on snl.
change what? he asked, very confused.
ok after the first song, i wear your clothes and you wear my npg girl’s clothes. then the following song i wear hers. we’d all rotate. but the singing must never stop marcus. in fact, since its your birthday, another rule must be that you have to always have a bra on.
i dont know if thats allowed.
can you do drugs with these women?
yes, we split an eight ball tonight.
so you can coke these beauties up and do saki bombs, but you cant wear their bras? what sort of country are we living in?
i dont think you understand, he said, trying to calm me down
BUT I WAS CALM
so all of you have girls, but none of you had any sex with them?
correct, he said, adjusting his glasses after putting his phone down on the seat.
where do you get your blow jobs? he asked me directly
me? im gonna be 58 in a month. at my age, bjs are like finding money in the street. it happens and you look around to see if this is a hilarious prank, but you know it’s all luck having nothing to do with you.
you will remember, oh yeah thats where i found $20 in the gutter.
you dont use an app? he asked and told me about a site called humaniplex
this is why i drive rideshare, i told him. you people teach me everything.
WHAT ON EARTH IS HUMANIPLEX?
it’s where you can pay girls for blowjobs and handjobs.
i looked at him via the rear view mirror in the back seat. it was dark and i couldnt see very much.
i tried to ESP him, dont pay for things you can get for free. but my powers arent what they used to be.
ive been married almost 20 years, he confessed, and my wife doesn’t do that any more. once we had our second daughter, she looks at me as if i was disgusting.
bro, we are disgusting.
but she’s my wife. two minutes would mean so much. for my birthday she didn’t even give me a real kiss. i got a pat on the back as i left the house to get my lyft.
don’t drink too much soju! she said.
then he handed me the npg girl’s card which I discreetly placed in the soiled wrapper that once held my jack in the box taco.
you don’t want it? i asked.
i already put her in my contacts as soju.
and when he got out of the car he said, don’t tell my wife