The Barman, the Actress and the Prostitute

Last night I was helping a friend with her daughter’s 18th birthday party.  It was held at their very beautiful home where they have an enviable view.

The view from my backyard has no similarities with this scene.

Anyway, I would love to tell you all about the party that was a sit-down Italian feast for 38 pretty little things with straightened hair, ultra-short dresses and sky-high heels but first I feel I must tell you about the barman, the actress and the prostitute.  This story has everything to do with Archie.

Archie was the barman.

During the week I had asked my friend if she needed a barman for the event and she said that would be a great idea.  I told her Archie has plenty of experience as a barman and she said she would hire him for the evening.  When Archie came home from uni I told him I had found him some paying work.  ‘Mum, I don’t have time for that.  I’ve got assessments all next week’.

‘You don’t have uni on Monday, Archie and you don’t have to be in on Tuesday until about lunchtime so I think you can organise your schedule to fit in a couple of hours behind a bar’.

‘Okay.  I’ll do it.  But how late do you think it will go because I’ll have to get back to learn some monologues’.

‘She just needs you for about four hours.  Six till 10.’

‘Well good because I’ve got a stack of work’.

On the night, things started out well.  Archie arrived on time, he was smartly dressed, he had washed his hair; he was even wearing deodorant.  Then a guest arrived.  Archie offered her a drink.  Then he looked at her a little more closely.  ‘I know you’, he said, ‘we auditioned together last year’.

‘Yes’, she said.  ‘Oh wow’, she said.  ‘Good to see you’, she said.

She’s the actress.

Up until that point the actress had been feeling a little low.  Dumped by her boyfriend a few days earlier she had come to the birthday party feeling  subdued but now – now she had an unlimited bar and a barman.  And so she had a few drinks.  And then a few more.  And a little bit of food and then a few more drinks.

At about 11pm the party was winding down but the remnant wanted to kick on.  In Kings Cross.  The barman had now been paid for his services and the actress asked Archie if he would like to join her and the girls at a night club in Kings Cross.  ‘That would be great’, said Archie.

‘Ah, Archie,’ I said,  ‘what about your assessments and all that work you said you have on and that busy week you said you have coming up?’

‘It’s all good mum.  Everything’s sorted.  I won’t be late’.  And off he went with the actress and the remnant.

At 1.45am the parents of the actress received a phone call.  ‘Hi, your daughter just got out of a taxi in Kings Cross and she’s really drunk and she left her phone on the backseat.  I’m just ringing to let you know I have her phone.  I can’t get it back to you tonight but I could get it to you tomorrow.’

‘Where’s our daughter now?’

‘I don’t know.  She went off with some guy’.

‘I’m going to have to find my daughter so can I have your name and number so I can call you tomorrow about the phone?’

‘I’m sorry but I’m a street worker and so for security I don’t give out my private details but I can tell you my name’s Electra’.

She’s the prostitute.

The concerned parents then phoned the party girl’s parents.  ‘Do you know where our daughter is and who she’s with?’

‘After the party they all went to Kings Cross and she was with Archie, the barman’.  The father leaped out of bed and drove into Kings Cross in search of his daughter.  He stopped outside nightclubs and asked bouncers if they had seen his daughter.  One was able to tell him he had seen her leaving earlier with a guy.

At 4am, (having been given my mobile number by the host), the father phoned me but as I was asleep and immune to the unfolding events, the call went through to message.  The father said, ‘My daughter has gone missing.  We were told she was very drunk and in Kings Cross and we believe she may be with your son.  We are treating this as extremely serious and we have the police involved.  Please treat this message as extremely important and urgent.’

But I slept on.

And meanwhile the actress was asleep in Archie’s bed!  But he was on the couch.

At 6am when all phones started ringing and there were calls coming in from the birthday girl, the birthday girl’s mother, the birthday girl’s father, the actress’s mother and the actress’s father, I woke in a state of confusion and today I have pieced together what happened.

The barman, the actress and the remnant went to a nightclub in Kings Cross in a taxi.  The actress left her mobile phone in the cab but not remembering where she left it, told Archie it was back at the birthday girl’s house.  At the night club Archie, realising the actress was quite intoxicated, allowed her only to drink water.  After a short time at the night club Archie thought she should go home so he suggested they catch the bus together.  On the bus the actress became very unwell and I’ll just let you picture the scene.  Archie thought she was too unwell to go home by herself (she lives a half hour further out of the city than we do) so he suggested she come to our house to stay the night.  He let her sleep in his bed while he slept on the couch.  Archie did not know a prostitute (an honest one) had picked up her phone, phoned her parents and let them know their daughter was very drunk and with a strange man in Kings Cross.

I am not even going to question how it is that four hours of bar work so quickly unraveled to involve actresses, prostitutes, police and parents.

I think there’s a lesson in here somewhere and I’m sure it’s not, ‘Some prostitutes are honest’.

Now it’s time for something pretty.  Here are the flowers I created for the tables.  I’ll tell you all about the party (and there will be no mention of barmen or actresses or prostitutes) in tomorrow’s post.

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