Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is the Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

Hosted by Denise

This is a ‘the Case of the Missing Fig Leaf‘ story. When last we saw Ms. Whitelaw…

This week’s prompt word:

ERUPTION

Sieving her way through the crowd, Stacey Whitelaw got to the waitress station at the far end of the two-deep bar in time to see the Bartender send three drinks and a note to the bandstand; her curiosity was further piqued as the woman with as much hue as hair, stood and watched the waitress navigate the shoals of hips ‘n elbows between her and the three musicians on stage.

“I’m looking for a guy,” laughing at her choice of wording, Stacey was rewarded with an elevated eyebrow and a half-grin, even as the Bartender remained focused on the three men as they looked up from the middle of the Six Sentence Café & Bistro; the bearded bass player laughed a smile over the heads of the crowd, the drummer grinned and tom-tom’d his thanks, the guitar player, however, remained at the front of the stage, a frown corrugating his face as he read the note that accompanied the drinks.

Reading the name tag, Stacy persisted, “So Denise,” only to be interrupted as the guitar player addressed the crowd, “Thanks for coming out for this joint’s new house band, we have our very first request… oh my, it looks like AARP is in the house,” smiling at the crowd but looking towards the bar, Roger laughed and said, in a confiding manner, “What a surprise… a van Halen tune, ‘Eruption’,” the people standing in front of the band added their own sarcastic laughter.

“Hey, sorry to catch you at a bad time,” the look of practiced regret clutching the lesser muscles in the Bartender’s face almost convinced Stacey to ask somebody else but the sandbag fatigue from twelve hours moving against time zones inspired her to push through the jet-lag, “Sorry, man, I know this kinda jars with what you’re feeling at this moment, but I really need to find this guy, goes by the name ‘the Sophomore'”.

“No, don’t worry ’bout it, I saw the kid headed towards the manager’s office a little while ago,” the softening of Denise’s frown betrayed an affection all the more contrasted against the tired ache hiding at the corners of her eyes, “Follow the hall over there until you see a door with some way-tacky lettering spelling out MANAGER.”

“Listen,” Stacy put her hand on the wrist of the Bartender, where a leather and brass bracelet did a poor job of covering old scars, “Maybe after I find who I’m looking for, if you’re still on duty, I’ll buy us a cup of coffee?”