There's A Place (Beatles Fan Fiction)

“Customers! Customers, Julia!”

I looked up at the command, blinking out of my daydream. “Oh, sorry,” I mumbled, walking to the other end of the bar to serve the two waiting men.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” I told them. “What’ll it be?”

“You’ll do for a start, love,” said the one on the left, with a toothy grin. This was Mark, a builder who came in here most evenings.

I just smiled back wearily. “Lagar?” I offered. He was also one of the more bothersome and unfortunately, persistent regulars.

“That’ll do,” Ken, on the right, said.

“When are we going out for that meal then?” Mark asked as I began pouring the drinks.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. I’d run out of pithy answers. Every night I was at work he would ask me out. The fact I turned him down each time and the point he looked like a troll didn’t dent his confidence, or his ego, in the slightest.

“You said Monday last week, and now its Friday!” he said as I placed the glass in front of him.

“Mmm,” I replied, disinterested. “I was busy,”

“Right, we’ll go out next Monday then,” Mark continued.

“Take no notice of him, love,” Ken said sympathetically, holding out the money for the beer.

“Ta,” I said and walked over to the till, ignoring whatever lewd comments Mark made to Ken as soon as my back was turned.

“A word with you please, Julia,” the bar manager, and my boss, Bob said in my ear as I handed Ken his change.

“Oo-oh,” Ken said, smiling.

“Eh! She’s yer top barmaid, that one! She’s alright!” Mark said to Bob. Bob nodded slightly and turned away. Maybe Mark was good for something after all.

I turned to Bob.

“Julia, all you’ve done since you got here tonight is stand about,” he said grumpily.

In fact, I hadn’t. I had wiped all the tables twice over, restocked the fridges, washed all the glasses and served all of the four customers we’d had through the door since eight o’clock. Then, with nothing left to see to, I had ended up standing next to the glasses trays, trying to think of something to do, or redo, when my mind had wandered and I had missed Mark and Ken walking in.

“I shouldn’t have to be telling you this after all the time you’ve been here,” Bob continued. “You’re not paid to stand about and daydream all night!”

Well, okay, so I do tend to drift off into a fantasy world, but that’s only because my job is so mind numbingly boring! Four years at university and the only gainful employment I had managed to secure since graduating was as a barmaid in a hotel bar. Wiping tables and emptying ashtrays. It’s just until… I had always said, it’s just until I get a ‘proper’ job… but that was five years ago now and my career prospects were non-existent.

“Sorry, Bob,” I said, not really meaning it, “But we’re hardly run off our feet tonight, are we?”

“No, but that’s not the point,” Bob sighed. “Right, I’ll be up in the office. Gizza buzz if you need ewt,” he said over his shoulder as he left. I nodded at his back.

Our only other customers, an elderly couple who were revisiting their honeymoon at the hotel, got up to leave.

“Thanks! Goodnight!” I called over to them. They waved back as they unsteadily made their way down the steps and towards the doors to the hotel reception.