On the evening of Day Two post-apocalyptic fall, I abandoned Dorothy and headed out on a solo visit to Siem Reap’s famous night markets. The night market area is also the locus for what’s known as Pub Street, which is not the official name, but captures the delightful Spring Break ambiance. 100% of the businesses in the area surrounding the night markets are bars, restaurants, or spas. Maybe 99%, but I honestly couldn’t tell you what the other 1% might have been.

With the choices being spa, restaurant, and bar, I partook of a little of each. I enjoyed a mani-pedi for $12, at a place that looked a little disreputable compared to the glitzier spas in the area. But everyone needs to make a buck, so I spread the love. Both mani and pedi were fine, but the polish was artlessly applied. I actually had the polish on my fingers removed.

Next came dinner, which was a plate of vegetable fried rice for $1 and a to-go order of spring rolls for Dorothy at a regal $1.50. Not a fine dining experience, but an experience, which was the point.

Finally, a cheap drink. All the bars seemed to have $1 well cocktails, and not much beyond the well. You can’t win the lottery without buying a ticket, so I picked a bar, grabbed a $1 gin on ice, took a seat, and proceeded to have the highlight of my night market visit.

Because shortly after sitting down a lovely young Cambodian lady sat down beside me, draping herself casually about me in a manner that suggested genuine fellowship and good feeling. She was very friendly, told me her name was Emily, and asked if I’d buy her a drink. I have seen this hustle before, so I knew to ask how much her drinks cost. A whopping $3. Sure. It’s my role as a visitor to fuel the local economy, and it would, at worst, be entertaining to see how this played out.

So she sits down with her drink, gives me a flirty look and says, “Let’s play a game.” It would undoubtedly be a game I didn’t want to play, given that I had genuinely sat down to have a cheap drink and soak in the local atmosphere (which I appeared to be doing in spades), but I wasn’t given a chance to respond. She hopped up, went to the bar, and returned with… a Connect Four set. She actually meant that we should play a game.

This turned out to be the most charming bar hustle I have ever encountered. She did not take her Connect 4 casually. We played 9 games. She won five, I won three, and we drew once. One of my wins was the last one, which she clearly lost intentionally. I suspect my other two wins were also at her discretion, although she was more subtle about it. But maybe not. She seemed genuinely angry when she lost, and also took the draw poorly.

And that was it. We played Connect 4, I spent a total of $6 on a pair of drinks for her, and I went home. She makes money on her overpriced drinks, and that’s all she was about. The bar had been pretty empty when I sat down, but more couples of, shall we say, disparate ages were seated as we played. None of them were playing Connect 4. It’s like she’d peered directly into my soul and understood that the thing that would fulfill my dreams and fantasies was not an evening with a lovely Cambodian lady but a playdate over games.

I felt so, so seen.

Deep Cuts

The punchline to this story, as if it was somehow lacking in punchline, is that when I got home I slurred to Dorothy, “I met proshtitoots.” This was not technically correct, as there was only one of Emily, and I have no idea where she landed on the Bar Hostess spectrum. It’s not like she was trying to upsell me.

That line was a deep cut quote, going back to our days in the Kensington neighborhood of Brooklyn.

Picking up the pieces after the collapse of our hosiery company, I wound up working for a guy who had been a senior protocol official in the Ford administration. He was obviously well connected and he’d married into money, so he was scratching the entrepreneurial itch. He’d bought the US rights to an Australian product, day-glo colored sunscreen, and my soup-to-nuts product launch experience was just what he needed.

We’d start by importing some of the Australian product to get us going, but I had to build the US business. Branding, packaging, product formulation and manufacture, FDA approval, product launch (at Bloomingdales, natch), photo shoots and press and promo. I was back in the game.

When we get back to the States I’ll update this with product shots from my archives, but here’s a picture I scraped from Etsy. Haute 80s.

In the buildup to the US launch, I had been in constant communication with the Australian owner, a lovely man named David. By Telex, for those keeping score on the technology timeline. So, after smoke signals and before email. David decided to spend the week before the push to the Bloomies debut in NYC with me, working hand in hand.

I’d enjoyed working with David long distance, but he was my business boyfriend for that week. Smart, funny, resourceful, genuinely kind and helpful. He was a delightful collaborator.

We’d pulled off a successful Bloomies launch together, and David was headed back to Sydney the next morning. He suggested we go out for a celebratory dinner, which couldn’t have been a more welcome proposition. We went to a high-end Chinese restaurant, ordered dinner and a drink, and I called Dorothy from a payphone to let her know what David and I were up to and that I’d be home a little late, in a few hours tops.

Then I learned a new thing.

In addition to the famous admonition to “Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom’s. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own.” I could now add a fourth: “Never match an Aussie drink for drink.” You will lose.

I lost.

I honestly have absolutely no idea how many drinks we had. It was, unquestionably, the most I have ever had to drink, to this day. With no identifiable close second. A drink at the Chinese restaurant was followed by… several more? Then we went to a bar. Or two. Or more. I don’t know.

Finally, we wind up back at his hotel for a nightcap at the hotel bar. What’s a night out without a nightcap? We’re sitting at the bar, but mostly I’m trying not to fall off the barstool, with David to my right. Swear to god, at this point I’m just trying to focus my eyes. I have no idea what time it is, among other things I don’t know, but I have yet to check back in with Dorothy because I may have forgotten she existed. Or how to use a telephone. Or what a telephone even was.

Before you know it, the two seats to David’s right are occupied by a pair of stunningly beautiful women. Even more magical, they were friendly! And personable. That just never happens. By focusing carefully on the mirror behind the bar, I could see that they were all having a wonderful time chatting together.

I thought it might be helpful if my ears worked, so I mustered all my focus and was able to listen in on their conversation. David was asking them what they did, and one of them replied that they were in the entertainment business. What kind of entertainment? They staged parties. David asked if they were public or private parties, and was told that they were strictly private. He asked how much it might cost to attend one of their parties.

And that’s when the lightbulb finally went on. These lovely, charming, friendly women were prostitutes. And unless my deductive powers had completely abandoned me, David seemed to be negotiating with them.

When he was satisfied with the price, he turned to me and said, “What do you think, mate? I have a couple of frangers in me room.” “David, that’s awesome. What’s a franger?” “A condom, mate.” “Oooh, David, I don’t think I can.” Which I’m sure I meant in every sense.

David turns back to our companions and begs off. “I’m sorry ladies, but I have an early flight in the morning, and I don’t think it’s a good idea.” They turned on me. “What about your friend?”

I did what any red-blooded American man would do in the same situation. I panicked. “Ah, right me. Yes. Well, the thing is, David here is headed back to Australia and he needed cash so I withdrew my limit from the ATM to give to him and now I don’t have any money and can’t get any more.” That’s pulling it out of the ditch, am I right?

“Oh, that’s not a problem. It’s just turned midnight so it’s a new banking day and there’s an ATM right there in the lobby.” As if I could remember my PIN. I think I looked at the floor and muttered an “I’m sorry,” and they walked off. I felt like I’d let them down.

But I did realize that a crucial piece of intel had just been casually dropped. It was after midnight. I’d last spoken to Dorothy seven hours ago, telling her I’d be home in a couple of hours. Very not good.

I made my goodbyes to David and sluiced myself into a cab, whose cabbie thankfully knew exactly where I was going in Kensington, as I promptly passed out. He poured me to the curb and I staggered into our apartment. Dorothy was up, watching an Elvis movie on TV, and pretty rage-filled. I slurred out “I met proshtitoots” and told her my story.

She decided that punishing me was unnecessary, as she sensibly predicted the epic hangover I had inflicted on myself. There was nothing she could do to me worse than what I’d just done to myself, so no reason to throw pointless labor at the problem.

It took two days to fully recover. And I’ve never drunk with an Aussie since.

By the way, after the successful launch of Le Zink I heard that Marvel Comics was for sale, and I convinced my boss that we should own a comic book publisher. I spent a year working on our offer, deep diving on Marvel’s financials and coordinating the legal team. It was down to our bid and Ike Perlmutter’s at the very end, but they went with Ike. That’s how close I came to owning Marvel.

The failed purchase of Marvel did lead directly to my starting a new imprint for DC Comics, but that’s another story. Which I promise to tell.