There was no way that the King was going to be my goddamn mentor. I know this because he told me so.

"I'm not going to be your goddamn mentor," the King said to me. "No way, no how, sorry, not sorry."

See? What did I tell you? Luckily for me, he waited until we were actually inside HTDK and had gotten past the extremely hostile and overbearing Ugly Twins who had insisted that I was persona non-grata and there was no fucking way I was getting inside.

Have you ever seen a grown six-foot-six man get pimp-slapped into next week? I use the term "pimp-slapped" with no sense of irony or political correctness since the King was in full pimp mode even at 3 AM on a weeknight. Plus the both of us were pretty damned high since we had both had a mouthful of blood from the girls on the way over. Riding in the King's limo had it's perks, for the girls and us. We got high on their blood, and the girls got high on the drugs that were readily available in the back of the limo; cocaine seemed to be a group favourite. So yeah, we were all pretty fucking high, and the King was not in the mood for taking shit from anyone, least of all the Ugly Twins.

The two highly attractive hostesses who looked like they had been poured into their dresses, had no problem at all and were kind of cool with us, even a little flirty with me, but the instant Ryan #1 had placed his hand on my chest to stop my entry, it had all been over.

Ryan #1's head spun around so fast, for a second there, I thought that the King had broken his neck. The sound of the slap still echoed through the foyer as Ryan #1 staggered a few steps back. It was only because Ryan #2 had grabbed him that he hadn't gone all the way down to the ground. The two hostesses gasped audibly, but it was the tall Korean-looking one who reached for the phone on the counter.

"You do not touch my friends," the King said, all signs of his regular accent were gone, "and you sure as shit don't tell me what to do. Do we understand each other?"

Ryan #1 looked back at the King, his fangs extended in his mouth and good God they were huge. Ryan #2 stepped between him and the King, apparently the more cautious of the pair.

"No disrespect King, but we have orders directly from Harry."

The King didn't look away from them but spoke directly to the hostess behind them.

"Jina, do me a favour and remind these assholes of exactly who I am and if I were you, I'd get Harry on the phone right fucking now. Or you can wait and just call Madame Vera to pick up two dead bodies."

Jina nodded eagerly and dialled as quickly as possible.

I just tried to look as small as possible and grinned helplessly at the trio of stoned girls behind us. I would have struck up some lame conversation but they all had stripper names, Diamond, Amethyst, and Pearlie and I really couldn't remember which name belonged to which girl. My two previous attempts had been completely wrong, and I was sure to fuck it up again.

The King leaned against the nearest wall and calmly rolled a joint. He didn't even bother to look at the Ugly Twins any further, but there was a subtle menace in the very deliberate way he was rolling that joint. For a second there I thought they were going to attempt to grab me, but Ryan #1 whispered something to Ryan #2, and they just shook their heads in clear agreement. Jina, the hostess, listened to the phone, obviously distressed.

"Respectfully speaking sir, this is the King we're talking about—" She listened as Harry said something possibly offensive on the other side of the line.

The King raised his eyebrow and offered the joint to me. "You can hit the Green. It's a designer strain. Nice and smooth."

"You can't smoke that in here sir," the second hostess said nervously, and the King just smiled her off.

"Don't worry about it. I'll wait until I'm upstairs with my friend. I'm just not used to being made to wait."

Jina spoke up. "Apologies sir. Harry's calling legal to advise on this dispute."

Legal? Holy shit. "Maybe I should just go," I suggested. "I didn't think it would be this much trouble to get in."

The King shook his head and lit his joint, pulling hard and long as he looked at the hostesses, daring them to stop him.

"I'm a senior partner in the Family. You Bob? You're my guest. And all of this is bullshit."

I watched as the King exhaled a long thick plume of smoke into the air. I could smell the thick, sweet pungent odour of the cannabis, and there was something alluring about the smell, something different from any of the common weed I had smoked over the years. I reached for the joint, wishing I had taken the green hit when it had been offered.

"Fuck this," the King said and handed the joint to me. "We're going inside."

Ryan #1 reached out for my shoulder—

The King was a blur. He hit Ryan #1 with a flurry of blows to the torso and then shoved him back ten feet through the air to crash into a corner. It had happened before I had even finished turning around to try to evade being grabbed. One second, Ryan #1 had been there reaching for me and the next instant he was picking himself up from across the room, the King standing in front of me. I hadn't even managed to get the joint up to my lips yet.

Ryan #2 stepped up to the fight, really not wanting to get killed tonight because of his stupid partner.

"STOP!" Jina yelled, and the King glanced at her, still ready to fight.

"You have an answer for me?"

Jina nodded and spoke quickly and directly to me, the phone still to her ear as someone dictated to her.

"You're allowed in the upstairs VIP area only by invitation of the King and only in the presence of the King. Failure to stay within the immediate company of the King will result in your immediate ejection for the remainder of the night. As a courtesy to the King, you will also be allowed into the general area downstairs, and you will also be granted access to the VIP areas there, where you will be treated as one of the Family. Any attempt to enter into the upstairs VIP area for any reason other than being invited and accompanied by the King will once again result in your immediate expulsion from the premises for the remainder of that night. Your behaviour in the general area will be closely monitored, and it will be up to the discretion of HTDK staff to take any immediate action should you break any of the rules. Harry encourages you just to nod your head, smile and I quote: take it up the ass like the bitch you are. End quote. Do you understand the terms as I have laid them out for you?"

My mouth must have been agape at the sheer flood of verbiage that had just been hurled at me. The King leaned in to whisper.

"I'll have a chat with Harry later. Just nod and agree. "

I found myself nodding yes.

"I'll need verbal confirmation," Jina said, and held up the phone, so my words would be clearly audible.

"Just so we're clear, still free drinks right?"

Jina smiled tightly, obviously trapped. This was obviously a new situation for her.

"None of the Family is expected to pay, so the answer to that is, yes. Just use your discretion."

I glanced at the King and then nodded in agreement. "I can be discreet. That's a yes from me."

Jina smiled with relief and gestured towards the entrance. "Please enjoy your stay with us."

The King didn't move, even as the three girls made their way inside. He stood there coolly staring at Ryan #2 who was beginning to look extremely nervous.

Ryan #2 broke first. "I would like to apologize—"

The King didn't let him finish. "Bob I want you to come over here and slap this man."

"What?" I said, unable to believe my ears.

"What?" Ryan #2 repeated, and he definitely was unable to believe his ears.

"They threw you off the roof. Into my car. I'd liked that car. I think it's only fair." The King looked Ryan #2 directly in the eye in a very deliberate and telling manner. "Don't you agree that's fair?"

Ryan #2 squared his shoulders and grit his teeth as he accepted his fate and presented his cheek for me to slap with a look in his eye that promised a certain amount of pain later when the King wasn't around.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" I protested. "These guys hold a grudge! If I slap him, I'm signing my own death warrant!"

"This is probably going to be your only chance to get a proper shot you know. Look, he's even standing still."

I didn't slap him. I wasn't that suicidal.

As we made our way up the stairs, my mind racing on just how awesomely cool the King was and how he could teach me so many things and it would be awesome because we could party together, it was almost as if he could read my mind. He has already shaken his head to my unasked question.

"As a matter of fact, I wasn't going to ask you to be my mentor," I lied as huffily as I could. "I was about to say thanks and tell you how awesome that was. Then I was going to ask you how old you were. But now I'm not going to do any of those things."

"You're a bad fucking liar, " the King said.

"I know," I shrugged, "but I'm working on it. Takes time."

"Look, the best I can do is give you a few tips, and you need a few."

"I need the owner's manual is what I need," I grumbled.

"I'll have some pamphlets sent to your place, but that's only cuz I kinda like you. None of this mentoring bullshit, okay?"

I gave him the thumbs up and made a mental note to actually read whatever the King sent for me.

"Dude, let me just give you a tip on the blood. You don't need as much as you've been drinking. A single mouthful is more than enough to get you good and properly stoned. Any more than that is just overkill, and you're going to go from enjoying yourself to being a pain in the ass and believe me, that's no fun for anybody. The girls will like you a hell of a lot better, you'll be a lot more chill, and you won't end up a big fucking mess passed out between the urinals in the men's room."

"Wait, did that actually happen to me? The urinal thing?"

"Not yet, but you were pretty damn close. Just take it easy, okay man?"

I nodded, still picturing myself on the floor between the urinals and then smiled as genuinely as I could. I couldn't get that picture out of my head for the rest of the night. When some new girl cozied up to me, thinking that I was someone special because I was hanging out with the King, and I eventually took advantage of my privilege and drank deeply from her, my drinking was cautious, not as eager as before.

******** AUTHOR'S NOTE **********

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