Golf Widows

By Derek Smith

As a bartender at exclusive country clubs in Atlanta and Savannah, Cass Cassidy has perfected his art of seducing "golf widows," the wives of high-roller golfers whose only real love is the mistress that is their sport. Over cocktails, these ladies chatter about their Louis Vuitton purses, Ferragamos, designer jewelry, and who among them has had

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cushing Publishig
• Release date: Jan 30, 2024
• ISBN: 9781963661019

Book preview

Golf Widows

Derek Smith

An open book with glowing pages Description automatically generated

Cushing Publishing

http://cushingpublishing.com

Copyright 2024 Derek Smith

ISBN: 978-1-963661-01-9

Cushing Publishing

P.O. Box 38

Middlesex, NC 27557

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored or transmitted by any means – whether electronic, mechanical, auditory, written or graphic – without the written permission of both the author and the publisher, except for excerpts required for reviews and articles. Unauthorized reproduction of this work is illegal and punishable by law.

Dedicated to Milky Way…

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

About the Author

Chapter 1

So I’m looking at a dogleg right from the middle of the fairway, and I’m thinking, ‘How the hell am I gonna make this shot from behind this friggin’ tree!’ And did I forget to mention that there’s a pine cone the size of Iowa perched just to the right of my ball?

Hey, hey, guys, that sounds more like a personal issue than a golf problem!

Blue cigar smoke wrapped the accompanying hard laughter like flourishes around silent movie dialogue.

I think big Ed here has got a major crush on that beverage cart girl to get too serious about his game. That right, Eddie? That why your putting touch has gone to hell?

Simon, did somebody whack you across the head with a driver? If not, I’m gonna be the first to crack your skull. What do you think about that?

She is one fine young thing, boys and I’ll tell you what. If big Ed decides she’s too much for him, maybe I can fine tune her swing a little bit!

The laughter crescendoed, echoing high and loud over the granite-stoned patio and through the titanic magnolia trees lining the eighteenth green like arboreal gladiators.

Other than the scenery, the nineteenth hole at Pine Meadows Country Club, or PMCC as it was called, was really no different than any other exclusive club, the golfers ready to chill out with a smoke and a drink or eight, while trading locker-room machismo, off-color jokes and secrets of their games. There were always disagreements over scorecards, most often harmless banter, but they could occasionally become livelier with someone’s honor called into question. Dueling in Georgia had been outlawed centuries earlier, and while golf sometimes brought out hotheaded Southern proudness, these minor feuds usually ended with backslaps and cocktails at the club’s billboard-sized cherry wood bar.

More often the nineteenth hole – the bar itself - was a whiskey- or beer-laced miasma of five iron versus sand wedge arguments, serious strategies in approaching the turtle pond guarding number nine, and microscopic analyses of some other player’s strengths and weaknesses.

The women golfers took their games seriously as well. But their post-round chatter over mimosas or cosmopolitans was more geared to Louis Vuitton purses, designer jewelry and who among them was supposedly having work done, the all-inclusive term for breast implants, Botox injections, liposuction, tummy tucks and other forms of anatomical improvement via the wonders of modern science.

Pine Meadows was one of the oldest private clubs in the Atlanta area, having been established in 1903 by financial moguls who had helped rebuild the gutted city after the war of Northern aggression, as some still referred to the Confederacy’s demise. Indeed, Pine Meadows’ acreage included land that had been a battlefield in 1864, and it wasn’t uncommon for a golfer or caddy to kick up a spent bullet, a piece of rusted bayonet or canteen on the course. Legend had it that a hacker in the early days had found his ball settled against an old cannon shell partially lodged in the ground. Expecting the shell to explode if he struck it with his club, the man had nonetheless been true to his sport and swung away, his eyes clinched shut. The story went that he coiled and hit his ball amid a diatribe of alternating curse words and calls for the Lord to preserve him for the next hole.

Pine Meadows wasn’t Augusta National, but a Georgia spring with a good balance of showers and sunshine could burst the azaleas like pink and white popcorn in a majesty to at least put her in the same homecoming court as her more famous golf course sister.

So what days are you off this week, Cass?

Well, it’s amazing to me, but I’ve got a rotation that gives me weekends free, at least for the time being, if you can believe that.

George Cass Cassidy laughed and looked up from his job of washing glasses behind the bar, studying the lady’s eyes and expression.

Why are you asking, Mrs. Torbert?

She didn’t meet his gaze, staring into her gin and tonic and twirling the lavender cocktail umbrella.

I’m hosting a brunch next Saturday and I need someone to tend bar and just help out with the food. Are you interested in making some extra money?

Absolutely, Mrs. Torbert. If you need me, I’ll be there.

As he usually did when working behind the bar, Cass had been half-listening to the golfers’ conversations gliding on the warm April breeze through the massive French doors leading out to the patio.

He had never struck a golf ball in his life and wasn’t remotely familiar with the game’s rules, never having lingered long enough while channel surfing to see any of Tiger Woods’ televised glories. Golf highlights on ESPN were an opportunity to hit the john or get a snack before the real sports - football, baseball and basketball - college or pro, returned to their domination of the airwaves. Still, he knew these guys on the patio were heart-attack serious about their game. They had to be, since they were, for the most part, high-dollar professionals who had worked hard for years of forty-plus-hour weeks to become successful enough to buy elaborate, elegant homes, snazzy rides and a Pine Meadows membership.

Young looking even for 25, Cass was certainly in the age range of many of the golfers but that is where the similarities ended. He had not attained their loftier status in life and lived from week to week on his paycheck from the club. He knew that some of them likely looked down their noses at him, perceiving him merely as a server who brought their drinks and cleaned out their ashtrays, smiling politely and knowing his place well below them in life’s pecking order. Of course, their superiority was never overtly blatant - except for one exception - but Cass was not in their circle of Ralph Lauren and Titlelist and, frankly, could care less.

The only member who gave him any trouble was Peter Weldon, a pediatric hematologist oncologist with a crappy short game and an ego that probably eclipsed that of any other hacker at the club. The only thing overshadowed by his crummy putting, however, was his bad comb over, an opinion which Cass had heard others voice at the bar and in the men’s locker room when Weldon wasn’t around. The good doctor’s superiority complex was well known by the Pine Meadows staff, whom he generally treated with the disdain of something unpleasant found on the soles of his Gucci loafers. Cass had heard rumors that a couple of waiters and waitresses had spit on his entrees before they cheerfully delivered his main course to his table.

Cass had his own personal history with Weldon. It had been a humidity-soaked scorcher of a Wednesday the previous September and he had been working the bar and busing tables in the dining room and patio when Weldon trudged off the course with the other members of his foursome. Even though he had only been at the club for a couple of weeks, Cass already knew the physician and the other three golfers, greeting them all by name as they settled onto the cushioned swivel chairs at the bar.

There was Jonathan Grubb, whose family owned several area supermarkets, and Hayden Rice, an orthodontist, and Howard Ruger, a personal injury attorney, whose photo was on the back of one of the Atlanta phone books. Cass distinctly remembered their alcohol reek, realizing that they had been imbibing pretty heavily during their game. He brought their drink orders, including a tequila shooter for Weldon, who downed it in a gulp. The entire incident was branded in Cass’s memory, especially what happened next. Weldon, his pink eyes watering, slammed the glass onto the bar.

Man, are you trying to poison me? he blurted.

No sir, what do you mean? Was there something wrong with your drink?

You could say that. I believe I asked you for a shot of Jose Cuervo and you mistakenly gave me a glass of Chihuahua piss instead.

His buddies roared with laughter and Cass had played along, believing Weldon was joking.

Um, Dr. Weldon, I can get you another shot from the same Chihuahua or from another bottle of something else if you like, he smiled.

Weldon’s face flashed like heat lightning to Cass’s response, a meanness seizing his features.

My friend, you might have heard that I located here from Massachusetts, is that right?

Yes sir.

That being said, I can tell you that I’ve been around two kinds of Southerners since I came here. Would you like to know what those kinds are?

Cass didn’t join the doctor’s buddies in their low snickering, all awaiting the punch line, but Weldon appeared to be dead serious in his drunkenness.

Sounds like you’re bent on telling me, so fire away.

Two types of Southerners, Weldon slurred, those like my three compadres here who’ve made it and are quality people. He paused to down another tequila that Cass set in front of him. And those like you who are just pure white trailer trash.

Weldon’s friends were silent now, their faces lined in expressions of shock and disbelief. Cass, meanwhile, was resisting every instinct and emotion screaming at him to crawl across the bar and choke the life out of this scum with one fist while pounding his face into a bloody swamp with the other.

Hey Pete, don’t you think you’re being a little bit harsh there buddy?

I agree, man, I’d say you need to apologize to Cass.

I betcha all that beer just made your tequila taste funny. Don’t you think?

The others were trying to soften the remarks, but Weldon would have none of it.

And I’d say that all of you are just trying to pacify me because I’m a rich Yankee who tells it like it is and recognizes poor service from this waste of life, he shouted, waving an arm toward Cass and sending a Coors bottle cartwheeling off the bar. So how about another shot of dog piss, my friend?

Cass had obliged in silence, and Weldon’s group, looking to avoid any trouble and end the tenseness, soon hustled him out of the club. After their departure, Cass had immediately informed the club general manager, Don McCook, about the encounter, just in case there were accusations against him. News of an incident like that spread quickly at a country club and rumors could certainly twist facts into a gossipy fairy tale where he had been disrespectful to Dr. Weldon, not offered the finest service of the Pine Meadows tradition and indeed had threatened a member. Cass went home that night proud that he had been able to smother his anger and keep his job by not retaliating against Weldon. But he would never forget or forgive.

With golf season in full swing, he often saw the physician in and about the club, but Weldon never acknowledged him in any way, as if the confrontation had never happened. Possibly, he didn’t remember it; and he never lodged a complaint against Cass. To their credit, at least in Cass’s estimation, Ruger, Rice and Grubb had individually approached him and apologized, each seeming genuinely embarrassed. He appreciated their sentiments, but none of them really mattered without a similar gesture from Weldon. Without it, he seethed and waited, for what, he wasn’t sure. Cass certainly wasn’t the type to simmer and finally boil over. He would never be in the headlines for going postal, gunning down innocent people or co-workers in a berserk frenzy. But his memory railed at him, Weldon’s awful insult not constantly on his mind but bubbling to the surface of his consciousness whenever he saw the doctor. The passing weeks healed some of his mental wounds, yet others would linger. Some day he hoped to pay back Dr. Peter Weldon for the emotional scars he had inflicted.

Cass Cassidy had not grown up wanting to be a bartender, waiter and bus boy, not that there was anything wrong with any of those jobs. It was just that he had dreamed of making more of a name for himself. Like it did for most people, reality had a different plan for him.

He had grown up on Tybee Island, a sleepy beach resort on the Georgia coast about seventeen miles from Savannah. The asphalt umbilical cord for the porkchop-shaped island was U.S. Highway 80, the only road in or out, which began in a beachfront parking lot, crossed the salt marshes and bisected the country to the West coast. His parents had moved to Tybee after his father retired from the Army, having served a portion of his career at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah. Indeed, Pullman Pully Cassidy had actually met Cass’s eventual mother, Evonne, on Tybee beach while on weekend leave. Evonne, a stenographer for a Savannah law firm, had been sunbathing with friends when the young corporal caught her eye while splashing noisily in the surf with some of his buddies. The courtship lasted a year before they were married, Pullman seeing combat in Vietnam before his retirement.

Since he and Evonne both loved Savannah, they returned there, buying an old and small bungalow with a rickety dock on Lazaretto Creek, a narrow, salt marsh rill carving across the island’s landward side. The rundown house was certainly not prime beachfront real estate, but Pully was handy with any tool made and soon had it fixed up with an additional room. This was the home that welcomed infant Cass when Pully and Evonne brought him home from a Savannah hospital on a gray April afternoon in 1973.

Cass’s earliest memories of Tybee were a mixture of extremes. The sultry smell of low-tide mud would later remind him of a Creole hooker he solicited in New Orleans. A sun-glittered sea broken by dolphins bursting through its silver sequins was a vista he always treasured. He grew up a child of the sea, swimming the ocean and the island’s murky inland waterways as if born with gills and fins, learning the best spots to place his crab traps. He learned the tide tables and the best seasons to gather big hauls of shrimp and oysters to be packed away in Pully’s rusty freezer in the garage.

Like countless other kids, his adolescence was filled with visions of becoming a rock star, and at age twelve he had made enough money mowing lawns to buy a battered Fender electric guitar from a sixth-grade school mate. He never learned to play it beyond the roar of feedback that shook the house and drove Pully wild. Still, he loved the rockers of the early 1980’s, especially AC/DC, Guns N’ Roses and Cinderella, plastering the walls of his room with posters and photos of the bands he found in music magazines.

If Cass enjoyed and learned from the ocean, there were earthy lessons to be learned on Tybee as well. The little island yawned to life with the arrival of the first warm weekend each spring, a thaw from hibernation that brought beach season, which lasted deep into September. From about 2,000 wintertime residents, Tybee’s population swelled fivefold during the peak summer months.

The invasion of tourists from all over and beach goers from Savannah transformed the island into an inflatable Neptune’s kingdom of corn dog stands, gaudy souvenir stores, and dark and smelly bars with cheap drinks and rattling air conditioners giving some solace from the heat. The air tangoed with suntan lotions, the smell of greasy fried fish, an army of beer breaths and - overwhelming all - the sweat of thousands. The soundtrack had remained the same for decades - the innocent, pleasured cries of those frolicking in the waves, the lifeguard’s occasional whistle, the yips or slurred curses of a drunken redneck or the whimpers of a child who strayed off the boardwalks and plodded into a nest of treacherous sand spurs.

This had been Cass’s world for all of his formative years. Early on, he had ridden a bus to school on the mainland, the watery prairie of saw grass carpeting the treeless salt marshes a daily panorama for him on either side of the two-lane U.S. 80. When he turned old enough to drive, his parents had helped him buy a 1979 Honda Civic to get around. His teen-age summers were spent working various jobs on the island, usually busing tables, washing dishes or other general cleanup duty in several restaurants and watering holes.

Cass never really enjoyed drinking, only occasionally sneaking a beer or two with friends or at keg parties, and didn’t smoke anything, legal or illegal, yet he never considered himself straight-laced in the least. He had lettered in football, soccer and tennis at Josiah Tattnall High School in east Savannah, but was a middle-of-the roader socially, sometimes being included in the cool kids’ groups due to his athletic talent, but always preferring to be a loner rather than a follower. Shyness kept him from dating much; he was much more at ease conversing with half-naked tenth-grade babes from Iowa while walking the Tybee strand than going out to a movie with any of the Tattnall High girls. Indeed, his virginity had been lost at age 15 to a beautiful little princess from Chicago in the low-tide darkness under the municipal fishing pier.

Still, Cass’s Achilles’ heel was always the opposite sex. Even as an eight-year old selling Clorox-bleached sand dollars from a card table in front of a friend’s house he had admired the female parade headed down the sidewalk toward the beach. If mind shots of his early life included swimming within inches of a hammerhead shark, they also flickered with images of him using Pully’s old army binoculars to ogle women in bikinis. Most of this innocent voyeurism had taken place between the drawn curtains in Hermie Sutton’s den overlooking the island’s main public beach. Cass remembered countless times when his mother had driven him over to Hermie’s to play computer games. The computer slept while he and Hermie took turns with the binoculars, young peeping toms with a stack of Penthouse magazines smuggled out of Hermie’s father’s workshop to occupy them when real babes were scarce. The process of spreading out the beach blanket, positioning the boom box and cooler, and setting up of chairs offered the boys prime opportunities to look down bathing suit tops.

In reflection long afterward, Cass estimated that many of the women they focused on were too fat or too old for their viewing pleasure, a fact likely shared by most of the men on the beach at the time. Of course, the opinions of this latter group mattered little since a majority had pumpkin bellies, hairy backs, corpse-white pigeon legs or all of the above.

In adulthood, Cass never viewed his strong attraction to the ladies as a vice or any other failing, but rather as a fascination, a healthy male bewitchment that made him red-blooded, a virile, wily predator thirsting to bag the limit. The conquest was nothing; the hunt all.

A different game surrounded Cass shortly after his 1991 graduation from Tattnall when he applied and was hired as a waiter and part-time bartender at Pulaski Hills Country Club on Savannah’s outskirts. His grades had left him no chance of getting into college and he briefly considered enlisting in the Army, but decided to work for a while, catch his breath and look at his options. Pulaski Hills was a golfing and residential experience, as the real estate brochures described it, with choice lots fronting the Wilmington River. The 36-hole golf complex was a puzzle of swampy water traps and fine, oak-leafed fairways with a white-columned clubhouse and veranda that Scarlet O’Hara would have adored, even with the vinyl siding and fake, potted palmettos.

Savannah’s mild climate offered golf almost across the calendar, although January and February could be dicey. Cass lived at home and commuted to work to save money, doing a little of everything at Pulaski, which always seemed to be short staffed. On days that he wasn’t assigned to the clubhouse, he was making sure that all the golf carts’ batteries were charged or supervising the driving range, trying to look important and in control despite his almost complete lack of golf knowledge.

Am I holding my driver right? a young beginner asked him one afternoon on the range. Seeing that the boy’s father was talking with a friend out of earshot, Cass told him, You just hold your shaft real tight and stroke it for all it’s worth. Aim for that little flag way out there, I think.

Um, okay, the kid replied, looking at him oddly.

Cass’s jack-of-all-trades reputation spread rapidly at Pulaski and he soon became one of the favorites on the staff. He also was growing up to be a handsome, well-mannered young man, which accented his popularity, his shyness seeming to melt the more he dealt with matters in the real world.

It was also at Pulaski that Cass first encountered a societal set of women of all ages, shapes, backgrounds, and bra sizes that melded into one category - golf widows. Their husbands were all successful businessmen or other types of professionals linked by a common mistress - their sport. Spare time equated to tee times for most of them, leaving their wives on their own. Bad weather wasn’t a problem, the men simply congregating at The Bubble a domed golf facility about twenty minutes away, or gathering at the clubhouse bar to watch a pro tournament on TV while rehashing every stroke of their last outing in maddening detail. Cass was on duty