Just for Laughs

‘Hello, Chester Hotel, this is Sue, how can I help you’ Sue spoke using her best posh telephone voice.

‘No, I’m sorry, no teeth have been handed in this morning, maybe call back a little later and check’

She turned to her coworker Cam, who was staring in disbelief.

With her hand over the phone, she mouthed the words teeth and they both burst into fits of laughter. Sue nearly dropping the phone as she struggled to hold her composure.

As she hung up the phone she wondered how exactly someone could lose their teeth.

‘Hey Sue, you wanna go check some of them local's mouths for those missing teeth’. It was Marty, laughing as he shouted across the bar, obviously he had heard her call about the missing teeth. Unfortunately, a lot of the local drinker's at the hotel had not made dental hygiene a priority in their lives, and due to that they were lucky to have a full set of teeth between them. So, the idea of them finding a set of teeth and snagging them up for themselves was indeed a possibility.

‘I will leave that up to you Marty, I’m not going down that road’ she laughed.

A roar of laughter rang out across the room as the teeth story circulated among the patrons. Marty was a bit of a clown and it didn’t take long for him to spread the story to pretty much anyone who would listen. To be honest someone losing a set of teeth was probably the most unusual thing she had come across. Though there was that time when Benny had lost his pet snake Beryl, but that was more terrifying than funny. It had eventually been found curled up behind the ladies loo. Sue remembered how she had tried to evacuate the hotel at the time but the patrons had thought her quite mad, accusing her of making a fuss about nothing but a little snake. The snake turned out to be anything but little.

The Chester Hotel was a quiet little hotel out the back of Bourke. A barren place, where the locals were as dry as the dusty Australian outback. A rough bunch who enjoyed a good laugh and a nice cold beer.

‘Hey Sue, did you hear about old Johnnie’s boy Jake’ Marty waved Sue over to the group.

‘What’s he been up to now, he’s been barred since last week’

‘You're not gonna believe it, he’s only turned up here last night, dressed like a sheila, trying to get in’ the crowd roared with laughter.

‘Are you serious?’ She wasn’t surprised; Jake was and had always been a bugger of a kid and he had grown into a bugger of a man. He had been barred last week for throwing a schooner glass full of beer at the tv, because his horse had lost its race. It smashed the tv and a replacement still hadn’t arrived from Sydney and the locals were not impressed. Most of the patrons were good, honest, hard-working farmers. There were just a few bad eggs amongst them. The Chester Hotel had been built in the sixties according to Stan and Pat, jokingly referred to as the walking dead by the patrons, due to them being the oldest patrons. It had been originally owned by a local family, but it had been bought by a chain of hotels in the nineties. The chain of hotels could be found all over Australia. The Chester being no more then a mere blip in the scale of hotels was sadly neglected and quite possibly its existence completely forgotten by the company. No one could remember the last time anyone from the hotel chain had been out to the hotel. Tom was the licensee, but everyone knew that it was Sue who ran the place. She was a bit rough around the edges, but she needed to be in this industry, especially as a woman. She didn’t take crap from the patrons, and they knew it. They all loved Sue, and she loved them, even if she did a good job of hiding it. She stuck to the licensing rules at all times, even when the patrons tried it on. They often pushed for her to stay open later then the license allowed or complained when she kicked them out for intoxication. No exceptions was her rule, and she stuck to it. Even driving certain patrons' home herself when the need arose.

‘I will go check that out on the cameras later’ Sue laughed as she collected empty glasses from the tables.

Skip hobbled in looking worse for wear, making a feeble attempt at flicking the days dirt from his overalls with his hat.

‘Schooner of New thanks love, when your ready’ he asked Cam as he headed towards the bar. It was unnecessary to ask as it was already being poured by Cam, who knew everyone’s drinks by heart.

‘Been a long day?’ Cam asked placing the overflowing beer onto the drip tray.

‘Sure, has love, and this damn heat don’t help’ Skip gulped down half his beer in one mouthful. Swiped his hand across his mouth and headed towards the others.

‘How we doing, boys’ he asked of no one in particular.

‘Where doin ok mate, how’s ya choppers going’ Marty was making a joke about the teeth at Skips expense, as poor old Skip didn’t have a tooth in his mouth to speak of. The crowd roared with laughter, poor Skip having no idea of the joke just shrugged and laughed along with them. No doubt someone told him because he suddenly let out a booming laugh that rang out across the room.

Sue stood leaning on the bar watching the crowd, lost in her thoughts. Cam sidled up to her.

‘Watch ya thinking?’

‘I’m just thinking what a funny bunch they are. Who would have thought someone losing their teeth could keep a bunch of men entertained all afternoon’

They both laughed.

The end