Nola had her arms around Ben as if she was being affectionate. Ben looked lethargically up at the night sky. The lights of buildings and neon signs gleamed at the corner of his vision. Then there it was, the bright neon sign for Talk of the City, a strip club. Ben's eyes rolled to the back of his brain to shield himself from degeneracy. Nola had insisted that they must go and experience all of American culture, had insisted that strip clubs were part of America's great heritage. Ben, a country bumpkin, who also wanted to partake in the full cultural experience, could not bring himself to disagree nor agree. Nevertheless, he felt like a total degenerate while Nola gleefully dragged him by the arm.

He had commented on the tall, good looking Aryan American specimen that paid for their bus fare. Nola had been waiting to test his masculinity.

"Ah, look, it's only ten dollars! It's perfect for you."

"Har har, very funny. You're the one running out of bills," he said.

They handed twenty dollars to the punk looking attendant with spiked up hair who looked to be in his early forties. "Sweet~ Enjoy your night. Here are your tickets to heaven. Also no cameras. Imma gonna have to ask this gentlemen not to take any photos."

"Yeah, no problem," Ben said.

Ben was going to ask more about the specifics in what is allowed and not but Nola scooched him through the curtain entrance into a dark corridor...

Ben woke up in a motel room dazed and confused. Nola was in her suit and stood fixing her hair at the large mirror in front of the double bed. He questioned what happened last night. He tried to think back against the throbbing pain in his head. Images of completely nude pole dancers, dancers grinding hard on the laps of-

His pants smacked him on the face. He looked at the bundle and his white dress shirt was there as well. "When did you grab our bags?"

"This morning. I even got breakfast already. Com'on and buckle up. We got the work convention to attend." Nola stood tall in front of him in full office lady gear; a tailored suit that her broad shoulders fitted in perfectly, neatly combed hair, sparkling earrings, a fashionable silky top with a bit of frills and a black knee length skirt. Ben saw she had light make-up applied which he had never seen her wear in person. She did not give a single indication of the wild night that occurred. Ben on the other hand was still flustered from a night he didn't remember. He looked under the covers and was glad he had something on. He looked left and right, there was only one bed.

"Why is there only one bed?"

"This was the only room." Ben did not push any further. He wasn't sure if his heart could take it.

Nola ushered him to hurry up so he dressed quickly underneath the covers. He thought it'd be better to regain his senses first from the grogginess before asking anything.

Nola on the other hand remembered the night well. She turned around and looked at the mirror. Her face flustered at the memory. She remembered the night very well.

There were no drinks allowed in the strip club lest the situation became too rowdy. Nola had screamed in exasperation at the thought of drinks not being available in a club, a strip club. Without the drinks, her adrenaline was shot up like crazy in her veins like a baby without milk. She had been more sober than usual these days which was causing her to lose her composure a bit. A symptom of alcohol withdrawal.

She shouted and hollered at the pole dancing beauties and threw dollars after dollars in Ben's horror. The other fat old men in the club followed Nola's example and hollered in unison at the completely nude and lean bodied pole dancers. At ten dollars a lap dance, it was a deal that tempted even Ben. Nola wore a permanent frenzied grin on her face at the red faced Ben who grasped his soft drink like the last connection to reality. She paid for two Puerto Rican beauties for lap dances, one on each thigh, while a drool faced Nola arched her back and laughed in a stupefied face. Ben who watched in horror, not at the degeneration, but at Nola throwing dollars after dollars to satisfy her succubuses.

The strip club was a dark mirrored room lit by purple and red mood lighting. In the other end to them were men in their mid-fifties that looked like their occupation was truck driving. There was one skinny, short youngster who strutted with manly confidence that he showed only at strip clubs. Nola whistled at his manliness when the little man beckoned at an African American beauty suggestively. The black dancer was over six feet, dark smooth in complexion and a leanly sculpted body with a perfectly round afro. She looked like a supermodel and wore nude like a model.

They exited the strip club in wild spirits. By the end, Ben joined in with the wild hollering and lap dances. Nola now looked to have drained most of her unlimited energy and spoke with a hoarse voice. She had sobered enough to be fully aware of what just happened in full view of her dear travel companion. Her face was red not from the sexual excitement that occurred mere moments ago but from what Ben has witnessed of her. She needed to rid him of his memory and she had an unethical scheme.

She took him to the nearest bar and drowned themselves with alcohol so that they would both forget. He was in the highest spirits that she had ever seen him and it was a shame she could not live with the shame of what occurred before. They drank together in merry glory with other fellow Americans in the bar, laughing and trading stories until finally Ben was the first to drop down on the table. Nola wanted to black out as well but alas, her alcohol tolerance was through the roof.

She gave Ben a drunken piggyback to the closest motel. In the piggyback, Ben had spoken in his drunken state of stalking her. Nola didn't understand any of his drunk talk. He kept apologising profusely. "Sorry, so-rry, sorrli, sowry..." over and over again he slurred. He rubbed his teary face on hers, wetting her shoulder and cheeks. Then she started crying too in her half-drunken stupor. She whispered kind words of forgiveness as she would to Allie. Eventually she stumbled upon a motel given by the directions by the Americans she asked at the bar. She was in a slobbering mess that frightened the little Asian lady behind the counter.

The Asian lady brought them to the room and opened the door for Nola seeing that she was carrying a drunk. Nola sat on the bed and she released her hold. He flopped back, laying sprawled out on the bed. She dropped beside him to his left. She faced him. His face was rosy red with a vulnerable innocent. So close, she felt his hot alcoholic breath. She grabbed his hand. She imagined Allie would look like him when he grew older. She clutched her chest feeling a pain and then covered her mouth feeling something come up. She got up and ran to the toilet as Ben laid in blissful ignorance and laughing to himself, dreaming. Ben had cried something about checking his phone on the entire piggy backed ride. She knew his swipe gesture after seeing him unlock his phone so many times to look at the map. Nola took out his phone but the screen was cracked. Whatever he was telling her, it didn't matter now.

They stood outside at a bus stop underneath a motorway, awaiting for the next bus to Santa Clara. The shade kept them cool in the hot and dry weather. They sat on the bench counting their cash.

"I'm out," Nola gave Ben an inquisitive look. "I don't have change or bills left." Ben was rooting through his wallet for change. Nola told him she had blown through her last wad of cash at the strip club. Now she relied on him as his piggy bank. He poured out the change onto the bench and sorted the cents.

The bus came within fifteen minutes and Nola got up and extended her hand to stop it.

They boarded the bus. They both dropped down cents in a slow meticulous manner as it had to be separate and the change was extremely loose. The bus was entirely empty, they grabbed a seat near the middle.

Ben looked at his cheap Casio watch. "Yikes, we're late for the one thing you came for. Sorry." Nola was reminded of his apology last night. She felt she wanted to prod on but she felt anxious looking at the time. Just when the door closed, it opened again to let in an elderly distinguished looking black gentlemen. He was a tall, lanky man and wore a yellow grey pinstripe suit with a top hat. He carried a cane and waggled it highly as he walked. For all the seats he could choose, he sat directly behind them. Nola widened his eyes at Ben and they jumped across to sit at the other side. Throughout the hour long ride, the elderly man would let out a strange robotic wheezing cough in exactly four second intervals. The cough sounded like some weird factory machine automation mixed with the croaking of a frog. Nola started to lose it in laughter once Ben tucked his nose under his shirt and she did the same.

"Ugh... I think I caught it." He patted his chest.

“Stop,” she sniggered, “the man has a serious life threatening illness. The man's dying for god's sake”
“My chest is starting to feel funny.”
As well as from the germs, they tried hiding their laughter in tucking their noses underneath their shirts to no avail.
“This is the strangest cough I have ever heard. Like it has a rhythm and beat to the timing.”
It was all too much for Nola who grimaced in laughing pain at the poor black gentleman.

Finally they got off the bus and she could breathe without laughing and without whatever corona germ that elderly, elitist dressed black old man was coughing out. Although Ben was stifling his laughter, he was also legitimately afraid of catching whatever disease that floated around in the bus. There were times when they got on a crowded bus and had hobos that smelled like faeces and piss come onboard. The poor bus driver told them that's why the window was down at all times.

Nola took out her phone with GPS and the maps and led the way. It was a large glass building filled with people in suits. Nola went up to the counter to grab her pass. Ben took out his camera and said he was a photographer for the local university. The large black security guard waved a no with his hand but Ben gave him a tilted glare as if he was about to cause a scene and blocked the other entrées. The security guard shook his head and let him in as he wasn't paid enough to deal with this.

"Easy. I've done things like this countless times." Nola gave him a silent two thumbs up.

The convention was hosting speakers from all areas, philosophy, technology of the week, gender diversity pandering talks from people in the fashion industries and many more that bored them to sleep. There was an A.I. talk on betting by a short round bald man who sweated profusely and was out of breath for his entire talk as he jumped energetically back and forward around the platform. The talk piqued Ben's interest but it soon became apparent that it was a sham. The bald man promised he would run a simulation side by side with a current gamble. He did not. Empty promises. The talks were all just self-advertisements and corporate shilling.

When the first half of the talks ended, they could finally get up and grab some lunch. For Ben it was breakfast and he was starving. They ate at a small standing table, shovelling food into their mouths.

"What do you think?" Nola asked.

"What do I think? I can't believe they paid you to fly half way across the world to attend glorified advertisements. I'm pretty sure this is a money laundering scheme. I mean did you see those ticket prices? Eight hundred dollars per individual. It's money laundering akin to art auctions."

Nola bobbed her head in silent agreement while sipping an orange juice carton. Her friends in accounting would agree to his statement.

She left Ben to grab his third meal while she went to do her presentation for her company. It was held in a small room on the first floor. Six people attended it. Ben waited outside her room after his brunch.

They left for their final destination for their trip, the Golden Gate Bridge. Today was their last day before the flight.

For all their time in San Francisco, despite having crossed the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods, visited Alcatraz Island, picnicked at Golden Gate Park, Oakland Bridge, visited Twin Peaks to the much needy request of Ben to see the sunset, walked a bit around Fisherman's Wharf at night before realising that the temperature plummeted to below ten degrees while they wore shorts and t-shirts so they went bar hopping, Nola's favourite past-time, and so they have yet to pose with the most iconic bridge in the world, the red Golden Gate Bridge. They left the convention and took the bus to Emeryville before changing to another bus at Shellmound Street before crossing Oakland Bridge, the ugly sister of Golden Gate, to Salesforce Transit Center and finally to Toll Plaza, the gateway to the Golden Gate Bridge at Fort Point. This took them two and a half hours.

Nola fell asleep on the bus, this time her head fell onto his shoulder accidentally. Ben shifted his little camera pouch above his crotch. He was amazed and glad he somehow still had his camera after last night and not have it lost somewhere.

He patted her lightly on her arm.

"Here."

She rubbed her eyes and stretched her arms with a groggy expression.

The weather was cloudy with hints of sunshine when they got off the bus. Soon the skies became clear and the weather started to scorch them but it was nicer this way. Nola had her suit jacket tied to her waist and Ben had his sleeves rolled up. He looked like a model; lean looking in his shirt and slacks, his flaxen hair was delicately styled and lit up to a golden brown in the sun, his handsome face was relaxed and he was smiling smugly for no reason. Nola couldn't help but smile smugly back. It had been a wild five days and it was coming to an end.

"Okay, that's my three hundred and fiftieth picture of you. What's my prize?" Nola asked after taking a selfie with Ben with the Golden Gate at the background.

"My humble apology," he said, whatever that meant. "Let's get one with my camera."

Ben asked an old man from a couple to take a photo of them with the bridge with his camera.

"Give it to her," the white bearded man pointed his head towards his wife, "she's the one who knows technology."

It was the one photo of them together using his camera for the entire trip, until the old lady moved around and snapped more of the couple at multiple angles.

They followed down the sandy road. On a wooden pathway by a ditch, they spotted a night heron. Nola jumped down and tried to catch what she called a San Francisco penguin. It would make a perfect souvenir for Allie. The heron flew away when Nola got within grabbing range. She looked up at Ben and yelled a profanity.

They continued on down the shore, soon reaching the docks that was filled with luxurious yachts. Joggers ran up and down their jogger lanes beside their pedestrian lane. They saw many people walking multiple dogs on leashes. On their right were the big, fancy San Franciscan houses. There were the trademark steep incline roads beside them. It was a beautiful posh and wealthy area and not once was there a homeless person roaming here.

Suddenly a deafening sound ripped through the air and then another as the second fighter jet screamed across the azure sky. Some stopped in their tracks to clap at the contrail.

“Seriously?” Ben shook his head at the proud patriots.

They crossed a park and used the public restroom there. Next, they reached the first pier. They rested on the steps that stood behind the little strand of a beach. She went to a hot dog stand and tapped her card to buy a crystal Geyser Alpine Spring Water for three dollars that would normally go for one dollar in a convenience store. They shared it.

“Remember how you were complaining of indirect kisses at the beginning,” she teased him. “You're such a child, Allie and I do it all the time.” She watched him for his reaction.

"Yeah, yeah," he yapped. That and resting her shoulder on his shoulder had aroused him as much as he didn't want his body to. "I can't help that I'm a prude." He leaned his head back to hide his blush. Then he reached into his wallet and took out the tram tickets they bought before. On the back was a discount for the store behind them. "Look, there's Ghirardelli Ice-cream. What do you say? My treat."

He came back with ice-cream. "Which one?" She went for the marshmallow hot fudge sundae called Twin Peaks leaving him with the cherry topped vanilla sundae called Muir Woods.

They followed the waterfront to reach Pier 39, a pier filled with seals.

"AR! AR! AR!" Nola cried out loudly to the seals, "AR! AR! AR!" She then covered her head in embarrassment at the looks she drew in from the crowds of tourists. Her hand slapped and gripped Ben's shoulder. "'I'm sorry. I can't help myself!" and laughed uncontrollably while burying her face under her arm. Ben just smiled hopelessly, used to her antics by now.

Ben told her of the sumo seal match on the platform on the right. There was a single seal that successfully won every match against challengers who jumped up onto his platform. He would slap the shit out of a challenger, gradually backing him into falling into the water. Ben dubbed him The King and wished he could be like so. Nola said that the others lazing on top of each other on their communal wooden platform was the better life. Eventually The King lost when a stronger challenger showed up. He must have been tired by then.

"Yay! She felled The King." Nola had a way of rubbing Ben the wrong way.

"Whatever, didn't want to be like him anyway." Ben finished recording the sumo matches of the seal now. He capped his Sony mirrorless camera and put it back into his camera pouch.

They walked down the other piers until Nola's stomach growled. There wasn't much past the tourist district and they turned back. Nola's stomach cried out for some authentic American food. They remembered they had walked past an In's and Out's.

The place was packed but they found a seat quickly. Both got a large Double Double meal.

"Isn't it weird that you get a large empty drink but you refill it anyway. And look at that sign for ice-cream. It says real ice-cream. I would hope it's real." Ben had filled half of his drinks with Bang's root beer that was actually Barq's root beer in a confusing typeset. He said it tasted strange as in awful strange.

Most of the time they fed themselves on the one dollar hamburgers plus tax of McDonald's which were the only decently priced food here.

They explored the plaza afterwards. The neon lit signs dotted the scenery, Applebees, Chipotle and Chowder Hut in the distance, all great American heritage, except Applebees. They had the worst steak at Applebees and it wasn't even cheap. There was a police SUV parked in front with six cops hounding the area. The night was cold and they were suited up in their nice black jackets with their batons and pistols, ready to tackle the savage American gangs that roamed the land. They saw a hobo reach into the bin and took out a used In's and Out's cup. Nola and Ben jumped out of the way to let him through for his free refill.

They explored the darkly lit plaza and found a strange arcade area.

"Wow! Allie and Eleanor would love to see this place!" she exclaimed excitedly and jumped beside the strange contraption. "Take a picture of me." She posed with two hands resting on the machine, one leg kicked up and an expression that suggested she was in heaven. Ben took out his camera with the swiftness of drawing a revolver.

"I believe it's called a player piano." It was a thicker than usual upright piano. There were two glass panels that showed the inner workings of the mechanical instrument and another glass panel covered the keyboard. The warehouse was filled with player pianos, some were playing rag pieces. At the back were retro arcade machines. The music and jingle of arcades and voices filled the air nicely. Nola commented Lauren would love those.

They walked back out to pier 39 after playing some arcade games. It was cold and they decided to run and stopped when they saw the police, lest they pulled out their guns in question for being high on illegal substance, then they ran again until they hit the next plaza. They laughed, running until Ben ran out of breath first. She went up, her face red, and hooked Ben's arm under hers and pressed her body to his.

"It's warmer this way." She had decided then and there that she may have feelings for him but she wasn't sure. She did it because she wanted to and he accepted it without dragging his ass like when she pulled him into the strip club.

It was better than walking separately, he thought.