From Deuce ‘til Dawn

© Melissa Burley

Club Duece

It’s 8 o’clock on a Sunday morning and I’m fresh off assignment on the SoBe strip, where scantily-clad girls are throwing themselves at sugar daddies for one two many Grey Goose-and-tonics. I glance at my friend, who’s been a champ through it all. He looks at me as if he’s read my eyes, which are looking a bit lifeless and bored. “To the Deuce,” he says. And we go.

Mac’s Club Deuce Bar, for stereotype’s sake, is Miami Beach’s true diamond in the rough. Tattoo artists are shelling out stories of last night’s shift, regulars nod back to each other in preferred seating and tipsy patrons order up Miller Genuine Drafts (I go for the Patron, it’s been a long night) to keep things cloudier than reality. Rosie’s on shift, so I call her over. “Hey, girl. I remember you, did you ever find your wallet from last time you were here,” she calls. I did. After another insane WMC brigade, I’d misplaced my wallet at a club downtown, but got the luckiest call in the world when it was discovered a week later. “Here ya go,” I hand her my I.D., making up for last time, but when you’re known around the Deuce, more than likely, you’ll get served. 

Mac, the hippest senior citizen who has ever lived in SoBe, comes out of his office to scope the scene (he bought the bar back in 1964 when it was already a whopping 38 years old). As the hot pink-and-green lights flicker along the border of the cozy checkerboard floored space, there’s action – always – going on at the pool table; a place where you’re prohibited to play without a drink-in-hand. Rosie throws muted Sportscenter on the boob tube and heads to another corner of the pink linoleum bar, shaped in a double horseshoe, to even out her face time on both ends. I’m left alone, my buddy’s well into his second game of pool so I start making new friends. Guns ‘N’ Roses “Welcome to the Jungle” transitions into an old Bo Diddley jam. Now, that’s the Deuce.

They’ll continue to serve you 21 hours a day (happy hour is from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.) while the jukebox delivers everything from classic Jazz to ‘80s Rock, ‘70s Disco to current Billboard chart toppers. There’s rarely a dry seat in the house, and as I look around, I swap my next Blue Moon for good ‘ol H20. I’m just shy of 25 and have hung around with the best of ‘em. Old men have written me love letters on napkins, girls have crossed me just to apologize and say, “Man you’re great, I’m so glad you asked me to move my purse.” And while this golden dive is my recent choice-hang to come and unwind, there’s one thing that will always stay true: “What happens in the Deuce, stays in the Deuce.”