Hick - Andrea Portes [43]
I look up at the bartender, helpless. The bartender shrugs.
Eddie stands there, still, blood boiling underneath.
The stranger meets his gaze, blank, but somewhere behind his eyes there’s a sneer and a twinkling, born bad. He’s proved Eddie’s untrue grit.
“I believe you owe me a hundred dollars. I’ll take cash, thank you.”
Eddie stares at the man, sizing him up.
“I’m not paying.”
“What? I didn’t hear you?”
“I’m not paying.”
“Oh, okay, well then, in that case . . . I’ll make you a deal.”
The stranger comes up close to Eddie and starts whispering in his ear, looking over, here and there. I catch his eye quick and he looks away, guilty. Eddie listens and listens, asks him a question and listens some more. The bartender wipes off the counter, trying to make-pretend he’s part of the wall. I’m the only one who senses something bubbling, something filthy and unkind.
Eddie comes sidling over, leaning his elbow on the bar, putting his hand on my shoulder, nice.
“Now, Luli, we got man stuff to discuss now, so I want you to just go back there and wait a spell.”
“Back where?”
“Back there.” He nods toward the bathroom, quick.
“Nuh-uh, no way.”
“Luli, look, I’m in trouble here, all right, and I need you to help me, can you do that? Can you help me?”
I hesitate, looking to the floor for an answer.
“C’mon, darlin . . . you like that? You like that when I call you darlin?”
He picks up my chin now and starts talking quiet.
“I think you do. I think you like it a lot. I bet there’s some other things you’d like, too. Am I right?”
I bite my lip and nod, barely. I can’t stand it. This is a special bar trick I know by heart. He’s writing the lines now. Somehow this got turned round and he’s writing the lines. I just want him to call me girlfriend names and make nice and pull my chin up. I just want him to stay like this, protective.
“I guess.”
“You guess. Well, okay, then, just go back there and wait a spell while we talk business, quick, and then we’ll go for a nice drive, maybe get some ice cream.”
Something doesn’t add up. Something doesn’t add up and I’m letting it not add up and I don’t know why. There’s something pulling me, shifting back and forth.
Here are the gears. There’s this one about getting called sweet names. There goes that one about learning how to drive and a fantasy date with an ice cream cone. There’s this other one about some sneaky bet off to the side. There’s this one, too, about naysaying. Then there’s this one, this lumbering gear, about wanting to ride off into the sunset with Eddie, treating me nice. Can you hear them shifting? Can you hear them shifting back and forth, back and forth, jamming up, getting loose, shifting forward, shifting back and getting stuck all over again?
TWENTY–TWO
The bathroom in the Million-Dollar Cowboy Bar is more like a few bucks. There’s a light buzzing overhead, trapping a few dead bugs, in silhouette squares on the ceiling. The room seems painted green until, upon closer inspection, you realize there’s actually not one bit of green in it at all, but the light above bathing everything white into fishy.
In the mirror, my face looks spooky and worn down, like some kind of broken-down ghost, left over November 1st. I’ve been waiting here for about three minutes, crunching gears, and I don’t know what I’m waiting for, but I know it’s not good.
There’s a squeaking and a shifting and, finally, a lock into place and next thing I know I’m heading out the door because this math just does not add up and I write these lines, this is my show. But before I get there, the door opens and I find myself face to face with the ugly stranger. He stands there looking at me like a wolf looks at a sheep. He’s got a long nose, stretching too far down, almost to his lip, skinny. I decide to put my head back on my shoulders and get this thing squared away.
“Let me by, Mister.”
He stays put, blocking my way, staring.
“Why don’t you take a picture, it’ll last longer,” I say, leaning against the sink,