The Devil All the Time - Donald Ray Pollock [41]
She went to the register and made the car thief’s change and took it back to him. “These tater chips are stale,” he told her.
“Then don’t eat ’em,” she said.
“Now, darling,” the wife beater said, “that ain’t no way to be.”
Ignoring him, Juanita lit a cigarette and walked down to the end of the bar where Bodecker sat. “Hey, stranger,” she said, “what can I get—”
“—and by God if her ass didn’t drop open like a lunch bucket,” one of the men said loudly just then, and the table erupted into laughter.
Juanita shook her head. “Can I borrow your gun?” she said to Bodecker. “Those bastards been in here since I opened up this morning.”
He watched them in the long mirror that ran behind the bar. The car thief was giggling like a schoolgirl while the wife beater mashed the potato chips on the table with his fist. The third man was leaned back in his chair with a bored expression on his face, cleaning his fingernails with a matchstick. “I could run ’em out if you want,” Bodecker said.
“Nah, that’s okay,” she said. “They’d just come back later wanting to give me some more grief.” She blew smoke out of the side of her mouth and half smiled. She hoped her boy wasn’t in trouble again. The last time, she’d had to borrow two weeks’ pay to get him out of jail, all over five record albums he’d stuck down his pants at the Woolworth’s. Merle Haggard or Porter Wagoner, that would have been bad enough, but Gerry and the Pacemakers? Herman’s Hermits? The Zombies? Thank God his father was dead, that’s all she could say. “So what can I do you for?”
Bodecker gazed for a moment at the bottles lined up behind the bar. “You got any coffee?”
“Just instant,” she said. “Don’t get many coffee drinkers in here.”
He made a face. “That stuff hurts my stomach,” he said. “How about a Seven-Up?”
After Juanita set the bottle of pop down in front of him, Bodecker lit a cigarette and said, “So Sandy ain’t come in yet, huh?”
“Ha,” Juanita said. “I wish. She’s been gone over two weeks now.”
“What? She quit?”
“No, nothing like that,” the barmaid said. “She’s on vacation.”
“Again?”
“I don’t know how they do it,” Juanita said, lightening up, relieved that his visit didn’t seem to have anything to do with her son. “I don’t reckon they stay any place fancy, but I barely make enough here to pay the rent on that ol’ trailer I live in. And you know damn well Carl ain’t paying for none of it.”
Bodecker took a sip of the pop and thought again about the phone call. So it probably was true, but if Sandy’s been tricking for over a year, like the bitch said, why in the hell hadn’t he heard about it before now? Maybe it was a good thing he had taken the pledge. The whiskey had evidently started turning his brain to mush. Then he glanced over at the pool table and considered other things he might have been careless about the past few months. A sudden cold chill swept over him. He had to swallow several times to keep the 7-Up from coming back up. “When she coming back?” he asked.
“She told Leroy she’d be home by the end of this week. I sure hope so. The tight ass won’t hire no extra help.”
“You got any idea where they were going?”
“It’s hard to tell about that girl,” Juanita said with a shrug. “She was talking about Virginia Beach, but I just can’t picture Carl sunning himself by some ocean for two weeks, can you?”
Bodecker shook his head. “To tell you the truth, I can’t picture that sonofabitch doing anything.” Then he stood up and laid a dollar on the bar. “Look,” he said,