Last Call Lounge (7 page)

“When you’re finished with that,” I said, “you can sweep the parking lot. There’s a broom and a dustpan in the closet in the men’s room. You already know where the men’s room is. If Boyd gives you any trouble, tell him to call me and I’ll explain it all.”  I knew Boyd wouldn’t give him any trouble – it wasn’t in Boyd to stop someone else from sweeping if they wanted to.

“Okay,” Frank said. He chuckled, ducked his head a little. “Thanks.” 

I turned toward my truck, then turned back.

“Come back at nine,” I said. “You can bar back. I’m not promising anything. We’ll have to see how it works out.”

“Sure,” he said, grinning widely. “Thanks, John.”

“And you might as well call me Little John,” I said, walking away. “Everyone else does.”

He bustled inside to get the broom. I leaned back against the front wall, squinted into the falling sun. Mitchell pulled into the parking lot, squeezed his tall frame out of his tiny Ford Festiva, and loped his gangly lope up to me. He had an Astros hat pushed back on his head. Even though I'd given him shit about it dozens of times, he wore black socks and white tennis shoes and cargo shorts. He held a plastic grocery bag, bulging with lemons and limes. He was about to say something when Frank burst out the door, broom in hand, and went running to the parking lot.

“Hi,” Frank said to Mitchell as he passed. Mitchell cocked his head to one side.

“Okay,” Mitchell said. “What the hell is he doing here?”

“He told me he was impressed with our fair prices and friendly customer service,” I said.

Mitchell stared me down, waiting for an answer. Mitchell would have made a good cop. “He came by today, said he’d quit drug dealing and wanted to learn how to tend bar,” I said.

“And you believed him?” Mitchell asked.

“Look.” I tried to think of the right way to word it, but nothing came to mind. Instead, I said, “I’ve been thinking about what you said. About the mask.”

Mitchell frowned at me.

“He might have taken it,” I said. “And at least if he’s around and we get the chance to learn some things about him, we might be able to find it.” 

Mitchell’s frown relaxed a little bit.

“I told him he could bar back tonight. We’ve been talking about getting you a bar back on Fridays,” I said. Mitchell worked with another bartender on Fridays, sometimes Tracy, sometimes a guy named Kenny, and usually it was just busy enough to be too much work for the two of them. I'd end up jumping up to get them ice or shag glasses. “I told him we’d give it a try. It seemed like the best chance of finding out what happened to Pancho,” I said, playing the Pancho card.

Mitchell put his thumb between his teeth, nodding. Mitchell was a boy scout when it came to evil-doers, and the idea of knowingly letting a drug dealer behind the bar was a tough one for him. But his desire to get the mask back, I figured, would win out.

“Okay,” he said. “But remember -- your father always said, ‘Don’t feed a stray or you’ll never get rid of it.’”

“I know,” I said. “He said that’s how he got stuck with you.” 

Mitchell rolled his eyes and almost laughed -- which is as close as I ever got with him.

I pointed to the grocery bag.

“What's with all the fruit?” I asked.

Mitchell looked down at the bag in his hand.

“I stopped at the store and people were buying up everything,” he said. “I figured it might be our last chance to get lemons and limes before the hurricane hit.

“Shit,” I said. “I didn't even think about that.”

Mitchell nodded at me, like he knew I wouldn't have thought about it, and pushed past me into the bar.

SIX

I sat it my truck, chewing on my bottom lip for a few minutes before I finally started it and headed for home.  The streets between the bar and my house were small and quiet, with low-hanging power lines and telephone lines.  Antique stores and thrift stores peppered between old brick duplexes and pier-and-beam bungalows.  The summer heat pushed in through the windows and radiated off the hood. When I was about two blocks away from home, my phone rang. It was Worm.

“What the hell are the cops doing there?” he asked as soon as I answered.

“What? How do you know the cops were here?” 

“Well,” he said. His voice was a rapid screech. “A friend of mine drove by, saw the patrol car out front, and got worried, because he knew what happened at the Galaxy and knew that you and I are friends, so he was worried for me, you know?”

“Uh huh,” I said.

“So, then I thought, ‘I’d better call John and make sure nothing happened,’” he said.

“It had nothing to do with you,” I said. “Completely unrelated.”

“Okay, good,” he said. “Because I was worried about you, you know?  With everything that has happened in the neighborhood lately.”  At a red light, I switched the phone to my other ear.

“Did you talk to Frank and the other guy?” I asked.

“I called them last night,” he said. “Right after I left your place. Get this. The kid Frank told me he was quitting. Can you believe that?  Quitting, like it’s a job at the mall or something.”

“Huh,” I said.

“So, listen,” he said. “Everything’s all right, right?  I mean, I know that everything is all right, because you’d tell me if it wasn’t. But I just want you to know that you should tell me if everything isn’t all right.”

“Everything’s all right,” I said. “The cop had nothing to do with your money or your gun.” 

There was a long pause.

“Okay,” Worm said. “And, you know, if anyone comes in and asks about me, you don’t have to say anything, right?”

“Is somebody going to come asking about you?”

“No, no,” he said. “Of course not. I’m just saying, you know, that you don’t have to tell anybody anything you don’t want to. You know?  This whole thing is between me and you. You don’t even have to tell anybody you know me.”

“Trust me,” I said. “The last thing I wanna do right now is tell anybody I know you.”

My house was stubbornly hot inside. I turned the thermostat down, took off my shirt, and lay on top of the bed. It was close to six o’clock. I had to be back at the bar at nine to work the door. I wanted to sleep, but I couldn’t keep my eyes closed. I thought about Frank and Worm, about Mitchell and the mask, but mostly I thought about Ruby. The way her lip tugged into a half smile, the way her long, white hands lay on her lap. Finally, I sat up.

“Fuck,” I said and got up to make a pot of coffee.

I started the coffee, then went out the back door to smoke.  Six o’clock in the evening and the sun was cutting across the treetops.  There was a breeze but all it did was push the heat up onto the back porch.  I leaned against the rail and lit a cigarette.

My backyard was separated from my neighbor’s by a high hedge that ran half the width of my lot, then by a low chain-link fence.  In the gap between the hedge and the neighbor’s garage, I had a view of a five-foot slice of their yard.  As I smoked, I saw the slicked top of my neighbor Archer’s head gliding behind the hedge.  When he came into view at the chainlink, I saw that he was carrying a plastic lawn chair.  He was wearing blue cargo shorts and a collared shirt with the logo of some energy company on the breast.  He disappeared behind his garage and a moment later I heard a splash.

Archer reappeared, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, disappeared again behind the hedge. A minute later he was back with another lawn chair and a minute after that there was another splash.  I grabbed my cigarettes and walked across the yard to stand by the chainlink fence.

Archer was a guy I got along with, although I couldn’t tell you why.  He was a big guy, wide chest and a gut that stuck out over whatever dared to try to circumvent his waist.  He slicked his black hair straight back from his forehead.  He coached his kids soccer teams, little league teams.  He owned two video cameras and I had witnessed him whistling while cleaning his gutters.

For whatever reason, I was drawn to him.  When I’d spot him outside, I’d make some excuse to go out there.  Suddenly the trash needed to be taken out or the garage door needed to be locked.

When Sarah finally left me, when she took Jacob and moved out, Archer mowed my lawn for two weeks.

“What in the hell are you doing?” I asked as he returned from his pool empty-handed. His pool was his pride, always clean and chemically balanced.  It was on the other side of the garage, hidden from view.

“Wait a minute,” Archer said.  He ducked into the side door of the garage and returned a moment later with two long neck Bud Lights.  He twisted one open and handed it to me, then opened his own.

“You asking about the lawn chairs?” he said after he’d taken a long drink off his beer.  “That’s a hurricane trick I learned from Ronnie.” He gestured with his bottle at a house I assumed to be Ronnie’s.  “Half the damage during a hurricane comes from your own shit blowing around in your yard.  Lawn furniture and shit.  So, you throw all your loose stuff in the pool.”  He held the side of the bottle to his forehead.  His big cheeks were pink from the heat.  “When the storm’s over, you have the kids dive in and fish it all out.  Make a game out of it.”

“Makes sense,” I said, glancing at my two folding chairs.

“You can throw your shit in my pool, too, if you want,” Archer said and I laughed.

“That’s about the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me, Archer,” I said.

He grinned and leaned against the chain link fence.  His eyes tracked across my yard, my house.

“When I finish this,” he said, “I’m gonna board up my windows.”

“Mmm,” I said.

He kept his eyes on my house.

“I can help you board up yours, too,” he said.  “If you want.”

I lit another cigarette.

“Not tonight,” I said.  “I have to go back to work.  I’ll try to get to it tomorrow.”

“You got tools?” Archer asked.

He knew that I didn’t.  Once, soon after Jacob was born, Sarah bought a dresser from IKEA.  I dragged the box into the back yard to assemble it.  It was a hell of a fight, but the dresser won.  I cussed and kicked and banged my knuckles countless times.  At some point, Archer appeared at the fence and watched me.

“Jesus God,” he said after about five minutes.  He went into his garage and came back out carrying a red metal tool box.  He came through the mother-in-law gate in the fence and set the toolbox down next to the scattered dresser pieces.

“I can’t watch any more of this,” he said.  “Watching you try to put that thing together is like watching a monkey trying to fuck a football.”

I laughed in spite of myself.

“Make yourself useful and get us beers,” he said.  And he proceeded to assemble the fucking thing in ten minutes.

“I’ve got some tools somewhere,” I said.

“Wood?”

“I can stop at the hardware store in the morning,” I said.

He stretched his arms above his head and let his eyes roam across my house.  He was counting and measuring windows, I could tell.  He had a big A and M class ring on his pinkie.  He turned it around and tapped the crown on his beer bottle.  And I knew he knew I wasn’t going to board up my windows.

“Well,” he said, turning back to his porch.  “Let me know if you want any help.”  He turned to me.  “You know what can really fuck up a house in a storm?”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“A lazy bastard of a home-owner,” he said.  Then he grinned and waved over his shoulder as he trudged to his house.

I climbed the steps to the back porch and dropped into the folding canvas chair.  I lit a cigarette and pulled the smoke deep into my lungs.  I heard Archer’s screen door bang shut, heard his big voice bellowing something through his house.  The drying leaves of the Mexican sycamore rustled in the breeze. 

I smoked my cigarette and lit another one and stared out at my yard.  I tried to picture it.  Me.  My life like Archer’s.  Spoiled kids and an unconcerned wife.  A charcoal grill and hamburgers next to the pool on Sundays.  I stared at the yard and tried to work out the other part of that scenario.  Sarah.  Or Ruby. Or some faceless woman who hadn’t walked into my bar yet.  The light turned orange in the treetops and the shadows pulled longer and longer across the grass. 

I went inside and got the coffee pot and a mug, then went back out on the porch.  I poured a cup of coffee and I smoked another cigarette and stared out at my empty yard until it was dark and it was time to get ready for work.

SEVEN

I got back to the bar just before nine. I was showered and shaved and wearing a good western shirt, even though I was fairly sure Ruby wasn’t going to show up. Frank was behind the bar, watching intently as Mitchell showed him how to fill the three-compartment sink. Frank had tied an apron around his waist and tucked a bar rag into his back pocket. He just needed some sleeve clips to look like a bartender from a fifties cowboy movie.

Tim Cole was there, too, sipping a vodka and lemonade out of a tall glass, concentrating on the sudoku in the Chronicle. This was his weekend routine, his Friday evening routine. The rest of the week, he drank draft beer and shots of tequila. Fridays, he tended to be a little calmer and the slide into drunkenness took a little longer. I waved hello and he waved back. He smiled and tried to draw me in, but I quickly looked away.

I was feeling kind of raw, ragged in my chest and behind my eyes. I lit a cigarette and stubbed it out right away. Mitchell was playing Lightning Hopkins on the stereo and the jangling of the guitar scratched at my skin. I wanted a shot but decided to wait. Mitchell saw me and ambled over.

“How’s Frank doing?” I asked. Mitchell looked over his shoulder at Frank, who was stooped over the sink washing glasses.

“I can’t figure him out,” Mitchell said. “He’s working really hard.”

“Maybe he really wants to learn the job.”
“Mmm,” Mitchell grunted.

We watched him for a moment. Mitchell started to head back. I asked him for a beer and he gave it to me without opening it.

It was a slow night. The storm spun on the TV and the colored cone of the projected path stretched from the Louisiana border to Brownsville.  The bar was quiet and Mitchell kept the music turned down.

I looked back at Tim. He looked better than the night before, calmer. He was staring at the puzzle in the paper, but his pen rested on the bar. He caught me looking at him and smiled.

“You doing all right tonight?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah, yeah,” he said.

“Better than last night?” I asked.

He grinned. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “Yeah, yeah. Sorry about that.”

“That's all right.”

“I worked some things out,” he said. “I think my luck's changing a little.”

The door opened before I could answer and a familiar-looking, middle-aged Hispanic man walked in. He sat down at the bar between Tim and me. When he put his hands on the bar, I saw the big silver watch and recognized him as the man who Allen had scared away earlier that afternoon. Tim turned away in his stool, bent back over his drink. The Mexican man ordered a draft beer.

Now Tracy came in, walking as close to me as she could, but keeping her head turned away. Her buttery smell floated behind her. She was dressed to go out, in tight dark jeans and a low tank top. She sat at the far end of the bar and Mitchell started making her a Cosmopolitan. I reached for my beer and noticed that the Hispanic guy was looking at me.

“This your place?” he asked when he caught my eye. He was probably my age, maybe a few years older. His short hair was starting to get some gray and he had large, intelligent eyes with heavy lids that made him look drowsy. He was wearing new-looking jeans and a white button-down rolled up at the wrists. His forearms were covered in inky prison tattoos.

“Yeah,” I said.

He held up his pint glass for me to toast.  “I like it,” he said, clinking his glass against my bottle. “Nice place.”

“Thanks,” I said.

He looked toward Tracy, then looked back at me with a grin.

“She your girlfriend?”

“Mmm mm,” I said, downing a sip of beer. “Employee.”

“You must of pissed her off somehow,” he said. “She wanted to make sure you were watching her walk away.”

I nodded.

“She always likes to remind me when she’s in the room,” I said.

“I’m Oscar,” he said and held out his hand.

“John,” I said and shook it. I thought about asking him about earlier, when he had cleared out after seeing Allen, but decided against it. Oscar looked around the room, nodding.

“This is a nice place,” he said. “My dad used to take me to places like this when I was a kid. He’d stand at the bar and drink and I’d stand on a chair and play pinball.”

“My dad owned this place,” I said. “I used to kneel on a chair to shoot pool.” 

He laughed and held up his glass to cheer again. I tapped my bottle on his pint.

“I like this place,” he said. “I’m gonna have to come here more often.”  The prison rasp in his voice made this sound like a threat.

A couple came in. I turned to card them and Oscar turned to look at the TV. I handed them back their IDs, picked up my beer and walked behind the bar, not because I needed anything, but just because I needed to get up. Frank was moving glasses from the sink to the shelves. When I came behind the bar, he came and stood next to me, wiping his hands.

“Who is that guy, Little John?” he asked, gesturing towards Oscar without looking at him.

“His name’s Oscar,” I said. “I just met him.” 

Frank was making a point of not looking at him.

“I’ve seen him before,” he said. “But I can’t remember where.”  He said something else, but I never heard it, because when I looked back to where Oscar was sitting, Ruby was there.

It was a ridiculous thing, her stance. She held her purse in one hand, and it hung down below her knee. Her other hand was on her hip, which was cocked out. It should have been an awkward, off-balance stance.  Her knees rubbed together, her head was tilted high.  But something about her swelled.  Her presence throbbed across the room and one by one people turned to look.

Mitchell saw her, too, and stepped out from behind the bar. Ruby ran and jumped into Mitchell’s arms, flinging her purse around behind his back and almost hitting Tracy. The couple I had carded came to the bar to order. Mitchell started to step back behind the bar, but I waved him away. While he and Ruby chatted, I made the drinks and casually tried to check my hair in the bar mirror.

After a few minutes, Mitchell came back behind the bar with a loose little grin on his mouth.

“Thanks,” he said, releasing me from bar duty, but I stayed behind the bar. Ruby sat down next to Tracy.

I stepped toward her. Ruby was wearing a dark, short-sleeved sweater and long silver earrings. She brushed her wispy bangs off her forehead, let her breath out in a short push.

“Hello, stranger,” Ruby said, setting her purse on the bar. I smiled in spite of myself. Tracy craned her tan neck to look at Ruby over her shoulder, then turned away. “I can’t stay long,” Ruby said. “So please don’t waste my time with more of your insults.”

“I’m glad you came back,” I said.

“Why? Did I walk my tab?” she asked.

I wanted to answer with a joke, but couldn’t. I found a place on the bar for my hands. Ruby fished in her purse for a mint, unwrapped it and popped it in her mouth.

“Can I get you something?” It sounded formal, so I added, “to drink?”

“Just a Lone Star for now,” she said.

The “for now” made my heart thump.  I grabbed one out of the cooler. Tracy leaned a little to the side and held up her empty glass to me.

“Another Cosmo please, Little John,” she said.

I made the drink, trying not to look up. I set the glass on the coaster in front of Tracy.

“Ruby,” I said. “This is Tracy. She works here.”  Tracy looked at me like she was about to laugh. “Tracy, this is Ruby. We used to date.”  Ruby turned and held her hand out to Tracy.

“We were engaged,” Ruby said as Tracy took her hand. “Or so lots and lots of people thought.”

“Well,” Tracy said, picking up her glass. “John never mentioned it.”  She downed her Cosmo, almost the whole thing in one long swallow. Then she set the glass down and pushed it across the bar to me.

“I won’t be able to see you later, Little John,” Tracy said. “I have plans.”  Then she stood on the rung of the barstool, stretched her perfect body across the bar. She arched her back a little and leaned her head close to mine. I thought she was going to kiss me, but she whispered in my ear.

“Have fun with your old girlfriend,” she said. I turned to her and she winked. She left, a buttery trail floating behind her. I picked up the glass and washed it, buying a little time. When I turned back to Ruby, she smiled.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed,” she said. “But Tracy has a really nice body. I saw it when she was writhing in front of my face.”

“Yeah, well,” I mumbled. “We have a sort of history.” 

She laughed, a near-silent, throaty laugh.

“I never would have guessed,” Ruby said.

Tim Cole hunch-waddled up next to Ruby, holding his glass in front of him with both hands. He nodded his full-neck nod for a second, then spoke.

“Well, hey there, Ruby Red,” he said, smiling and looking at his drink. Ruby turned on her stool.

“Tim Cole,” she said, standing to hug him. Tim’s face gave a hint of his dilemma – he hated to be touched, but wanted Ruby to hug him. He tried to reciprocate, hugged her back with half an arm. “How’ve you been, Tim?” Ruby asked, sitting back down and folding her hands in her lap. Tim nodded and squinted up at her.

“Good,” he said. “Yeah, yeah. Good. You know.”  He set his drink on the bar, but then didn’t know what to do with his hands. He picked the drink back up. “You in town for long?” he asked. Ruby sat up straight, let her eyes wander as she thought of an answer.

“I don’t know yet,” she said. “A few days, at least.”

“Not evacuating?” he asked.

She looked down at her hands.

“I don't know,” she said, frowning. “I haven't really decided yet.”  She put up a smile. “You?”

“What, and miss all the excitement?” Tim said, forcing a grin. “No, no. I can't,” he said.  He looked at her and his eyes went up and away, remembering.  “Something’s new, huh?  Different?”  His eyes came back.  “Your hair is different.”

“Oh,” Ruby said, touching her hand to her bangs “Back then, I used to dye it.  Black black.  I don’t color it anymore.”

I looked at her, tried to take her in now instead of how I remembered her.  Tim was right.  Her hair was still black, but there was a coppery hint to it.  A mahogany I never would have noticed.

Tim and Ruby stood, nodding and smiling. Merle Haggard came on the jukebox.

“Well,” Tim said finally. “Good to see you. Good to see you.” 

“You, too, Tim,” she said.

Tim hesitated, then turned and waddled back to his stool. Ruby watched for a second, then spun back to face me. I inhaled, deep, and held it.

“Would you like to sit down and talk?”  I forced the words out, past the fear that she would say no. Something undefined flashed across her face, something not unlike pain, and I was reminded of how I had treated her that afternoon.

“Sure,” she said.

“Thanks for coming back tonight.”

“Sure,” she said again and I knew it had taken a lot of effort on her part to walk back in.

“Hold on a minute.” 

I grabbed Frank and asked him to watch the door for me. As I walked him up to the stool by the front, I explained the basics – how to spot a fake ID, no drinks in or out. He listened seriously, his brows furrowed. He sat up straight in the stool, hands on his knees. I went back behind the bar, poured two shots of Beam, grabbed two more Lone Stars and came back around to stand beside Ruby.

“Lead on,” she said, standing up and grabbing her purse.

I led her to a booth near the back, a high-backed wooden booth past the pool table and the pinball machine. She slid in to the seat, I sat down across from her. I pushed her drinks across the table. She toyed with the shot, rolling it between her thumb and middle finger, then tapped it next to the beer bottle. There was a black, plastic ashtray in the middle of the table.  I put my cigarettes next to it and tried to think of something to say.

“Did you want to ask me whatever it was?” I said, finally.  “Whatever is was you wanted to ask Dad?”

She waved the question away with her thin, white fingers.

“No, no,” she said. She seemed on the edge of speaking, but shook her head instead. “It wasn’t important.  It wasn’t anything, really.  I don’t want to talk about it anymore.  Besides, it was just an excuse,” she said, raising her eyes to mine, “to come in and say hi.”

I knew she was avoiding something, distracting me with a hint of a compliment, but I smiled in spite of myself and felt a flush of warmth spread across my face.

Ruby leaned back in the booth and spread her long hands on the table in front of her.  She looked slowly around the room, then shrugged.  “So,” she said, tilting her chin. “Sum up the last six years for me. What’s new?” 

I drew in a long breath.

“Well,” I said. “I have a son.”

“Wow,” she said, leaning back. “I’m impressed. Surprising information from the very beginning. How old and what named?”