THE COLLAPSE: Swantown Road (6 page)

Tarra suddenly felt really embarrassed at that moment, and all the heated color in her face flushed to pale.  She had mis-judged them severely.

One of the crab fishermen added, “You want a Jaeger-bomb, too?  We don’t wanna make you feel jealous, Butterfly, you’ll always be our favorite drinkin’ buddy!”

Tarra cocked her head and smirked at them, “Well, you know I can’t turn that down!”

It all made sense to Tarra at that point, as she gulped down the delicious mixture of Jaegermeister and Red Bull.  In any other instance these oil workers and fishermen would have harassed the hell out of those two city slickers – right out of the bar! 

As Motley Crue wailed “
Without You
” from the jukebox, Tarra watched as the two sailors sang the song to each other, loudly. 
“You’re the reason the sun shines down, and the nights, they don’t grow cold.  Only you that I’ll hold when I’m young, only you, as we grow old.”
  Pulling that type of gay-ass shit in that bar would normally get you your ass kicked.  But the two carried on, getting in each other’s face and over-emphasizing the words.  Yes, it was pretty embarrassing and pathetic in Tarra’s opinion, but for some reason she wanted to be over there, singing also and having fun with them in their own little world.  She needed to act fast.  It was getting later in the evening, and a few of the local skanks were making their grand, dramatic entrances into the bar, each one of them dressed as hoe-baggish as they possibly could.  With the amount of drinks that Tall-And-Tattooed and Hair Club had put down, it wouldn’t be long before they might just be out the door with a couple of those skanks.

Tarra went into action.  Her overnight knapsack lied at her feet between the brass rail and the wooden planks of the bar.  She reached down and snatched it up, then hauled ass to the restroom. 

First, she washed her face and put four drops of Visine in each eye, which would hopefully take effect before she was done in the bathroom.  She then used some disposable makeup remover wipes on her eyes and cheeks before applying a fresh coat and quickly brushed her long black hair with several long, smooth strokes.  She stood a few steps back from the dusty and scratched mirror and checked herself out; front, back and profile.  Her jeans were a bit loose, presumably from not eating much in the last few days, so she hiked them up to ensure her perfect bubble butt would display nicely and then safety-pinned the jeans tight, as best she could.

After Tarra completed her hasty makeover and was back at the bar, she rounded up all the money she had left and counted it.  Nine dollars.  That was it.  Tarra had noticed that the two sailors were drinking bottles of Alaskan Amber.  Unfortunately for her, Amber was four dollars a bottle in Jessup’s bar.  Tarra squeezed the money tight in her fist, and sighed.  She decided to go ahead and use the very last of her cash to buy the sailors a drink. 

That decision, however, would turn out to net her the biggest return on
any
investment she had ever made, in all her life. 

Tarra waved down Jessup in between customers and called him over.  She was delighted to notice him do a double-take on her appearance, although he said nothing about it. 

“Two bottles of Alaskan Amber, please.”  She shouted over all the noise.

“You too, eh?”  Jessup said, cocking his head over at the sailors.

“Yeah, me too.”  Tarra stated as she handed eight of the nine dollars to Jessup, and proudly slam-dunked the remaining dollar into his tip jar.  He winked at her, having no clue that she was officially dead broke.

Tarra clutched the icy-cold bottles and contemplated taking a quick pull off one of them, just in case her plan didn’t pan out.  But she didn’t.  Instead, she gathered herself and confidently strolled over to the sailors’ table.  Hair Club was the first to see her coming and did a double-take on her, one quite similar to Jessup’s a few moments prior.  She waltzed right up to their table and laid an Amber at each of their places.  Both the guys were looking at her now, curiously.

“I just want to thank you guys for that awesome rendition of Motley Crue earlier.”  Tarra laughed as she said to them over the loud crowd.

Hair Club replied, “Thank you young lady, it is very much appreciated!  I’m surprised and also embarrassed that you took notice.”  He shyly picked up the bottle but didn’t drink it.  He was looking up at his buddy, almost as if to say,
“Help!  Pretty girl alert!  I don’t know what the hell to do right now!  Save me!”

Tall-and-Tattooed nodded at her and said, “Yeah, thanks dude.”  He grabbed his bottle by the neck and took a hefty pull off it as he cautiously eyed her up. 

Dude?
  She thought
.  He called me ‘dude’.  What the fuck? I don’t think this is working, time to bail. Damnit!

Tarra put on her most charming, innocent local girl act and said, “Well, I hope you guys have fun while you’re here in Alaska!”  She turned to go back to her place at the bar, broke and defeated.  Her feet felt as if they were drudging through a foot of mud on her way there when suddenly she heard Tall-and-Tattooed shout, “Hey!  Where you going?”

Tarra turned around and he was waving her back to their table!  She was ecstatic, but kept her cool as she returned.

“Yes?  Can I help you, sir?”  She said to him with a sly grin.

“We didn’t even get your name.”  Tall-and-Tattooed said to her.  When he said ‘we’, she was pretty sure that Hair Club was the one wanting to know, but he was too shy.  Tarra gave them her name, the abbreviated version of it, of course.  No need to confuse the gentlemen on their first meeting.  She was pretty sure that Tall-and-Tattooed had given her fake names because he had introduced himself as “Fish” and his buddy, Hair Club, as “Stephen King.” 

Tarra thought to herself;
Wow, does this douchebag really think that I am such a primitive native inuit waaaayy up here in Alaska that I have never heard of Stephen King before?
He was actually starting to piss her off, and she was about to get his goat.

Tarra sarcastically said to Stephen, “Wow, I really love your writing, Mr. King, I am such a huge fan!”

Fish knew he was busted, and interrupted, “It was just a joke.  His name really is Stephen, though.”

Stephen, however, wasn’t done with the ruse yet.  He looked at Tarra and said, “What was your favorite book of mine?”

“It’s a toss-up between
The Stand
or the
Gunslinger
series.  But I am a fan of just about all of them.  Which one did you enjoy writing the most, sir?” 

Stephen was at a loss for second since she was still playing along, but quickly recovered.  He replied, “All of them were fun, but I would have to say
IT
was the most fun.”

“
IT
was the most fun!”  Tarra exclaimed and clapped her hands.  Fish looked confused.

“Yes, IT
was
the most fun!”  Stephen added.

Fish, desperately trying to get in on the act, blurted, “I really liked your book
Cujo
.”

Tarra nodded and threw him a curveball, “So, if he’s such a good buddy of yours, name five other books that he wrote.” 

Fish paused, since he was put on the spot, but came up with, “Oh, that’s easy.  But, did you know that he actually wrote
The Shawshank Redemption
?  Most people don’t know that, they think it’s just a movie.”  Fish proudly countered.  He only knew that information because a few days prior they had played the movie on the USS Chandler’s site TV system, and Stephen had mentioned it to him during the show.

Tarra laughed and replied, “You mean
Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption?
  It is one of his novellas from the
Different Seasons
collection.”

Stephen cocked his head with interest at her.  This girl was smart, and she knew what she was talking about!  She was a fellow Constant Reader!

Tarra and Stephen hit it off instantly.  It was obviously apparent to her that between him and Fish, that he was the brains behind their whole little operation.  Even though Fish was tall and attractive, nothing clicked with him like it did with Stephen.  As the two talked, Fish told them he felt like a ‘third wheel’ and left the table to mingle it out with the rest of the crowd.

Stephen and Tarra talked and talked.  He was able to ascertain that Tarra was dead broke, due to buying him and Fish the Ambers, so he went ahead and paid for all her drinks.  Drink after drink after drink.  They were having a great time!  They were over an hour or so into their conversation, when Tarra’s so-called “boyfriend” staggered very drunk into the bar and spoke to Jessup.

She spotted him talking to the bartender and slunk in her chair as Jessup pointed her out through the crowd. 
Damnit!  Not now, you bastard.

“What’s wrong?”  Stephen asked.

“Nothing.  Well, maybe something.  My boyfriend’s here.”  She answered.

“Oh, I didn’t realize you had one.”  Stephen politely stated, but looked disappointed.

“He’s not really my boyfriend.  Well, kinda.  It’s complicated.” 

“I understand.  He looks pretty rough.”  Stephen said, observing the large, angry man shoving his way through the crowd toward their table.  Stephen quickly scanned the bar for Fish, but couldn’t find him.  Maybe he was in the bathroom or something.

“I’m sorry.”  Tarra said quietly to Stephen, just as her boyfriend, Luke arrived at their table.  Luke looked at all the empty bottles and shot glasses on the table, then turned his intoxicated glare to Stephen, who was also intoxicated but passively looked away because he wanted no trouble.

Luke swayed as he spoke to Tarra, “Looks like you did some good mooching off these tourists, Butterfly.  Nice.  Now let’s go.”

“Ok, just go outside, I’ll be there in a minute.”  Tarra snapped at him, reluctantly.

“You’ve got one minute.  Like, as in, sixty seconds,”  Luke said, and gave Stephen one last look of disgust before leaving and heading towards the door.

Tarra looked hurt as she explained to Stephen that she owed him money, and that he has all kinds of connections in Alaska.  He was not a man to be messed with.  She also threw in a quick line (and guilt trip) about Stephen being gone with his ship in a couple days but she would still be stuck there.

Stephen acknowledged that he understood her predicament, and gave her a quick, friendly hug before she gathered up her belongings and left the table.  On her way out, she looked him deep in the eyes and said, “I wish things were different.”

Stephen watched her as she reluctantly made her way through the crowd and out the door.  He was sad.  There was something about Tarra that Stephen had never experienced before.  He really, really liked her.  He also wished things were different, and that they could have at least exchanged contact information or something.  He scolded himself for being so weak and letting her go away so easily.

Suddenly, Stephen noticed another man moving from the pool table area quickly toward the door.  It was Fish!  And it looked like he was on a mission.  Stephen immediately realized what had happened.  Fish must have been playing pool and saw Tarra leave.

As Tarra left the bar and lit up a cigarette, she dreaded leaving Stephen.  He was a total sweetheart, super intelligent and good looking too!  She didn’t have to dumb down her conversation when talking with him, as she had to do with most of the roughnecks and fisherman she dated.  She could be herself. 

Tarra was about to make an extremely poor decision by getting into a very intoxicated boyfriend’s car when she heard a shout behind her.

“Hey!  What the fuck, yo?”  It was Fish, and he was moving quickly towards her boyfriend’s car.  Her boyfriend saw him approaching and got back out of the vehicle, ready and hungry for a confrontation.

“Why you gonna leave my buddy hangin’ like that?”  Fish shouted at Tarra as he walked up.  He was swaying also, almost as much as Luke was.  Although Fish was a decent-sized man, Luke’s arms were bigger, and he was a bit more rough around the edges than Fish.  Tarra didn’t know much about Fish, but based on general appearances, she figured that Luke had a good chance of taking him in a fight.  Additionally and more importantly, Luke
never
fought fair, and that worried Tarra.

Tarra shouted at Fish, “Just go back inside, jackass!  This isn’t your problem.”

“The hell it ain’t!  Who’s this turd?”  Fish pointed at Luke, who was slowly making his way around the hood of his car towards them.  Tarra became nervous, she didn’t want to see Fish get hurt, he was only trying to help out his friend.  She then saw the bar door burst open and Stephen emerged, loud music blaring from behind him momentarily before the door slammed shut.  He immediately ran toward the scene developing in the parking lot.

“Fish!  Wait!  Hold on, man.  I need to tell you something.”  Stephen yelled.

Fish pointed at Tarra and said, “Don’t go anywhere.”

Stephen pulled Fish a few feet away from the scene and explained to him what Tarra had said about the boyfriend, the money, and his “connections”.

“I don’t give a flying rat’s ass who he is!”  Fish shouted at Stephen and waved a sloppy arm towards Luke.  Stephen recoiled and nervously looked over at Luke, who was now standing next to Tarra with arms crossed in happy anticipation of some type of conflict.