After applying a minimum amount of makeup and blow-drying her hair, she came out of the bathroom to see that Nadine, on the couch staring at the TV, hadn’t moved an inch in the last thirty minutes.
“Nadine, I thought you said you had a job.”
“Right now it’s just long days on Friday and Saturday until somebody quits and I can get more hours.” Nadine didn’t bother to unclasp her eyes from the screen. “I should probably be making more money, but at least this way I’m maximizing my cable TV dollar.” She looked at Mary Jean for just a second. “You know I just saw an interview with Christie Brinkley, you know the first supermodel, and she said when she first started out she had to do her own hair and makeup. Can you imagine that? I never realized she had it so tough.”
Mary Jean paused just long enough to realize that Nadine wasn’t kidding. She shook her head, got her keys and left. Though she drove slowly, she was probably already downtown before Nadine had even noticed MJ was gone.
She parked in the back of the comedy club and went in through the kitchen. The first person she saw, the only person in the kitchen, was Manuel, an illegal who had been doing the dirty work at the club for as long as anyone could remember. He was at the big stainless steel sink finishing the dishes from lunch with his back to Mary Jean.
“Manuel Labor, how ya doing?”
He turned and smiled at Mary Jean, a smile that was beautiful despite a few missing teeth. “Senorita Maria, como esta?”
“Doing okay, Manuel, I just got back into town. Is Senor Burns esta aqui?”
“No esta aqui por mas que semana.”
“So who’s in charge? Como es el jefe this semana?”
“Dave.”
“You’re kidding?”
“No, senorita.” Manuel shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“Is he here?”
Manuel pointed in the direction of the bar.
“Gracias.” Mary Jean smiled and patted Manuel on the back then walked toward the bar wondering what could possibly be next. About a year before Dave had started as a bar back. He was not a particularly good bar back, who eventually became a bartender. He was a short, fat Eskimo or Hawaiian, MJ was never sure and had never bothered to ask, who was now head bartender or manager or whatever title Gene Burns had bestowed before he hotfooted it out of town to spend some of the money which seemed to come to him as easily as if it were falling from the sky.
Dave, the only person in the room, was on the phone behind the bar. He nodded at Mary Jean and then made her wait while he chatted on for another two or three minutes.
“Mary Jean. So you’re back.”
“Yeah, Dave, and I was wanting to get back to work as soon as possible.”
“Well, that’s going to be a bit of a problem.”
“A problem?”
“Yeah. You see the boss has got himself another blonde, so now we’re full up with waitresses, sorry.”
“What do you mean, sorry? Where’s Gene? I want to talk to him. Get him on the phone.”
“He’s in Tahoe. Probably won’t be back for another week. But it won’t do you any good to talk to him. He specifically told me to tell you he couldn’t wait around for you to come back, but you’d be the first he’d call if anything came up. Like I said, he got himself another blonde.”
“I really don’t like the way that sounds, Dave. I wasn’t fucking somebody to work here. I was working here because I’m a damn good waitress, and I make the place a lot of money, and I’d be making Gene a lot more money if little jerks like you were more professional and attentive and knew how to fill a drink order.”
“Hey, I’m one of the best bartenders in town.”
“In your dreams you little idiot.” Mary Jean turned and headed for the front door. She had gotten the picture and saw no need to prolong the conversation.
“Anything I should tell Gene?” Dave shouted to Mary Jean’s back.
“Yeah, tell him this.” She held up her left hand in a fist except for a protruding middle digit but didn’t bother to turn around as she marched out the front door. Out on the sidewalk, she circled the building until she found the front seat of her car where she sat wanting to kill someone. Anyone handy would do.
But soon her anger became frustration that was swiftly converted into despair. Her life had suddenly hit that stumbling block, that fork in the road. Now it was decision time. What to do, what to do, whack a do. Alaska was still a possibility. She didn’t have much cash but had a car and a lot of furniture to sell. She had an old high school friend who lived near Homer and long ago issued an invitation to visit, and she knew a fisherman from Juneau or someplace who spent his winters in Tiempo. They had become pretty good friends. MJ thought she might have fucked him during an alcoholic blackout, but she wasn’t sure, so even if she had it didn’t count, and she could go and see him without any pressure to allegedly have sex again.
Looking out at the cold gray sky surrounding her, instantly realizing that moving to Alaska this time of year was more wacky than most of her wacky ideas, she felt a sudden surge of strength, of energy, born exclusively from her deep well of Irish pigheadedness. All her recent setbacks weren’t going to beat her. After starting her car she headed west. First she stopped at a Burger King just to use their bathroom to apply a little lipstick and mascara and to brush out her hair; then she drove another half mile to the parking lot of Danny’s, a little bar and restaurant she hadn’t set foot in for over a year.
She took off her jacket and exposed her tan shoulders to the cold for the short walk from her car to the lounge. She’d known Danny casually for years from around town. She spotted him immediately after she entered the bar. He was stuffed into a booth with two other large gumbas, meeting together in what looked like a scene from a low-budget remake of the Godfather. MJ walked directly to where they were sitting.
“Hi Danny,” she flashed one of her brilliant smiles.
Danny looked up. “Mary Jean, how ya doing, doll?” He turned to his cohorts. “Fellas, this is Mary Jean, she used to be the best-looking cocktail waitress in town.”
MJ somehow held her smile basically intact, partly because she knew Danny was actually trying to compliment her, but mostly because she wanted something.
“So what are you up to, doll? Can I buy you a drink?”
“No thanks, Danny. Actually, I just got back from a vacation in Mexico, and now I’m looking for a job.”
“I thought you were working for Burns at the comedy place.”
“Time for a change. You wouldn’t have anything, or know about anything would you?” She continued to smile.
“Actually I do need a girl for three nights a week. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, but they are pretty slow nights except for Monday football nights, and football season is over.”
“I’ll take ‘em. When do I start?”
“Tonight.” He shrugged. “Just come in at six and check with Chester, the bartender, he’ll set you up. Wear whatever, I’ll trust your good taste, doll.”
“Thanks, Danny.” MJ passed around a final, parting smile before she strolled away and hit the road.
Back at the garage apartment, Nadine was still on the couch focused on the TV. “Oprah’s book club.” She turned to Mary Jean for just a second.
“Oh? So what’s the latest best-selling romantic fantasy?”
“24.95.”
“No…ah…ah, forget it. Nadine, I’ve got to go to work tonight, and I need to take a nap.”
“Use my bed.”
“I was planning to. What I want to know is how clean are your sheets?”
“They haven’t been on there too long.”
“Well, I guess what I’m asking is how many guys have you fucked on ‘em since you last changed them?”
“Gosh, Mary Jean, why do you always treat me like I’m some kind of slut? But there are clean sheets in the closet if you want to change them.”
“Thanks, slut,” Mary Jean laughed, but she did change the sheets, and did
take her reliable travel alarm clock into the bedroom to wake her. But as she tried to relax and work her way to sweet slumber land, she couldn’t fully shake the nagging, irritating thoughts of her special pyramid clock out there lost and beleaguered at the whims of fate like an abandoned child.
But she did get some sleep and after she awoke, she showered, dressed, and reported to work at Danny’s fifteen minutes early. The bartender, Chester, was a quiet, fat kid who didn’t seem to be in a hurry for anything. Business in the lounge was slow all night, but the restaurant was busy for a few hours, and after MJ made friends with the only food waitress, Linda, she helped her out by doing cocktails in the restaurant, making sure the transactions were separate from the dinner bills, and when Mary Jean punched out at a little before eleven she left with more than forty bucks.
Back at the garage apartment, the room was dark except for luminance from the overworked television, which showered its light over Nadine lying across the couch.
“Here.” MJ handed Nadine twenty-five dollars. This is for my half of the rent. I’ll give you the rest tomorrow. But I’m only going month by month, and I get the bedroom.”
“Okay.”
“And I want my car fixed as soon as possible. The headlight has to be replaced right away.”
“Okay.”
Surprised there was no argument or backlash, Mary Jean quickly changed the subject. “So what are you watching?”
“A movie.”
“Any good?”
“No, it’s terrible. I’ve already seen it three times.”
MJ left it at that. She took a Valium and set her alarm to go off in five hours. She hated the thought of getting up before dawn, especially after less than a full night’s sleep, but she had an important appointment early that same morning. A meeting with a woman named Patty who always wore a red hat.
Uncle Tom’s, probably the last bar in town that still opened every day of the year at six A.M., was a throwback to an era when having a few pops before work was less than a mortal sin. The crowd was still good at six, but now most of the patrons, long-time regulars, were long retired and more apt to drink coffee than whiskey or gin. Mary Jean got there about fifteen minutes after the doors had opened. After adjusting her eyes to the dark room, she studied the crowd and saw no other women, let alone one wearing a red hat. She pulled up a stool away from everybody at the far end of the bar.
“What can I get you?” the bartender asked.
“Just coffee, black.”
“Mary Jean? Is that you?”
“Yes,” Mary Jean answered with suspicion.
“It’s me, Dick Hartoonian. I worked with you at the old Stardust on Hobson Boulevard.” The bartender squinted his eyes and rubbed his chin. “That would have been about nineteen and sixty ”
“No need to be specific, Dick. Of course I remember. That was my first cocktail job. I wasn’t even twenty-one.”
“I remember you were pretty green, but you picked it up real quick.”
“You’ve got quite a memory, Dick.”
“I never forget a pretty blonde, which is probably the reason I’m still working and not retired to Palm Springs. Coffee black, you got it. I just made a fresh pot.” Dick turned to his right and walked away.
“Oh heck, put a shot of Baileys in it, Dick.”
The bartender delivered the drink and slid MJ’s money back towards her. “I got the first one, babe.”
“Well, thank you Dick.” Mary Jean rewarded him with a big smile. “Say, Dick, you probably know someone I’m trying to get a hold of. They call her Red Hat Patty.”
“Patty? Sure she’s in here just about every morning for a shot of Beam and a beer.” He looked at his watch. “She’s usually in here by now. What’d she do rip you off?”
“Why? Is she a thief?”
“I wouldn’t go as so far as to call her a thief, but I wouldn’t trust her to hold my wallet if you know what I mean.”
“Oh no, this isn’t about anything bad. I just heard through a friend of a friend that she might be able to help me find something I lost.”
“Well if she comes in I’ll point her out, but I probably won’t have to that red hat thing speaks for itself,” the bartender said. Then he walked down to the other end of the bar to attend to his other customers.
Mary Jean sat sipping her coffee and trying to mind her own business. Occasionally she took a glance at the digital clock on the cable TV box that kept her mindful that time was slipping away on this fragile project, and her mission du jour was probably a total waste of time anyway. She finished her drink and ordered another.
“Coffee and Bailey’s, right?”
“Yeah…oh shoot, put a little Irish in too, just a little.”
Dick delivered the mixture and again slid her money back at her. “That gentleman wants to buy it for you.” He nodded in the direction of a skinny guy several stools down who looked to be about a hundred and forty years old. “Don’t worry. He’s harmless. He’s just being nice.”
Normally MJ would have refused a drink from a stranger, but owing to the bartender’s disclaimer and the fact that her cash was running low, she accepted without personally acknowledging the old coot. “Tell him thanks.”
More time slid by in this lonely old bar full of lonely old people. Mary Jean looked up at the clock to see it was seven-fifteen. “Dick.” She waved him over. “So what are my chances of seeing Patty today?”
He turned to check the time. “If she’s not here by now the chances aren’t good. I’ll say one thing for her, she works hard at what she does, and she likes to get an early start.”
“Could you do me a big favor?” She pulled a pen from the lotto ticket display on the bar and wrote her name and Nadine’s phone number down on a fresh cocktail napkin. “I’ve got to leave after this drink, but if you see Patty in the next few days could you give me a call? I’d really appreciate it.” Mary Jean forced a smile, which wasn’t easy to provide at this time of the morning after so little sleep. “But this is just between you and me, okay? I wouldn’t want to scare her away.”
“No problem.” He tucked the napkin into his breast pocket.
Mary Jean swished around the final contents of her coffee cup, and was just about to suck down the dregs, when Dick delivered a fresh one. “What’s this?” She was both surprised and a little dizzy.
“They included you in their last roll.” He shrugged and nodded in the direction of the large group rolling dice at the other end of the bar.
Mary Jean shrugged. “Tell ‘em thanks, I guess.” Well, she thought, what the hell? The caffeine would keep her straight enough to drive the short way home, and the alcohol would help her sleep, plus one would have to admit the combination of coffee, sweet liquor, and whiskey did taste awful damn good in the morning.
She was halfway through her final final drink when the front door opened, spreading light into the dark room, and in marched a frantic small woman wearing a broad-rimmed red hat. She plopped down two stools away from the now slightly inebriated Mary Jean.
“Damn it, Dickie, make the Beam a double. My day’s shot. Everything is fucked. The best day of the year is down the tubes.” Red Hat Patty sat with both fists planted on the bar.
“What’s the deal, kiddo?” Dick set down a beer and a double shot.
“The one day I wait for all year, the best day of Operation Clean Up, and the chain on my bike breaks. Normally I could fix it, but I need parts and the shop doesn’t open until ten. By then all the good stuff will be picked clean.”
Mary Jean leaned over, buzzed just enough to push her way into the conversation. “So what am I missing?”
“Why should I tell you?” Patty snarled.
“It’s okay, Patty,” Dick said. “She’s an old friend. She’s not in the business. She’s just asking a question.”
Red Hat Patty shifted her focus between the bartender and Mary Jean a few times before centering it on MJ. “Operation Clean Up is a twice a year thing where the
city picks up throwaways that are too big for regular trash pick-ups. Every week it’s a different part of the city. Usually it’s just crap or so-so stuff, but now they’re doing it in the north side of town. Those rich people throw out great stuff. I’ve gotten stuff that still had the price tag on it. And I know this one alley that’s kinda hidden, my secret alley, that’s pure gold, just pure gold.” Patty stopped, took down her shot and seemed to savor both the whiskey and the thought of her awaiting treasure. “Today’s the first day they start puttting things out, and I’m stuck without transportation. What rotten luck.” She grabbed her bottle of Budweiser and hammered half of it down.
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