Mick beamed. There was nothing he’d like so much—unless it was to get into some clean, dry clothes.
Geri slowed the truck down and wrenched the wheel right, shifting down into second gear. The truck whined and buckled over a muddy road that cut through a thin wood. A few branches beat at the truck and squeaked over the metal fenders and doors. She hit one pothole a little too fast and the cargo of crates thundered in the back of the truck. Mick made a face. The thought of all those worms escaping from their confinement made him shiver with disgust.
Geri took the rest of the road more carefully, and after a minute or two more they were back on a paved road. And a moment later, civilization! Well, not really civilization, Mick thought, rebuking himself for his insufferable New York City snobbery, but at least Fly Creek was the most civilization he’d seen since getting off the bus.
Fly Creek was an anthill of activity as its residents and shopkeepers cleaned up after the storm. The streets still glistened with water; leaves, twigs, and branches still littered lawns, streets, and sidewalks. Here and there could be seen scattered shingles, which Mick traced to a patch of bare roof on a saltbox house just off the main street. On the main street, itself, several stores sported broken windows, damaged façades, downed electrical wires. The hot sun beating down out of a cloudless sky sent steam rippling into the air, giving the town a misty aura. Above, a few squeaking seagulls reminded Mick that this was a coastal town.
Geri pulled up in front of a gas station beside which was an ice machine. “I promised my mother I’d get some ice. All our electricity is out.”
“Yeah?”
“And the phones.”
“Must have been a dilly of a storm,” Mick murmured respectfully.
Geri shook her head, still a little shocked by the intensity of the experience. “Mick, it was incredible. Like a war. Everything was lit up. And the wind, and the thunder. Oh, wow!”
“Sorry I missed it,” Mick said, not quite sincerely. “I like a good thunderstorm once in a while.” He slid a little closer to Geri. “Makes you feel helpless, which is kind of nice once in a while, don’t you think?”
An electric charge seemed to spark between their eyes as Geri read his meaning clearly. She answered him mutely with a loving look, then pulled up the handle of her door. “I’ll only be a minute,” she murmured, touching the back of his hand before departing.
Mick sat still in the cab of the truck, taking in the town of Fly Creek. It was an ordinary enough town, which for a city dude was extraordinary enough since he rarely got to see a building smaller than six stories high, rarely got to see foliage that did not belong to an artificially constructed city park, rarely got to see the curving contours of hills, valleys, winding roads. In the city it was all straight lines, horizontals and verticals, sharply delineated east, west, north, south, up, down. The commonness of the old barber shop, the prim little hotel, the luncheonette, the package store, took on for Mick almost as much charm as he’d have experienced sitting in the plaza of some European town.
The only things that spoiled it for him were the crates full of worms on the other side of the steel and glass partition behind him. It was odd how the thought that—gosh, how many worms would fit back there anyway?—well anyway, all those worms sitting a few inches from your back could taint an otherwise delightful experience.
Then came the bump.
It must have been his imagination, conjuring up the notion of a bunch of angry worms sore at him for thinking bad thoughts about them. Yes, Mick decided, a thrill of fear running down the flesh of his back, it was definitely his imagination. He was so certain he’d imagined that bump in the back of the truck that he decided to get the hell out of there. He climbed out of the truck and strode in the direction of Millie’s Luncheonette, trying not too successfully, to control the pace of his footsteps so as not to give any indication he wanted to put as much distance as possible between himself and that truckful of worms.
God, worms! Mick said to himself, ambling past the Fishing Post where two men were cleaning up its broken plate glass window. What kind of creeperoos would farm worms?
Mick walked around a man carrying a piece of plywood to the Fishing Post window to cover the exposure until plate glass could be ordered. Then he stepped over the feet of some young campers stranded in town, chugging Cokes in front of a general store. People stopped to stare at him, and he realized that despite his muddy clothes his pale skin, well-groomed sandy hair, and eyeglasses marked him as a city tourist.
He stepped into Millie’s and immediately had second thoughts about the charm of small towns. It was dreary and hot. The electricity had been knocked out by the storm, and the only light coming in filtered through an unwashed front window. Near the screen door as he walked in were racks of comic books, girlie magazines, men’s adventure magazines, and some well-fingered paperback novels. Along one wall was a counter containing all sorts of things ranging from candies to practical jokes that looked distinctly corny and unfunny. Two boys stood before it, making their selection.
There were some farmhand types sitting in booths or at the greasy counter, nursing their morning coffee or sipping Dr. Pepper through straws. A stiff-spined blond man wearing a khaki uniform also sat at the counter, drinking coffee morosely and watching the blowsy redhead behind the counter over the top of his cup. As Mick straddled a stool at the counter, this man swiveled his head and studied Mick professionally, and a slight curl of the man’s clean-shaven lip suggested he didn’t particularly like what he saw. Mick glanced over, gave a friendly smile as he noted the Sheriff’s badge on the man’s shirt, but, getting no friendly smile in return, shrugged and turned away.
Mick listened to the old-timers talking about the storm in their lilting drawls. Millie, refilling the cup of one grizzled character in overalls and red flannel work-shirt, asked about a family named Cutter who always seemed to be the first victims of local flooding due to their location at the end of Fly Lake.
“They took the brunt of it all rght,” the farmer said. “I hear old Wally had to get out with a row boat. They’ll be pumping till Christmas.”
Millie paused to take some change from the two little boys who’d decided to take some long red worm-like licorice whips and a practical joke called Doggie Poo that they thought might be cute to leave lying on somebody’s carpet. Cute.
“I hear a whole electrical tower went down,” Millie commented, returning with a damp rag to the counter. She swiped at it a few times, but as far as Mick could see she merely redistributed the thin veneer of grease that coated the formica.
“Luckily it didn’t start a fire,” the sheriff observed. “All that juice pouring into the ground. Over a million amps.”
“When are they to get the lines up?” Millie asked with an edge in her voice. “Before I go out of business, I hope.”
“They’re sending men up from Scranton. They promised to have it straightened out by tomorrow morning,” the sheriff said confidently.
“Yeah,” sneered Millie. “And in the meantime, all that electricity going into the ground, and guess who’s paying for it.” She gave a what-are-you-gonna-do shrug and looked around for something to do or someone to serve. That’s when she remembered Mick, who’d become so absorbed in the conversation, he’d forgotten to ask for anything. “Yeah, honey, what’ll it be?” Millie asked.
Without hesitating, Mick said, “I’ll have a large egg cream and a glass of water, please.”
Every head in the luncheonette turned and focused on the pale-skinned, four-eyed intellectual kid who’d just made this bizarre request. Millie glowered, her eyebrows knitting together beneath furrowed brows. “I got the water. But what was that? An . . . aik-cream?”
“Egg cream,” Mick pronounced with exaggerated inflections, and it was only then that he realized that egg creams were not universally known the way, say, Coca-Cola was. He could have kicked himself for personifying the typical New Yorker who believes the whole world thinks the same way he doe
s. Now he had to explain what an egg cream was, which probably would make things worse, for, when you broke it down into its components, it sounded a little nauseating. “Just chocolate syrup, a little milk, and some seltzer water,” he said, smiling feebly.
Millie tilted her head and roved the ceiling with her eyes, seeking in the dim recesses of her mind some way of associating egg creams with something in her experience. Ah, a light went on in her skull. “A chocolate soda.”
“That’s it,” Mick beamed, looking as pleased as if he’d just managed to communicate with a native of some Pacific island. “With a little shot of milk to give it a head.”
Shrugging her shoulders, and exchanging glances with the amused customers, she began assembling the components for this challenging concoction. What normally took a street corner soda jerk fifteen seconds in New York City, took Millie some two minutes. After all, Mick had mentioned three ingredients, but he hadn’t described their proportions.
“Yep,” said another old-timer. “Why, that was the worst storm I can remember around here since I was a tot. ’Course, there was the one in . . . uh, thirty-seven. But that was snow.”
Millie put the finishing touch on the egg cream, and served up, with a proud smile, a glass of what appeared to be brown-colored foam to the youth at the counter. “How’s that, dear?”
Mick’s disappointment was inexpressible, but he smiled bravely and said, “Fine.” He dropped a straw into it, sucked, but getting nothing but air for his troubles, put the straw down and sipped from the glass directly. A foam mustache was his reward.
“ ’Course,” another old man was saying, “there was the storm we had about three years ago. All that thunder and lightning—scared them tourists right out of their shorts. Never seen anybody row that fast trying to get off that bay, dropping their fishing rods and what have you.” The old man found this notion particularly humorous and burst into a hissing laugh, and was joined by the others. Mick morosely nursed his drink, wondering how anyone could call country humor funny.
Mick raised the glass to his lips and was about to tilt it upright in the hopes of extracting some liquid from the bubbles when he noticed in the bottom of the glass an ingredient that had never, to his knowledge, appeared in any egg cream created in the greater New York area.
It was solid, but so coated with liquid and foam that he couldn’t distinguish it absolutely. As he reached into the glass with a long index finger, his mind flashed associations with the practical jokes and red licorice whips sold at the candy counter. For the thing in his glass did look like a licorice whip, and was probably a practical joke played on the dude from New York City. Ha ha, very funny.
It was not so funny when the licorice whip squirmed violently between Mick’s fingers and tried to bite him with two hideous, fanglike little teeth. He dropped the thing, uttering an involuntary cry, and jumped off the stool.
Millie, the sheriff, and everyone else in the luncheonette spun their heads as one.
Eyes wide, Mick pointed at the slimy thing flip-flopping on the counter in a pool of chocolate milk. “There’s a worm in my egg cream, lady!” he cried.
Millie stepped closer to the counter and inspected the writhing creature, then reached down, produced a washcloth, covered the worm with it and bunched up the cloth. She squeezed hard and disposed of the worm, washcloth and all, in the garbage can. Then she returned to the counter, glaring angrily at Mick.
“If you didn’t like the drink, all you had to do was say so,” she hissed, brushing a lock of orange hair out of her eye. “I have enough troubles today without comedians.”
“What!” Mick burst out. The men at the counter leaned closer to take in the exchange, which would undoubtedly provide them with anecdotal material for years to come. “I found it in the glass,” Mick protested. “I didn’t put it there.”
As if defending her maidenly virtue itself, Millie said, “Those glasses are hand-cleaned. I keep this place spotless. Never had that happen before.”
“Well,” Mick protested righteously, “it happened now and it’s not a good way to win over new customers, if you want to be objective about it.”
Suddenly Mick was aware of a dark shadow eclipsing the light coming in from the window. He looked up at the imposing figure of the sheriff, who’d gotten off his stool and was peering down at him menacingly.
“Now, why’d you go and do a juvenile thing like that, fella?” His voice was pebbly. His blue eyes were ice-cold and all business. Mick opened his mouth to reply, but decided that in the mood the sheriff was in, just about any answer would be misinterpreted. So Mick said nothing.
“Where you from, fella?”
“The city, most likely,” Millie chimed in.
Mick knew a bad situation when he saw one. He rose, reaching into his pocket for some change.
“I don’t want your money,” Millie growled. “Just be on your way.”
The sheriff clapped an iron-like hand on Mick’s shoulder, thrusting him back down on his stool. “Don’t you think an apology is in order, fella?”
Bad situation or not, that was too much. “Apologize for what? Finding a worm in my egg cream?”
The sheriff glared at him with those disconcertingly icy eyes. “What business do you have in Fly Creek?”
“No business,” Mick said sarcastically, “just pleasure.” He rose from his stool again and walked out, feeling an itch in his spine where, irrationally, he expected a slug from the sheriff’s revolver to enter momentarily.
CHAPTER
V
As Mick approached the truck, he saw Geri struggling with an enormous block of ice that looked like it weighed a ton. He took it off her hands and climbed into the passenger seat. “You’ll have to hold it,” she said, looking around and realizing there was no room for it anywhere else but Mick’s lap. “I guess you can’t get any wetter than you are.”
That was not strictly true. The block of ice between his legs made him considerably wetter than he had been, to say nothing of making him cooler than he wanted to be, however hot the day. As Geri started the engine, Mick looked ruefully back at Millie’s Luncheonette.
“Why is everybody around here so unfriendly?”
Ignorant of the incident in the luncheonette, Geri shrugged and spoke benignly about small-town ways. “Oh, they’re really very nice people. But they’re suspicious of strangers. The tourists pollute the lake and bay.”
“Well,” Mick said indignantly, “I’m not a tourist. I’m a . . .” The ice had at least cooled off his anger, and he managed a small joke. “I’m a Libra.”
The trip back was uneventful, if you can call sitting soaking wet with a block of ice between your legs and a truckful of worms at your back uneventful. From time to time Geri took her eyes off the road to glance affectionately at her boyfriend. Her loving looks didn’t make Mick any drier, but at least they made his cold wetness a little easier to bear.
After a ten minute drive, the truck pulled into the dirt driveway shared by the Sanders and the Grimes. Mick hoped that the ramshackle house on the left wasn’t Geri’s, and his hope was fulfilled. They pulled into the Grimes’ driveway. Geri shut off the engine and left the key in the ignition. They got out and crossed to the pretty, well-kept yellow house with the four white pillars skirting a verandah and a huge elm tree casting a cooling shadow over what appeared to be a recent addition.
The beat of rock music assaulted their ears as they entered the dim hallway and looked into the living room where Alma sat, slightly out of breath as if (Mick guessed) she’d been peeping out of the windows to catch sight of Geri’s boyfriend and then rushed back to her seat to assume a casual pose as he entered. Mrs. Sanders sat in a comfortable armchair busying herself with knitting.
“Mother,” Geri beamed, “this is Mick.” She waved her hand at Mick as if he were some prize sculpture, and her love-filled eyes were blinded to the fact that he was muddy, dirty, and carried a heavy block of ice. “Mick, my sister Alma.”
Mick
could hardly reach out and shake hands, but he did manage to wiggle his fingers from under the ice block. He realized it felt a little lighter, and when he looked down it appeared to have lost about twenty percent of its bulk thanks to melting. And guess where that twenty percent had gone? Into his pants, was where.
“Mick went for an unscheduled swim. He’s soaked through.”
Mrs. Sanders rose from her chair and clucked solicitously. “Give him some of daddy’s old clothes. They’re upstairs in storage. They’ll be a little big, though. Your father was built much bigger up here,” she said, gesturing at Mick’s chest and shoulders. The three women seemed totally oblivious to Mick’s predicament Not even the goosepimples on his arms suggested that somebody ought to take the ice off his hands. Finally Geri noticed the puddle forming on the floor around his feet. “Oops,” she said. “Let’s get that in the kitchen.”
She led him into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator door. Mick pushed the ice block into the darkened refrigerator, half smiling at the fact that the block was now almost half the size it had been when Geri shoved it into his lap in town.
Finally rid of his load, Mick began to relish the idea of a shower and clean clothes. Alas, as little as it was to ask, he was destined not to realize this dream quite yet.
“Oh Mick, wait until you see Mr. Beardsly’s store. He’s got the greatest old stuff,” Geri said breathlessly. “You’ll go crazy. And he’s very reasonable. I mean, you can bargain with him.”
She looked up at the clock on the wall over the sink. Mick did too, but the clock made no sense.
“I forgot,” Geri said. “The clock stopped. What time do you have?”
Mick checked his watch. “About eleven-twenty.”
Geri frowned. “I arranged to meet Mr. Beardsly at his store at eleven-thirty. He’s opening it just for us. We’ll have to hurry.” In utter disregard of Mick’s comfort, she turned to her mother. “Mother, Mick and I are taking the car to Beardsly’s.”
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