Shop Talk

by Carolyn Haines

  Mona growled. How much longer could Coco demonstrate a cream puff? It wasn’t as if every bakery in town didn’t sell them.

  To loud and vigorous applause, Coco untied her apron and flung it on the table. The demonstration was over. Coco walked straight to Mona. “Where’s Dallas?” Andromeda was mother-sitting.

  “Some foolishness about her husband disappearing.” Mona nodded to the escalator, and they both stepped on.

  “Robert never goes anywhere except work. Where’s he gone?”

  Mona shrugged. “Dallas said he and an old television were gone when she got home two nights ago. They reported him missing at work. It seems the government is quite upset.”

  “So tell me about this writer we’re meeting.” Coco focused on a bit of chocolate on her thumb.

  “Her interest is romance, particularly western. She has access to a large shop during the evenings.” Mona’s gaze followed a young man who wore a denim jacket with the arms torn out and the front completely open. His bronzed chest and arms rippled with muscles. Her attention focused back on Coco. “Are you sure this Walden won’t let us use his loft?”

  Coco sighed. “He said absolutely not.” Mona tugged at her short leather skirt, stepped off the escalator and led the way to the restaurant. “Hare,” she said to the maitre’d.

  “I’m terribly sorry,” he responded, his smile disappearing in a frown of concern. “What dish was it in?”

  “No, I’m meeting Lucille Hare. Has she arrived?”

  His gaze dropped to Mona’s leather boots, laced with what appeared to be human dreadlocks, her short, black skirt, sleeveless black turtleneck and black captain’s hat. “Over by the window, last table.”

  Mona brushed past him as if he were a gnat. She stopped so suddenly that Coco walked into her back. “That can’t be her!” A lone woman sat at the last table, her gaze on the menu. The slanting rays of the sun caught her hair, turning it the color of a good Merlot. Her lips were painted the same shade and contrasted sharply with her pale white skin. She wore an aqua and yellow plaid business suit and color coordinated eye shadow that made her look both jaundiced and bruised.

  At that moment Lucille looked up. The menu slipped from her fingers and fell to the table, knocking over a tiny crystal vase with a white rose in it. Water spread over the pale coral tablecloth, but Lucille did not notice. She was transfixed by the sight of the leather-wrapped Mona and the tall, scantily clad Coco. She knew them instantly. She had day-dreamed them in a million different details. In the flesh, they were better than she had dared imagine.

  Coco nudged Mona “This was your idea,” Coco hissed. There was going to be blame accorded to someone, Coco could tell by the way Mona’s shoulders lifted. The little ridge of the deltoid muscle was clearly visible, a bad, bad sign.

  “How desperately do we want a place to meet?” Mona asked. Just the very sight of Lucille Hare pissed her off. Lucille was kin to every female in Mona’s family. Every badly dressed cousin who got her hair done in house trailer beauty shops where all the cream cheese recipes were torn out of Ladies Home Journal magazines and cigarettes burned in ashtrays beside peroxide bottles. Where the topic of conversation ranged from pectin to cures for warts and what Michael and Lisa Marie might have done when they were alone at night.

  “Go.” Coco pushed Mona into taking a few steps, and at their approach, Lucille stood.

  “It’s a real pleasure to meet you.” Lucille held her napkin in both hands, jerking a little as she tried to decide whether to shake hands or not. She decided against it when Mona pulled out a chair and sank into it as if her legs had given out.

  “Hi,” Coco said, slipping into another chair. “You must be Lucille Hare.”

  “Horrid name, isn’t it.” Lucille sat down, at last noticing the overturned vase. She blotted it with the napkin she still held in her hands. “I just want to say how much I love your names. They’re so … perfect.” She put the damp napkin on the fourth, unused place setting. “Imagine, if you can, growing up in a small town with a daddy whose name is Happy Hare.” She grinned. “Daddy wanted to call me March, but thank goodness Mama wouldn’t let him. I mean it’s funny the first time you hear it, but can you imagine? Daddy pointed out to her that the name would have had two murmur diphthongs. Murmur diphthongs bring fame and fortune. If Mama hadn’t forced Daddy to name me Lucille, which doesn’t have a bit of a diphthong or romance in it, I probably would have been published by now. In case I ever get published, I’m going to change my name to—” She stopped, stricken by the glare Mona was shooting at her.

  “To what?” Coco asked. “What are you going to change your name to? You know it’s a simple process to go down to the courthouse and legally change—” She sat up straight as Mona kicked her under the table.

  Lucille tried to smile, but she lost her nerve. Mona d’la Quirt unsettled her. The woman was such a force, and maybe just a little bit mean.

  “You said you have access to a place where WOMB can meet?” Mona kept her voice level. Maybe the Hare woman didn’t really have a place. Maybe this was just one of those terrible computer episodes where one party lied grievously to another. Maybe, in two minutes she could get up and leave.

  Lucille nodded. The truth of the matter was that she hadn’t really asked Bo if they could meet in his shop. The shop had been Driskell’s idea. But Bo was always harping at her to develop a social life. Being a member of a critique group would be a good start. “I, uh, there is a space available.”

  “We can meet on a regular basis? Weekly?” Mona pressed.

  Lucille looked at Coco. “Don’t you want to see some of my writing?” She reached under her chair and brought out two slender manila envelopes. “I brought the first chapter of my new book, Forbidden Words. It’s a western with the most unusual hero.” If they would just look at her book, they’d have to let her in. They’d recognize her talent and ask her to join even if Bo wouldn’t let them use the shop.

  Forbidden Words? Coco’s thin forehead puckered in a tiny ripple of wrinkles. “That’s unusual for a romance. I mean does the hero, like, talk dirty?”

  Mona’s eyebrows lifted.

  “No,” Lucille waved her hand in front of her face. “No, no, no. Nothing like that! He’s the hero. He doesn’t have to talk dirty. He’s a poet. A cowboy-slash-poet. That’s what makes him so unique. He’s a man of action and a man of words. And his words are so beautiful. Sometimes in my head I can hear him just talking away. His voice makes me want to lie down and die.”

  “I can’t wait.” Mona took the envelope that Lucille held extended toward her.

  “When will you read it?” Lucille asked. “I’m desperate to see what you think. I’ve been trying to find a critique group ever since I read an article in Writer’s Digest about the importance of finding a really good group.”

  “Can we see the place where we can meet?”

  Lucille looked from one to the other. “Sure. When would you like to go?”

  “Right now.” Mona caught a scent of evasiveness in Lucille’s behavior.

  “Well, it’s my brother’s television shop, and he’s open for business right now.” She didn’t want to go up there and ask Bo in front of Mona and Coco. Bo might not be cooperative, in the beginning. She felt perspiration beading on her upper lip.

  “Good, then hell be there and give us a decision.” Mona felt Lucille trying to ooze her way out of a clean-cut answer.

  “Maybe it would be better if we met him after work.” Lucille’s heart was racing. They were going to reject her before they read her work. They weren’t going to give her a chance.

  “Now would be better. I’m not hungry, and Coco never eats.” Mona stood. “Let’s go.”

  “Not eat?” Lucille was truly shocked.

  “Coco doesn’t eat. She drinks water and counts my calories.” Mona leaned toward Lucille, who sat back in her chair. “Some of us derive satisfaction from excess, others from deprivation. Guess which of us has more fun?”

&n
bsp; “I really have to get back to work after lunch,” Lucille managed in a weak voice. “I work at Coastal Bank, and they’re already threatening to fire me because I get so caught up with my writing that I sometimes stay up all night and forget to go to work. I can’t be late from lunch.”

  Mona looked past Lucille to the small sailboats that braved the crisp April day. Their bright sails looked like an advertisement for cigarettes or medical insurance. Happy Americans using their leisure time to self-destruct or to enjoy the last, few, carefree minutes of health before disaster struck.

  “Are you, uh, married?” Lucille asked. “I can see why a man might find you intimidating, with all that leather. I mean you’re hard looking, but it’s attractive. On you.” Lucille popped a cracker into her mouth. A long silence fell over the table, and in it she could hear her teeth grinding the cracker into dust.

  Mona sat back in her chair in disbelief. Had Lucille Hare actually called her hard looking? And without batting an eye as she chewed a cracker like a ruminating bovine.

  “Wherever did you get that suit?” Coco asked, trying to break the tension.

  “Oh, I made it.” Lucille looked down her chest and then brushed a few cracker crumbs away. “My home economics teacher thought I should become a home ec teacher. She said I could put my creative talents to work sewing and teaching.” Lucille blinked a sudden wet sheen from her eyes. “She never believed I could make it as a writer. No one did,” she finished softly. She crumbled the cracker wrapper in her hand and then tossed it onto the unused place setting with the sodden napkin.

  “I’d really rather wear clothes like Ms. d’la Quirt,” Lucille gave Mona a smile, “but I’m much too feminine. If my beaus saw me in an outfit like that, why they’d just grab their crotches and run.” Lucille chuckled. “All of my men view me as a lady.”

  Mona stood up, knocking her chair over behind her.

  “Now, Mona.” Coco flattened herself against the plate glass window as she simultaneously grabbed Mona’s elbow and righted her chair. “Let’s see the meeting place, Mona.” She tugged once, gently, pulling Mona back down into her chair. “If we don’t find a place, WOMB will have to disband. And you’re so close to finishing your manuscript.”

  Lucille checked her watch. There was no way she could be back at the bank on time. She’d have to think of a good excuse. Maybe something about her car. That usually worked, but she’d used it a lot lately. Maybe a wreck. Or an injury. She kept an ace bandage in the back seat for emergency excuses. She could wrap her ankle and pretend she’d sprained it on a curb. That was the best thing to do.

  With that settled, she picked up the menu. She always thought better on a full stomach. “The seafood here is delicious, and everyone knows that fish is brain food.” She nodded at Coco. “My Uncle Peter Hare used to tell me I’d be the smartest girl in the world because I loved fish so much. Uncle Peter raised hogs, and he never could eat pork. He said if you knew what a hog ate, you wouldn’t eat one either. He was always talking about killing his wife, Doris, and feeding her to the hogs. He said they’d eat her up, bones and all. But oddly enough it was Uncle Peter who disappeared. After he divorced Doris, he took to living in his truck and one day he just up and drove off. Mama said if we really wanted to find him we could just follow the stench, because he got to where he didn’t bathe much. I mean he was living in his truck and all.”

  Mona put down the manuscript. “There’s something you have to understand, Lucille.” Mona felt the words pulse in her throat, little arrows of rage. It took a lot of effort to make them leave her mouth in a controlled fashion. “We don’t discuss our personal lives. Not at all. Not our parents’ names, not our uncles who raise hogs, not anything at all about our personal lives.”

  Lucille blinked. “Why not?”

  Mona lifted one eyebrow. “First, because the members of WOMB decided it would be that way. We don’t want anything personal interfering.” She leaned forward. “Second, because writers are cannibalistic.” She pointed her fork at Lucille. “You’d make a lovely chapter on uses for Red Devil Lye.”

  Another cracker disappeared in Lucille’s mouth. “I don’t get your meaning.” She chewed and swallowed. “If we meet at the shop, you’ll have to know my brother. That’s a really stupid rule.”

  Mona went completely still. “Maybe it is a stupid rule. Maybe it is.” She signaled the waiter. “I think I’d really like to hear more about Uncle Peter Hare. After we see the shop.”

  Chapter Seven

  When the bell over the shop door jangled, Bo looked up from a 1973 Sylvania he had disemboweled. Radical surgery was required, and he was Mandy Pitinkin from the first season of Chicago Hope. The very best surgeon. Maybe a little arrogant, a lot crazy, but the best at a delicate procedure where the patient’s life hung in the balance. Wires and the tiny chip boards that showed his patient’s age were jumbled in his hands.

  He ignored the second jangle of the bell and wished that Iris was beside him, assisting him. Iris loved the Chicago Hope scenario. They could both relate to a character who had relatives in mental institutions.

  At the third jingle of the bell Bo gave up his fantasy and the television and went to tend to the customer. His annoyance turned to interest at the silhouetted figure that walked toward him. The woman had good looking legs, and she was wearing a short skirt and some kind of military hat. Behind her was a tall, slender woman in high heels, and then … Lucille. An image of Shelley Winters going down in the engine room of the Poseidon blanked out everything else. When his vision cleared, he saw Lucille was wearing a plaid suit that looked like something a demented Easter bunny would put on, or worse, a Junior Leaguer on acid.

  “Bo, these are my new friends, Ms. d’la Quirt and Ms. Frappé.” Lucille stood behind Mona’s shoulder.

  Bo cleared his throat. “Ladies.” It wasn’t the right thing to say, but there was no other salutation that served better.

  Mona stepped forward and held out her hand and captured Bo’s, giving it a firm squeeze. “My, that Y chromosome can make a difference.”

  The big metal door in the back of the shop opened and Iris rushed into the shop waving a newspaper. “Bo, our local celebrity, Dr. Beaudreaux, has mysteriously vanished. The newspaper says he disappeared with an old black and white television.” Iris stopped when she saw Lucille and the two strange women, one holding her husband’s hand.

  “That’s my sister-in-law, Iris,” Lucille said.

  Mona gave Bo’s hand a little squeeze before she dropped it. Lucille was an idiot, but her brother was a hunk. And the shop was the perfect place to meet. Perfect. It had an air about it, an energy. It would be the ideal place for a lot of things.

  Iris eased to Bo’s side and put her hand on his shoulder. “Your sister has the most interesting friends, baby.”

  Mona ignored Iris and let her gaze linger on Bo. “We’ve come to make sure it’s okay if we hold our writers’ meetings in the shop.” Mona decided to take the moment in hand. She didn’t have the rest of the day to fool around. “Lucille said you wouldn’t care if we met up here once a week on Wednesday night. To go over our manuscripts.”

  Iris flicked her lighter and started a cigarette in the silence that followed Mona’s announcement.

  “Is that what Lucille said?” Bo gave his sister a long look.

  “Bo, I didn’t get a chance to talk with you, but what would it hurt? The shop is empty. You and Iris are in the back. We wouldn’t hurt a thing. We’d just need a table and some chairs.”

  A long, thin stream of smoke reached out from Iris to Lucille, almost a touch. “Wednesday night. Sort of like prayer meeting. I don’t suppose y’all sing and handle snakes, do you?”

  “Iris!” Lucille turned a pleading look on her sister-in-law. “We’re writers. We’re professionals. We aren’t kooks.”

  Iris blew another puff of smoke. She saw the tall, thin woman take up a sleepy-eyed position in front of a soundless television, watching the images flicker back and forth a
s if she were hypnotized. Or a lip reader. Iris ruled her as harmless. It was the whip lady who bore scrutiny.

  Aware of Iris’ surveillance, Mona wasn’t put off. She visually measured the distance between Bo’s shoulder blades, an infallible indication of the size of his endowment. Yes, indeed, he was a full grown man. His butt was a little flat, but put him on bottom, let him work those gluteus maximus in a mutually satisfying exercise, and he’d round out.

  “Lucille, I don’t think this writers’ meeting is such a good idea.” Bo picked up his screwdriver. He didn’t want a bunch of flaky writers running amok in his shop, not even one night a week. Driskell was bad enough. It was like having a large rodent in the shop at night. A talented rodent, to be sure. The man could repair televisions and VCRs, averaging ten a night. He was the best help Bo had found in the seven years he’d owned the business. Good enough so that he and Iris were thinking about taking a vacation. A real trip. Iris had been talking for years about the wax museum down in St. Augustine, Florida. There were figures from history and television personalities. And they might even make a swing by Universal Studios in Orlando and see some of the sets. But the entire trip hinged on whether Driskell LaMont stayed on to work. The one thing Bo didn’t want was Lucille and her crazy friends making life uncomfortable for Driskell.

  “Bo, this is important to me.” Lucille put her hand on his arm. “Really important.”

  Bo could feel her trembling. Lucille, who didn’t bat an eye at being fired or thrown out of her apartment. Lucille, who thought nothing about driving without a license or forgetting to buy a new car tag. Hell, Lucille didn’t worry about insurance. The last time she got fired from a job as a receptionist at a home health care group, she’d lost not only her paycheck, but her medical coverage. She had been totally unfazed. Why was it that she wanted this instead of something sensible?

  “Bo.” Her voice trembled and her lip quivered. “Bo, this is the most important thing in the world to me. I’m begging you. Remember the day Daddy died, when he called you in the room and made you promise that you’d look after me? He said that we were special, the two of us. That you were my big brother, and that no one could take care of one Hare the way another Hare could.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “That you should take care of me and Mama.”