by Lynn Red
“Why? And who says I’m going anyway?”
“Oh,” Tenner said, “I think you made your mind up about five minutes ago that you were gonna go see ol’ Yvette. You better call her Eve though, everyone does. It’s kind of a ‘Walt sent me’ kind of passcode. But I’ll tell you this. Don’t be late, son, because Eve hates it when people are late. It’ll do you good anyway.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Dawson grumbled, tromping up the stairs. But no matter what he said, the whole way up, and the whole time he was getting ready for bed, and the whole time he was lying in his mound of blankets and pillows, the only thing on his mind was flaming red hair, burning green eyes.
Someday, he thought as he drifted off, someday I’ll catch you.
3
“What on earth is that?” Dora walked through the front door of Mating Call Dating Agency’s office and dropped a pile of folders on her desk as the smell of something roasted and delicious hit her nose. “Is that pig?”
Eve looked up from Dora’s desk, where she had been sitting for a couple of hours already. She pushed her reading glasses up her long nose and blinked a couple of times. “What?”
“The smell. It smells good, but I don’t remember the last time you bought lunch for the office.”
“Oh it’s not for us,” Eve said, before turning back to making notes on a small pad. “We’ve got a bear coming in later, he’ll be hungry. And yes, it’s a pig. I got Boris from that meat market down the street to roast me a suckling pig.”
Dora crinkled her forehead so that her eyes went narrow. She clicked her teeth together and rubbed her puffy cheeks. “Uh, so you got a new bear client and you bought him a damn pig? Do we even have enough petty cash for that? And good lord, can I have some? That thing smells heavenly. I had no idea Boris could cook.”
Eve shrugged. “You know I like to take care of the men who trust me. Makes life easier. Full bellies make happy bears. That, and I haven’t had a bear in my Rolodex for weeks, so I’m pretty happy to have him.” She flipped through her notecards. “I’ve got just the girl for him, I think. Angie Holton? The fox who lives on Pine.”
Her voice was distant and thoughtful.
“If you had an opium habit, I’d think you were Sherlock Holmes,” Dora said. “What the hell would you do with yourself if you never found this job?” She took a folding chair from the wood paneled wall and unfolded it before flopping down. “And why aren’t you in your office?”
Eve made another note. “What time is it?” she asked, completely ignoring her closest friend cum assistant. “Not ten yet, is it?”
“Uh,” Dora checked her phone, “half past twelve. How can you not know the time? You’re sitting in front of a computer with a clock displayed as the screen saver.”
“I hate computers,” Eve said with a sneer. “I don’t trust what they tell me.”
“Even if it’s just a clock?”
“Especially if it’s a clock. The thing about computers is they’re going to trick us, make us reliant on them, and then when we least expect it, become sentient and wipe us out.”
Dora rubbed her forehead. “So you watched Terminator 2 again last night? I thought we talked about this, Eve. It makes you paranoid.”
“No, I went out and got drunk at Tenner’s piano bear.”
“You mean bar? And since when do you get drunk? That sounds more like me.”
“Oh right, piano bar with a piano bear.” She pushed her glasses up again. “That’s our new bear.”
“He plays the piano at a bar? That’s what you got excited enough about to buy a suckling pig? Really?” Dora let out a long, trailing sigh. “And I can’t have any.” She was pouting comically.
“I said you could if he didn’t want it all. Anyway, you’ve never heard a piano sing like this bear managed. It was like he was tickling a baby that kept gurgling and laughing. Er, wait, that doesn’t sound right. It was like he was petting a cat that just purred and purred.”
“You’re hungover aren’t you?” Dora grinned. “Want some Alka-Seltzer?”
“More like menudo,” Eve countered. “That’s good for hangovers, right? And I’m out here because the pig is in my office in one of those stay-warm bags, and the smell of food is making me nauseous. How the hell do you do this every week?”
“Have you ever smelled menudo? You can’t sit in a room with a delicious roasted pig, but you’re thinking about eating stomach and tongue soup?” Dora asked, slyly aware of how evil she was.
“Ohmygod,” Eve gulped, and held her hand over her mouth. “Enough, enough!”
“Seriously though, first of all I don’t stay at a bar until closing time picking up clients. Also, I chug a couple pints of water right before bed. And take some Advil when I wake up. Wait, did you say menudo?”
Eve narrowed her huge, round eyes. “I saw on one of those shows where a clown shoe host eats bugs and yak tongues or whatever that it cures hangovers.”
Dora couldn’t help but laugh. She kept it quiet though, out of respect for her friend’s condition. “Tell you what. You bring the pig out here—I promise I won’t eat it all—and then I’ll go get you some Gatorade. You’ll be good as new in a half hour or so.”
“You get it,” Eve said. “I’m not entirely sure I can keep my dignity if I start heaving.”
“Dignity, she says,” Dora chuckled. “Only Eve could worry about her dignity when she’s nursing a hangover at half past noon.” She made her way back through the glass door to Eve’s office, fetched the enormous tray, and almost salivated as she placed it on a couple of chairs opposite the front door. She helped Eve, who groaned loudly, to her feet and packed her off to her office. She watched through the window as her owl-shifting friend hunched over, put her head in her hands, and massaged her temples.
“Oh hell,” she said when she saw a note on her desk that said a certain Dawson Lex – who she figured must be the new bear – was coming in just an hour. “Guess I better hurry.”
*
It took ten minutes and five bucks, but she made it back with all the necessary hangover curing accoutrements in tow. Dora laughed again to herself when she noticed Eve was in exactly the same position she’d left her in – hunched over, head in hand. For a moment she thought about announcing herself with a loud honk of the car horn, but decided that even if it was funny, she couldn’t do that to her friend.
Stepping out of her old – she called it classic, but... uh... – Ford Focus, Dora took a deep breath of White Creek air. There was just the first hint of incoming fall chill in the air, and when she filled her lungs it tingled a bit, like electric fingers tickling her nerves. Either way, when she finally got Eve to drink the seltzer water, and got some Gatorade down her, things started looking up.
After another fifteen minutes of stormy-eyed glaring, Eve finally reappeared from her office and even had a small smile on her face. “Thanks,” she said. “I don’t know what I’d do without you. I feel like a truck hit me in the face and then pulled me along after it for a mile or two. How do you do that every weekend?”
Dora smirked. “Actually I tend to not get shitface-wasted every weekend. Turns out, when you only have a few drinks, you don’t end up sucking the toilet seat the next day.”
Eve scrunched her forehead. “Oh. Huh. I guess I’ll try that next time.”
“You still haven’t told me why you went to that bar in the first place. Were you meeting someone?” Dora’s pulse quickened when her old friend started averting her eyes. “Oh shit! You had a date! The legendary Yvette Lorraine has finally managed to get a man of her own!”
“No one bear could tame this, girlfriend,” Eve said, sliding her hand in a comically non-sexy way down her sides. “I got a tip about the piano bear at the piano bar. Bear bar. Bar bear,” she snorted and laughed at herself. “You ever say a word over and over again until it starts sounding really funny?”
“Er, right, so you’re huffing nitrous now?” Dora asked. “Or have you just entered the delirium phase?”
“No, no,” Eve said, growing more manic by the second. “Listen, try this one. Pump. P-u-m-p pump pump,” before long, she descended into a cackling madness that reminded Dora of a witch in a bad b-movie. At the same time though, it was kind of funny when you said it over and over like that.
“Pump,” Dora said, joining in the wonderful idiocy. She drew the word out like she was Southern, and added an “ew” sound to the middle. Before long both of them, normally dignified and even elegant women, were laughing themselves stupid. Dora turned deep crimson in her cheeks, and Eve had gone almost purple when there came a gentle tapping, a tentative rapping, at their office door.
The two of them shot each other a confused glance, and then proceeded to crack right back up. By the time the man at the door got brave enough to come on in, Dora was doubled over, repeating ‘pump’ like she belonged in a padded white room, and Eve was clutching her friend with one hand and the desk with the other.
“Oh, uh,” Dawson said, chuckling softly. “I didn’t realize we had legalized.”
The two women grew silent for just a moment, looked at the huge bear with the gorgeous eyes and the high cheekbones, and exploded again. This time, he caught the fever.
“Why am I laughing?” Dawson choked out in between violent guffaws. “What’s so funny?”
“Pump, pump, pump,” Eve said, changing the tone in her voice slightly with each recitation of the word. She let out a long, hissing sigh that sounded a whole lot like the air going out of a tire. “Pump. It’s a funny word, and good lord am I embarrassed at myself right about now.”
Dawson furrowed his brow and started to repeat the word to himself. Before long, his scowl turned to a smile, and a second later, he was howling with laughter.
“We better stop before Marsha at that hair salon next door blows a gasket and calls the cops,” Dora finally said, sucking in a deep breath to steady herself. “They’d never believe we weren’t on some kind of drug.”
Slowly, the laughter faded, and all three participants took a deep breath and let out a sigh. “Well then,” Eve said, immediately serious, “I’m glad you came, although you’re a quarter-hour early. I thought we agreed on half-past one.”
“Er,” Dawson was caught off guard. “Sorry, I didn’t think being early would get me in trouble. Tenner told me that you hate people being late, so...”
“If you’re a half hour late, you’re pushing someone’s patience. If you’re early, you’re saying you’re more important than whatever they were doing.”
Dawson’s face got a bunch of deep lines when he frowned. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
Before he could finish his apology, both Dora and Eve erupted into laughter again. Dawson smiled, then started shaking his head. “You two are something else, you know? I was all nervous about coming in here, but now I think I might be the only sane one in the room.”
“Says the bear who walked into an office and started laughing even though he had no idea what the two others were laughing about. Sounds totally sane to me,” Eve said with a sly grin. “I’m just messing with you. But seriously, with Mating Call, you’re in good hands, even if it seems like we’re about four bricks shy of a load.”
After the three of them finally calmed down enough to hold a civilized conversation, Dora excused herself to do some filing, and Dawson followed Eve back to her office. As soon as she plunked the pile of papers labeled ‘INTERVIEW’ on the desk, Dawson took a hard gulp.
“You okay?” she asked. She rubbed her eyes and took another gulp of Gatorade. “Seem nervous.”
“That’s just quite a pile of papers,” he remarked, trying to stay casual. “Do we really have to go through all that?”
“Not if you’re willing to play me a song... Piano Man.”
Dawson gritted his teeth and scrunched up his eyes. “Okay fine, let’s do the thing. I’d rather end up answering a hundred thousand interview questions than having to play Billy Joel on my time off.”
She snickered. “Right, well, most of it is just for my notes. I do a lot of interviewing and a lot of sorting and a lot of matching. I like to keep a nice catalog of menfolk to match ladies with, but right now we’re running a little short on the fellas. Maybe because I’m so good at what I do.”
She smiled with pride at herself. It was true though. The town of White Creek had rarely been as coupled up and happy as it had been since Eve started her service five years before. But, her success did come with a few problems. Predictably, when everyone was matched up, there aren’t too many people looking for matching.
“What’s your name?” Eve asked.
“Dawson Lex.”
“Middle?”
“Nada.” Dawson looked at her as she scribbled. “I mean I don’t have one. Nada isn’t...”
“Yeah, sure, I know,” Eve said, scratching out what she had written. “I totally didn’t write that down. Good, so, job?”
“I play piano at Tenner’s Bar every night. Sometimes I help in the kitchen if he’s shorthanded, but no, I’m a piano man.”
Eve was shaking her head slowly. “You’re a hell of a catch, you know that, right? Big, handsome bear who plays piano, sings like an angel and cooks?”
“Well to be fair, my specialty is hamburgers. Not exactly a gourmet cook. I’ll take the compliment though.”
Eve scribbled a few more notes. “Hobbies?”
“Well,” he took a moment’s thought. “I don’t really have any. Read a lot, I guess. Fix motorcycles when I get the chance. To be honest with you, most of my free time is spent staring at a wall and trying to get rid of my constant headaches.”
“Interesting,” Eve said, in a clinical sort of voice. “And what is it you’re looking for in a mate?”
Immediately, and probably completely unbeknownst to himself, Dawson’s eyes flickered to life. “Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “Listen, it’s hard to do much thinking when that tray of roast pork hasn’t been mentioned. The smell of that pork is really, really distracting.”
“I almost forgot!” Eve said. “If I give you some, will you tell me about what you’re looking for in a mate?”
Dawson looked back over his shoulder, obviously excited about the prospect of eating something besides breakfast cereal and hamburgers. “I can’t believe you tricked me like that,” he said with a slight grin. “Yeah, well, like I said I don’t really know.”
“I think you do.” Regardless, Eve buzzed the intercom and called Dora, and the pig, into the room. She unveiled the feast, and although Eve’s stomach roiled at the thought, Dora and the bear both dug in. Eve watched out the corner of her eye for a moment, and then had to hide her face from the destruction.
He chuckled. “Yeah, well, I might have been thinking about this for a while now. Roasted pork, I mean,” he looked around waiting for a laugh. “Uh, that’s a joke. Anyway, I don’t really talk about it with anyone, I... yeah, I might have been stewing about this for a long damn time now, come to think of it.”
Eve looked over the top of her reading glasses at the bear sitting opposite her. “You just got all growly,” she said. “Was it something I said? By all means, keep being growly.” She coughed. “Uh, I mean, if that’s how you feel then do whatever feels right. Not that, uh, it does anything for me, in particular.” She adjusted her position on her chair, making sure to cover up her blushing by letting her hair down around her face. “Right, so, hobbies?”
“We already did that one. You were asking me about what sort of mate I want.”
“Sure,” she said with a laugh. “That’s what I meant. So, go on?”
“Someone I can talk to,” he said, smiling into the distance. “Someone that’ll sit around and watch the entire run of The Wire with me over a weekend.”
“Is that a specific requirement? That one show?” Eve looked very serious.
“Well, no, I mean just that kind of girl. I don’t want anything big and wild, I just want someone to be with. I’ve always been sort of lonely, sort
of distant, I guess is the right way to put it.”
Eve scribbled furiously.
“And I knit.”
That got a raised eyebrow. “Wouldn’t that be under hobbies?” she asked.
Dawson shrugged. “More of a habit, really. Some people drink, some people constantly listen to the radio, I knit to keep my hands busy. Keeps my fingers limber too, good for the piano bit.”
“Tell me more about the lonely business?”
Dawson leaned forward, putting his chin into his hand and resting his elbows on Eve’s huge desk. “It’s nothing surprising or even interesting really. Grew up on the run, never had many people around. These days my only friends are Tenner and,” he thought for another few seconds, “my dad, I guess, but that’s a weird situation.”
“Upon which I’m guessing you don’t want to expound?”
A smile crossed Dawson’s lips. “I just take care of him sometimes. Old bear without a mate, I just... don’t want to end up like that, I guess. But like I said, nothing out of the ordinary. I’m not getting any younger, and at some point I’d like to take the piano thing to another level. Although I’m pretty sure at this point I’m too old for that sort of thing.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Eve said. “When you were playing I was a little amazed that you were sitting there in that bar. You seem like the sort of person who could really go a long way. Talented, I mean. But let’s go back to this dad thing.”
Dawson grumbled. “I’d rather not. It isn’t very happy.”
“Well, I need to know what I’m dealing with. You don’t have to give me the details if you don’t want to, but it’ll make this go easier.”
“I was,” he swallowed. “Not from around here, I’m from out west.”
Eve nodded, scribbling on her pad.
“My dad got caught up in some bad scenes. He was kind of a small time drug dealer, nothing serious. But he got mixed up with the wrong people. Started getting more serious about his choice of profession, and that ran him against one of the gangs out that way.” He sighed heavily. “My mom died of a heart attack when I was six, so the family was just dad, brother, me. My brother getting caught up in the gang thing almost killed my pops. And then...”