Dead Shot

by Ethan Johnson

  “Move it or lose it, hon.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t—”

  Mabel disappeared through the exit, and Diana sighed. She was thankful for the job, but some days were harder than others. She liked the slow times when she and the other waitresses joked around and made comments about the customers, the staff, and Scott, their ineffectual manager, most of all. Not a day went by that he didn’t say or do—or not do—something that set off the wait staff, inspiring a new wave of colorful nicknames. Diana was learning all kinds of new words from Mabel and blushed at the thought of the dirty words that rhymed with “Scott”.

  As if on cue, Scott emerged from his office, and crooked his finger, gesturing to her to come over. She held up the check and gave an apologetic smile, but he insisted. She sighed and responded to his summons. “My office,” he intoned.

  “But I’ve got to close out table six,” she protested. He shook his head, and grabbed her arm, escorting her into his cramped office, littered with clipboards and piles of papers. He held one up and thrust it at her as she sat in his only guest chair.

  “What’s this?”

  “Your termination notice, unless you can clear this up right now.” He sat back, crossing his arms.

  Diana’s eyes darted across the page, then looked up at him. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what I’m looking at.”

  Scott’s lip curled in response. “Okay, let me decode this for you. This here is your background check. To refresh your memory, this is the one that hasn’t cleared for months, but your buddy Mabel kept insisting I was doing it wrong. Well, this is from the best in the business, and unless you can point out something wrong on this report, they tell me that there never was a Diana Pembrook from Lincoln, Nebraska, not one born in this improbable year, and not for the last seventy, just in case.”

  Diana sat back, stunned. Her jaw trembled, and her hands shook as she scrambled to explain away the report. Mabel told her to say she was from Lincoln, and that would be the end of it. She had assisted with the process, interceding on the grounds that Diana had been left with nothing by her good-for-nothing father, which included her birth certificate. She compelled Scott to pay her in cash under the table and write it off as cooking oil.

  “N-no, this is wrong. It wasn’t ‘Lincoln’, it was s-supposed to say,” her eyes darted around the room and landed on a grey binder poking out from under a stack of invoices that said LANSING DEEP FRYERS. “L-Lansing. Not Lincoln. That explains it.”

  Scott shook his head. “I’ve had enough of these shell games. Mabel can’t save you now. Diana, if that really is your name, I’m letting you go.”

  Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she crumpled the background check report in her hands. “Now? But… but table six, and I’ve still got to count the—”

  He shook his head and pointed to the door. “You’re done. Sally will cover your shift. Leave, or I’m calling the police.”

  Diana rose from her chair numbly and removed her apron. She dropped it on the chair and staggered out of the office and into the kitchen, where two cooks dropped their spatulas at the sight of her. One stepped forward but was pulled back by the other. “Stay out of this,” he urged, quietly.

  She couldn’t feel her feet as she shuffled out onto the dining floor, and the sound of the elderly couple asking for their check thudded against her ears. She took a deep breath and made her way toward the front door. Mabel called after her, then stepped in to calm the customers down with assurances that their meal was comped, and she apologized for what just happened.

  The chill March air struck her face as she marched along the sidewalk toward the drug store. She was about halfway there when a hand grabbed onto her shoulder. She stopped but didn’t turn around. Mabel stepped in front of her and looked her up and down. Her features softened, and tears welled up in her eyes.

  “Oh, baby, no. No, no, no. Not like this. Not today. Where’s Scott? You and me are gonna march right back in there and give him what for. That hemorrhoid has been aching to fire you since day one, and he’s not getting his way. Not today, not ever. Come on, hon.”

  Diana held her ground and heaved a sob. She shook her head and pushed past Mabel, whose jaw dropped at the rejection. “I’ll just go. There’s no use fighting anymore.”

  Mabel stepped in front of her once more and put her hands on her shoulders. “Of course there is. Honey, you can’t just give up when you hit a roadblock. You’ve got to barrel through, head-on. Come on, you’re one of us now. We Stickler Bitches are a tough bunch. Now get back in there, and let’s take Scott down a few pegs and eat some pie.”

  The elderly couple walked past, and the wife glared at Diana. “Well. I don’t see any reason to come back here,” she sniffed.

  Mabel put her hand on her hip. “Oh, cram it, you two. You got a free lunch. Quit your whining.”

  The couple turned away in shock, and Mabel called after Diana. “Wait, where are you going? Front door is this way.”

  Diana raised her arm and waved without turning around, as raindrops began to pelt them. “Thanks for everything, Mabel. See you at home.”

  Mabel looked at her, then at the restaurant. Customers and staff stared at her through the window. “Oh, for heaven’s sakes. The show’s over. God bless it.” She held her order pad over her head and hurried back inside.

  Diana sat in a wooden chair and stared through her rain-streaked bedroom window at the modest front yard of Mabel’s home, and out at the interstate. Vehicles of all shapes and sizes whizzed by, and when she’d spot a pickup truck, her pulse quickened, and she wondered if her father was driving by. She never caught sight of him if so, and she imagined him holed up in a cabin beside an idyllic lake, eating something from a can.

  Life with Mabel wasn’t glamorous, but the rent was cheap, and she was learning how to fend for herself. They took turns cooking, and Diana had to learn how to whip up dinner for two on a shoestring that didn’t leave them foraging around for snack food an hour later.

  Her daydream was interrupted by the sound of Mabel returning home from her shift. “Diana Mae Pembrook, you get your skinny butt over here right now.”

  Diana gulped and answered her summons. Mabel stood in the dining room pulling off her wet winter coat and shaking off the cold. “Hey,” Diana said, as she slipped her hands into her pockets.

  “Hey, nothing. I got your last wages out of Scott. Believe me, that was like pulling hen’s teeth. Can you believe that rotten bastard tried to say that he was deducting the cost of your uniform because you didn’t return it before you left? I asked him how you were supposed to walk around naked and made him fork over twenty extra dollars.” She dropped a wad of bills on the table. “As a delivery charge, for when I bring it back to him tomorrow.” She cackled and slapped her thighs.

  Diana smiled weakly and reached for the bills. “Thanks, Mabel.”

  Mabel swatted her wrist, and she pulled it back painfully. “Uh-uh. This money has to last you, and you’re not going to get where you need to be if you blow it all on crap.”

  Diana cocked her head. “Where I… what?” Tears trickled down her pale cheeks. “I thought I was staying here with you.”

  Mabel stomped into the kitchen and started rustling up dinner. “Was. You can’t stay here now, not with no job. You’ve got to have family someplace; besides your father, I mean.” She slapped a skillet down on her electric stove and rummaged through the fridge.

  Diana took a step backward, reeling at the next in a string of losses. “B-but, I can get a new job. Rent’s paid ‘til the end of the month. You can give me ‘til that long, can’t you?”

  Mabel shook her head. “New job? Where? Doing what? Stickler’s is out, at least so long as Rot, I mean, Scott works there. Fat Carl at the drug store don’t like you either for some ungodly reason, which leaves the gas station, and they haven’t been hiring for months.”

  “M-maybe there’s an opening. I could go down there and ask about it tomorrow. I’m a hard worker, Mabel, you kno
w that. There’s got to be room for me someplace.”

  Mabel stepped away from the stove and put her hands on her shoulders. “Sweetie, this one-horse town dreams of the day it actually had one horse. Crocker’s just about done, hon. Give it three more years, and it’ll be off the map entirely.” She swore and hurried back to the stove as the skillet sizzled.

  Diana pulled back a chair and sat down. She stared at the wad of bills and wondered when she’d see steady employment again. “Might be a man could take care of me.”

  Mabel choked and coughed. “Do what, now? A man? Oh, honey, no way. Don’t sell yourself to a man thinking that buys you something. You’re 23 now, going on 16, with your child-like mind. I swear… you need to grow up some before you worry about reeling in a man.”

  The pair didn’t speak for a long time after that, and it was when Diana was standing at the sink hand-washing the dishes that Mabel broke the ice. She set a glass of water down next to her and smiled. “Let’s think. I figure you don’t have an employment problem, you’ve got an idea problem.”

  “I definitely have an employment problem,” Diana said.

  “Well, fine. Have all the problems in the world. You wanna complain, or you wanna fix this?”

  Diana nodded and set a plate on the drying rack. “Maybe I could get a car.”

  “And do what with it?”

  “I could drive to the next town, looking for work over there.”

  Mabel shook her head. “Okay, look. Maybe you don’t have any family who can bail you out, or maybe you just aren’t aware you do. I’ve got a cousin out east who might could help you get back on your feet. But Diana, sweetie, you’re going to have to get your papers in order. You can’t go on sneaking around like some wetback.”

  Diana held up her soapy, pale hand. “Do I look like a wetback to you?”

  Mabel adjusted her glasses and frowned. “No, but you can’t get by just on skin color. You’ve got to get your act together. Maybe the city will have places that can help you get everything straightened out. I mean, you were born somewhere. There’s got to be paperwork. You just need to get ahold of it and start fresh.”

  Diana focused on washing another plate and took a few deep breaths. When she was certain she wasn’t going to cry, she said, “I don’t want to leave you, Mabel. I owe you so much.”

  Mabel patted her shoulder. “You ain’t leaving me, darling. You’re leaving Crocker. Let it die without you.”

  “But you live in Crocker too. Does that mean you’re going to die?”

  Mabel gave her a crooked smile in response. “Well, we all do, sooner or later.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Diana hoisted her suitcase out of the trunk of Sally’s car, and Mabel stepped forward when the wheels tapped down on the pavement. “Guess this is it, then.”

  Diana fought back tears and hugged her. “Guess it is.”

  “Write to me when you get there, hon. Let me know you’re safe.”

  “I will.”

  Mabel squeezed, then they broke their embrace. Diana hugged Sally as well, who smiled politely but visibly had less invested in the relationship. Diana and Sally got along fine at Stickler’s, but they were never going to be as close as she and Mabel had become.

  Diana pulled her suitcase along to the train station, and a short time later, she was seated in a passenger car, watching the station slide past her window, followed shortly by bare farmland. It wasn’t springtime yet, and the ground was too solid to start planting. Large patches of dirt passed by, broken up by strips of barren trees, or patches of civilization.

  The train would take her through Omaha up into Chicago, then eastward. She tried to imagine what big cities would be like, starting with Omaha. She closed her eyes and saw skyscrapers towering over busy streets, with cars filling every roadway. At least, that’s how the customers at Stickler’s described it. “Way too crowded,” said Old Jim. “More tall buildings than any place ought to have,” said Francine. She opened one eye and saw acres of dirt, then drifted off to sleep.

  She awoke with a start as the train slowed down to stop in Lincoln. The train was abuzz with activity, with some passengers leaving, and others getting onboard. A middle-aged couple decked out in red and white outfits proclaiming their support for the Cornhuskers sat down in front of her. “Indianapolis, here we come,” said the husband.

  “Did you remember the tickets?” Diana couldn’t see them, but she was privy to their conversation over the rise of dark blue seat backs.

  “We’re on the train, aren’t we?”

  A loud sigh filled the air. “For the game, silly goose. Please tell me you remembered to—”

  Diana heard panicked patting noises from the seat in front of her, and she suppressed a giggle. “Those tickets! Well, let’s see here, I remember where they were this morning when I asked you where my lucky socks went.”

  The other seat back strained a bit. “You forgot the tickets? Harold!”

  The man snickered, and Diana peeked over the seat as he held them up. “Relax, I’m just messing with you. There’s no way in hell I’d miss out on seeing my Huskers take down Rutgers. No finer feeling than Husker basketball at tournament time.”

  His wife took on an icier tone. “They’re my Huskers too, and that wasn’t funny. You dang near gave me a heart attack.”

  “Sorry, sweetie, just… having some fun.”

  The pair sat in silence as the train pulled away from the station. Once they were moving at a good clip, Diana saw the reflection of the man in the window as he leaned over to his wife.

  “You did find my lucky socks, right?”

  Unfortunately, Diana slept through the approach into Chicago, and now it was nighttime, and she wasn’t sure what she’d see from the next train. She hurried to make the connection to the train that would ultimately take her to Mabel’s cousin, Veronica. Diana only knew of her what Mabel had told her. She couldn’t find any old family photos except for her baby picture, and unless she was still bald and swaddled in a blanket, she was relying on her to identify herself in some other fashion, such as a handmade sign.

  The dirt fields of Nebraska had given way to the dirt fields of Iowa, which were punctuated at intervals with groups of lazily spinning wind turbines. She watched with fascination as the blades swept along in a wide arc, and she wondered what they did, and why there had to be so many of them.

  The man in the seat in front of her pointed them out to his wife and quoted an array of statistics, such as so many gigawatts per hour, and such and so forth homes powered from just one turbine and getting audibly more excited at the sight of a grouping of at least thirty of them and declaring that Des Moines was drawing a significant share of their electricity just from that one wind farm. His wife didn’t seem to share his enthusiasm, and the conversation, such as it was, fell silent.

  The couple had to take Diana’s train to Indianapolis, but they boarded the train further back. Diana proceeded to her assigned car, where her ticket was checked by an attendant, and she was directed to her seat. She had walked the length of the connecting train and wondered what it would be like to have her own private room, rather than a single seat. She didn’t have a seatmate on the Chicago leg of the journey, but she anticipated a larger crowd for the eastward trip.

  True to her prediction, a brown-skinned man in his late twenties sat beside her and nodded. She nodded back and clutched her ticket. She enjoyed the window seat and didn’t want to argue. The man popped a pair of wireless earbuds in and swiped his finger across a glowing touchscreen. Diana didn’t mean to stare, but Crocker, Nebraska wasn’t exactly on the bleeding edge of the technological advancements of the day. A man wearing sunglasses and a tight-fitting suit gyrated on the screen, surrounded by women in tighter clothing, or skimpy bikinis. Diana felt her cheeks redden as the man crouched down and pointed at a sizable rear-end, accented but in no way covered by a thin pair of hot pants.

  She turned away and pressed her forehead against the window. The cold glass
was uncomfortable, but she squeezed her eyes shut and imagined the slower pace of Stickler’s, where an exciting day meant arguing whose turn it was to vacuum. In a short span of time, she was learning how cloistered her life had been up to this point. The wind turbines were as alien to her as the man seated beside her. Her exposure to brown-skinned men came by way of Rene and Luis, the cooks, but the man to her right was clean-shaven, and better dressed than those two ever were.

  She didn’t have long to wait for the next leg of the trip to begin. The train lurched forward, and after the station finally passed by her window, she gasped at the sight of Chicago at night. She couldn’t see the towering skyscrapers she was told about by others, but the sheer scale of the city that she could see through her window was astounding. Her neck hurt as she strained to see as much of it as she could, only to be vexed by wide buildings or other obstacles that prevented her from truly appreciating the view.

  She looked at her seatmate, who sat forward, watching the silhouetted scenery glide by the window. Diana sat back and smiled, offering him a clearer view. He waved her off. “Nothing really to see. It’s pretty boring, actually.”

  She saw a strip of restaurants and night spots glowing with LED and neon lights and wondered how anybody could think a place like that could ever be boring. Everywhere she looked, she saw lights, cars, and people, even in the cold winter night.

  Sally had one piece of advice before dropping her off at the train station in Nebraska: “Act like you’ve seen it before. You’re far less likely to get mugged.”

  Diana pressed her cheek to the glass and tried to tamp down her wide-eyed fascination with the scenes that passed by.

  “Miss?” A voice called to her from the aisle.

  Diana tore herself away from the cold glass. A black woman in a blue and white uniform smiled at her, and Diana’s eyes darted to her gleaming name tag that read WILMA. “Yes, Wilma?”

  The woman reeled as if slapped on the cheek. “Wilma! My word, we’re already on a first-name basis, Miss…”