Never Coming Back(37)

“Maybe she’s met a man,” Sunshine said.

“She already has enough men in her life,” Brown said. “Between Jack and Dog, who needs any more men?”

“How sweet. A bottle of whiskey and the ashes of her departed dog.”

“Hello,” I said. “Rudeness.”

I willed the bartender back behind the curtain, and I willed the scorch mark not to fail me, but fail me it did. The bartender kept opening the curtains to poke his head through and smile. I wrapped my arms around myself so that the thin dark wire, invisible under my shirt, would hold me together. It had been seven years since I got that tattoo and I knew exactly where to put my hands and how to crook one forearm into the other so that the beginning of the wire would meet the end of the wire. It was a technique of last resort.

“Sunshine, she’s doing the wire thing again. She’s holding herself together with ink.”

“I see that, Brown. But why? What’s she holding in?”

“Rudeness times two,” I said again. “Rudeness squared. Speaking of someone in the third person when she’s right here. Demerit.”

“There it is again!” Brown said. “I swear to God she sounds happy-ish.”

I clutched each arm with the other but the laughter was coming on strong, and “Screw you both,” I said. “I met someone, okay? This guy.”

“Whoa!” Brown said. “Did you hear that? Has she ever told us she met someone?”

“Nope. But here she is. Look at her, smiling.”

“Where could she possibly have met this guy? What do you think his favorite color is? Do you think he’s an eggs man or a cereal man?”

“Is he a boob man or a butt man? Or a mostly-neither man, given Winter’s physical configuration?”

“I bet he’s a lumberjack. You know she’s always had a thing for lumberjacks.”

“Hellooooo,” I said. “Still right here.”

“Oh,” Brown said. “What do you know? She’s right here. So where’d you meet this guy? Did you go to a party and not tell us?”

I shook my head. “A bar. He’s a bartender.”

“A bartender? Free drinks!”

The bartender materialized again in my mind. He stood behind the bar, slicing limes into thin wedges. Sunshine and Brown were talking about the drinks they would order when they met the bartender. They would go big because the drinks would be free, or should be free, because weren’t drinks always free if you were with the bartender’s girlfriend? Wasn’t that like an unwritten rule or something?

“He’s not my boyfriend. I just met him.”

“Can you imagine her and her boyfriend in the tiny cabin?” Brown said. “Where would she put him? Maybe she could turn him into a piece of furniture too. Or artwork! A human-size sculpture made out of a human.”

“There would be room if she made room,” Sunshine said.

“Are you speaking metaphorically, Sunshine?”

“I am, Brown.”

Brown turned to me. “Sunshine is speaking Metaphor,” Brown said, as if it were a nearly forgotten language and he a professor instructing me in its ways. “And she’s also speaking Literal. Kind of like simulcast.”

“Stop,” I said. “It’s not right to talk about this kind of thing.”

“What kind of thing?”

“You know. Happy-ish things.”

“Why not?” Sunshine said.

“Because. It’s not the time or place. We’re here to talk about Tamar, not the bartender.”

“Of course it’s the time and place. We can talk about Tamar and we can talk about the bartender.”

“Simulcast,” Brown said helpfully. “See?”

“Happy-ish things don’t stop because Tamar has Alzheimer’s,” Sunshine said. “Being a cancer survivor gives me the right to say that.”

She tilted her head and smiled her brave-cancer-survivor smile and we automatically tilted our heads and smiled our brave-cancer-survivor-supporter smiles back at her. Our smiles were closed-mouthed and flat-eyed. We had invented them long ago, when people started referring to Sunshine as a cancer survivor, which was a term we all hated. It put the cancer first and Sunshine second, and if we couldn’t get rid of the cancer entirely we at least wanted the wording to be the other way around.





* * *





“But enough of happy-ish things,” Brown said. He had the ability to pivot like that, and we pivoted with him. “This meeting is called to order. First order of business: other than that there was at least one moment in her life, corroborated by mysterious photographic evidence, that she was wearing a non-woodcutter-type shirt and she looked pretty, what have we learned about Tamar Winter since last we convened?”

Was that an existential statement? Or a rhetorical question? Question marks scrolled across the bottom of my brain. ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Curlicued little sea serpents hunching along in search of answers. Sum up what you do know about your mother, Clara.

“Tamar Winter is my mother. She applied and unapplied decals for Dairylea for thirty years. She was justice of the peace for fourteen. She was a choir singer who never sang in church. She is a fan of firewood, food eaten straight out of the jar and Jeopardy! She was also a fan of Asa. At least until the night before he broke up with me.”