VenCo(57)

“A powwow woman.”

“Powwow? As in, jingle dresses and big drums? Ooh, can we go?” She was suddenly animated. Even the thought of steady pounding that matched the throb in her head didn’t put a damper on her excitement.

“No.” Meena crawled back into bed beside her naked wife. “I wish. It’s not that at all. Pennsylvanian powwow has nothing to do with Native powwows, or even Native people at all. They’re German originally, very old thoughts and ways—prayers and charms together.”

The women held each other under the wrinkled sheet, pulling against each other, skin to skin, with sore limbs and goose pimple flesh, bruised from the inside out by gin and revelry. This was the state Lucille sought for them—this brokenness, this vulnerability. She needed them unarmed to get to her answers. But that brokenness also made lovers ache for each other. Lucille clucked her tongue at one-night stands, not for any moral reason, but because she thought that such a delicious state was wasted on strangers too new to each other to get to the power of it all.

“We have to get up soon and hit the road,” Meena whispered into Wendy’s hair.

“I know, I know—just five more minutes.”

“C’mon, we still have to break it to Lucky that she’s been called forward.” But Wendy bit the side of her breast, rubbed her cheek over the small indents, and laid a kiss on top of it, and Meena forgot what she was worried about, what she had to do, what she would ever have to do outside of this bed. She rolled over, pinning Wendy with her weight, and holding her arms above her head with one hand. She moved the other over her stomach. “Maybe just five more minutes.”



“Okay, we’re good to go? Everyone got all their shit?” Their pathetic regiment was lined up on the walkway, reflected in the black lenses of Meena’s oversized sunglasses. She was answered with groans and a few feeble yeses.

“Alright then, Lucky? You got the directions?”

Lucky held up a piece of paper with the motel name across the top.

“Where’s your grandmother?”

“We don’t have to check out for another two hours. She had an adventure last night, so I’m letting her sleep in.”

“And you’re sure we can’t just take her back with us? We’d take good care of her while you’re gone,” Wendy asked from the passenger seat of the Audi. She’d had to sit down with a plastic bag on her lap, just in case.

“Thanks, Wendy, but I need to keep her with me. I don’t want her taking any more midnight trips on anyone else’s watch. She gets confused, and it’s just better if I’m there.” She felt this weight like a noose, the excitement of chasing the final spoon dampened by the knowledge that she had to bring Stella. She was starting to think she should have just left her with Clermont. At least their apartment would be close by, and the cat . . . Fucking cat.

“Okay, but call if you can’t find Ricky,” Meena said. “Lucille didn’t say anything about you having a passenger on this trip, and any deviation from her instructions could mean you won’t find what you’re looking for.”

“Should I ask Lucille?” Lucky offered.

The group laughed, quietly, so as to not shake their sore heads.

“You think Lucille exists in the daylight?” Morticia said. “In the sun that bitch would melt like she came from Oz.”

“It’ll be fine, I’m sure.” Meena reached out and touched Lucky’s shoulder. “You just take good care of each other.” She turned and climbed into her car. “But call if anything goes wrong. And after you see Ricky too. Remember, tell her Lucille from Trout’s sent you, in case she doesn’t already know. She’ll be able to take it from there.”

The others mumbled their goodbyes and piled into the back seat, Freya briefly fighting with Morticia before stomping around to the far door and throwing herself in. Meena sighed, then climbed into the driver’s seat. “Should be a fun trip home . . . Remember, call me.”

Lucky waved as they pulled out of the lot. She was sad to see them go, partly because of her trepidation about the trip ahead, but also because she would actually miss them. Already they felt to her like some kind of fucked-up family. Lucky was good with that, being used to families of the fucked-up variety.

Behind her, the door opened. “Hey, some kid dropped a Popsicle in front of our room,” Stella said, stepping outside. “It’s all sticky out here. Little asshole.”

She came to stand beside Lucky, who was watching Meena’s car sliding up the road. Lucky put an arm around her grandmother’s shoulders. “You’re up already? We should go get breakfast, then.”

Stella brightened. “Ooo, can we get Popsicles?”



They found a small diner half an hour outside of Buzzards Bay and ate a quick, greasy meal, leaving with to-go cups of oily coffee. Stella passed out with a full belly in the front seat, and Lucky drank both cups herself. They had another seven hours in this first part of the journey. Stella dozed on and off. When she wasn’t napping, she tried to get Lucky to play driving games, like I Spy and Place Names.

“I can’t spy with my fucking eye unless you want us to crash into the ditch. Then all we’ll be spying is the hospital.”

“Jesus, you’re grouchy. Just like your dad. He was a real grouch on road trips.” Stella folded her arms over her chest and fiddled with the radio again.