Rachel tried to make small talk again. “I’m really here to talk to my mother,” she admitted. “I knew she’d be here.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” said Bert. Rachel regretted bringing up mothers. When Bert was seventeen, his mother went out to pick mushrooms in an area recently scorched by a small forest fire, and slipped on the new growth, cracking her head open on a bombed-out stump, bleeding to death overnight. The search lasted for a day, and Bert Senior shot himself in the head two hours after the memorial service. Bert had become an orphan in the span of five days. Instead of mourning, Bert had gone shopping. He blew his inheritance on a new truck and a trailer to haul his new speedboat. He forgot to tie it down completely, and it flew through the air as he sped toward the lake, nearly killing the people in the car behind him. A month later, Bert’s new truck and trailer were found upside down in the shallows of the Kootenai River, a truck-size hole blasted through the guardrails of the rickety bridge above. Bert became a cautionary tale, just like Rachel. Bert walked away from the wreck, left it there, knowing that someone else would have to clean up the mess. Rachel could identify with that as well.
Bert finally broke the silence. “I don’t want to be seen with you,” he said. He fled to the rear of the fire hall, and Rachel watched as the crowd parted for him. Enough time had passed that they did not whisper, but it was clear the town still worried that his speedboat of a mind was not completely tied down.
The heaviest drinkers never left the immediate vicinity of the kegs, sunk in garbage cans, slowly settling in their shawls of crushed ice. Rachel spotted groups of Clinkenbeards, Runkles, Giefers, and Dempseys. Ginger Fitchett kicked at a strand of crepe paper that had fallen from the ceiling, and lit a long and thin cigarette, the sole person in Quinn who smoked that brand. Ginger was the richest woman in town, owner of the Sinclair, the town’s only gas station. She was drinking a wine cooler with Martha Man Hands, her longtime cashier. Martha was a Russell, somehow related to Bert, but her last name was unimportant. Ginger hired Martha and her truly enormous hands twenty years ago, and the nickname had stuck. Those hands and hairy knuckles were hard to ignore, as they handed back change for a twenty, or a corn dog in a greasy paper bag. Rachel’s attention was captured as Tabby Pierce opened her compact, and the fires of the barrels flashed on the tiny mirror. Tabby powdered her forehead, shiny from the heat. Ten years ago, Tabby was hired to replace Rachel at the bar. She was also tangentially related to Bert, a toddler in the car that the airborne speedboat nearly destroyed. Tabby checked her teeth for lipstick and closed her compact, rejoined the noisy crowd. Rachel realized there was an order, groups were determined by genes, marriages, or restraining orders. Rachel’s mother was among them.
Rachel had not seen her mother in nine years, but she had not changed one whit. Laverna Flood was on the short side, mousy-brown hair permed and cut close to her head. Laverna’s mouth was a severe line, the perfect accessory for the expectant look on her face. She owned the Dirty Shame, one of two bars in Quinn, and she had the face of a bartender, impatiently waiting for customers to make up their mind about what kind of beer they wanted, even though there were only three options, and they always ended up ordering the same thing anyway.
Rachel waved and tried—unsuccessfully—to catch her mother’s eye, but Laverna was at least twenty feet away, and Rachel no longer threw lit cigarettes at people to get their attention. So she stared until her mother turned and regarded her with heavy, weary eyes. Rachel raised her diet soda in salute. Laverna turned back to her cabal of friends, one of whom was pushing the keg pump up and down so ferociously that her breast threatened to fall out of her dirty tank top. Judging by the size of the breast and the lack of bra, Rachel knew it was Red Mabel. This meant that Black Mabel was lurking somewhere else, and if nothing had changed in the last nine years, she was most likely selling painkillers in the darkest corners of the room.
A young fireman materialized before her. He was probably a senior in high school, because the QVFD recruited early, indoctrinated them as soon as their delighted parents signed the waiver, rolling their eyes at the very thought of liability. People in this town were immune to danger. There was always a bear or a drunk driver or food poisoning from salads made with mayonnaise.
This fireman had a squirrely disposition, and buckteeth to match. He twitched, rocked back and forth on his boots, but remained standing silently before her. He had probably been dared to do this, possibly by Laverna.
She took a sip of her diet soda. He remained silent.
“What?” She wanted this to be over as soon as possible.