Джеффри Дивер - Nothing Good Happens After Midnight - A Suspense Magazine Anthology

Another mountain staffer ambles behind George, having locked his own company truck. George hears the beep of this worker’s universal fob and twists to nod a hello. The co-worker, Kyle something or other, he’s new, brand new, nods back.

Where’d Kyle whatshisface come in from? Colorado? Marquette? Who cares. Not tonight. Don’t care.

“Hey there, George,” Kyle New Boy says.

“Hey,” says George, scrunching his eyes to avoid a deluge of snow from the sky.

George doesn’t wait for Kyle, and this isn’t George being rude. This is him teaching new boy the ropes. There are rules, laws, amongst staff and townies in the hidden cocoon of Malforson’s Bar and Grill. And one law is no talking outside. Another is no monopolizing a single-solitary person’s short-time inside, before a mountain shift. One can talk to the whole bar, if the whole bar is listening, but one-on-one ear beatings are strictly banned. Kyle doesn’t rush to catch up to George, so hopefully new boy gets it.

And so, the regular night routine clicks in to begin.

But this is no regular night. No! I won’t let another night pass. Tonight is the night.

It is the beginning of the work day for the skeleton crew that grooms the slopes in the middle of profit-promising blizzards, such as tonight; and it’s the middle of a drinking night for the Cliffs and Norms of the village. This is their Cheers . The binary menu fits both sides of the divide: eggs-n-bacon sandwiches in tinfoil, kept under a humming heat lamp is one choice; and palm-shaped sliders cooked in a toaster oven is the other. Mostly the sliders are meant to soak up the townies’ constant rum and cokes and dozens of draws from the tap, and the egg-n-bacon hockey pucks are for mountain staff. Sometimes the staff and townies mix up the menu between themselves; a grease-dripping slider from the toaster before an all-nighter in a snowcat is a great way to start one’s work-night. But no matter what, no matter what , there’s not a damn fool townie who would take even a drop of drip coffee meant for the mountain’s night staff. That would be sacrilege. Also sacrilege would be mountain staff taking a townie’s designated seat at the bar. Coffee and stools are sacrosanct, the détente formed to accommodate the demilitarized zone of Malforson’s.

These are the intricate, unstated but firm, laws of Malforson’s: no ear-beatings, only communal talking if the community as a whole is listening, no coffee for townies, no designated bar stools for mountain staff. Laws .

Breaking any could lead to violence. Possibly justified homicide.

There are other laws, too.

Such as, one law, seems to George, is that not a mugger in here is permitted to believe any of George’s amazing, and true dammit, tales. Nor do any of these fools believe he’ll ever actually profess his love to Karen’s face.

But dammit. Tonight is the night to profess his love. Screw these muggers at the bar. Who cares what they believe.

George, at six-foot-five and straight-up turned fifty this year, doesn’t flinch under the sheets of snow layering him like fancy-pants buttercream on a normal-old cupcake. He doesn’t sway a fraction from the frigid, whipping wind. Doesn’t slip even a second on the black ice hidden under accumulating powder on the walkway from parking lot to black bar door. A long-term employee of Richard’s Mountain, he’s wearing his strap-on cleats over steel-toe boots. His internal temperature is a furnace anyway, so he’s not cold, especially since he’s in a Richard’s Mountain, arctic-tundra, gortex, smoretex, whatever newfangled fabric coat. Fine .

Whatever , he thinks, while spiking into the black ice and pulling the black handle on the black door. Big deal we got a storm. It doesn’t matter. It’s tonight. Tonight is the night. I’m talking to Karen if she’s willing to listen. I hope I haven’t waited too long.

In a short mudroom of sorts, George takes off his coat in a way that shimmies any snow to the metal grate floor, meant to capture snow and send it to a well beneath. In hanging his coat on a wood peg, he slides out a thin empty thermos from an inner pocket. Next, he bends to remove the strap-on cleats from his boots and sets them in his regular cubby, one amongst a total of fifty, lining both sides of the bar’s foyer. In behind him bustles new boy Kyle, who, breaking a Malforson’s law, speaks.

“George, right? It’s George?”

“Yeah.”

“We have to take our spikes off here?”

“Yeah,” George says, nods, and walks off.

Again, George isn’t being rude, he just has to get this new kid to get it. He can’t be seen being cornered into talking with some wolf pup. George is barely accepted, even after twenty years on the mountain, in this townie-dominant bar. He can’t allow himself to be one of the staff the townies ask the owner to bounce. A terrible fate, for there’s no other joint in Richard’s Village open past ten p.m. for food, and eating in the resort bar at midnight means mingling with well-heeled skiers from New York City.

George doesn’t like being reminded of New York City.

Ugh , he cringes, setting a hand to his heart to think of New York City.

But no! No more! No more wallowing on heartbreak of the past! Tonight is the night.

He’s going to tell Karen during their night shift on the mountain. Even in this fog-out, blinding blizzard, which at the crack of dawn will bring all the gosh-damn city skiers. Yep, tonight’s the night for love in Vermont, no matter how much snow-catting and limb trimming and lift clearing they need to do on every one of the 99 trails of dreams and ways to fall in love.

Tonight!

George makes his way to a non-designated middle stool at the bar. New boy Kyle sits two stools over, and the entire bar gasps. A woman at a table by a window with an amber candle says, “Oh shit, here we go.”

George closes his eyes. Now he’ll have to talk to Kyle. It’s incumbent upon him to correct Kyle’s gaffe, given that staff instructs staff and townie instructs townie. No other mountain staffers are present yet; George swivels to confirm. Not his beloved Karen, thank goodness. But she never comes to Malforson’s anyway. And no annoying Bob yet. Not even ever-present Old Eli. So, dammit, George has got to do it.

“Look, kid. You can’t sit there, right. That’s Pete’s chair. You best move before he...”

The bartender, named Kemper, with white rag in beer mug steps up and helps, “Before Pete gets back from his piss, yeah.”

“Boy, you better hurry up,” George says, trading an eyebrow-twitch with Kemper the bartender. This Kyle is in his thirties, George guesses, but George calls all of the newbies, “Boy,” until they prove themselves worthy to have an actual name.

Kyle doesn’t, as he should, immediately stand. He continues sitting, his lips pursed, looking at George as if evaluating.

“Right,” Kyle says.

George squints an eye, wondering if he’s going to have to bulk up and fight. Wouldn’t take much. George is a lumberjack of redwoods compared to Kyle’s kindling-gathering frame. But George doesn’t like violence. He especially doesn’t want to fight tonight, tonight is a night for blizzard love.

Kyle breaks the gaze, stands, and says, “Well then. I’ll move,” not apologizing or noting any concession to established laws and norms as the new kid on the block.

As Kyle moves away from the stool, Pete rushes from the bathroom to reclaim his spot and shoots a glare at Kyle. Kyle raises his arms and says, “Settle old boy, no problem.” To this shocking affront, Pete flares his nostrils at George and says, “You best get your boy in control.”