Laura Furman - The O. Henry Prize Stories 2011

He winks and it’s a little spooky how he’s talking right into me, how his words are driving into my head like pennies dropped from eight miles up.

The ladies are sisters, widows, some of them twice over. Three of our guys are widowers. Chet and Ernie are married, but Ernie’s wife is an invalid. Doesn’t give me an excuse to fool around, he says glumly.

What about you, they ask me before we go in.

We’re standing in the street of some shady neighborhood-shady meaning it’s leafy, not ghetto. The sidewalks are old and broken where the roots of oak trees push up. There’s a dove cooing somewhere. A sprinkler hisses a few houses down. I see the blue haze of mist in the evening light.

They’re waiting for an answer and I don’t know how much to say. You can’t tell people about your loneliness without adding to it. No one wants to hear how you’re somewhere between the beat with people, never finding the count.

I’m in between, I say.

A pair of legs? Clyde asks, grinning. He has a square jaw and a Charlie Brown curl of gray hair on his big, blotchy forehead.

Between girlfriends.

Oh! Ménage à twat, Horace says.

Not like that, I say.

Now they’re all grinning.

You guys are some dirty grandpas, I tell them.

They laugh. Good band name, they say. They slap me on the back. Clyde makes like he’s strangling me. His hands are rough at my throat. You’re a good kid, he says. He pulls me aside. You’re not a cockblocker are you?

I shake my head. Me? I’m thinking.

No one likes a cockblocker, Clyde says. He’s patting me hard on the back, like he’s burping a baby.

The women are waiting. They’ve laid out a happy-hour spread. There’s a green ceramic serving dish with pretzels and Ritz crackers. The dish has a built-in bowl that they have filled with some kind of white creamy dip. There’s another plate of cheese and grapes and a can of roasted peanuts. I start attacking the snacks, standing over the low table, raining down crumbs.

Horace says, Easy, Stanley.

The women laugh. Someone’s hungry!

They say, You boys should take a seat, waving us over to the long, avocado-colored couch. I sit down with a handful of crackers and line up cubes of cheese on my leg and start the assembly line. As I cram it all in my mouth, I take in my surroundings. The colors are green and yellow. A massive organ sits in the corner, its wooden pedals like a rib cage on the floor. There are plastic plants in the corners and hook rugs on the wall-shag tapestries of trees with red leaves, clouds over an island, an owl with furry eyes clutching a real piece of driftwood. There are shelves lined with little owl statues made from glass and clay. Someone likes owls. This is an owl house.

The women gather up and introduce themselves. They have cotton-candy hair and foggy eyes. There’s more than one brooch and bracelets all around, so they jangle when they move. Shiny pants and small knitted vests; clown collars, nurse shoes. I have to say, these are some good-looking old ladies. The Jazzmen really scored. The ladies smell nice, too. I can smell them from across the room: it’s all baby powder and flowers. They deliver their names like they’re performing a song. Ruth and Ethel and Nancy are sisters, we learn, and Betty is an old friend from the neighborhood. Great names, I say. Some cracker crumbs fly from my mouth and Clyde gives me a look.

The women tell us how much they loved the music.

Ethel says her fingers are sore from snapping. The guys chuckle at this.

I hit the peanuts, throwing a handful in my mouth. I watch their lips move through the grinding in my head. When I swallow, I hear Betty say, So many of the summer concerts are such disappointments.

Ruth recalls a terrible rap act and they all shudder.

Wally says, That’s not poetry, what they’re doing. I don’t buy it.

They look to me, expecting an opinion, I guess. Rap sucks, I say as I reach for some more cheese.

You have the most unusual eyebrows, Nancy says.

I don’t understand, then I remember that I had bleached them.

Goes better with the mustache, I say.

Everyone laughs because, at the moment, my mustache is curled up on the dashboard of my car.

How’s that for commitment? Clyde says. The kid lands a gig and he goes the extra mile to fit in. You didn’t tattoo our name on your backside, did you?

I shake my head, because my mouth is full.

Stan the man can swing, Clyde says, reminding me of my new name. His smile has something like pride in it. They all look at me, smiling warmly.

I feel like I’m eight years old-a little kid with a whole army of grandparents. I never knew my real grandparents. My dad was already old when I was born and my mom never told her parents about me. One day she told me her father had finally died. That was all I had ever heard about them.

Wally slaps his thighs. Say, how about some drinks?

Clyde says to Chet, You bring in your kit?

Chet says, Get yours.

The way he says it is kind of harsh. Clyde looks at him and there’s a quiet little stare-down before Clyde whistles through his teeth and heads out.

When Clyde comes back he has a small black box with a handle. It’s like a square suitcase. He puts it on the dining room table and opens it up. I go over to check it out and he tells me not to get crumbs all over the place. I peer inside the case and see its shimmering contents. The inside is lined with black velvet. Held in places cut into the walls of the box are stainless-steel tools-shaker cups, some tongs and long spoons, a strange coil of spring, and, behind a secret panel, he shows me that it holds a blue bottle of gin and another bottle of tonic water. It’s an incredible thing. I like cases and gear and kits. That’s one reason I love the drums. I like how everything collapses, folds up, and has its place to go. It looks professional, just like Clyde’s kit looks professional, even a little religious.

Would you ladies like to try a fine gin and tonic? Clyde asks. When they seem to hesitate, Clyde reminds them that the gin and tonic was invented as a health drink. Everything about it is designed to keep you alive. British troops in India came up with it, he explains. The tonic water has quinine, which cures malaria. Add gin for its cleansing quality and a lime to fight scurvy and you have yourself a good glass of medicine.

No, insists Betty. You’re pulling our leg.

Nancy says, It’s true, Betty. I heard that somewhere before.

Ethel and Nancy head to the kitchen to get glasses and ice while Clyde goes to work. Not everyone wants gin and tonics, but the ladies also have scotch and rum. There’s no wine or beer, just hard liquor.

The party chugs forward, with the ladies pumping on the organ and some of the guys playing along on their horns, with stories of wars and coming west to pick citrus, more nuts being poured, more cheese being cubed and tossed like dice.

In the kitchen, a roast sits smoldering like a meteorite in the old car-size oven. Nancy is sitting in the breakfast nook, telling a story about how she was the only sister brave enough to go barnstorming with a crazy carnival pilot, spinning low over the long-gone orchards and vineyards and looping over the fairgrounds, so close to clipping the Ferris wheel she could hear the riders scream. She’s staring into space as she tells about it, like she’s watching it happen on an invisible screen.

After the dishes are done, they start dancing to records. Ethel’s on the turntable, spinning Rosemary Clooney and Louis Armstrong. Horace thumbs through a dead husband’s stacks and finds Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. He insists on “Sittin’ on Top of the World” and it calls for pushing back the coffee table and pairing up. I watch, still hitting the crackers and nuts, even though Nancy had served up roast beef and potatoes, hot buttered rolls and Jell-O salad, cottage cheese on a leaf of lettuce. Wally sits next to me, watching Clyde dancing with Betty.