Bud Smith - F 250

“They’re off now getting tattoos,” Feral said, all wide eyed and entertained by the idea.

“Seth is too?”

“Yeah! Denise said she’d buy him a tat if he went with her. She’s real chill, ya know? She didn’t wanna go alone. ‘In case things got weird,” she said. Know where she’s getting inked?”

“Her pussy.”

“Her pussy! Exactly! Oh man, if this was a game show, you woulda just won a washing machine or something.”

“Seth getting the KISS logo?”

“Yeah,” Feral said, busting a gut, “on his pussy.”

At seven-thirty, I went to see the Irish Lady. The Tin Man silver lipstick on my hood said her name was Mary Beth. There was a line of cars parked in front of her little yellow house: 118 Mermaid Ave. A swan mailbox. Chipped and faded paint. Cars in the driveway too. I was both troubled and relieved to see the other cars. It felt wrong going to this woman’s house, like something was gonna go down that I wouldn’t be happy to take part in. (“My husband’s outta town,” I kept hearing her say).

The LeSabre wasn’t there. I double-checked the address on the hood. It was the one.

It reminded me of the house where I grew up and Seth and I played. Cramped. Crowded. Tons of junk packed onto the tiny crabgrass lawn.

I went through a chain-link fence, past an army of bird baths and garden gnomes. I knocked lightly on the door, my other hand clutching the envelope of money.

The door opened right away. Mary Beth. She’d changed her outfit. Now she was in a black shirt covered with sequins. Her hair had been straightened, and she wore earrings that dangled. A necklace with a large octagonal emerald hung down, swaying.

“Oh, you! Good,” she said. “Come in, come in, come in.”

I stepped inside her house. It smelled like one of those candles that people think smell like the beach. She touched my back, patting it like we were old friends, as she guided me further in. We walked down a small hallway with benches, crowded with umbrellas and wet shoes, that opened on a packed-tight kitchen full of music and food and many odd-faced people.

I was at a large family dinner. There were maybe fifteen of them, all sitting on various tables that were set up as hubs around a large wooden table with a flank steak on one plate and corned beef on another. Bowls of cabbage, potatoes, steamed broccoli, and carrots. Rows of 3-liter store brand soda: black cherry, cream, and orange.

There was music: the oldies station. Aretha Franklin belting out, “At last, my love has come along …” A baby cried. A woman was scolding a pre-teen girl in a red, fluffy dress. Colorful balloons hung over everyone’s heads and against a deactivated ceiling fan.

Mary Beth pointed at the table and said, “Have a seat. I saved you a spot.”

Everyone was looking at me, like: “Who the hell is this weirdo?” I told her I was okay, and kept trying to pass her the envelope full of money. She kept slapping my hand away, saying, “Sit down, sit down, sit down!” She wasn’t the only one who thought I was being rude. A woman, severely wrinkled and all crunched over, demanded, “SIT, BOY! SIT!”

I took a seat, an uncomfortable wooden chair without a cushion. The fat envelope of cash sat next to my plate. The people at the table kept glancing at it, perplexed. It was beyond awkward.

A bearded man, who was sitting beside me, extended his beefy hand.

“Rudy,” he said. “Who are you?”

“Just a friend,” I said for some reason.

“He crashed into me at a red light today,” Mary Beth said.

The table of people grumbled. “Where?” asked a lady with thick-framed glasses who looked like she could be Mary Beth’s sister.

“Oh, down over there by Dr. Dean’s. Downtown. By the boat basin.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“What’re you sorry for, you didn’t make it rain, did you?”

“How’d the accident happen?” Rudy said.

I shrugged. Turned red.

“You were speeding,” Rudy said.

“I … I—”

“It was wet out. Pouring,” Mary Beth explained.

“You must drive more careful in the rain,” the wrinkled woman offered as advice, “especially near children.”

A little boy had materialized at her knee, gripping it and looking up at me curiously.

“I’m sorry,” I said again to everyone.

Mary Beth nodded, waved me off.

“Silly, it was an accident.”

She dished out a massive amount of food onto my plate: meat, boiled potatoes, cabbage. She set the plate down and passed me the mustard and soda bread. Everyone watched me. No-one else had been served yet.

I couldn’t recall the last time I sat a table like this and had a meal with a family. It’s something I’d never done. My mother and me never ate like this. It was usually eating ramen noodle or fast food, quickly, at a small table or a motel room bed. It was no better when we moved in with Aldo, although sometimes he’d make a pot of spaghetti. We ate off TV trays in the living room, never enjoying our food. Seth invited me to eat at his aunt’s house about fifty times, but I never went.

And here I was, with a big plate of food and many eyes on me.

The family leaned in. Holding their breath. They were very concerned about me and the plate of food. I could feel them all collectively suck their breaths in and curl their toes.

What would I do?

I put the fork to my mouth and took the tiniest bite of cabbage. The tension immediately lifted. I heard an audible sigh. Everybody started getting plates of food, standing almost in unison. A glass of wine appeared before me.

“This is his birthday,” the wrinkled woman said.

“Who?” I asked, confused.

“Come out here, Jackie, so the bad driver man can sing you your special happy birthday song.”

The small child was evidently hiding under the table. I froze.

“Jackieeeee,” she sang like it was its own little song, “come on out! He wants to sing you your birthday song!”

Just then the door opened, and Trish walked in. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Her dreads were fuzzy.

She looked at Mary Beth and she said, “Sorry I’m late mom. Frickin’ Dollar Store. They act like we’re saving lives in there.”

“Well the value is great and a lot of people are struggling …” Rudy said, sipping his wine.

Trish looked over at Rudy and saw me sitting at the table. She was bewildered. I thought about her climbing up into the attic with Denise on that stormy afternoon.

Trish looked slowly around the room at the faces of her family members, perhaps expecting to see other strange, unexplainable faces. Satan. Jerry Garcia. Dr. Strangelove.

“Lee?” She was blinking and stunned.

I gave a little wave.

“What are you doing here?”

The little kid, Jackie, jumped out from under the table and yelled “HE’S HERE TO SINNNNGGG ME MY HAPPY BURFDAY SONG!”

Ethan wanted a rehearsal.We hadn’t played any of our set in quite a while, and he’d booked us a show in New York City. It was a big deal to us.

I left K Neon’s house. She wanted to come watch us rehearse, but I knew it wasn’t a good idea. Ethan freaked out about that kinda thing. He didn’t like people watching him sing unless he was on stage. I found that silly and childlish.

Ethan’s parents’ ocean-side manor was lit up with soft orange lights in every window. I drove down the long pebble driveway and couldn’t help but feel a little bad for Ethan. Unlike K Neon’s vacant manor just up the road, where freedom was abundant, this place was always occupied by parents that kept a hawk-like eye on Ethan’s movements.