Mark Dunn - We Five

“Whoo boy! There’s a Ruth Thrasher I don’t see very often.” Jane ran her hand along the fabric of the couch. She sniffed the air. “Did somebody pee on this sofa?”

“I think Lucius had a dog for a while.”

“Let’s hope he had a dog. Aren’t these colors wild ? How old is this trailer house of yours?”

“Ancient. I didn’t mean what I said about those old people. I like old people. I guess I just prefer old people like the ones who go to CGS — people who are trying to make the world a better place — not the ones who just sit at slot machines until all their organs shut down.”

“I know that, honey. I also know that going to that church has given you a big ol’ conscience. I depend on your conscience, since sometimes I can’t find where I put mine. That comes from having a brother it’s so easy to want dead. First tortured with acid and then dropped off a bridge.”

“Jane, have you ever once thought something and then not said it?”

“All the time. Like all morning I’ve been thinking of how much I’m gonna enjoy getting the night off. Lyle’s doing something with his friends tonight, and I’ll have the apartment all to myself for a change. I plan to take a sudsy bubble bath with scented candles all around and sip white wine like somebody in the movies. And there’ll be no Lyle to come banging on the door and tell me to please feed him, like he’s a helpless baby chick waiting for his worms. I thought I might ask if I could move in with you , Ruth, since we’re the only ones of the five of us who aren’t abnormally attached to a parent.”

“Because we don’t have parents,” Ruth superfluously interjected.

“Well, duh, yeah. But now that I’ve gotten myself a good look at this place, it’s really small.”

“You’re right. It is pretty small. But I’d have you for a roommate in a New York minute if it wasn’t. You know that Mags’ mother and Molly’s father might be getting married, right?”

“Yeah, I’d heard that. Mrs. Barton will be saving a ton on chiropractic services and all those holistic teas and things Doc Osborne sells. Do you have any coffee?”

“No. Do you want me to get you a cup from the house?”

“What? And give your opinionated Aunt Lucille a chance to say something new about how sucky my chances are of getting a husband? I don’t know why she has it in for me.”

“I think she means well, Jane. She just can’t overlook those things the two of you have in common.”

“Excuse me, Ruth Thrasher, but I have absolutely nothing in common with your shriveled-up old Aunt Lucille!”

“Now who’s talking smack about old people?”

“Who’s that guy walking up to the trailer?”

“By the look of his livery uniform, I’d say he’s the courtesy van driver from Lucky Aces.”

“That was fast.”

“I think he must be picking us up first. Put your shoes on.”

The man seemed more boy than man. He looked like a college kid. Very well groomed and nice-featured. Big lips, though. Mick Jagger lips. He introduced himself as Tom. Full name: Tom Katz.

In the van, Tom, now seated behind the wheel, said that his father had a sense of humor.

“Katz is a Jew name,” said Jane, seating herself right behind their young, good-looking driver. “Are you Jewish?”

“First, Jews don’t generally like it when you use the word ‘Jew’ as an adjective, although I don’t think you meant anything by it.”

“Oh I didn’t mean anything at all. I like Jews. Especially the ones who give me the giggles like on Seinfeld. ”

“Well, as it so happens, I’m not Jewish. I mean, technically. Although my father’s Jewish. Hence the name. But to be Jewish your mother has to be Jewish and my mother was a Pillsbury. Not one of the baking company Pillsburys, but the Greenville, Mississippi, Pillsburys. Though ironically, Mama did go to the Pillsbury bake-off one year before she married my father, but they wouldn’t let her compete because they were afraid people would think things were rigged if she’d won. The good thing was that she got one hundred dollars anyway just for showing up and being a good sport, and everybody liked her cobbler and didn’t even guess it had brandy in it.”

“You’re a good driver,” said Jane. “You handled yourself on that ice patch in a very fruity way. You know: ‘with a plum.’”

Ruth rolled her eyes.

“A plum?” asked Tom, addressing Jane through the rearview mirror.

“Jane only tells jokes that have to be explained,” shouted Ruth from the rear of the van. “In my opinion, they stop being jokes at that point and just become a nuisance.”

Jane emitted a low growl. “What I was trying to say, Ruth, is that I notice he hasn’t spun us into a ditch like some people we know and love.”

“Yeah,” said Tom. “They did put us through a little mini training course. But it was mostly about how to treat our passengers — you know, how to lay the Southern hospitality on real thick, since a bunch of Lucky Aces employees are coming from other parts of the country where rudeness is the order of the day. My four buddies and me — as it happens: we’re locals. We just graduated from Ole Miss last year, so we know all about Dixie manners.”

Jane looked as if she was merely feigning interest, but she was actually genuinely engaged in what Tom was saying and couldn’t help it that her face didn’t register sincerity convincingly. “You graduated from college and now you’re working for a casino?”

“Just till the end of the summer. We all thought it would be nice to get ourselves a taste of the real world before going on to law school.”

“You’re all going to be lawyers?”

“Well, four of us. Pardlow wants to be a legal historian. He wants to write about the law and go on Court TV and CNN and say shit like — sorry. Say stuff like, ‘Well, you know, Wolf, this isn’t the first time a man has been charged with killing his whole family with a fireplace poker. That would be the People of Ohio versus Billy Pokeman back in 1923.’ Anyway, I mention my buddies because we’ve been watching the five of you since we started working at the casino a couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh, you have ?” Jane raised her eyebrows for the benefit of Ruth, the way people in sitcoms do to show wry, shared interest.

Tom nodded. “And we were wonderin’ if any of you were seeing anybody. I mean, we haven’t noticed any guys hanging out at the casino who looked like they might know you.”

Jane laughed. “You mean since you don’t see any guys who might be our boyfriends, that means we don’t have any?”

“Yeah. Well, yeah. ”

“Well, we don’t have any boyfriends,” Ruth blurted. “And some of us aren’t even in the market for boyfriends.”

“Just one-night stands,” Tom Katz let fly.

Jane mimed drumsticking a snare. “Ba-bum-bum! Does your Pillsbury Dough Mama know her little Jewboy talks like this?”

Tom locked eyes with Jane through the rearview mirror. “Not to get too P.C. on you here, but Jewish men don’t generally like it when you put the word ‘boy’ after the word ‘Jew.’”

“I was just funning you.”

Ruth interjected sourly, “Why don’t you explain to Mr. Katz just how that was funny?”

“Oh why don’t you just hush up, Ruth?”

Tom tried to get the conversation back on track: “I guess what I’m tryin’ to say is that we all — my four friends and me — we’re gettin’ a little hard up for some decent female companionship. And ya’ll are the only ladies anywhere near our age in skuzzy Casino Land who don’t look like they used to be strippers or drug addicts, or’ve been out there spreading STDs around since junior high school.”