“Nah. You know…too much effort, I guess. Plus, I have a good job and all.”
“Right.” Chantal works in the town hall as a secretary, one of four employees there. She knows everyone’s business and is free with her gossip.
“Hey, I went to church this morning,” Chantal says with a sly smile. Like a lot of local women under the age of one hundred and four, she’s going to church again. “And guess what?” Chantal continued. “I joined the bereavement group.”
I close my eyes and sigh. “Chantal…”
“For widows and widowers, you know. There was an announcement in the bulletin.” Chantal adjusts her shirt so that more of her impressive cl**vage shows. Conversation at the bar stops briefly as the men admire the show. Another inch and they’d be able to nurse.
“And how long have you been a widow?” I ask.
“Oh, gosh…twenty years, I guess. I was eighteen when we got married, nineteen when he died.”
Chantal mentioned once, when we first starting hanging out, that she was widowed ages ago. It’s strange to think that Chantal was married; she’s only six years older than I am but has been a widow more than half her life. “What was his name, your husband?” I ask.
“Chris. Cute guy.”
“That must have been really hard,” I say.
“It sucked,” she answers. “At least we didn’t have kids.”
“Did you want to?”
“Oh, shit, no. No, Maggie, I’m not the motherly type.” She laughs and takes a swig of her drink, emptying the glass.
“So you’re suddenly seeking the solace of a grief group?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, I guess I’d rather sit there and have Father Tim comfort me than sit at home, scratching my ass,” she says cheerfully. “He gives great hugs. He must lift weights or something.”
I am simultaneously jealous and irritated with my own hypocrisy. Chantal has joined a church group in order to be near Father Tim. Sounds familiar. I picture Father Tim patting my hand, looking sorrowfully and deeply into my eyes as I detail the terrible loss. “Bereavement group. You’re so lucky,” I say without thinking, then blush. “Sorry, Chantal. That didn’t come out right.”
“Well, I’m pretty lucky,” she says, shrugging. “Hey, Paul, can we get another round?”
Dewey nearly soils himself in his haste to get close to Chantal again. “Sorry, what did you say?” he says, staring down her blouse. Chantal smiles and arches her back. I roll my eyes, feeling very flat-chested indeed, my plain little 34-Bs nothing compared to the bounty that Chantal is offering. Dewey licks his lips. My teeth clench.
“Another round, honey. Maybe on the house, what do you say? For your favorite girls?” Chantal tucks a finger into her shirt and pulls it just a fraction lower.
“Sure,” Dewey whispers.
“Chantal! Stop,” I say. I’m blushing, even if she’s not. Paul walks in a trance back to the bar. “I’ll have a Grey Goose martini, Paul,” she says, as if he carries that high-end stuff.
“Burnett’s okay?” he calls back.
“Sure, baby.” Preening, she turns her attention back to me.
“Nice floor show,” I comment.
“We’re drinking for free, aren’t we?” she says smugly. “What were we talking about? Oh, yeah, my husband.”
Jonah comes in and does a double take when he sees Chantal. She smiles back at him. In order to distract Chantal from undressing my baby brother with her eyes, I ask, “So, did you love him?”
“Who? Oh, Chris? Sure. I guess. I mean, we were teenagers. Screwed our brains out, I’ll say that.”
“God, that’s so romantic,” I say, unable to suppress a smile. “I think Hallmark has a line of cards like that. ‘I miss screwing your brains out, my darling departed husband.”
Chantal laughs her big, rolling laugh. “‘Baby, no one did me like you.’ There’s probably a market for that. Should look into it.” She excuses herself to go to the bathroom, and I go up to the bar to say hi to Jonah, despite the fact that it’s been mere hours since we last saw each other.
“Hi,” I say. “What’s up?”
“Hey, Mags. Nothing. How about you?” he says amiably.
“Hanging out.”
“Is it okay if I come over to watch TV tomorrow night?” Jonah asks. “There’s that crabbing show on Discovery. Looked cool.”
“Sure.” I own one of the few satellite dishes in town. The cable service frequently goes out way up here, and as a single woman, well, let’s face it. I watch a lot of TV.
Chantal returns. “Jonah! My, how you’ve grown,” she purrs.
My earlier amusement at her antics evaporates. Even though Jonah is a grown man (officially, anyway), I don’t want him decimated by a man-eater like Chantal. “Chantal, stop. Not my brother. Leave Jonah alone.”
“No, no, no. Chantal, stay. Don’t leave Jonah alone,” Jonah says, grinning. “Hey, Chantal, you know anyone Maggie here could date? We’re trawling for men who will go out with her.”
“Thanks so much, Joe,” I say, pinching him. “A little louder, please? I don’t think they heard you in Jonesport.”
“Hell, I don’t know,” Chantal says. “The pickings are certainly slim. Present company excluded.” She edges closer to Jonah.
I get up and wedge myself between them. “If you sleep with my brother, I will be very mad at you, Chantal,” I say firmly. “Jonah, Chantal is a diseased woman. Crabs, chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, syphilis…”
“Don’t believe her, Jonah. Underneath all this, there’s a heart of gold.” She gestures to her chest.
“Is there?” Jonah asks. “Can I see?”
“Stop, Joe!” I smack my brother on the back of his head.
Chantal smiles. “Back to your problem, Maggie. How about Malone?”
“God, you’re the second person today who’s said that!” I exclaim, jarred out of my irritation. “First Christy, now you.”
“Why not?” Chantal says. “He’s kind of cute.”
“This from the woman who said Dick Cheney had that ‘sexy bald thing’ going on.”
Chantal shrugs. “Well, I can’t help it if it’s true.”
I stare at her. “Chantal, please. Maybe, I don’t know, Andre Agassi or Montel Williams. But not Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney will never have a sexy anything going on.”
“Well, Malone’s got that Clive Owen thing going on,” she continues, taking a sip of her martini.
“Clive Owen after being beaten and left for dead, maybe.”
“More importantly, he’s single. Right, Jonah?”
My brother nods sagely at Chantal’s breasts. “Ayuh.”
“Malone is surly, scary and ugly,” I say. “So I’m gonna pass on him, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t know,” Chantal says. She looks past me. “What do you say, Malone? Want to go out with Maggie?”
Crap. Crappety crap crap. I close my eyes and let the mortification wash over me. Big Mouth strikes again. And Chantal led me right into it.
I open my eyes and glance past my brother. There he is, surly, scary and ugly. “Hi. Sorry.”
As nothing brings my brother as much joy as his sister’s humiliation, Jonah is slapping the bar in mirth. “You know Maggie, right, Malone?” he chortles gleefully.
Malone stares at me, unsmiling, and he is a little scary. But I never noticed, on the rare occasion that I’ve been this close to him, that his eyes are actually quite nice, light blue contrasting with thick black eyelashes. Short, curly black hair, heavy eyebrows, sharp cheekbones. Deep lines run between his eyebrows, out from his eyes, alongside his mouth, and let me assure you, they’re not laugh lines. It occurs to me that I’ve never really looked Malone straight in the face before. Actually, I can kind of see what Chantal means…a little. He’s definitely masculine and?
“So, what do you think, Malone?” Chantal asks. “You want to go out with Maggie?”
By now, the whole bar is listening. Though I should be used to public embarrassment, my cheeks are burning. Malone drops his gaze to my chest, looks for a minute, then looks up at my face again. He shakes his head. The bar erupts in laughter. Chantal and Jonah clutch each other, shrieking, Stevie and Dewey high-five each other at Malone’s insult, and I just sit there and nod my head.
“Right,” I say over the hysteria. “Well, I deserved that. Sorry, Malone. That was a crummy thing to say.”
He gives a slight nod, then turns to the beer that Dewey presents him.
“Okay, I’ve embarrassed myself enough tonight,” I say to my brother and Chantal. “I’m going home. Good night.”
“Bye, Maggot! Thanks for the laughs,” Jonah says, sliding his arm around Chantal’s shoulders. She blows me a kiss, then turns to say something to Jonah. My jaw clenches momentarily.
I get my coat from the table and head out. At Malone’s stool, I pause. “Sorry again,” I murmur.
He nods without looking at me.
“I still owe you that pie,” I remind him. He doesn’t respond.
Although I catch a glimpse of Malone once in a while at Dewey’s or at the dock, I haven’t spoken with him since he drove me to Joe’s in the rain. He did a kind thing for me last spring, and tonight I insulted him.
As I walk home through the quiet town, an unpleasant sense of shame keeps good pace beside me.
CHAPTER FIVE
A FEW DAYS LATER, whatever shame I felt has faded to a distant prickle. Once again, the presence of Father Tim melts away all bad feelings, his beautiful smile simultaneously reassuring and thrilling.
Last night, my parents had summoned their off-spring to a family dinner, something they insist on about once a month or so, and much to my delight, Father Tim was invited, as well. As I showed Colonel to his doggie bed in my old bedroom, I could hear Father Tim laughing downstairs, the rumbling voice of my dad, Violet’s happy, ear-splitting shrieks. It seemed so natural.
We had a very nice dinner and a lemon cake that I’d baked in honor of the occasion. Father Tim had two pieces. “Maggie, you’re a genius, you are, my girl,” he said, finally pushing back from the table. I smiled sappily, heart fluttering.
Talk turned to the inevitable?my failure at finding a boyfriend. “Will, dear, can’t you find anyone for Maggie?” Mom asked.
“Apparently not,” Christy intoned, nudging her husband, who looked rightfully chagrined.
“It’s not funny, Christy,” Mom said sharply. “She’s never going to meet anyone behind that counter. Think of how you’re going to end up, Maggie! A spinster waitress like Judy.”
“I like Judy,” I answered weakly. Mom likes to go right for the kill.
“Now, Lena,” Dad said meekly. I knew it was no use. There was no stopping my mother on this subject. No daughter of hers was going to be unmarried. Not if she had a breath left in her body!
“Well, I just don’t understand why it’s so difficult,” Mom said to Father Tim. “She’s perfectly nice! Look at Christy! Did Christy have trouble finding a nice husband? No! So why can’t Maggie do the same thing? Maggie, if only you’d get a real job, some place where you could meet some eligible men. Like Christy?”
This comparison theme song, which I have mentally entitled “Christy is Better,” is one Mom’s sung many times. “Do you have to be so perfect?” I asked my sister.
“Sorry,” she sang, wiping mashed-up carrots from Violet’s eyelid. “I really can’t help it. It just happens.”
“?in my day, people wanted to get married,” my mother was saying. “Now, of course, everyone’s out there, doing all sorts of things. Why buy the milk when you can just rent the cow for free?”
Jonah shot me a quizzical look?Mom’s never been good with clichés?then mooed softly at Violet, who banged her spoon on the highchair tray in approval. Jonah mooed again, this time in my direction.
“I have a great idea,” I said. “Let’s pick on Jonah! Jonah, why haven’t you given Mom any grandchildren yet? What’s the matter with you? Don’t you have unprotected sex anymore? Don’t you care about your own mother?”
“Maggie!” Mom admonished. “There’s a priest in the room! Father Tim, I don’t know where she gets this trashy talk.”
But Father Tim was laughing, as I knew he would be. “I’ve no doubt that Jonah conducts himself like a gentleman,” he said. “Furthermore, Jonah, my man, I trust that you’ve given thought to?”
“Actually, Maggot, thanks for reminding me,” Jonah interrupted blithely. “I’ve got a date. Thanks for dinner, Ma.”
“Wait, honey, I have some leftovers for you,” Mom said, pressing a huge plate into his hands.
“Goodbye, you spoiled little prince,” I said, allowing him to kiss my cheek.
“Goodbye, you dried-up old hag,” he returned fondly. He turned to Christy. “Goodbye, beautiful, nice sister. Goodbye, filthy little baby.”
“You put me in mind of my own family,” Father Tim said. He looked a little sad, and I took the opportunity to pat his hand.
“You must miss them so much,” I commented.
“I do, Maggie. I do.” He patted back, and a shameful heat flowed up my arm to my heart.