As a kid, I listened to what the men and women said. I hardly said a word, but I learned. I learned that people are emotional, vulnerable, prone to tears, happy, rowdy, out of control, sometimes violent, gentle, creative with their language,intellectual and dumb as chickens, understanding, racist, hilarious, deeply sensitive, and deeply dense, slightly drunk, moderately drunk, and drunk as hell. Sometimes they’re a mix.
Most people, I learned, are good.
My mother taught me how to steal car keys out of people’s pockets when they were drunk. There’s a box under the bar for all of them. I would make an excellent pickpocket.
I paused outside Lady Whiskey’s Wild West doors before I entered and took a deep breath. I was back. Again.
The building had recently been painted a dark blue with black trim. The saloon doors were, as always, bright red, but they seemed to shine more now. My mom had replaced the windows. I knew the bar would be the same as always—a kaleidoscope of people, noises, scents, emotions, talking, yelling, laughing, and arguing.
I rolled my shoulders, tipped my chin up for courage, and stepped in.
“Well, look who’s here!” Camellia, my mother’s best friend, yelled out.
Camellia and my mom have been best friends since kindergarten, like Logan and me. Camellia is the official manager of Lady Whiskey’s. She has five kids and a bunch of grandchildren. She would have quit a decade ago if she weren’t best friends with my mom.
A whole bunch of people turned toward me and smiled, their faces lighting up.
“Hello, everyone!” I called out, waving with both hands. “Merry Christmas!”
“Merry Christmas!”
The employees—two of my favorites, Javier and Marcos—and others I’ve known forever yelled a welcome. A happy shriek or two, or ten, went up. Friends and employees ran over andgave me bear hugs, welcoming me back. Customers raised their wine and beer glasses to me, then came over to say hello and ask how I was and if I was going to flip any tables or squirt ketchup out of bottles at “poorly behaved people,” or put drunks in headlocks, “like your momma,” to calm people down if they got into fights.
“I hope you still have your temper, honey!” Rex Overland said. Rex is a rancher. “You know how to wrangle people down when they’re misbehavin’!”
“I don’t have a temper,” I said, but the protest was weak.
“Sure ya do, honey!” Donla Parkson said. Donla used to be an opera singer in Los Angeles. Now she lives in a pink house in downtown Kalulell and is in the bar twice a week for a “nip and a tuck.” Anipis her tequila, and thetuckis her hamburger. I don’t know how these words go together.
“I’m sure my temper won’t come out,” I said, still weak.
Oh, they thought I was funny!
“I hope it does!” Dr. Wilma Jefferson said. She doesn’t drink, but she likes our steak and potatoes dinner, with a banana split for dessert. “You keep everyone in line here at Lady Whiskey’s. No mean drunks, no fighting. You make everything exciting!”
“Hello, Dr. Wilma,” I said. “My temper has been exaggerated.”
“No, no! No, it hasn’t, darlin’,” Ox Miller said. “I’ve seen it!” He declared this with joy, as if it were a privilege. “It’s fiery! Fierce! Something to behold!” Ox is short for Oswald. He owns thousands of acres of land. You’d never guess he’s mega wealthy. He owns two pairs of jeans that he rotates. He’s a major contributor to our annual Christmas show to buy gifts for the kids of Kalulell, and he’s donated hundreds of acres to the city of Kalulell for biking and hiking.
“You and your momma and her sisters!” Taz Lehman said, shaking her head. “That temper is in your DNA! Especially whensomeone needs protectin’. Good to see you, kid.” She gave me a hug.
I felt so welcome. I lived such a quiet, hermitlike life in Oregon, and now…this.
My spirits lifted. I was happy to see everyone, especially people I’ve known for most of my life, school friends, a handful of cousins, two of my uncles, two of my aunts, and friends of our extended family. It feels like home.
The hugging continued, those warm feelings of “I’m home” crowding in.
I simply didn’t want to work in this “home” for the rest of my life. I had already worked in this bar for years. I did not want to work like my hair was on fire twelve hours a day, six days a week, for the next twenty-five years. I did not want to give up my writing career.
Introverts can’t happily work in bars. I am an introvert.
I wanted quiet. I wanted to be alone. I wanted to think of antics and adventures for Roxy Belle, who comes from a normal family where the parents will never ask their children to work in a bar and mix alcoholic drinks.
I felt a responsibility to my mom, though, because I love her so much. She has worked so hard for this bar—it’s her dream, it’s her baby, her life’s work, the place she created for us and for others…but if I lived here, in Montana, I would end up livinghere, in the bar. It is not my dream, not my baby, not my desired life’s work.
So many people asked about my mother’s “runaway” and “stolen” and “rebellious” and “bad” uterus, I was kept busy assuring everyone that Lady Whiskey was recovering without her irritating and prickly uterus and would be back in no time at all.
They were so relieved. Why, it wouldn’t be Christmas without Whiskey at Lady Whiskey’s!
