Memory Lane
Murphy
The long pause weighed more than I knew either of us could hold. Which told me everything she didn’t want to put to words. My cell phone blared from my pocket and saved me the indignity of retracting that proclamation. The one with her non-answer still branded into mychest.
She eased off my lap as I fished the phone from denim and cotton. “Jake, what’sup?”
The music and cacophony of my bar—my home— cut through the line. I could barely hear him even at a yell in his weak attempt to be heard over thenoise.
Mara perched on the edge of the bed and ducked her chin, folding into herself, and I couldn’t help but study her as Jake’s words barely pinged off my head. Instead of trying to puzzle it out, I answered, half aware of the words, most of my attention pin-pointed on her. “I can’t hear you. I’ll be over in aminute.”
I hung up and watched her snag her shirt from the floor and jerk it back on. The movements had no anger in them, more likeresignation.
“Look, I’m sorry if…” I began, but she cut me off with a shake of her head and wave of her hand. The lack of eye contact didn’t exactly sell it. “Mara,” Isnapped.
Her shoulders jerked back, and she leveled me a glare so familiar that for the first time, I felt glad to see it. “Do you want to come over and talk while I work? I couldn’t make out what Jake was yelling at me, but I assume he got too busy to handle the placealone.”
She blinked a few times, and I caught another glimpse of this vulnerability I’d never witnessed before. Had it been present all along, and Mara hid it well, or did it grow after her injury? Something to puzzle for later. I picked up my own shirt and ducked into it, the smell of beer and peanuts already overtaking the soft soap scent from herskin.
“Do you want to grab a coat? It’s cold outthere.”
She didn’t answer, but shrugged into a worn faded black leather jacket and a pair of boots before following me out into the parkinglot.
The bar sat not even 200 yards away, but we both huddled against the biting wind cutting across the parking lot stirring up loose gravel and debris, the darkness only punctuated by a few lights of the hotel and a streetlight up the road. That and the neon beer sign on one of my darkenedwindows.
We more fell into the bar than entered, the cold cut off by warmth and noise as I secured the door behind her. She glanced around, taking in the bar now in fullswing.
I led her to a stool at the middle of the bar counter, the one she always sat at, when she made it back to town, before squeezing through the line of people to duck behind the counter. A quick hand wash and I cleared Jake’s backup in under five minutes. He didn’t need me; he needed to stop flirting with the gaggle of women out for a bachelorette party. The bride must have low standards if this place topped thelist.
I finally made it to Mara and leaned down and smiled. “The last night I saw you, before you left, was right here, on that stool. She glanced down like she might be able to read the angry exchange across its beat-up vinyl surface. “Oh, and how did that go? I got bits and pieces, but”—she leaned up on her elbow and braced her cheek on her hand— “I want to hear you tell me aboutit.”
I chuckled and whipped the dishtowel off the rack. Then I snagged a wet glass from the tray of freshly washed dishes and began drying one with a flourish. “It was a quiet night, cold, snow still on the ground from the day before. I was standing here behind the bar, minding my own business, when you started to get a littlerowdy.”
She laughed, and the smile curled all the way to her eyes. My heartbeat gave a stutter, but I continued. “You wanted another beer, and I refused to serve you since you weredrunk.”
“How many did I have?” she demanded before glancing down at the green bottle in front ofher.
I braced my arms on the bar and leaned in to whisper. “Only two. You’re a bit of a lightweight, if you hadn’t figured that one outalready.”
She laughed again. Music to my ears. Almost as sweet as her yelling profanity at myback.
“Now, you were mad I wouldn’t give you beer. And you were mad I kept cock-blocking you from flirting with my bar back at the time. Some kid who was like twenty-one.”
She scrunched her nose and shook her head. “You’re lying. I’d never hit on akid.”
“Five years ago, you were a kid. Let’s be realhere.”
She tilted her bottle neck toward me and took a long swing. “Go on. What happenednext?”
“Well, you reached your limit. You picked up an empty peanut bowl and threw it atme.”
I tossed the towel on the counter and scooted the full peanut bowl toward her with a wink. “You missed, ofcourse.”
Another laugh and smile. Where had this woman been for the last fifteen years? I’d never seen Mara smile so much in one sitting, let alone directed at me. Not wanting to ruin it, I continued with thestory.
“I hauled you off the stool by the arm and dragged yououtside.”
“Andthen?”
