Funny to think how, in some ways, she was responsible for the life he was living now. He was a fucking goatherd! It was pretty funny.
“I don’t think you’ve ever cared enough about a woman to get drunk about her,” Gabe said idly.
“What a tribute, eh?” Mac lifted his bottle in a sardonic toast. “But Idon’tcare about her. Not. At. All. She’s just a thorn in my side.”
“Sure, sure.”
“And she has these... theseeyes.” Mac pointed to his own with two fingers. “Big brown ones. And you just want to kind of sink into them like... like a fur rug or a warm bath or I don’t know.”
“Sounds way cuter than a donkey.”
“Word,” Mac said, grimly, and took another sip. “She can be mean, though.”
“Yeah. And you’re a delicate little flower.”
This made Mac grin. His grin faded. “It’s just that some people can say things to me and they roll right off, but when she says the same damn thing...” He swept a hand back through his hair. “She sees things, you know?”
“I get it.” He couldn’t possibly, because Mac was hardly being a beacon of clarity, but the sympathy and brotherhood were a balm.
“I just don’t likeanyonegetting the better of me.”
“Yeah. That must be what’s bothering you.”
Mac shot him a black look.
“So who is it?” Gabe demanded.
“Don’t wanna say.”
“I bet I know.”
Mac fixed him with a look that dared Gabe to keep guessing at his own peril. That was going to be the end of the subject.
And as if his friend had actually issued a command, Gabe raised his hands in mock surrender and lowered them again.
They drank in comradely silence for a time, and watched Mikey McShane struggle with his guitar. Mac found himself hoping poor, frustrated young Mikey McShane made it out of this town. A lot of people lived in this region because they couldn’t afford to be anywhere else. And Mac knew you needed to leave before you really understood whether you belonged in the first place.
“I’ve been looking into grants for at-risk kids,” Gabe mused, as if he was reading his thoughts. “We just don’t have enough programs for after school. I wish there was a place for them to go to learn actual life skills. To build some self-esteem and confidence when their home lives are just shit, or outright battlegrounds.”
“Yeah, otherwise they might end up singing Goth folk songs at open mics.”
Gabe laughed.
But the wheels of Mac’s Sierra Nevada–moistened brain began to spin. “They have grants for that sort of thing, huh?” he said idly.
Gabe left it at that. But a seed had been planted. You didn’t poke at a seed after you planted it. You had to give it a chance to grow.
“This song is called ‘Rainforest,’” Mikey McShane finally said. He cleared his throat again and dragged the mic stand toward him, and the mic squealed so aggressively everyone’s head contracted into their bodies like the audience was comprised of so many turtles.
“Gosh, what do you think the song is going to be about, Gabe?” Mac asked his friend.
“I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s about the rainforest, Mac.”
“I hope so. I really hope so.”
Open mic nights at the Misty Cat were sporadically attended and unfailingly entertaining in a variety of ways for the person willing to see them multi-dimensionally.
“The woman I can’t stop thinking about hardly knows I’m alive.”
