to do with it, it would surface in his mind if anything else came up with my name on it. Repeated coincidences draw attention, and the last thing I wanted was attention. Once, hospitalizing people —or doing a bit more than that— was nothing extraordinary to me , but those days were pretty long ago.
Then, too, the fact that Sunshine had been killed with an ice pick bothered me. It bothered me a lot.
Summer is considered, among most of the local service industry ilk, to be a lousy time to wait tables here. Louisiana’s summers are brutal, heat and humidity spiking into the nineties. At the same time the hotel rates plunge, and the yokels and overseas tourists come. And they don’t come with a lot of money, or they don’t lay out decent tips when they do.
Summer ... and waiters and bartenders prone to panic will panic, and talk desperately about the SEASON . The SEASON starts in October or December or January—depending, naturally, on who you’re talking to—and it means Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest, and if we can only hold on until the SEASON , the promised SEASON , we’ll be set , rolling in tip money, and all our troubles will be over!
I don’t subscribe to this faith. Granted, I work at what’s very nearly a locals-only restaurant. I don’t depend on influxing tourists, but that’s not the point. If every day of the year was the SEASON , those wait-folk who bitch and panic the worst would still always be on the verge of financial tragedy. They’d be doing the headless chicken dance, wondering if the $27 check they just wrote Entergy would clear before the lights got turned off. They’d piss and moan about the night’s cheap tips, even while they fed those aforementioned tips a bill at a time to the poker machines you’ll find in nearly every bar in the Quarter.
In short, I don’t have a whole lot of sympathy.
When Kirk, one of Pat O.’s green-jacketed waiters, started that familiar sullen gripe after I’d asked him about Alex, I wanted very much to snatch his tray out of his hands and bash his skull with it. But I wanted more to know where she was. Someone I didn’t know—and who didn’t know Alex’s whereabouts when I’d asked—was currently guarding the gift shop’s array of T-shirts, sweatshirts, champagne flutes with the Pat O.’s logo, and other souvenirs.
“I’m tellin’ you, these tight-ass people coming over here from France an’ It’ly an’ shit ... ” Kirk, who was young twenties and still going with his griping, I knew only slightly.
“Kirk.”
We were standing on the large, two-tiered, open-air rear patio. When Pat O.’s is busy, this area is mobbed. Right now, on this summer weekday with the sun still up, it was dead.
Kirk blinked and centered on me.
“Where is Alex,” I said, steel in my voice, “the girl that’s usually in the gift shop right around now?”
He glanced toward the bored girl sitting at Alex’s usual post at the window. I started to push past this dumbfuck kid and go find a manager. Something in me was thrumming like a live wire.
“Bone!”
I turned, and there she was, coming off the stairs from the second level. Relief slapped me like a cold wave. Her message on the answering machine ...
“Oh Bone, I’m sorry.” She took my hand, pulling me through the club’s long brick archway. “I shouldn’t have called. It’s nothing—not what I guess I made it sound like, but I was really upset, and I just wanted to talk to someone ... ”
We were out front now, on St. Peter, the Calf across the street, but hours before Padre and the regulars showed up.
“Alex, what happened?” I turned, squeezed her shoulders. Two doormen in those sad green jackets were sweating and standing by the club’s entrance. I do despise my job, but I don’t have to wear any uniform to it. Alex wears slacks and a white shirt.
She looked into my eyes. I could see she was a little frightened, still, though she forced a brave smile. “I thought you’d just phone
Then, too, the fact that Sunshine had been killed with an ice pick bothered me. It bothered me a lot.
Summer is considered, among most of the local service industry ilk, to be a lousy time to wait tables here. Louisiana’s summers are brutal, heat and humidity spiking into the nineties. At the same time the hotel rates plunge, and the yokels and overseas tourists come. And they don’t come with a lot of money, or they don’t lay out decent tips when they do.
Summer ... and waiters and bartenders prone to panic will panic, and talk desperately about the SEASON . The SEASON starts in October or December or January—depending, naturally, on who you’re talking to—and it means Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest, and if we can only hold on until the SEASON , the promised SEASON , we’ll be set , rolling in tip money, and all our troubles will be over!
I don’t subscribe to this faith. Granted, I work at what’s very nearly a locals-only restaurant. I don’t depend on influxing tourists, but that’s not the point. If every day of the year was the SEASON , those wait-folk who bitch and panic the worst would still always be on the verge of financial tragedy. They’d be doing the headless chicken dance, wondering if the $27 check they just wrote Entergy would clear before the lights got turned off. They’d piss and moan about the night’s cheap tips, even while they fed those aforementioned tips a bill at a time to the poker machines you’ll find in nearly every bar in the Quarter.
In short, I don’t have a whole lot of sympathy.
When Kirk, one of Pat O.’s green-jacketed waiters, started that familiar sullen gripe after I’d asked him about Alex, I wanted very much to snatch his tray out of his hands and bash his skull with it. But I wanted more to know where she was. Someone I didn’t know—and who didn’t know Alex’s whereabouts when I’d asked—was currently guarding the gift shop’s array of T-shirts, sweatshirts, champagne flutes with the Pat O.’s logo, and other souvenirs.
“I’m tellin’ you, these tight-ass people coming over here from France an’ It’ly an’ shit ... ” Kirk, who was young twenties and still going with his griping, I knew only slightly.
“Kirk.”
We were standing on the large, two-tiered, open-air rear patio. When Pat O.’s is busy, this area is mobbed. Right now, on this summer weekday with the sun still up, it was dead.
Kirk blinked and centered on me.
“Where is Alex,” I said, steel in my voice, “the girl that’s usually in the gift shop right around now?”
He glanced toward the bored girl sitting at Alex’s usual post at the window. I started to push past this dumbfuck kid and go find a manager. Something in me was thrumming like a live wire.
“Bone!”
I turned, and there she was, coming off the stairs from the second level. Relief slapped me like a cold wave. Her message on the answering machine ...
“Oh Bone, I’m sorry.” She took my hand, pulling me through the club’s long brick archway. “I shouldn’t have called. It’s nothing—not what I guess I made it sound like, but I was really upset, and I just wanted to talk to someone ... ”
We were out front now, on St. Peter, the Calf across the street, but hours before Padre and the regulars showed up.
“Alex, what happened?” I turned, squeezed her shoulders. Two doormen in those sad green jackets were sweating and standing by the club’s entrance. I do despise my job, but I don’t have to wear any uniform to it. Alex wears slacks and a white shirt.
She looked into my eyes. I could see she was a little frightened, still, though she forced a brave smile. “I thought you’d just phone
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