She was tired. Had it been her shop, she would have gone home, closed the curtains, turned the air-conditioning unit on high, and slept straight through the afternoon.
Winnie was slightly irritated when the man came in again the following afternoon. It was two o'clock, her normal break time, and she was anxious to leave the store.
“I'm back,” he announced, all smiles.
“I can see that,” she said. She flipped the OPEN sign around and stood jingling the keys. This was as rude as she could be.
He leaned into her. She took a step backward when suddenly he touched her face with his open palm. She slapped his hand away.
“Don't be afraid,” he said.
Working in the shop bored her. Fear was not something she considered in her daily routine, though one time a guy with a gun had asked her to empty the cash register. She showed the would-be thief the credit card slips she collected in a pearl-laden jewelry box and tried to explain that they were not a cash kind of retail store. She invited him to take his choice of black leather jackets.
“I'm here to help you, not hurt you,” he said. “I don't want help,” Winnie said.
“Are you afraid of something, little lady?” the man asked. “Is that why you won't talk to me?”
Winnie, especially opposed to people who called her lady, dear, or darling, did not know why she was talking to this man.
“Come on,” he said. “Let me hear your fears.”
“You want to know what I'm afraid of?” Winnie eyed the man suspiciously.
“Yes,” he said. “Tell me your nightmares. What keeps you up at night?”
She thought for a minute.
“Rats,” she told him. “I'm deathly afraid of rats.” She had lived in New York for a short period of time when she was in her midtwenties, and she never forgot the sound of the rats scurrying in the wall beside her bed. She would have died if she had found one in her kitchen. She had seen the movie
Ben
, about a boy who befriended a rat, and while she liked the title song, the movie had given her nightmares.
“You're a funny lady,” the man laughed.
I'm not, she wanted to tell him. I'm not funny at all. I'm a middle-aged, maybe even old woman who makes ten dollars an hour for doing nothing. I wash my hair three times a week and when I get drunk on red wine I stand in the dining room watching the shadow of my reflection in my plate glass window and pretend I'm Fantine from
Les Miserables
. Some nights I sob when I finish my solo number. One time I fell into the breakfront and broke the creamer from my wedding china. I'm twenty pounds overweight and the last man I had sex with was a police officer who gave me a parking ticket three days after we slept together. My son, who is too ashamed or too afraid to admit that he is gay, though I've known since he was twelve years old and won first place in the neighborhood Easy-Bake-Oven-Cook-Off, brings pretend girlfriends when he visits. They stay for one cocktail, then leave, as if he thinks I'm bedridden and boring. I take myself out to dinner when I need cheering up. You can't imagine how often a waitress can apologize for forgetting to put in your dinner order.
“Cynical maybe,” she admitted to the stranger. “People have even called me bitter, and though I'd like to, I can't argue with that.”
“You're not so bad-looking,” he said. He whistled when she stood on her toes to check the clock over the Unitarian church two blocks west of Walnut Street.
“It's two o'clock,” Winnie said. She was in the mood for a tuna melt on rye at Pamela's Country Kitchen. The waiter was a surly young man who hated working at the restaurant. He poured second and third cups of coffee without asking if she wanted refills. He never made small talk. He never asked her if everything was all right.
“I need a favor.” The would-be thief unbuttoned his coat and fiddled with his tie. He did not exactly exude confidence, and Winnie could not imagine he was very successful in his ventures. His accent was Pittsburgh, but he was doing his best to hide this. He wore penny loafers with no socks, but the shoes were half a size too big, and the backs kept slipping off his foot. The leather made loud sucking noises every time he took a step.
“I don't think I can help you,” Winnie said. He kept looking at her. His gaze was not flirtatious, but calculating. He was sizing her up for something. She wanted him to know that she was most definitely the wrong size.
“What have you got to lose if you listen to me?” he asked.
“Lunch,” she said.
He shrugged as if her hunger was no big deal. “I want you to listen to me,” the man said. “That's it. Just listen to me.”
“Listen to you?” Winnie asked.
“Yes, listen to me.”
“If you're here to rob me, go ahead,” Winnie said. “The store's insured big time. The stuff isn't mine. I won't put up a fight. You can tie me up, lock me in the dressing room, or let me roam the streets while you clear the place. There's no reason for shenanigans or tall tales if what you're really here for is to take the merchandise.”
But it was his story he wanted her to hear.
“If you do nothing else for me,” he begged, “at least listen to my story.”
She was irritated and hungry, but nodded for him to go aheadâshe would listen. He looked around for a seat, but there was only one and she was sitting in it. He would have to stand to tell his tale.
“I'm a cowboy,” he told her. “A real old-fashioned round-'em-up outlaw.” His accent became more southern.
“I'm a drifter, a rambler, a loner, a solitary man. I march to the beat of a different drum. You know I'm not someone who can be expected to play by society's rules. I'm just not like that.”
“So?” Winnie interrupted. “What's the problem? Go be a cowboy.”
“Even cowboys get the blues,” he said.
Winnie put her hand on her hip and waited for him to continue. It took her a minute to understand that he had finished telling her what he wanted her to hear.
“My mother,” he said when he saw her look of incomprehension.
Winnie was surprised. She had not been expecting a mother in his story.
His mother, it turned out, lived three blocks off Walnut Street. According to her son, she was sitting at home darning the socks of her long-dead husband. She was a rich woman who had promised her son his inheritance once he got married.
“So where's your wife?” Winnie asked.
“It's not easy to be married to a cowboy,” the man said, and Winnie immediately understood the problem.
“Especially one who doesn't have any money,” Winnie agreed.
“I'm bringing back my wife from Las Vegas to meet her. It turns out it's you.”
“Me?” Winnie asked. Once again she was lost.
“If you want the job,” the man said and held out his hand for her to shake. “There'll be something in it for you.”
Winnie hesitated.
“I'm desperate. I wouldn't have come back to Pittsburgh if I wasn't desperate.”
Winnie, well versed in desperation, agreed to help him. She would do it for half an hour only. She did not want to be paid.
He was not wearing a wedding ring, and Winnie asked if maybe they shouldn't stop at the toy store and buy fake diamonds or gold bands.
“The woman I marry,” the man told her, “won't need rings or jewelry to know that I love her.”
“She might not need it, but she might like it,” Winnie said.
The woman lived in a brick house surrounded by red and pink geraniums. Her living room was filled with cuttings from her flower beds. The pink of the geraniums matched the pink trim of the throw pillows. Winnie accepted a cup of tea.
Winnie, who was supposed to be from Vegas, had changed into a pair of leather pants. Size twelveâthey were tight across her behind. The smell of new leather was fierce and she did what she could to ignore it. She had accessorized with a bolo tie with a sterling-silver lizard at the neck that kept bobbing up and hitting her under the chin.
The woman smiled at Winnie, then poured herself a glass of single malt scotch whiskey. She swirled the amber liquid around the three ice cubes, then lifted her glass into the air. “Bottoms up,” she said determinedly. Winnie recognized this woman. She was obviously someone who was used to toasting and drinking to herself.
Winnie had half a mind to join her. She finished the tepid tea in two swallows and held out her cup for the mother to fill.
The son kneaded Winnie in the ribs and whispered for her to act like a wife from Las Vegas. Winnie forced her thoughts toward cactus and slot machines. She tried to look as empty as the desert air.
But hell, Las Vegas. They drank like fish in Las Vegas.
And she was from Vegas. She should drink.
“Might as well do me too with that magic,” Winnie said.
Winnie praised the woody taste of the scotch.
“To good health,” the mother said.
“And long lives,” Winnie agreed.
Winnie asked to see photographs of the man when he was a young boy. The mother smiled as if praising Winnie's effort. She made no move to bring out her photo albums.
Winnie would have liked the opportunity to tell the mother about her own son. He lived three miles away, yet never called. She knew almost nothing about what he did in his life. His weekly visits were painful, the bother evident in his strained conversations. He often turned on the television and pretended to be interested in the local news, though she knew he hated everything about living in Pittsburgh.
Winnie had been at the Arts and Crafts Show in Mellon Park last spring when she saw her son browsing the ceramic bowls in the tent booths. When he turned and saw Winnie, he and his young friend took off running. Winnie, thinking there was something wrong, followed him down the stone steps. Then she realized why he was running away from her.
Winnie covered her mouth, but not before a small burp escaped.
The mother had a list of things she wanted done around the house. The son agreed to fix the VCR so the green light would not flash
12:00
all day long, but after much fidgeting he admitted defeat. He was too tired to look at the garbage disposal. He had no idea why the back door scraped the cement step when she tried to close it.
He flipped through the Yellow Pages and tore out a section. “Call this number,” he told his mother. “A handyman will come and do whatever you need done. I know you can afford someone to help you around the place.”
The mother sighed. The skin around her mouth tightened. Winnie recognized the way the woman held her tongue. She did not have the freedom to criticize. This was not right.
The mother did not want a stranger fixing her things. She wanted her son to be there. The house and its repairs were just an excuse.
Another round of cocktails, another plate of sausage and cheese hors d'oeuvres, and the conversation lagged.
The mother and Winnie discussed the shrinking parking situation in the neighborhood.
“At least I've got a garage,” the mother said.
“Isn't that the truth?” Winnie agreed.
There was no need to pretend anymore. Winnie understood this. The mother had read the situation correctly. She had recognized Winnie for who she wasâan impostor. And though disappointed in the way the afternoon had turned out, she could not be angry. Like the tables of contents in the novels Winnie read, the mother knew what was going to happen long before it happened. The living chapter titles told the whole story. The mother stared into her glass. Loneliness like that could make you crazy. There was nothing you could buy or sell to stop it from taking over your life. When her son left she would be alone. Whether or not she gave him the money, she would be alone. It was that simple.
The man stood up and kissed his mother on the cheek, promising to see her in the morning. Winnie shook the mother's hand. “It's been a pleasure meeting you.” Had she had a card with her name and number, she would have left it on the coffee table. Had she been alone, she would have stayed for another glass of scotch. She would have done what she could to write a surprise twist into Chapter XVâIn Which Mrs. Martin and a Lonely Widow Drink a Whole Bottle of Scotch, or maybe a new chapter, In Which a Very Funny Fifty-Year-Old Explains How to Have Fun with a Bit of Overdyed Leather Even When You Have a Large Rear End.
Once on the street, the man walked as if in pain. Winnie asked if he was going to be sick. “It's my bladder,” he complained.
“Doesn't your mother have indoor plumbing?”
“I couldn't leave you two alone.”
Winnie agreed that that would have been dangerous. There was no telling the kind of trouble two lonely women could get into, especially when they had jackass liars for sons.
“You were supposed to be my wife,” he said. “A woman my mother could respect. Instead you drank scotch, snorted at her jokes, and ate the whole plate of hors d'oeuvres.”
“I skipped lunch because of you,” Winnie said.
“No one is that hungry,” he said.
“You should have brought the woman you vowed to love eternally,” Winnie said.
“I don't have a woman,” he said.
“Then don't take your mother's money,” Winnie said.
“You don't understand,” he said.
“Listen,” she commanded so loudly he had no choice but to do what she said. “The open road is calling. And it's not for me. You better hop to it.”
The man did not look like he was wanting to ramble anywhere that night.
“You want my advice?” she asked.
“Not at all.”
“Go back home. Talk to your mother. Tell her the truth. Explain your situation. Don't leave anything out.”
The son looked at her once then walked away, scurrying as if he was afraid she would follow. Winnie stood her ground, not quite finished with the advice she had to give.
“This summer the two of you should go to Three Rivers Stadium. Stand in line and buy season tickets to the Pirates. There's been a baseball strike. People are suspicious of the stability of the ball clubsâyou'll be able to get bleacher seats. When the vendor comes around and says what'll it be, she might want a few jumbo beers. I say let her have 'em.”