Friday Night Flights

by Susan X Meagher

  “If you ask me, you should have tried to get something going with that girl you took to that play last month. Anyone who’d sit outside and swat mosquitos while watching Shakespeare clearly wanted a piece of you.”

  “Not my thing. After being together for a couple of hours, I realized I wasn’t into her. You know I’ve never had sex with someone just to waste an evening.”

  “It’s not a waste if you do it right,” Ben said, chuckling.

  “Like you’d know! You haven’t tried to pick up a woman since you were in college.”

  “I did all right in college,” he sniffed. “I landed Julie, didn’t I?”

  “You sure did,” she said, slapping his shoulder, which felt like a log wrapped in flesh. “And as soon as I meet a woman like Julie, I’m going to grab her hand and race to the altar. Until then…”

  “You’re going to brew beer and play on the company softball team with a bunch of straight guys. As usual.”

  ***

  Avery’s mom drove them back to the family home in Hudson, with Avery in the back seat, idly watching the dim headlamps illuminate only a portion of the road. If she’d been driving, she’d have had her brights on. Deer leapt onto the local roads with alarming frequency, and she’d witnessed many fatal encounters while growing up. Luckily, never in a car she’d been in, but you couldn’t be too careful.

  “Hey, Mom?”

  “Hmm?”

  “You never told me how you got in touch with Casey the first time.”

  “Oh, I heard she was working at the brewery, and I thought my troop would like to see a factory in action. Which they did,” she said, looking into the rearview mirror to smile. Her mom had only been retired from the DMV for six months now, and had jumped into scouting, which had surprised and delighted Avery. There hadn’t even been a troop when she’d been in school, but her mom had been a Girl Scout when she was a kid, and now that she had time she’d made it happen.

  “But how’d you find her number?”

  “Because of Mark.” She took a look into the rearview mirror. “Her uncle? Come on Avery, you know Mark from Villa Napoli.”

  “That’s Casey’s uncle?”

  “Uh-huh. Her mother’s brother. Her mother and I were in school together, you know. I think she was a year ahead of me.”

  “Small town,” Avery said. “If you grew up here, you don’t have to dig far to find a connection.”

  “Not very far at all. So I asked Mark, and he told me she was working at Kaaterskill. I called over there and they hooked me right up. Honestly, Casey couldn’t have been nicer. I think we were at the brewery for two hours. Right in the middle of the workday, too.”

  “She seems nice,” Avery admitted. “And she’s clearly attractive. But…she sure didn’t seem interested in me.”

  “Maybe she was having a bad day. Or she was tired. She does so much over at that brewery. Besides making the stuff, she runs a program for parents of young kids.”

  “What?” Avery started to laugh. “She runs a day camp at a brewery?”

  “For babies,” she stressed. “She had to go set up for them on the day my troop was there.”

  “Stop!” Avery demanded. “What in the hell are you talking about? She gives babies beer?”

  “No, no, she heard people complaining there wasn’t much going on for infants around here. So she started a program where parents with very small kids can bring them over to the bar we were in tonight, and let the kids play while the parents have a drink or two. It’s good for the community, and good for the brewery.”

  “How many DUIs have the police given out? That sounds nuts!”

  “No, no, Casey’s very careful. She only serves the lowest alcohol beer she makes, and she’s the bartender. Knowing her, she keeps a very close watch on the adults.”

  “Who’s watching the babies while the parents are passed out on the floor?” Avery asked, laughing at the image of Casey running around after a bunch of toddlers, having to climb over the bodies of their shit-faced parents.

  “If anyone needs watching, Casey would be more than competent to step in, which I find utterly charming.”

  “You’re charmed by her getting parents of babies soused?”

  “They’re not soused. Trust me on that. Casey started the program not to sell more beer, but because she loves kids. She told me that herself. She decided not to have a baby, but I can tell she regrets the decision.”

  “Damn,” Avery sighed. “A single, super-attractive lesbian who wants just what I want, and she didn’t give me a second look. Is that a kick in the ego, or what?”

  ***

  On Sunday afternoon, Casey went out to the backyard to lie in the hammock, the most recent addition to the unending Van Dyke home improvement scheme. Her dad was a gardening maniac, fully intending to turn the acres of lawn and garden surrounding the house into something worthy of universal envy. At least it seemed like that was his goal, since he never sat down to actually enjoy it. When he was home, he was working.

  Currently, he was installing a French drain on the side of the house where he’d convinced himself the rain wasn’t draining properly. The landscaper he usually worked with insisted the drainage was fine, but that didn’t stop him from starting the project on his own. Casey could have offered to help, but she’d stopped that years ago. Besides not wanting to be bitched at for not doing everything exactly the way he wanted, her dad genuinely seemed to prefer solitude. Leaving him alone would let him complain about how lazy she was, which apparently gave him great satisfaction. Whatever worked…

  As she settled into the hammock, which rested upon a new bluestone patio off to the side of the pool, she looked up at the Japanese maple trees that ringed the stones. They’d look fantastic in the fall. Having a bright spot of red in the yard was the perfect touch.

  She had a big glass of lemonade, and she could smell something good wafting from the open back door. Her mom was definitely baking, probably cookies, but biscotti was a strong possibility.

  Casey put her feet up and relaxed, sure she could fall asleep if she let herself. Then her dad started making some god-awful noise with what sounded like a grinder. Sighing, she picked up her phone and started to look for a podcast. She liked anything about beer, or brewing, but there weren’t all that many good-quality podcasts that focused on her favorite things. While it was sometimes fun to listen to people talk about figuring out how to home-brew, it was frustrating to hear how much bad advice there was out there.

  Recalling her interaction with Avery from Friday night, she found the note she’d left and guided her browser to the page for the magazine with the unpronounceable name. Finding Short Shorts wasn’t tough, and she pulled up the details on the most recent episode. Then the one after that. And the one after that. She’d never heard of any of the writers, which didn’t surprise her. But the stories sounded so grim! She wanted something like a bedtime story, with a calm, soothing voice to help her chill. Not stories about betrayal, divorce, alcoholism, ethnic cleansing, and child soldiers. She switched over to one of her music streaming services and chose the modern country channel. They were also singing about betrayal, and divorce, and there was so much talk about beer and bars that some of the people had to be alcoholics, but at least there was some nice music to go along with it.

  ***

  Two weeks after Casey had run into the Nichols’, she spotted Kathy and Ken walking down Warren Street, the main business street in Hudson. They were at the far end of the long street, closer to the river than many of the trendy restaurants, leading her to assume they were heading to her uncle’s restaurant. She picked up her pace to catch up with them, and called out, “Hey, Nichols family!” when she was about a block away.

  They stopped and turned, then Kathy gave her a big, exaggerated wave. “Hi there,” she said. “Going our way?”

  “I’ve just come from there. It’s starting to get crowded.”

  “Ugh,” Kathy said, rolling her eyes. “Summer people have mad
e it almost impossible to go out to dinner without a wait.”

  “My uncle’s not complaining,” Casey said. “Business has gotten better every year.”

  “Ken, go put our names in,” Kathy said. “I’ll stay here for a minute and talk to Casey.”

  “All right. Good to see you again,” Ken said. As he backed away, he added, “Don’t get carried away, Kathy. You know how you get.”

  “How I get,” she grumbled, showing a good-natured smile. “So? What are you up to? Big date?”

  “Nope. I’m going to a meeting of the Hudson Valley Brewers Collective. We’re going to… Wait for it… Sample some beers at The Tipsy Leprechaun.” She thought about that for a second, adding, “Isn’t that an awful name?”

  “Oh, it’s not so bad. I give them credit for making a go of it, given the city people wouldn’t be caught dead in there.”

  “I guess you’re right. I assume they weren’t intentionally implying that Irish people drink more than most. Much of Eastern Europe has them beat by a mile.” She laughed a little. “I guess The Tipsy Belarusian doesn’t have the same ring.”

  “What’s new at the brewery?”

  “Not much. I had my Baby Brewers today, so that always perks me up.”

  Kathy gazed at her for a moment, clearly on the verge of asking a question. But she seemed visibly unsure of herself. After a second or two she said, “Do you do that to bring in business?”

  “Kind of. It doesn’t throw off much money, but I’m sure it draws new customers as effectively as having tastings in a bar. But if I’m going to be honest, I set it up mostly so I could play with babies. They’re my favorite people.”

  “No possibility of having your own?”

  Kathy didn’t seem to be prying, but that was still a pretty personal question. Since she seemed genuinely interested, Casey went with it. “I don’t have any interest in giving birth, but I’d love to be a parent. I just haven’t found a woman who wants to parent with me.” That sounded kind of pathetic, so she added, “It’s hard to get the timing right. I was too young when I had a girlfriend who wanted to be a mom, and my last girlfriend would have had to…” She let that thought go, not wanting to get into the fact that her last lover was going through menopause when they were together. “Timing,” she said, repeating herself. “It’s hard to get it right.”

  “Mmm.” She gave Casey a long look, then said, “Avery’s having the same issue, I suppose, but from a different perspective. She wants to have a baby, but she’s worried about doing it on her own.” Her mild frown changed into a smile when she added, “That’s why I’m trying to find her a wife. I want some grandkids.”

  “Mmm.” Casey was stuck for a minute, not sure how to respond. “You don’t have any other kids?”

  “No,” Kathy said, with her smile fading quickly. “Just Avery.”

  “Brooklyn’s a big place, why doesn’t she try some dating apps? She could probably find someone on the next block.”

  “That’s probably true.” Kathy put her hand on Casey’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “Good luck on your quest. I’m absolutely certain you’re in demand.”

  “Um, thanks,” she said, feeling like kicking herself as she watched Kathy walk down the street. There was no way to tell a perfectly nice woman that you didn’t want to even take a shot at her perfectly nice daughter because she’d been a shit, or at least shit-adjacent in high school. But it was the damn truth.

  Chapter Two

  Two Years Later

  It was a bright, sunny Saturday in July. The kind of day Avery would have lusted for even a year ago. But today, with a bad cold, a throbbing headache, and chronic exhaustion that was an elemental part of her life, she longed for a storm. Staying inside, preferably asleep, was a need so strong she could nearly taste it. But even a brief nap probably wasn’t in the cards. The baby was wide awake and full of energy, and it was Avery’s job to be not only available, but friggin’ cheerful.

  A woman walked out of what was probably her own jewelry store and leaned against a painted wooden column. “Nice day, isn’t it?”

  The woman had that “Yes, I look fabulous, but I swear I don’t put much effort into it,” look that made Avery want to punch her in the nose. But she acted like an adult and nodded. “It certainly is.”

  “I might just close up,” the woman said, stepping further onto the sidewalk to look up at the sky. “This is my first summer here. I thought business would be better on the weekends.”

  “It was twenty years ago,” Avery said, realizing the woman had instantly pegged her as a native. “But the weekenders who’ve pushed out a lot of the old businesses spend their days drinking and eating. They don’t seem to be shoppers.”

  “Mmm. I suppose I should stick it out, but it’s tempting to go sit in the sun.”

  “Make sure you wear a hat if you do,” she said, now so thoroughly indoctrinated into regarding the sun as a clear and imminent danger that she treated it like a threat to all.

  She started to walk again, finding it odd that the shopkeeper hadn’t commented on Lisbet. Most people couldn’t get enough of her. But the lack of interest saved Avery from having to keep talking, which would eventually have required her to wipe her nose on her arm. Her tissues had run out blocks earlier.

  As she strolled along, wishing she had the energy to walk faster, she reflected on her town. Hudson had really changed. Up until she’d graduated from high school, the town had been a faded, down-at-the-heels community in the upper Hudson Valley. At a hundred miles from Manhattan, it had always been too far away from the city to have a large commuter population. But it had been a big player in whaling during the Revolutionary War, standing in for New England, whose whaling ports had been effectively blockaded by the British. But whale oil did not last as a hot commodity—luckily for the whales.

  At the turn of the twenty-first century, Hudson had little going for it besides good access to the river, a lot of Victorian-era homes needing serious renovation, and a train station that allowed for expensive but reliable service to Manhattan.

  Avery wasn’t sure who the first rural pioneers had been, but in short order Hudson had become a hot spot for New York City weekenders. The best of the row houses were snapped up, and the renovations began.

  Now, as she walked along, she counted three high-quality espresso shops, one French bakery, one gluten-free bakery, and three yoga studios. When you added in the top-notch restaurants as good as anything Brooklyn had to offer, and the twee home design shops, she had to admit Hudson had become a very nice place to spend an afternoon window-shopping. But looking at windows wasn’t going to pay the new shopkeepers’ rent. Time would tell if anything other than restaurants and bars would be able to survive.

  As she started to cross the street, a voice called out, “Avery?”

  Turning, she saw Casey Van Dyke standing on the sidewalk, carrying large metallic trays, stacked three high.

  “Hi, there,” she said, embarrassed to be caught carrying the baby, even though that made no sense at all. “What’s new?”

  “Is that…” She struggled a little under the weight of her burden, managing to get a little closer. “Is that your baby?”

  “Sure is.” She knew she was blushing, but that was beyond stupid. It’s not like she was a fifteen-year-old who’d gotten knocked-up because of poor impulse control.

  “Are you just walking around?”

  “Uh-huh. The baby loves to see the world, and the world usually loves to see her too.” She turned her head and sneezed loudly. “Sorry. She was sneezing and coughing and feverish on Thursday, but perfectly fine twenty-four hours later.” She patted her little sun hat. “She gave me every one of her germs, and I don’t have her powers of recuperation.”

  “Let me run these inside,” Casey said. “Don’t go away!” She’d turned to keep an eye on Avery, but had only succeeded in catching the curb with her foot. Somehow, she instinctively spread her feet wide, landing on both, trays still intact. “Lucky
!” Then she scampered into the side door of her uncle’s restaurant.

  Avery waited, speaking quietly to the sweet, fully-engaged face that gazed at her. “I’m sorry I acted like I was ashamed of you, Sweet Pea. I don’t know why I get so weird when I see people I haven’t run into for a while.”

  Movement at her side revealed Casey standing close, murmuring, “Oh, my God. I’ve never seen a prettier baby.” She was staring so hard it looked like she was having a vision. “Is she like a couple of months old?”

  “Six months tomorrow. I guess we’ll celebrate her half-birthday if I can get out of bed.”

  Casey tore her attention from Lisbet to give Avery a long, concerned look. “You really do look awful,” she said, then her eyes got big. “I mean… You don’t look awful in a… You just look sick,” she said, fumbling to finish her thought. “Your eyes are…”

  “Droopy. Watery.”

  “Yeah. That’s about right.”

  “And my nose is red and irritated.”

  “Um, pretty much.”

  “I didn’t comb my hair before we left the house. That has to help.”

  “Hey,” Casey said, with her voice lowering to a gentle, soothing tone. “I was just empathizing with you. Summer colds suck.”

  “Thanks,” she said, now embarrassed to have made such a big deal about feeling under-the-weather. “I’m grumpy because we came up for a visit without checking to make sure my parents were going to be around. My dad’s playing golf, and my mom’s taking her scout troop to a swim party.” She lowered her chin and rested her cheek against Lisbet’s, something the baby loved. “I dreamed of two days full of naps and homemade chicken soup. Instead, I’m on full-time baby duty—as I am every minute I’m not at work.”

  “Is there any way I can…” Casey’s attention locked onto the baby’s snuggly carrier, complex enough to need a structural engineer to figure it out. Their eyes met, and Casey shrugged, clearly embarrassed. “I’d love to hold her.” She blinked. “She’s a girl, right?”