Nowhere but Home

by Liza Palmer

  “I’m not going to sneak out of here like a dirty little secret. I’m your sister,” I say, hating that I’m begging not to be hidden from the light of day. Again.

  “I just don’t want a whole thing, you can understand that,” Merry Carole says.

  “I’ve done nothing. We’ve done nothing. She has a problem with us, remember?” I ask, my blood boiling.

  Merry Carole just sighs.

  “It’s actually adorable that you think you can hide enough of yourself so these people will accept you, bless your heart.”

  “Well, they’ll have to accept me after tomorrow.”

  “Why?”

  “The parents of the starting team are automatically appointed to the board of the Stallion Battalion, so once Cal gets named QB1, they’ll have to put up with me.” Merry Carole flips a small mirror on the front desk around and checks her hair in it. A quick pouf, a lip-gloss touch-up, and she turns the mirror back around.

  I don’t say anything. My blood goes from boiling to running cold. I feel nothing but compassion for my beautiful sister. She must know those women will never accept her. She must know that they will find some loophole and not let her be part of the Stallion Battalion. How can she not know this by now? I guess for the same reasons I don’t. We’re constantly waiting for this town to be . . . fair. We’re waiting for our home to accept us, as we accept it. I guess we’re waiting for our “terms” to be considered.

  But it’s never going to happen.

  “Five minutes,” Fawn says, her eyes darting toward the door.

  “I just want to talk to Dee and then I’ll sneak out the back. I promise,” I say.

  “You guys can talk back in the kitchenette. And close the door,” Merry Carole says, motioning to Dee to make it quick.

  Dee and I walk to the kitchenette and I elaborately close the door behind us.

  “Can you get away tonight? Maybe we can drink and talk?” I ask.

  “Sure, sure . . . Shawn gets home around seven, I can meet you at the Hall of Fame at what . . . eightish?” Dee says.

  “That’s perfect. I’ll meet you there,” I say.

  “Just real fast, how’d it go?” Dee asks, pulling a Coca-Cola from the minifridge and cracking it open.

  “He offered me the job,” I say.

  “What . . . did you . . . are you taking it?” Dee plays with the top of her Coke can, dusting it and spinning the flip top around and around.

  “I don’t know. I honestly don’t.”

  “Okay . . . we’ll talk. Tonight. Now go on before we both get into trouble,” Dee says, shooing me out the back.

  That night, I walk down the same side streets Merry Carole and I played on endlessly as kids. The closer I get to the Drinkers Hall of Fame, the closer I get to the plot of land where Momma’s restaurant once stood. It’s dark enough that I won’t have to really see it, but I know the terrain like the back of my hand.

  I step up onto the curb and walk through the dirt and overgrown weeds that have overtaken where the shack once was. I just stand there looking at the emptiness. Haunted. The cicadas sing. The music wafts out from the bar. The leaves rustle at a rare summer breeze. And I just stare. Gone. It’s gone. The eight-by-eight shack where I spent my childhood is gone and now just blackness remains. In a lot of ways. I let my head fall to my chest as I try to steady my breathing. I know Merry Carole hasn’t sold this land out of some warped sense of loyalty to Mom. I wish she would. That way the failures of our family wouldn’t live on as a black hole in the North Star landscape. A couple of people burst out of the bar just next door and it snaps me out of my unwelcome literal walk down memory lane. I turn and drag myself away from the gravitational pull of my disastrous family tree.

  The Drinkers Hall of Fame. An induction ceremony no one wants to be a part of. The Hall of Fame, as we call it, has stood on that dusty plot of land for as long as North Star has been a stop on the railway. It’s been called the Hall of Fame since around the 1950s. Before that it was called every hackneyed Texan name in the book: the Two-bit Whore, the Hitching Post, Old West Tavern, Lone Star Saloon, the Cowboy, and the ever memorable Three Wise Men Bar and Grill (which never really caught on).

  From the outside, the Hall of Fame looks like every other bar in a small town. Not really welcoming, but not scary either. But for us in North Star, it’s our watering hole. The place where the lights are low enough and the music is loud enough so people think they’ll have privacy—until the rumors about what they did are being whispered all over town the next day. I push open the creaky wooden door and try to prepare myself for what’s just inside.

  Steve Earle’s “Feel Alright” hits me like a ton of bricks. The darkness blinds me momentarily as I blink to steady myself. A crack of the cue ball hitting a newly set up triangle of balls, a hoot and a cowboy boot shuffle, and the sound of beer bottles hitting the inside of a trash can wafts over me. I open my eyes and the room comes into focus.

  The Drinkers Hall of Fame. Just like I remember it. The smoke-tinged dark wood floors set off the dark wood paneling nicely. The dark wood paneling goes well with the dark wood raftered ceiling. The beautiful dark wood raftered ceiling is complimented by the dark wood tables and chairs. And the dark wood bar brings the whole room together. The giant Lone Star flag on one wall is set off against several neon beer signs on the other. The pool table in the back of the room with the jukebox just behind it is where people go to loiter, lean, and observe. They’ve all “got next.” Cowboy hats are pulled low and beer bottles are held close. Women drape themselves over their men, arms hung over broad shoulders clad in plaid shirts. The tiniest of dance floors invites you to sway close and don’t you never let go.

  “Queenie!” I can barely make out Dee in one of the dimly lit corners that’s usually saved for lovers. Her pastel flowery separates are a beacon that leads me to the safety of her saved table.

  “Hey there,” I say, sitting down across from her and fighting the urge to hug her. We’ll hug with our good-byes, I tell myself.

  “I ordered you a Lone Star. I know how you like the puzzles,” Dee says, twisting around to hook her purse on the back of her chair.

  “What are you drinking?”

  “Sea breeze,” Dee says, taking a genteel sip from the tiny straw.

  “I didn’t know this place did sea breezes,” I say, unable to keep from smiling.

  “Yes, Queen Elizabeth—it’s not just New York City that has all the fancy new cocktails,” Dee says.

  “I heard you were in town,” Bec says, setting my beer on a coaster she flips deftly down first. Bec. Not Becky. Not Rebecca. And Bec? Bec is terrifying. Just the sort of waitress you’d expect in a bar like this. She’s ageless and she’s worked here forever. She used to let me sneak in to use the bathroom when I worked at Momma’s shack. Merry Carole and I were positive she was a witch of the Hansel and Gretel variety.

  “Hey, Bec,” I say, taking a swig of my beer.

  “That’s all you got for me?” Bec says.

  “No, ma’am,” I say, standing and wiping my now clammy hands on my jeans. I extend my hand to her and she takes it, gripping tightly. We shake hands efficiently and I’m positive she’s stealing my soul or channeling some long-lost relative who’ll tell me in some spooky elsewhere voice that “Queeeen Elizzabetthhhhh, your grandmamaaaaa looooves youuuu.” I’m for sure going to have nightmares.

  “I’m glad to see you safe and sound,” Bec says as I take my seat.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I say. My posture is perfect.

  “All right then.” Bec pauses. The look. It’s the same look we get from a lot of people. Not the ones who are actively wishing us ill, but the other minority. The other people this town looks down on. They’re sorry about what happened to Momma. They’re sorry we got a momma like that in the first place. And then they’re just sorry. I nod and offer her a smile. A tight smile back and she’s gone to the next customer.

  “I swear to God, that woman . . .” Dee takes a long, dai
nty sip of her sea breeze.

  “I know,” I say. I look toward the bar. I’m hungry and those potato chips clipped to the Budweiser mirror are looking better and better.

  “So, the job,” Dee says, settling into her chair as Kenny Chesney wafts through the bar talking about me and tequila.

  “I think I’m going to take it,” I venture, saying it out loud for the first time.

  “I’ve got to tell you, I just . . . Shawn hasn’t been the same man since he’s been working there, you know?”

  “I can see how that would happen,” I say, fidgeting with my beer bottle.

  “He comes home after . . . well, after . . . and he’s like a robot. He doesn’t want to talk about it, he just wants to be around the boys. I think it has to do with just wanting to be around goodness, you know?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I mean, from what he was telling me, it’ll be very different for you. It’s not like you even have to see who you’re cooking for.”

  “I’m counting on that.”

  “I think that’s what wakes him up at night, you know? The faces.” I nod. Dee continues, “So, you don’t have to worry yourself with that. You just cook the meal and that’ll be that.”

  “I know, that’s kind of what I was thinking,” I say.

  “Is the money that good? I mean, it’s not like you have any expenses here. Why . . . why take it if there’s some question about it, you know?” Dee is being very careful with her words.

  “As I was leaving, Warden Dale said that I was the right person for the job. That I’d fit in there. No one’s ever said that to me before,” I say.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, I get these jobs and there’s always all these explanations and addendums about ‘taking a chance on me’ and how hiring me is ‘out-of-the-box thinking,’ and on and on. This was the first time someone just flat out said they wanted me and only me.”

  “It sounds like you’ve made up your mind,” Dee says.

  “The last time I got fired, my boss talked about how I didn’t have any passion for the food unless I was complaining about their recipes. Like I had none of my own, you know?”

  “But you do.”

  “I know. So why didn’t I make them?”

  “Maybe because you’ve been making those same recipes since you were a kid? I can see how you would have gotten burnt out,” Dee says.

  “I guess.”

  “Maybe you thought you’d find another way to cook that you liked better.”

  “But I didn’t. And then I just forgot everything. And started yelling at tourists for putting ketchup on their eggs.”

  “Chance puts ketchup on his eggs. It’s disgusting.”

  “Different strokes, right?” I say, my stomach turning.

  “I guess. Makes me think I’ve failed as a parent is what it does.”

  We are quiet.

  “I don’t know. Something about being able to cook food for real Texans, and that it has to be perfect? That’s speaking to me something fierce,” I say.

  “I can see why you’d like that,” Dee says, not making eye contact.

  Dee continues in an awkward blurting out, “Laurel was in particularly fine form this afternoon. I think Merry Carole was right about not having you in the salon.”

  “I just think it’s all so futile. Like there’s anything we could do or have done already to make it so they don’t hate us. It’s their little pastime at this point. It’d be like taking away scrapbooking or making deals for people’s souls. And Merry Carole playing into it isn’t helping. They’re going to smell it on her and . . . I just hate to think of what’s going to happen,” I say.

  “Laurel’s been different ever since the divorce,” Dee says, taking another sip.

  The bar sounds muffle around me. My breath is yanked from my body and I can only focus on that tiny straw in Dee’s impossibly pink drink.

  “The divorce?” My voice is raspy as I settle deeper into the tiny chair.

  “Yeah, sure. She and Everett got divorced about a year after they got married. It barely lasted a minute,” Dee says, her voice now a conspiratorial whisper.

  Everett. I can’t even form a thought. I just keep thinking his name inside my head. Everett. Everett.

  “I didn’t know that,” I say, finally managing some kind of quasi-understandable succession of words.

  “They said it was on account of her not being able to have babies, but . . .” Dee trails off.

  “But?” I can’t breathe.

  Dee looks surreptitiously around the bar—she decides we’re far enough away from the denizens of the Hall of Fame and curls her body over the wooden table. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.

  “I know they’re from good families and all that, but I just never thought there was anything between ’em, you know? She was okay in high school, but holy smokes, she just got meaner and meaner,” Dee says, her voice a tiny whisper. I wonder if it’s that Laurel has gotten meaner or is this what happens to the women who love Everett Coburn?

  “Yeah,” I say. I can’t feel my body. I can’t feel my face, but I start to feel the littlest of embers warming inside me. I haven’t felt this heat in years, definitely not since I left North Star. We could pick up right where we left off. We’ll take our place in the shadows and . . . and I can be whole again. Even if it’s just for a little while. Or . . . or does he even love me anymore?

  “You look like you’re going to be sick,” Dee says, putting her hand on my shoulder as if she were comforting one of her little boys. She continues, “Here. You want another beer?” I am definitely going to need something stronger if I’m going to process this new information.

  “I think I’m going to need something a little stronger,” I say, offering Dee a smile. “You want another?” I ask, pointing to her sea breeze.

  “That’d be lovely, thank you,” Dee says, leaning back in her chair in search of her purse.

  I excuse myself and walk over to the bar in a daze.

  I don’t know what to do with this new information. Maybe the answer is right in front of me. I’ve been in town now for almost a week and I’ve heard nothing from Everett, notwithstanding his marital status. Maybe despite whatever I think happened in our past, he’s moved on. I take in a deep breath. I can’t . . . I won’t believe that. I know I meant more to him than someone he could easily get over. Shit, I’ve seen every kitchen from here to New York and I can’t rid myself of the memories of him. But maybe that’s just me. I was always the . . . my breath catches . . . I was always the dirty little secret. I was the thing that contaminated the mighty Everett Coburn. I was the old paint workhorse that would sully the Paragon thoroughbreds. He was my one and only. But what was I to him?

  “Hello, Mr. Mueller,” I say, trying to steady myself. Mr. Mueller owns the Hall of Fame. He had a rocky relationship with my mother in the past. I don’t blame him for it, she was not any kind of neighbor I’d like. But he liked her cooking, so he put up with her.

  “Queen Elizabeth,” he says, looking from under his low cowboy hat, the ever present toothpick switching from one side of his mouth to the other as he takes my measure.

  “I’ll have a bourbon and branch and a sea breeze for Dee, sir,” I say, standing tall.

  Mr. Mueller turns away without so much as a word. I continue to eye those potato chips.

  “Why don’t you just order them already.”

  Everett.

  “I was going to offhandedly suggest that hey, Mr. Mueller, you know . . . screw it, why don’t you throw in some of those potato chips while you’re at it.”

  “Seems like a lot of work for a bag of chips,” Everett says, leaning onto the bar and facing me.

  Goddamn. He takes my breath away.

  In the darkness of this bar, the hard edges of his face are shadowed and beautiful. The stubble that appears late at night outlines his jaw just as it always has. That crooked smile and those hooded, pinwheel-green eyes, the right one always a bit more squi
nted than the left. He makes me feel like I’m the only person in this room as he looks straight through me.

  “These are on the house,” Mr. Mueller says, sliding my two drinks across the knotty wooden bar.

  “Sir?”

  “Welcome home,” he says in his gruff smoker’s voice.

  “Yes, sir. Thank you,” I say.

  “Now you really can’t ask for those chips,” Everett says, holding up three fingers. Mr. Mueller turns and goes to get what I know will be three bottles of Shiner Bock beer.

  “Hoist with my own petard,” I say, picking up my drinks. Everett smiles.

  Mr. Mueller comes back over and cracks open three Shiner Bock beers. I can’t help but smile.

  “Thank you, sir. Hey, Mr. Mueller, you know . . . screw it, why don’t you throw in some of those potato chips while you’re at it,” Everett says, nodding his head in the direction of my beloved chips. I sigh. I can’t help myself. I sigh.

  “All right then,” Mr. Mueller says, turning to pluck a bag of chips from its hook. He sets the bag on the bar and nods to another customer as if to say, “May I help you?”

  “Welcome home,” Everett says, presenting me with the bag of potato chips. I take them, the plastic crumpling under my touch.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  I can’t help myself. I look straight into his eyes. Just as I’ve been doing my entire life. His eyes lock back on to mine and we just stand there. We’re inches from each other for the first time in ten years and yet we’re frozen. I can’t breathe. Everett leans in mere centimeters, but it feels dangerous. A crooked smile and that right eye squints just a bit more than the left. I let out a laugh, trying to hide the nervous gasp that sneaked out as I feel the heat from his body nearing mine. I hear him take in a breath, his eyes still fast on mine. The sounds of the bar fall away and it’s just us. Seconds. Minutes. Hours. Lifetimes. The crack of the cue ball. The hoot and holler and the shuffle of a cowboy boot. The beer bottles hitting the inside of the trash can. Waylon Jennings singing about being a highwayman.