“All of the antlers are free range,” Meadow said.
“I don’t know what that means.” Delight was running her fingers up and down the various staffs, looking quite practiced at the gesture.
“Well, it’s a philosophy of living, not to hurt Mother Earth.” She looked at me. “I don’t drive, I walk to where I want to go.” She looked back to Delight. “And I don’t destroy anything that’s living.” She spread her skirt. “The flax in my clothing, for example, is taken from the dying plant after it has lived its natural life-cycle.” She gestured toward the antlers. “The antlers I find once they’ve been shed in the woods.” Waving toward the bowls, she said, “Even these beauties that I use to make my living are from trees that sacrificed themselves for the greater good.”
“Sacrificial trees?” I blinked.
“Yes, they use the storms to give them the means for suiciding for the greater good.”
“I’m sorry, what good is that?” I kept my face toward Meadow, but my eyes scanned over to the suicidal tree bowls.
“The bugs break down the trees to nourish the dirt for future plants and to feed the insects. It’s important for the trees to forfeit their existence to help preserve and increase the lives of others.”
“The bugs?”
“Exactly. And then other animals eat the bugs, and bigger animals eat the bug-eating animals. It’s all part of the circle of life. And I make sure that if a tree makes the ultimate sacrifice, that I don’t diminish its efforts to help the forest floor and creatures. I only take some of the trunk to make the bowls, so I can pay the taxes on the land and guard nature.”
“Oh, I see. And do you use some of it for heating? I’m trying to imagine what kind of home you might live in.” To be honest, I was thinking yurt. I wouldn’t mind seeing the inside of a yurt.
“It would be a travesty to burn the wood. No. I have a solar panel on the side of my cave to provide me with adequate electricity for heat, light, and cooking.”
“Cave,” I whispered.
“We don’t have to destroy Mother Nature. She provides.” Meadow turned and picked up a basket. Pulling back a linen cover, she held it out between Delight and me. “Taste this,” she said.
I dutifully reached in the basket and pulled out a muffin. It was dense and moist.
Meadow gestured, and I knew, out of politeness, I’d need to take a bite. I really wanted to know what it was first. My mind flew back to all my hikes in the woods over the years. What would Meadow have used to make this muffin? I mean, besides the mud pies I’d made as a toddler, I couldn’t think of a thing. It should be okay. Maybe.
I took a bite. It was weird, I wasn’t gonna lie.
“Acorn meal.” She smiled. “I gather the acorns after they’ve fallen to the ground, providing for the animals of the forests. And I am, of course, just an animal amongst other animals.”
“You and the squirrels?” I asked. In the back of my head I could hear Kay saying, “I once saw a squirrel humping an acorn. Yeah, it was fuckin’ nuts.” But I curbed that before it popped out of my mouth. Instead, I said, “Thanks for sharing. This muffin is oak-ay.”
No one laughed.
“Acorns? Come from oaks? It’s oak-kay?”
Meadow and Delight shook their heads at me. Kay would have laughed.
I hid the muffin behind my back. And pointed toward one of Meadow’s bowls. It had a beautiful burled design. “Hey,” I said. “Why did the tree get put in time out?”
The women turned to look at the bowl, and I tossed my muffin toward my Hooch tent. “Because it was knotty.” I giggled.
Meadow and Delight turned back to me with furrowed brows.
Gosh, I was missing Kay. She would have laughed at that one, too.
I heard Twinkles next door making hacking sounds. I felt pretty sure he’d scarfed up the acorn muffin and was now wishing he wasn’t such an indiscriminate glutton.
5
Friday Night
Driving to Hooch’s Bar
The tent over at the Celtic Festival was set and ready-ish.
Colleen had handed me my event ABC license, so I could legally serve my booze. Hooch’s was hosting, but to keep things legal and have the profits go to the cause, the Celtic Festival board of directors had ordered the cases of booze. Plentifully. Obviously, they thought this was going to be a popular tent.
Colleen would truck the cases of booze over in the morning. Some things you could leave in a tent − like antler staffs or Viking drinking horns − and expect them to be left alone.
Alcohol? Not so much. Though, tomorrow I’d have a locked case to store the whiskey in.
I was relieved when I found out that the inventory had been handled. Without the heads up from Hooch, I would probably have had an hour, maybe two worth of whiskey. And that was only if I started first thing in the morning before the real drinking got going.
I knew this first hand.
Anticipating the teams who hung out at Hooch’s every year, I had ordered extra beer and Badge Bunny Booze for the bar. I loved when the teams were in town for the festival. They were all big men with high alcohol tolerances, and my cash register rang a happy tune. Besides, they were a lot of fun.
Hooch’s had never served at the festival that I knew of. But if those teams were any indication − and by Colleen’s inventory list, they were − then Delight and I would be busy, busy, busy.
Thank goodness for Delight, I told myself as I pulled up in the alley behind Hooch’s.
She had snapped up my offer to work with me. She was like that, the kind of person who jumps in to try new things and make new friends. Besides, she had a big competition down in “Hotlanta,” as she called it, in a couple of weeks. She was hoping to be crowned the Queen of the South East. Wouldn’t that be something? A little extra cash in her pocket would mean she could paint the town with her friends.
Yes, even though I’d opened the email in shock and dismay, things weren’t turning out badly at all. This is going to be fun, I thought as I parked my Mini.
I loved the Celtic Festival and seeing old friends.
My excitement was bubbling back up as my trepidation quelled. My tent was set. We were staffed. Inventory was on hand. Yes, it was all falling quickly and easily into place. Sure, it was a little extra work, but it was for an excellent cause. I would have been happy to have signed up for this myself, I just wished that Hooch had kept me in the loop.
I climbed out of my car, acknowledging that I was exhausted. “Come on Twinkles. Time to go to work.” I held the door wide as he hefted himself up from the seat and jumped down. I gave him a hard look, making sure that he wasn’t acting odd or ill from the muffin he’d snarfed down earlier.
To be honest, I was still a little weirded out that I’d eaten acorns. I had always been told they were poisonous. I’d Googled to make sure neither Twinkles or I would die. When I asked, Delight if she’d eaten the acorn muffins, she said she’d just pretended to eat it out of politeness. “I got me a policy about things like that. I don’t eat nothin’ that’s been cooked up in a cave, if you see what I’m sayin’.”
I thought that was probably a good policy to have, and I vowed going forward I’d adhere to that rule. But it was a little late now, seeing how I’d swallowed the muffin already.
The Internet articles said if the tannins were removed from the acorns before cooking them, that acorns were very nutritive.
Huh, who knew?
Well, Meadow did.
But that didn’t mean that I didn’t stop on the way back to Hooch’s to pick up cardiac-arrest burgers for Twinkles and me. Eating acorns as a complete meal was nuts.
I walked through the alley door and nodded at Joe, my dishwasher. He was deep in his Zen state of glass washing, and I decided not to bother him.
I wasn’t planning on staying here late tonight. Firstly, a girl needs her beauty rest. Secondly, while I planned on going to bed early, it wasn’t to sleep right away. Randy Goodman, like a good randy man,
had promised to pay me a visit after his shift was over and before he changed out of his uniform. Thirdly, Justice’s friends were able to come in at ten tonight to help out, and they’d be there to help her Saturday, too.
The Celtic Festival was Saturday and Sunday.
Sundays and Mondays Hooch’s was closed. Jamesburg was historically Catholic. There was a lot of penance to do on a Sunday, so opening didn’t make a lot of sense. And Monday was my day of rest, along with errands and laundry. By Tuesday, everyone was ready to drink again.
Yes, oddly, things were falling right into place and working out. And that just wasn’t how my life normally unwound for me. I crossed my fingers to keep the good juju going.
I walked past my office and into the main room. My eyes scanned over the patrons. Connor and Kay perched on stools at the bar. The Polly’s Cove Beavers weren’t here yet. But I recognized a few of the Golden Cocks who helped to make up the Bumpass, Virginia Police team, filling the seats at the tables. They were looking mighty rugged in their rugby uniforms, every bit as sweaty and mud streaked as the Beavers had been yesterday.
Yum.
The Celtic Festival time of year was my very favorite time of year.
I raised my hand in salute as Twinkles wandered over, whole butt waggling, to get loved on.
Justice handed me a beer and lifted her chin toward the chicky-doodle who was flirting up a storm with the table of Cocks from her perch on her bar stool.
“What is worn under the kilt, I wonder,” she said in an overly loud voice as I handed her a stein.
“Well,” I said. “I was in the Highlands of Scotland once. As I was climbing through the heather, there was a young man who was climbing near me. I turned to him and asked that very question. ‘Excuse me,’ I said, ‘but what is worn under your kilt?’”
And Kay called out, “Nothing, me lassie. Everything’s in perfect working order!”
“Here! Here!” called the Bumpass Golden Cocks.
“That’s not the truth,” chicky-doodle pouted.
She didn’t seem like a very bright bulb.
“When we’re not playing sports,” one of the team said, “the only thing under my kilt is a cool breeze and what God himself endowed me with.”
“The only thing under mine is me lucky charms,” Morgan said, then winked at Kay.
Kay blushed hotly.
Chicky-doodle scowled as she tried to figure out what that meant.
“What do you wear under your kilt, Officer Fitzgerald?” Chicky-doodle’s friend reached down and fingered one of Connor’s kilt pleats. She was using a Marilyn Monroe accent and a flirtatious flutter of heavily mascaraed lashes.
Connor’s face turned pink. “When I’m wearing my clan tartan, it’s customary to go commando. But at the contests tomorrow, we’ll wear compression leggings under the kilts.”
He couldn’t have been less flirtatious if he tried. Just stating the facts, ma’am.
Though, I’d admit, that was the first time I’d ever heard Connor say he went commando, and it made my girly parts do an odd little flip-flop kind of gymnastics thing.
“It’s a family friendly event,” Kay added.
Now it was, but for a moment, I pictured what the games might have looked like in times of yore, before compression shorts had been invented, when the men didn’t worry about their kilts flying up. My ancestral women folk must have had a very good time going to watch the matches.
I was distracted from my little fantasy when Delight walked through the door.
She was wearing a ratty sweat suit, old fuzzy house slippers, and her hair was wrapped in a turban.
“Is everything okay?” Kay called over.
“Everything’s fine,” Delight said, letting her gaze take in the Bumpass Golden Cocks. “Mmm, mmm, mmm, yes, just fine.” She focused over on Kay. “I’m just here to measure BJ right quick. I’m making us matching bar wenches’ outfits. We’re going to look fabulous, and all the men in their kilts will want to come to our tent to check out our wares.” She wove her way over to the counter. “You know, I didn’t really get a full feel of how much I appreciated a man in a kilt until I got on the Internet and started looking around. There is much to be admired about a man who keeps himself so accessible, if you see what I’m saying.”
The women in the bar nodded.
The men grinned.
“Hey,” Delight said. “Do you know what you call a badge bunny who likes a man in a kilt?”
“No, what?” I asked.
“A cop hop Scotch.”
I tilted my chin. “That doesn’t make a lot of sense.”
“No, you’re right. That doesn’t work when I say it out loud. In my head, though, I’m chuckling.”
“About tomorrow,” I walked to an open space at the end of the bar, so Delight could take my measurements, “Kay will be there on and off to help in our tent.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that.” Delight focused on Kay. “I would have bought more material and made a wench dress for you, too,” Delight apologized.
“That’s okay, I’ll be wearing my dance dress. The competition goes on all day, I need to run back and forth to the stage when they call the different levels for competition.”
“Oh, I see, okay, good then.” Delight reached in her pocket and pulled out a little notebook, a pencil, and a tape measure. She lifted my arms out to the side. “Now stand like that for me.”
I stood like a scare crow as she moved around me, mumbling under her breath and writing on her pad.
“And I have my competition, too,” I explained, hoping she could multi-task. “But between Connor, Kay, and me, we’ll make sure to give you breaks and let you get off your feet.”
Delight pulled the pencil from between her teeth and scratched down a number. “What all are you competing in?”
“She throws an axe,” Connor said.
“She hits the bull’s eye almost every time. That takes practice,” Kay said with a nod. “It’s not axe-edental.”
I rolled my eyes. “Kay will be in the story telling contest as well as the jigs.”
“How about you, Officer Fitzgerald?”
The way chicky-doodles friend kept calling Connor ‘Officer Fitzgerald’ told me that we had another badge bunny in our midst. I wrinkled my nose. I thought one badge bunny was plenty for this bar.
“I’m in the police bagpipe corps, playing drums, and I’ll be representing Clan Fitzgerald in the opening and closing ceremonies,” he said. And I could tell from his posture that he’d just come to the same conclusion I had. Connor wasn’t as comfortable as some other officers with being appreciated for his badge.
She sent him a little pout. “No rugby?”
“That’s not my thing,” he said, picking up his beer. “I compete in the heavy athletics.” Connor had started to move down the row toward me.
Miss Persistence picked up her beer and followed right along. “What does that mean?”
Connor sent me a wide-eyed S.O.S. look.
“It means,” Kay stepped between them, “he picks up tree trunks and throws them end over end.”
Blink blink. Hand to chest. A little wobbly in the knee like she might just faint at the awesome strength of burly Officer Fitzgerald. “Whole trees?”
“Mmm, mmm, mmm.” Delight reached out to run her hand down Connor’s bicep. “I’m just imagining you playing with your wood, tossing it around all masterful and shit.”
Connor turned bright red. Again, he shot me a look that read S.O.S.
Delight had stalled measuring my bust. I thought Connor was leaning over to see how big my boobs were, but instead, he whispered in my ear, “I’m heading out. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Then he caught my chin between his finger and thumb to angle my mouth up toward his, and he pressed a delicious, possessive kiss against my lips.
Man, he did that well.
I mean, Connor and I had kissed before.
And it always had the same affect. It curled my toes and made me want more
. But more came with a relationship price. Though, I knew he probably landed that kiss to let the badge bunny know he wasn’t on the market, so she wouldn’t follow him outside.
As Connor started out the door, Sal walked in.
Connor turned right back around and followed Sal to a bar stool. I wondered if Connor was picking up a dangerous vibe from Sal like I was.
Once again, Sal was dressed like a mob undertaker. I’ve known a few undertakers in my day, and even undertakers don’t dress as undertaker-ish as Sal did.
Sal squinted at Justice. “You know we don’t put up with rats in my line of business.”
“That’s not a rat, that’s Nicodemus,” I said. “He works here.”
Some random bar guy leaned in and tapped Sal on the chest with his pointer finger. “Hey,” he slurred. “What do the Mafia and pussies have in common?”
The bar went quiet.
“One slip of the tongue, and you’re in deep shit.”
I rolled my eyes as the Golden Cocks erupted with laughter.
Sal sat down at the bar.
“What can I get you, officers?” Justice asked, putting napkins down on the bar in front of the men to Sal’s right.
“So this is a screw bar?” Sal asked.
“Well, I do what I can,” I said under my breath.
Justice leaned toward me and said, “‘Screw’ is godfather talk for cop.”
“How would you know that?” I asked her.
“My grandfather loved those movies,” she said, pulling the tap and filling the first stein. “He played them all the time. This guy,” she tipped her head toward Sal, “talks like he’s out of a nineteen-seventies mob film.”
Delight leaned in to whisper, “Dresses like it, too. You wouldn’t catch me dead in a get-up like that.”
“Not enough sparkle,” I said. “Speaking of glitter, are you ready for your big drag queen competition coming up in Atlanta?”
“That’s not for a couple of weeks, yet. I think I’m good to go. I have my costumes all ready and Dwayne’s been working with me over the Internet on my choreography and presentation. He says it’s good. And he’s a judge at the Houston competitions, so I trust his eye.”
If You See Kay Jig Page 4
