by Inman Majors
After pacing aimlessly around to gather his thoughts, Marty went to the desk and grabbed a fresh write-up note, then scribbled for several moments. During the scrum with the patron, Penelope’s ponytail had broken free, and now a few locks of wayward, sweaty hair kept falling in her face. The hair smelled of ranch dressing and A-1, and Penelope luxuriated in the thought of how good a shower would soon feel.
Marty handed her the write-ups and asked her to sign both. What she hadn’t realized before was that these forms were on carbon paper, so after she signed, Marty briskly tore off the top copy for her, retaining the second for himself.
“Is this a souvenir?” Penelope said.
“What? No. It’s for your records.”
“Could I get one for my mother too? She keeps a scrapbook of my accomplishments.”
Marty’s brows were inquisitive and a little concerned, as if she was in the midst of a psychiatric episode.
“I’m kidding,” Penelope said, taking her copies of the forms and tucking them into her denim skirt.
“I’m really sorry to do this.”
“I know. Don’t worry about it. I need a better job anyway.”
Marty frowned as if Penelope had said something insulting.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” she said. “I just need something with benefits and more regular hours. For my son, you know.”
Marty blanched at the mention of Theo. Everyone in the restaurant knew just how broke everyone else was, and Marty looked now to be computing Penelope’s short-term financial straits.
“I’ll give you a great reference,” Marty said. “I know today was just weird. You’ve been an excellent Coonskins employee.”
Despite herself, Penelope’s eyes watered a little at this. It was a nice counterargument to the softball woman’s comments. It had been that gibe about her capabilities as a server, the wrongness of it, much more than the tossed peanuts or anything else, that had made Penelope willing to wrestle another adult in public.
Penelope wiped her eyes with her T-shirt, then stood up.
“I’ll have to ask you to turn in your apron,” Marty said, unable to meet her gaze.
Penelope reached around to untie it. She looked at the motto one last time: Coonskins: Where Fun Meets Frontier!
She handed the apron to Marty, waved quickly at the cooks on her way past, then exited the restaurant through the back kitchen door.
11
Penelope was back at her mother’s house after being fired. She felt some better after a marathon shower, though she was convinced a funky smell remained in her hair. Looking in the mirror, she pulled a big handful to her nose and took a whiff. Yes, it smelled of apricots and pineapple and whatever other fruity delights were in her shampoo, but there was also a hint of a stray onion ring, a rogue cheese fry. Maybe this smell would stay with her forever like some mark of Cain because of her unkind feeling toward stuffed raccoons and peanut shells. It seemed an odd fate, but then again, oddness sometimes had an affinity for her.
She entered the room where she’d slept these last four months. It still looked like every other guest bedroom she’d ever been in: a print of a flower arrangement; a print of a Revolutionary War battle waged by Virginians; curtains and bedspread from the 1970s, and no skimping on the pastels either. The only things she could claim as her own were a few photos of Theo on the dresser, her latest smutty novel—The Stranger Within—and the clothes draped on all available surfaces. Looking around for her robe, she noted one more thing that technically belonged to her—the denim skirt on the floor—and gave it a violent kick out into the hall. That restraining device was heading straight to the trash. She considered donating it to Goodwill, but couldn’t do that to some unsuspecting soul sister out there.
Feeling like a patriotic feminist, she dug around in a pile of dirty clothes until she found her robe. Thus garbed, she headed to George’s office, ready to start the job search anew. Getting fired was a setback, so she really needed to hop to. Doozy and his spatula would keep strict martial law in the confined space of the basement. It would be Nightmare in the RV all over again.
She sat down in George’s swivel chair, thinking about jobs and stinky hair. When she returned from Coonskins, all the vehicles were in the driveway, so she’d crept around back and let herself in through the basement door like a thief rather than face a long Q-and-A session with her mother about what had just transpired. She’d never been fired from anything. And her mom would be chock-full of tips for employment. She might even recommend cosmetology school again.
Man, did she ever need her own place.
Her last venture on George’s computer hadn’t been erased from memory, but it was just easier to see things on the desktop than her phone. Plus, she could take notes at the desk about job openings, should any catch her eye. So what if George loved preposterous monster bosoms? They were likely in short supply on a Western Channel cattle drive.
The computer, powered by a single wind chime on the front porch, was still taking its sweet time to load, so she dialed James’s cell phone, hoping to talk to Theo after his baseball game. It was always around this time on the weekend when she started to miss the little Fart Boy and thought a quick word with him might cheer her up.
“Hey Mom,” came Theo’s unusually peppy greeting.
“Hey honey. How’d the game go?”
“I hit the ball!”
“What? Seriously? That’s fantastic.”
“It was just a foul, but I did hit it. My bat hit the ball.”
While she was engaging in urban warfare at Coonskins, Theo had made his first-ever contact with the ball. It didn’t seem fair.
“Who cares if it was a foul, Theo? I am so proud of you. Now you’ll have to do it at your next game so I can see it.”
“That’s a lot of pressure, Mom. I’m just glad I hit it once.”
“Me too, sweetie. And no pressure at all. Did you all win?”
“I think so. Dad, did we win?”
Penelope strained to hear James’s reply, hoping, just to irritate herself more, that he’d still be using the solid TV dad voice he’d employed the day before, but his reply came back muffled and sounding faraway.
“Yeah. Dad says we won.”
“Well, what a day. I am so sorry I missed it. I’m going to try my best not to miss any more of your games.”
“I have to go,” Theo said. “Dad’s taking me for ice cream to celebrate the hit.”
“That sounds great. Eat as much as you can. You deserve it. And we’ll do something special tomorrow night as well, okay?”
“Do I have to come home tomorrow? Dad and I are having a lot of fun, and I was wondering if I could maybe stay an extra night.”
Penelope hadn’t seen this coming and took a breath before replying. And then a few more. “Honey, you’ve got school on Monday, remember?”
“I’ve got clothes here. Dad bought some so I wouldn’t have to worry if I ever forgot something.”
Penelope felt panicked. She’d heard stories about boys of divorced parents asking to live with Dad when they got to be teenagers but didn’t think she’d have to worry about that so soon. Who knew what James had at his house? He had plenty of room for that zipline Theo had wanted forever. How could she ever compete with a zipline?
She wanted to just speak truthfully, to say that she missed him and simply didn’t want to spend an extra day without him, but that was a guilt trip she couldn’t lay on a nine-year-old.
“Let me think on it, okay? It’s probably fine, but let me sleep on it overnight. I’ll call you after church and we’ll talk about it then, all right?”
“Great. Thanks, Mom,” Theo said and then hung up, forgetting as he usually did to say good-bye.
She stood from the desk and walked into her bedroom without knowing why. It was a beautiful spring day and she was alone and now her son was asking to spend more time at his father’s place. Grabbing her phone, she texted Sandy and Rachel: I got fired today. Want to do so
mething?
She knew this was a lost cause even as she typed. Weekends were family time. Sandy was at some youth sporting event, and Rachel was hiking or wine-tasting or doing something else romantic and irritating with her husband. Damn their intact nuclear families. And damn their husbands too. Especially their loving and interested husbands. Who was she supposed to hang out with for the rest of the day?
After throwing her phone back on the bed and kicking again the denim skirt in the hall, she went back to George’s office. The computer was buzzing along now and Penelope raced to James’s Facebook page, intent on locating a zipline or a trampoline or some other super-awesome inducement to woo Theo.
But nothing had changed. No new photos of the two of them doing something fun in the backyard or in James’s cute little house. It was still Hot for Teacher all over the place. No, wait. Dangerous Minds had been added to the movie likes. Was that the one where Michelle Pfeiffer played a teacher who instructs her tough-nut students in karate? Oh, this was too much. Hot teachers plus karate? Gag her with a spoon. James and his martial arts fixation knew no bounds. Did he think she’d forgotten Sad Karate Night? Or the whole Manhood Reclamation Project she’d been forced to initiate just to get the moping back to a manageable level afterwards?
She could picture him later that night, sexting in his shorty robe to his Very Special Lady, his pale legs keeping time to the Roadhouse soundtrack playing in the background. How James loved his bad boy southern rock when feeling frisky and alive.
Then she snapped out of it. No more obsessing about James and his possible recruitment, intentional or otherwise, of Theo. No more feeling sorry for herself. What she needed was her own place. And to manage that, she had to have a job. Doozy would not, absolutely would not, be bossing her around in his sleep about the succotash. She was getting out of that basement and into a cool new place for her and Theo, come hell or high water. Simple as that. She’d hunt for jobs right now. Just after she checked in—ever so quickly—with her LoveSynch account. She’d messaged that older guy in the cardigan right before work and maybe he’d replied. Who knew, maybe other men had contacted her as well—men closer to her own age and wearing a shirt. A girl could dream, after all.
Before she could get to the dating site, however, a fresh pop-up appeared. It was not, to Penelope’s surprise, another topless gal in stockings, but instead an advertisement for RhinoShaft, which touted itself as the unsurpassed male prolongater on the market. She clicked the pop-up from the screen, only to see it replaced by another for something called Cyclopenis. This came with a colorful cartoon of a happy-looking Cyclops, his one proud eye glaring defiantly from the screen. The source of his cocksureness seemed to be a steady diet of catuaba bark. Thinking that many of Theo’s drawings were better than this overconfident Cyclops before her, she clicked off the page. Immediately, another appeared. This one was for Steel Cobra, and to hell with catuaba bark. If you truly wanted to be serpentine between the legs, what you needed was yohimbe bark. Just ask the serious guy in the lab coat with the clipboard beside the snake. He was all about the yohimbe bark.
Penelope took her hand from the mouse, staring for a while at the smiling, lengthy cartoon snake and the fake scientist next to it.
Was George taking boner pills?
Surely her mother wouldn’t allow it with his heart in its current compromised state. Maybe he was taking them on the sly and her mom was just the lucky beneficiary of all this bark ingestion. Then again, after last night’s nudie show, maybe it was her mother who was pushing for rhino-cyclops-cobra satisfaction, and damn the fallout for her frail, sweet husband. Whichever the case, Penelope felt duty-bound to inquire. She loved old George and didn’t want him to kick off anytime soon via exotic herb overload. He was a Virginian, for Christ’s sake, not some Kama Sutra overlord.
She was now on the LoveSynch page and spent some time flitting, as a bumblebee in a picked-over flowerbed, around the assortment of single men who lived within her forty-mile dating radius. It was a sad affair, frankly. The men mostly left her with a poignant feeling, as if life hadn’t been one big Country Boy Party like they’d hoped. She recognized several from high school and felt weird reading their biographies, which seemed truthful to the point of masochism. Sure, there were guys here and there claiming to be early forties when they were well into their sixth decade, and yes, it was damn irritating that nearly every single man, even the saddest-looking, said he was looking for fit/slender/athletic women from 21 to 39. Yeah, of course. And she’d like to date Brad Pitt on Monday and Matt Damon on Tuesday, so long as they lived within forty miles of Hillsboro. Now do your thing, LoveSynch! Work your matchmaking magic!
Okay, she was depressing herself now. Feeling like an expired carton of milk in the world of Internet dating, she went to her Portnal (portrait + journal). She studiously avoided the My Way (bio) she’d written, the Enthusiasms checklist, and the Mr. Write narrative about what she was looking for in an Internet dream man.
Everything she’d revealed about herself made her blush, and she’d revealed very little, just a mix of TV shows and movies she liked, a compilation of places she’d never visited but sort of insinuated she had, and some nonsense about wine tastings, though she’d only ever been to one. She’d dashed off the entire Portnal in less than an hour and had tried to sound casual, self-deprecating, and most of all not desperate. She’d left the personal income item blank and told a white lie about exercise frequency, counting her intentions to exercise as the real McCoy. The most time had been spent debating how to respond to the education question or whether to leave it blank. In the end, she’d written Some College, which felt like the worst thing of all. She’d submitted one photo, a selfie taken in this very chair while filling out the application. The photo made her look a little tired, a little wan, but generally cheerful. She thought it the most honest part of her Portnal and the one thing that didn’t make her cringe.
The LoveSynch stats sheet said she’d received two new blends, seven flirts, and three Eiffel Towers. Though she’d never bothered to figure out what these things meant, it seemed like a pretty decent haul. She felt cheered that so many of the sad local men had found her blend-, flirt- and Eiffel Tower–worthy. Perhaps the day would turn out better than it had started. But first things first. She’d replied to the cardigan dude without closely reading the message he’d sent. Maybe she ought to have another look at it:
My Dearest TheosMom75,
I must extend, even before introducing myself, my heartiest congratulations to your parents for their foresight in giving you such a unique and fitting name. As soon as I saw your photo, I said to myself, there, if ever I saw one, goes a TheosMom75. In fact, the name was so apt, I wondered (aloud, I must admit. Brief segue: I sometimes talk to myself when expressing profound surprise or admiration) if your parents were even human. Perchance, thought I, this mysterious, lovely woman was taken in by mischievous woodland animals as a babe in swaddling clothes and raised as their own, free of spirit and unfettered by convention. Such was the effect of your symphonious name on my ear and imagination.
I found your Portnal listings inscrutable and fascinating and spent many hours considering how first to approach you. Should I send a flirt? No, fireworks rather hurt my ears, even as a boy, and I thought you might feel the same. Well, it’s an Eiffel Tower then, says I. But no. Paris and its trappings have always struck me as a rather bourgeois notion of romance. And the French, if you’ll pardon my French, are just a right pain in the bum. So I decided to be rash—damn the flirts! Damn the Eiffel Towers!—and “message” you directly.
I am not sure I exist in anyone’s Mr. Write profile. But I too enjoy tasting wine (though usually my own bottle at my own humble abode). And I too consider London one of the very best places on this lovely orb of ours.
Please write back. I feel, for reasons I can’t explain, that we might be something of a blend.
Yours most sincerely,
Fitzwilliam
Below this
was Penelope’s return message from earlier that morning:
Hey. Nice to meet you. Off to work.
She stared at her message, feeling it dwarfed and inadequate compared to the missive that preceded it. Who was this freak? And why did his name sound familiar? She read over the note again, then clicked on his Portnal. Feeling shallow for doing it, but doing it nonetheless, she sought out his photos first. Like her, Fitzwilliam had only posted one shot, the one where he wore a cardigan. She studied the photo for a while and eventually decided that he was more oldish than just straight old, and could be anywhere from fifty-five to sixty-five.
He had left a number of entries blank on his Portnal, including those asking about age, income, and height, not that any of these mattered greatly to Penelope. Her own page was about as forthcoming. Better to reveal too little than too much. She could respect Fitzwilliam’s restraint. Here is what he had to say for himself:
Places: Pemberley; Derbyshire
Occupation: Gentleman
Enthusiasms: Yes!
MyWay: Is not the way of the 21st century, alas.
Ms. Write: Will write! And often, I hope.
Education: Varied, sundry, and somewhat autodidactic in nature (also a PhD).
She compared this page to the others she’d perused on LoveSynch and found it notably lacking in mentions of bass boats, camo, duck calls, and a touch more about fishing. And not a word about watching sports. This gave her pause. Did this guy even live in Virginia?
No, if his Portnal could be trusted, he was from Pemberley by way of Derbyshire or the converse. English? In Hillsboro? It seemed unlikely. She threw both place-names into the search engine and soon had her answer. Of course. She thought that name rang a bell. Junior year in high school, she’d all but memorized the CliffsNotes for Pride and Prejudice for Mrs. Sketchin’s midterm. And the movie wasn’t bad either. Good old Mr. Darcy and his country estate, Pemberley. How could she have forgotten that? She still had the occasional nightmare about Mrs. Sketchin.
