Hot Point (7 page)

“Hey, let's grab that one.” Vern moved quickly to the prize table right as it was vacated. It was a table for two under the big drawing of Snoopy atop his doghouse and wearing his full “Curse you, Red Baron!” World War I fighter ace getup. Rumor had it Charles Schulz himself had drawn it years before, but there was no signature, so Vern kind of doubted it. Of course it would be high treason to express such an opinion in the Doghouse. So rather than risking a long walk off a short plank, he sat down and waved hello to Rikki, the waitress, as she worked another table.

It was only as Denise was sitting down that he realized what he'd done.

Mickey and Bruce had landed with a couple of the ground support guys at the big central table that MHA always grabbed when it could. It was made for six, but they often crammed eight or ten around it, with beer and conversation flowing freely. It also put the primarily male MHA crew within easy firing range of any cute windsurfer babes at a large number of neighboring tables. And when the smokejumpers were on the ground, it got even wilder.

Mickey gave Vern a look of flat-out, wide-eyed astonishment.

Vern shrugged a “What?” For not sitting with them?

Mickey tipped his head sharply toward Denise, then mouthed, “WTF?”

Jeannie wandered in with Cal and dropped down at the central table. Jeannie offered Vern a smile and a nod of approval.

Unsure which he found more irritating, Mickey's disbelief or Jeannie's easy certainty, Vern turned away. He'd have to go with Mickey because he too had no idea what Denise was doing here with him, and he really didn't need his bunkmate echoing the sentiment.

But isolating her? Was that fair?

“I should have asked.” Vern faced Denise. “Are you okay with being here rather than…?” He tipped his head to indicate the central table without turning to see whether all of the guys were now eyeing him oddly.

In a momentary lull that sometimes swept across a crowded room, he heard Bruce asking, “What's he doing with Stainless-Steel Conroy?”

It was one of her many nicknames, and Vern did his best to make a throat-clearing noise so that she wouldn't hear Bruce.

“I'm not that good in groups.” Denise looked down, hiding those green eyes as she inspected the tabletop. Maybe she had heard. He was going to need to beat the crap out of Bruce.

“Then we're good here?” Vern had spent far too much of his youth in bars or backstage at Mom's bigger concerts to care much about who he ran into and how big the group was. But he rather liked having Denise to himself.

She nodded without looking up.

* * *

Denise
was
good here. Sitting alone with Vern below Snoopy's protective gunfire. Before Jasper, she'd sometimes come along with the MHA groups that hit the Doghouse. It was expected, though it wasn't something she'd really choose to do on her own. But once here, she'd always liked the feeling of belonging in a group, even if she didn't really.

There were always whisperings like Bruce's. “Stainless-Steel Conroy” was actually among the nicer things said about her. Better than stuck-up, frigid, dyke, and a dozen others that had been aimed her way before she'd joined MHA. At least here they always gave her respect. They appreciated the mechanic enough not to disparage the woman, even if they wholly discounted her. The “stainless-steel” epithet was as bad as it ever got around MHA.

Well, she didn't exactly radiate womanly virtues, so that reaction didn't surprise her much. Though it didn't make the memory of the old ones hurt any less.

During the Jasper era, they'd only come here the one time. The Hoodies hadn't taken to him, nor he to them. Which in retrospect probably should have told her something. He didn't understand a comfortable bar filled with good people. He was a rich-kid windsurfer with a torn knee turned successful windsurf shop owner, turned aspiring yuppie with a BMW and an attitude. She'd been too polite to leave him until the relationship really did completely die and neither of them could even remember why they'd gotten together in the first place.

But sitting here, in the group but separate, with only Vern to deal with, was pretty close to ideal. The general hum of conversation and shouted greetings actually made their table quite private, like a sound isolation booth afloat on the cheerfully noisy sea that was the Doghouse's atmosphere. Now she would be included without being crowded. Rikki dropped off a couple of menus and took their beer orders.

The best parts of the Doghouse were the smells and the laughter. This wasn't a bar that you came to so that you could get drunk or have a fight. It was a place where friends laughed over mountains of nachos, potato skins, and burgers. It was a place for tasty craft beer and good company.

Denise needed a conversation starter. Vern was feeling awkward about something. Maybe her driving or the way that she'd tried to apologize or… She could feel herself spinning into her “stupid” place; going all mental was something she was far too good at.

“Vashon?” She leaped at the lifeline. He'd mentioned something about his dad on Vashon Island and it seemed a good place to start.

“An island in Puget Sound a couple hours north of here. Born and bred.” Vern latched on to the topic as well. He sounded easy and casual with that lazy drawl of his, but she could see the relief as plain on his face as it must be on hers. “Dad runs the marina, in a place called Quartermaster Harbor. Mom was a rock-and-roller, retired about ten years back except for the occasional local island stuff. She picked up painting, decided maybe that the reason she kept giving me art supplies as a kid was that she was the one who wanted them. I think she's even sold a couple at the island gallery—under a pen name. She's really done with the whole tour and fan thing. Maybe you've heard of Margi Taylor?”

Margi Taylor! She pulled out her phone and scrolled down her playlist before turning it to him. Four albums on her playlist. Both the music and the lyrics were intelligent. And it wasn't merely good rock; they counterpointed each other until neither element could stand alone. As neatly as her Fiat's synchromesh.

“Okay, that's kinda embarrassing. I guess you have.” He didn't look embarrassed. He looked amused. “Mom…” He had to raise his voice to be heard over a loud delivery of plates nearby. “Mom seems to be my calling card. I'm twenty-eight, and I never seem to introduce myself unless I introduce my mom as well. You'd think I'd have outgrown that by now.”

She stuffed the phone away. “Sorry, I didn't mean to—”

“She's like that. A cool mom who takes up a lot of space.” Then he narrowed his eyes at her.

She wanted a mirror to check there wasn't helicopter grease on her face or something. She glanced up, but Snoopy was fighting other battles off in the distance over her head.

“You apologize a lot. Why—” Vern looked up at Rikki's return and ordered something with the word “hamburger” in it.

Did she? She suspected that she did. It felt as if she was always apologizing for something. During her long year with Jasper, their relationship had been nothing but one unending apology. And it had been entirely on her part. Not his…ever. What was—

“Denise?” Vern and the waitress were looking at her.

She hadn't even looked at the menu yet, so she held up two fingers.

They both looked at her as if she'd lost her mind.

“The double teriyaki burger is about as big as your head. You that hungry?”

Denise held up one finger and tried not to be embarrassed when the waitress nodded and departed. Before she came here again, she'd memorize the menu; it was bound to be online.

A quick glance around the restaurant showed that the portions here were firefighter huge. The MHA table was practically mounded with onion rings, nachos, beer, and burgers. The table was packed solid with fliers now, and she was so glad she wasn't crammed in there. Brenna was right in the center of the mayhem. Denise suppressed a shudder; she was so glad to be at a table for two.

Jeannie looked completely at ease in the madness, even sent a friendly smile Denise's way which she did her best to return.

Mickey and Bruce were working a table of obvious windsurfer tourists. The fact that it appeared to be three couples already didn't even have them hesitating. The guys were utterly shameless. Well, she didn't spot any wedding rings on the women, but still.

“I'm glad you like Mom's music.” Vern's voice drew her attention back to the table. “She's great. 'Course I grew up listening to her play.”

“Do you?” She was so glad he'd dropped the earlier question because she was starting to suspect that she really wouldn't like the answers once she found them.

“Do I play?” He shuddered. “Mom tried to teach me. She gave up after like the fifth instrument. Claimed I was on the verge of giving her ears a coronary. Do you know her cut ‘Bad Man-Music'?”

She did. It was funny. Gentle and kind, but definitely making fun of a bad musician.

He tapped the center of his chest and made a small bow. “I did play backup guitar in the studio version. A sad attempt to redeem myself that is only tolerable because I think they unplugged my cable.”

Denise felt her laugh bubble forth and covered her mouth with a hand, but that didn't stop it. Not really.

“Yeah.” He grimaced. “Totally pathetic attempt. After that I was thinking I could maybe grow up to be a shepherd or something and never have to show my face in public again. Dad tried to make me into a boat mechanic. I liked to sail, but I can't do the kind of things you can. Machines despise me in almost every way you can imagine except when I'm flying them. Where did you learn that anyway? You're like freaking hippo-in-a-purple-haze good.”

“I'm what?” Of the many things she'd been called behind her back, that wasn't one of them.

“It's from an old
Bloom
County
cartoon. The guy who drew it lived on our island for some time. You've got a rep that goes right up to my neck of the woods.”

“All the way to Vashon?” It was a good joke, even if she could feel her cheeks heating up. She was never good at jokes, and she was bound to ruin this one. But it seemed good.

“Actually, yes. Old Yuri McKinnon, a crazy old coot with a Russian mom and a Scottish dad, mentioned this wizard female chopper mechanic. I'm guessing that's you. Not a lot of female wrenches in the helicopter business.”

“Flies a military 1953 Bell 47G-2A that never saw action in Korea.” She made it a flat statement. She'd worked on Yuri's rotorcraft several times.

“Flew. And how the hell did you know that?” His voice had gone cold and angry. No. Sad.

“I'm sorry. I didn't know.” She'd definitely screwed up the joke. And Yuri had been such a sweet old man. The world was a dimmer place for his gentle teasing now to be nothing more than a memory.

Vern took a slug of his beer and looked around the room for a moment.

She saw him take a deep breath, searching for equilibrium of some sort, and felt sorry she'd said anything. Maybe if she stopped speaking. She wished their food would come so that she'd have something to do.

“You knew Yuri?” His voice was steadier.

She nodded without looking up.

“How?”

“He'd bring his Bell over to Boeing Field when I was still working there. That's where I got my A and P—airframe and power plant certification.”

When he didn't speak, she glanced up out of the corner of one eye. He didn't look upset. As a matter of fact he looked amused.

“What?” She couldn't imagine what might be funny about this conversation.

“Yuri is the one who taught me to fly.”

Now, too late to save her earlier embarrassment, Rikki delivered their burgers, offering Vern a smile that spoke of a past. Well, apparently he'd left her happy, whatever had happened. She was nice enough to offer Denise a friendly nod that just might be interpreted as “Well done getting him; he's a good one.”

A moment later, she had whisked off and Denise looked down at the plates. There was no way on this planet she could have finished the monstrous meal that had landed in front of Vern. Even without the double sizing of her own order, she'd be taking at least half of her own burger home.

“And”—Vern nipped a french fry between his teeth, having apparently missed the whole exchange—“Yuri always told me there was this AME I really had to meet. Like I'd be interested in meeting a stodgy, old aircraft maintenance engineer who would discover in the first thirty seconds that I couldn't even change a car tire, much less fix a bird. He never let up on it. I'm guessing the old bastard meant you, but he never let on. Well, doesn't that beat all. You're a Seattle local, and I didn't know.”

“Closer than that. Fauntleroy.” It was the neighborhood where the Vashon-to-Seattle ferry landed, old houses and towering trees, mostly maple and oak. And it was funny how small the world was. “You know that big oak, kind of across from Thistle Street in Lincoln Park?”

He nodded, looking more than a little dumbfounded. The traffic off the ferry ran right along one side of Lincoln Park.

“I spent a lot of time up in that tree with a book. We lived about two blocks from there. No view of Puget Sound, so it was affordable, I guess, but right near the park which was all I cared about.” She'd probably watched him drive by at some time or other.

“That's…wow. You're not making all of this up?”

She didn't bother to answer. Yuri had loved teasing her about taking her home. At first she'd assumed it was the harmless flirting of an old man. But it wasn't, and now it made sense. A crazy kind of sense, but it fit together nonetheless. He'd wanted her to meet…Vern.

“Well”—Vern rubbed one of those large hands over his face as if trying to manually change his expression—“if you ever want to fly in it, he left the old Bell 47 to me.”