Olivia (21 page)

“I don’t know…” Olivia tried to get a read off of Clete, but his face revealed nothing.

Allie sat on the plastic bench and started changing her shoes. “I still have the stuffed chicken, but Juicy Fruit ate the snake.”

“What’s she talking about, Clete?” Olivia asked.

Clete busied himself with his own shoes. “I have no idea.”

“Go get us some more beers,” Mitch ordered. He drained the last swig from his bottle then set the empty on the table. “And get me some of those cheese ball things.”

Olivia shot one last glance at Clete before she headed to the bar. She remembered leaving Walmart on the scooter after the psychotic parrot laughed at her, but how would Clete know about it? She knew she didn’t tell him. Hell, she didn’t even remember what happened between leaving Walmart and walking home to the trailer court sans scooter and everything else she’d stolen from the store. Looking back, it was all just a fuzzy blur of confusing emotion.

Oh, shit!
Maybe Walmart caught her on camera and turned the tape over to the police for investigation! Great! Now on top of everything else she had to worry about being arrested for grand larceny.

“Damn it, Liv, you forgot the ranch dressing,” Mitch said when she came back to the table with their beers and his cheese balls. “How stupid are you?”

“Sorry, I’ll go get it.” She turned to head back to the bar, but he brushed past her.

“I’ve got it.”

She grabbed his arm. “Jeez, I said I’d get it! Just bowl. It’s your turn anyways.”

“I already went. It’s your turn.”

Mitch stormed off to the bar and Olivia rolled her eyes. He’d been in a fine mood until Clete showed up, but he was starting to get cranky, which meant they would probably be fighting before the night was over. Wonderful.

She bowled her round then sat on the bench and waited for Mitch to return. Allie was up on her and Clete’s lane, and she was pretty good. She had nice form and follow-through. With her first ball, she knocked down seven pins, but she missed her spare. Clete threw his first ball and got a strike.

“Ooh, looks like someone’s spent some time in the alley,” Olivia said, applauding his performance.

“A little bit,” he admitted.

“Dad plays on a league,” Allie said. She threw her next ball and got her own strike, then turned back to Clete and gave him a fist bump.

“Way to go, Allie!” Olivia cheered. The kid was cute with her aw-shucks grin and her blonde hair plaited in a slightly crooked braid that Olivia imagined Clete did himself. She couldn’t imagine Eugene had ever braided her hair when she was a kid, and she felt a little twinge of jealousy.

“Who’s up?” Mitch asked when he returned to the table.

“You,” Olivia said.

She watched him bowl and noticed for the first time how hard he threw the ball. It was as if he was trying not only to knock the pins down, but also smash them into smithereens. His style was different from Clete’s who exerted a little more control and a lot more finesse, but the result was the same. Mitch threw a strike.

Olivia took her turn and missed the strike but got the spare. Allie smiled and clapped for Olivia as Olivia had done for Allie, and Clete told her, “Good job.” Mitch said nothing, just picked up his ball and threw another strike. For the rest of the two games that were running parallel to each other, Mitch threw more strikes than spares, as did Clete, and Olivia and Allie ran a pretty close tie to each other. In the end, Olivia bowled a 197, Allie a 186, Clete a 227 and Mitch a 225.

Clete had ordered a pizza, so he and Allie sat out the next round to eat it. Olivia and Mitch kept bowling and Olivia bowled her best game with her sixth beer—a 210. Mitch also did better with a 247, and he started to get a little cocky. When Clete and Allie finished eating and returned to bowling, Olivia was on her seventh beer and should have known better, but when Mitch challenged Clete and Allie to a game against him and Olivia, Olivia thought it was a grand idea and goaded Clete until he agreed.

The details of the match are too ugly to put into words, but let’s just say Olivia was in fine form and bowled a 104, and almost all of those points came in the first five frames. She messed up on her own in frames six and seven, Mitch’s cursing and tantrum throwing messed up frame eight, and Olivia sent all four balls of frames nine and ten down the gutter on purpose to piss Mitch off. Before the match was over, Clete sent Allie into the arcade with twenty dollars and strict instructions not to come back out until he went and got her.

Mitch called Olivia some colorful names, Olivia pulled out her gigantic box of Crayola-words on him, and Clete tried to forcibly separate the two of them. The bowling alley manager watched from behind the counter with his hand on the phone debating whether Clete could handle the drunks on his own or if he should call in some cops who weren’t off duty and would therefore be carrying guns. When the words “needle dick prick” crossed Olivia’s lips, Mitch threw his size-eleven, rented shoes at her face and stormed out of the bowling alley.

Olivia cursed and fumed and threw a bit of a tantrum, then shoved her feet into her tennis shoes and headed for the door. Clete grabbed her by the arm. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Home!”

“How are you planning to get there?”

“I’ve got feet!”

“It’s nearly five miles from here to your house, and it’s pouring rain,” Clete said.

She struggled to free herself of Clete’s grasp. “So?”

“You’re not walking, Olivia.”

“Then I’ll hitch.”

“I’ll give you a ride,” Clete offered. “Hang on a second while I get Allie from the arcade.”

“Ooh! You think they have skee-ball?” Her anger instantly forgotten, she took off for the arcade.

Clete was a step behind her, tugging on the back of her shirt, trying to stop her, but her mind was focused. When she saw the twinkling lights and heard the comforting
whoosh!
of the heavy, wooden balls sliding up the ramp as a boy of about five-years old played a round on the ancient machine, she giggled and clapped her hands and jumped up and down in joy.

“Gimme a quarter! Gimme a quarter!” she squealed as she clutched onto Clete’s arm.

“Here,” Allie said and handed something to Olivia. “You have to use tokens. You can have the rest of mine.”

Olivia opened her hand and saw four shiny, golden tokens. She giggled again as she rushed right over to the open lane and dropped two tokens into the slot.

“Bah da da da da de dum! Charge!”
Olivia sang as nine heavy, wooden balls released and slid down the chute. She picked the first one up and turned to Clete and Allie. “Prepare to be amazed!”

Now, it should be noted that unlike bowling or soccer or volleyball, which are all games of chance and dumb luck, skee-ball is a game of skill, and Olivia was gifted with massive amounts of skee-ball skill. When she told Clete that she would be Olympic champion of skee-ball, she wasn’t exaggerating, and she proved it with a score of 750. Allie’s eyes bugged out as the tickets spewed out of the machine as if it were possessed by the devil. Olivia ripped the rope of tickets off and handed them over to Allie, then slid the last two tokens into the slot. Her next game was only 695, but she didn’t care. She was in the zone.

Like a twitchy junkie needing a fix, Olivia demanded, “Gimme more tokens!”

Clete pulled five dollars out of his wallet and gave it to Allie who rushed over to the token machine and returned to Olivia with a plastic cup full of golden coins. Olivia turned the golden coins into a mile-long purple snake of tickets, which Allie then carted off to the ticket counter. The attendant traded her tickets for a handful of scented erasers, some plastic bracelets, a Be-Dazzled coin purse, a stuffed monkey, six lollypops, and a poster of the boy band Allie adored. Allie immediately unrolled the poster and drew a heart around the face of Nick Jonas with the magic marker she carried in her back pocket at all times just in case he happened to be in Juliette, Nebraska, shopping at the Walmart or eating a Big Mac at McDonald’s and he wanted to give her his autograph.

Allie handed all of her goodies off to Clete and linked arms with Olivia, declaring them best friends forever. The two skipped off through the parking lot and splashed in the puddles. Clete grumbled words that didn’t belong in idle conversation under his breath as he tagged along behind them. Allie fell asleep in the backseat as they drove through Juliette, headed towards South.

Olivia watched Clete watch Allie through the rearview mirror. “She’s a cute kid.”

“Yeah, she is,” he agreed. His grip tightened on the steering wheel, his jaw clenched hard as he turned to look at Olivia. “And she’s a good kid who shouldn’t have had to witness what she did tonight. My daughter is off-limits to you from now on.”

“
Why?
” Olivia cried out, completely floored. Clete’s words smacked like a slap to the face, and they hurt. “What did I do?”

“What did you do?” he asked in dumbfounded disbelief over her stupidity. “You got fall-down drunk and lost control of yourself, and your temper, in front of a seven-year-old kid!”

“But, I—”

“And Mitch?” Clete practically spat out the name. “I’ve known that jerk for a long time now. He’s not a nice guy, and he’s not someone I want my daughter around.”

“I’m not drunk,” Olivia said. “And what’s wrong with Mitch?”

“You are drunk. You’re just too drunk to realize it. And Mitch was born an asshole and will always be an asshole,” Clete said without explaining anything.

“You guys didn’t act like you knew each other when you showed up at the bowling alley,” Olivia said.

“Oh, I doubt Mitch remembers me, but I sure remember him.”

“What, did you guys grow up together, or something? He bully you at school and steal your lunch money?”

“No,” Clete answered but said no more.

“Steal your girlfriend?”

“We’re not talking about this right now, Olivia. Not with Allie in the car.”

“Whatever.” Olivia pressed her body against the car door and stared out the window at the neon lights of Juliette’s main drag reflecting in rain puddles as they drove by. She was upset and close to tears, and didn’t want to be trapped in the car with Clete anymore, but she didn’t want to walk home either, so she kept her mouth shut and sulked.

When Clete pulled up to Olivia’s trailer, Eugene was sitting on her deck, smoking and knee-bouncing, waiting for her. The rain had stopped but the trees overhead sprinkled leftover rain drops down upon him, spotting his glasses and peppering his grey, one-pocket tee with water spots that spread like black ink as they soaked into the cotton fabric. Chester was nowhere to be seen, which meant he had probably run off again. Eugene confirmed her suspicion as soon as she stepped onto the porch.

“He’ll come home, Eugene,” she assured him with a weary sigh. “He always does.”

Olivia asked if he wanted to come in for awhile. He said nothing in return, like always, but he did watch out of the corner of his eye as Clete stepped out of his squad car and approached the deck.

“Good evening, sir,” Clete said with a nod of greeting. He did not offer his hand to shake Eugene’s. Instead, he pulled a card from his wallet and held it out to Olivia. “I want you to keep my phone number on you at all times. You can call anytime, day or night, and I’ll be here in an instant.”

“Why would I want to call you?”

“Olivia, please take the card.”

“Bite me, asshole.” Olivia went inside without taking the card and slammed the door in his face. If she never laid eyes on Officer Cletus Wade ever again, that would be too soon for her.

*  *  *

Mitch stayed pissy at Olivia and wouldn’t return her calls or texts or answer his door when she knocked. Izzie’s house was overrun by kids 24/7 and the sheer volume of it made Olivia’s ears bleed. She wasn’t talking to Clete, and she was still avoiding Kitty’s and George like the plague. So, with nowhere else to go, Olivia started hanging out at the Walmart again after work.

Afraid they had video footage of her stealing their scooter and were eagerly waiting for her to walk through the doors to pounce on her and send her to the pokey, she was cautious the first time she went. But when alarms didn’t sound and the ninety-five-year-old security guard didn’t hogtie her in the aisle, she got her confidence back. She did her normal, initial purchase scoot-around, and then did her follow-up laps with vodka and Dr. Pepper in her McDonald’s cup as though it were any other day.

She was on her third lap without seeing Louise and figured the old woman had quit coming to the Walmart altogether when Olivia came across her in the Garden Center. Louise’s scooter was parked next to one of the display patio sets and she was lounging on a lounge chair, wearing a big floppy sunhat, drinking out of a pink, plastic martini cup, playing Sudoku. Louise was brazen in her rebellion, and Olivia was highly impressed.

“Well, Olivia, my child! I haven’t seen you in ages! How in the world are you, my dear?” Louise asked in a faintly-southern accent.

Olivia paused for a moment, confused. She had just seen Louise not even two hours earlier at Garretson. Of course, she hadn’t seen the off-work Louise in a long time, so maybe that was the personality who was talking to her.

“I’ve been good,” Olivia said, and scooted over to her.

“Don’t park on the carpet, child,” Louise scolded. Olivia immediately reversed off the outdoor rug and climbed off the scooter. Louise picked up a plate of Vienna Fingers off of the end table beside her. “Cookie?”

“Don’t mind if I do.” Olivia gingerly took the top cookie, careful not to disturb the pretty, pinwheel display, then sat in the chair next to Louise. “I like what you’ve done with the place.”

“How sweet of you to notice.”

Louise did have a nice set-up. She had re-arranged the furniture in the display, and added rugs, strings of lights and an oscillating fan. Giant bushels of fall mums and pansies were scattered about in a way that looked haphazard but homey. Patsy Cline sang softly on a Bose CD player, and the area smelled faintly of jasmine and wild orchid, thanks to the Glade Plug-In powered by the extension cord tucked under the rug. She had a stainless steel shaker and a bucket of ice on a silver tray standing at the ready for another martini, the pinwheel of cookies, an assortment of cheese chunks, and a pretty bowl of fruit salad in case she got hungry.