Now, in the prime of adulthood, the candy tortured him in a different way. He had enough of his own money to buy a piece of peppermint or chocolate, but the desire was gone. What an ironic waste. Just another way 1882 sucks the meat. He settled for a piece of chewing gum.
He was about to walk out with his groceries when he noticed a very pretty girl standing by the cookware, examining a pot. Had he been clearheaded and unfettered by the pain of a broken heart, he would probably have felt the stirrings of arousal, but Louise’s power had snuffed out any possibility of that. Still, on a rational level, he was able to acknowledge her good looks. She had dark hair, flawless skin, and pretty brown eyes. It occurred to him that this was a perfect opportunity to take proactive control of his stagnant condition and begin the task of moving on from Louise—much as that thought made him sick to his stomach. Albert popped the chewing gum into his mouth, put on his coolest expression, took a deep breath, and walked over to the girl.
“Hi,” he said.
She looked up momentarily, smiled with a polite “hello,” then went back to inspecting her pot.
“I, uh… notice you’re looking at pots,” he said.
“Yeah, I am,” she said, once again giving him the polite smile.
“Store’s pretty great, huh?” He smiled back. “There’s gotta be like twelve different items in here. I mean, how do you pick, right? It’s like sensory overload.” His humorous, sarcastic observation would surely get a giggle out of her.
“Yeah,” she answered, offering up a less enthusiastic variant of her smile.
“Ran that eight-item store outta business. Right? That was pretty sad.”
Now the girl did not respond at all. Her full attention was on the cookware.
Albert shifted his approach. “You ever tried gum?” he asked, deliberately increasing the volume of his chewing.
“No,” she said, her eyes now fixed on a set of plates.
“It’s this new thing, pretty cool.” Albert smiled with faux confidence. “Just came out, been makin’ its way around the country. It’s like candy, but you don’t have to swallow.”
The girl put the plates back down on the shelf and granted Albert a last perfunctory look of acknowledgment. “Well, have a good rest of your day,” she said, turning to the selection of fabrics farther down the shelf. Albert pretended to be very interested in a sack of henhouse feed for a moment, then moved to follow. He had one arrow left in his quiver.
“Hey, listen,” he said. “I don’t know if you’re doing anything next Sunday after church, but they’re gonna be delivering a big block of ice into town and… should be pretty cool to watch. You don’t usually get a chance to see that much ice all together in one place.”
“That doesn’t interest me,” she said.
“Yeah, no, me either; it’s gonna be stupid,” he responded, jumping ship on the idea.
Then all of a sudden she turned and looked directly at him, giving him her full attention. His courage swelled momentarily, unticlass="underline" “I just figured out where I’ve seen you,” she said. “Aren’t you the guy that backed out of that gunfight?”
“Uh, yeah… You were there?”
“Pretty much the whole town was there.”
“Whole town, yeah. Guess I’m a pretty popular guy.”
“No, not after that.”
Knowing he’d blown this encounter and feeling defensive, Albert reverted to grade-school mode.
“Oh, yeah, like you’re so popular,” he said.
“Actually, I was voted prom queen,” she responded.
“Well, okay, but… how many people were in your class? Like three?”
“Six.”
“Oh, actually, that’s a lot,” he admitted.
Albert spun on his heel and walked out, feeling like shit all over again.
And so it was for the next several days. No one could have accused Albert of not trying to get back on his feet in the dating department, but between the scant offerings available in Old Stump and Albert’s own romantic ineptitude, he found himself doomed to letdown after letdown.
There was young Betty Alden, the saloonkeeper’s daughter, who could outdrink any man and who ended up vomiting in Albert’s lap as they sat on the front porch of her home, looking at the stars. There was Georgia Behan, an attractive-enough young seamstress who, however, had a superfluous incisor growing from her left nostril, which made kissing her a painful and sometimes injurious experience. And there was Yao Ling, the lovely Chinese girl Albert had met on the road on his way back from Edward’s Shoe Repair, whom he had subsequently asked out to dinner. They met at Clara’s Restaurant, Old Stump’s one and only dining establishment, and it didn’t take long for the evening to go sour.
“So, tell me about your family,” Albert asked her as they were waiting to order. “What do your parents do?”
“Are you… are you serious?” she responded blankly.
“Well, yeah,” Albert said.
“My dad owns a business that manufactures brass light fixtures for upscale hotels.”
Albert was impressed. “Wow, really?”
Her expression instantly turned contemptuous. “No, he’s a fucking railroad builder, like every other Chinaman out here.”
Albert laughed nervously. “Oh. Ha. That other thing was so specific, I thought—well, I bet he’s a… really neat guy, though,” he offered lamely.
“Gosh, I wouldn’t know, I never see him,” she shot back with bitterness. “You know how many hours he works?”
“Um… all the live-long day?”
Yao Ling was on her feet and heading out the door within seconds.
“Wait—come on!” Albert shouted desperately. “Are you… even allowed to be offended by anything I do?”
But of all his botched attempts at moving on from Louise, perhaps the most uncomfortable was the blind date. One of the neighboring dirt farmers just across the range had said he had a daughter who was still unmarried and offered to set her up with Albert. Grateful for the thought, Albert accepted and suggested a lunch meeting at Clara’s. When he arrived, he found himself seated across the table from a twelve-year-old girl.
Marriage at a young age was, of course, not uncommon, but Albert wasn’t the type to go in for such an arrangement. It would be difficult to maintain a satisfying, mature relationship with a woman if you were constantly being asked to help with her homework. He tried to let her down easily.
“So, I uh… I know this sort of thing is totally acceptable out here on the frontier, but, uh… not gonna lie, something about it feels kinda weird.”
“My mother says I need to find a husband so I don’t become an old maid,” the girl said, shifting in her seat.
“Well, I… I think you got a few years ahead of you before that. How—how old are you?” asked Albert.
“I’ll be twelve in this many days,” she answered, proudly holding up eight fingers.
The waiter approached with his order pad. “Would you and your girlfriend like some dessert?” he asked.
“Oh, she’s not my girlfriend,” Albert answered a little too loudly. “Um, we’ll just take the check.” The waiter smiled and walked away.
“Why were you such a dick about that?” The girl scowled.
“What?”