I took a little trip into Mel’s head, where I saw no lusty thoughts about me. If he’d been attracted, he’d have been thinking them, since I was right in front of him. Melwas thinking about the things Catfish Hennessy, Jason’s boss, had been saying about Jason in Bon Temps Auto Parts that day. Catfish’s tolerance balloon had burst, and he’d told Mel he was thinking about firing Jason.
Mel was plenty worried about my brother, bless his heart. I’d wondered my whole life how someone as selfish as my brother could attract such faithful friends. My great-grandfather had told me that people with a trace of fairy blood were more attractive to other humans, so maybe that explained it.
I went behind the bar to pour some more tea for Jane Bodehouse, who was trying to be sober today because she was trying to compile a list of the guys who might have given her chlamydia. A bar is a bad place to start a sobriety program—but Jane had hardly any chance of succeeding, anyway. I put a slice of lemon in the tea and carried it to Jane, watched her hands shake as she picked up the glass and drank from it.
“You want something to eat?” I asked, keeping my voice low and quiet. Just because I’d never seen a drunk reform in a bar, that didn’t mean it couldn’t happen.
Jane shook her head silently. Her dyed brown hair was already escaping the clip that held it back, and her heavy black sweater was covered with bits of this and that. Her makeup had been applied with a shaky hand. I could see the lipstick caked in the creases in her lips. Most of the area alcoholics might stop in Merlotte’s every now and then, but they based themselves at the Bayou. Jane was our only “resident” alkie since old Wil lie Chenier had died. When Jane was in the bar, she always sat on the same stool. Hoyt had made a label for it when he’d had too much to drink one night, but Sam had made him take it off.
I looked in Jane’s head for an awful minute or two, and I watched the slow shifting of thoughts behind her eyes, noticed the broken veins in her cheeks. The thought of becoming like Jane was enough to scare almost anyone sober.
I turned away to find Mel standing beside me. He was on his way to the men’s room, because that’s what was in his head when I looked.
“You know what they do in Hotshot with people like that?” he asked quietly, nodding his head toward Jane as if she couldn’t see or hear him. (Actually, I thought he was right about that. Jane was turned so inward that she didn’t seem to be acknowledging the world much today.)
“No,” I said, startled.
“They let them die,” he said. “They don’t offer them food or water or shelter, if the person can’t seek it for himself or herself.”
I’m sure my horror showed on my face.
“It’s kindest in the end,” he said. He drew a deep, shuddering breath. “Hotshot has its ways of getting rid of the weak.”
He went on his way, his back stiff.
I patted Jane on the shoulder, but I’m afraid I wasn’t really thinking about her. I was wondering what Mel had done to deserve his exile to a duplex in Bon Temps. If it had been me, I would have been happy to be rid of the multiple ties of kinship and the microscopic hierarchy of the little cluster of houses huddled around the old crossroads, but I could tell that wasn’t the way Mel felt about it.
Mel’s ex-wife had a margarita in Merlotte’s from time to time. I thought I might do a little research on my brother’s new buddy the next time Ginjer dropped by.
Sam asked me a couple of times if I was okay, and I was surprised by the strength of my desire to talk to him about everything that had happened lately. I was astonished to realize how often I confided in Sam, how much he knew about my secret life. But I knew that Sam had enough on his plate right now. He was on the phone with his sister and his brother several times during the evening, which was really unusual for him. He looked harassed and worried, and it would be selfish to add to that load of worry.
The cell phone in my apron pocket vibrated a couple of times, and when I had a free moment, I ducked into the ladies’ room and checked my text messages. One from Eric. “Protection coming,” it said. That was good. There was another message, and this one was from Alcide Herveaux, the Shreveport pack leader. “Tray called. Trouble Ur way?” it read. “We owe U.”
My chances of survival had risen considerably, and I felt much more cheerful as I finished out my shift.
It was good to have stockpiled favors with both vampires and werewolves. Maybe all the shit I’d gone through last fall would prove to have been worth it after all.
All in all, though, I had to say my project for the evening had been a washout. Sure, after asking Sam for permission, I’d filled both the plastic water guns with juice from the lemons in the refrigerator (intended for iced tea). I thought maybe real lemons would somehow be more potent than the bottled lemon juice at home. So I felt a little safer, but the sum total of my knowledge about the death of Crystal had not increased by one fact. Either the murderers hadn’t come in the bar, weren’t fretting over the evil thing they’d done, or weren’t thinking about it at the moment I was looking inside their heads.Or, I thought,all of the above .
Chapter 15
I had vampire protection, of a sort, waiting for me after work. Bubba was standing by my car when I left Merlotte’s. He grinned when he saw me, and I was glad to give him a hug. Most people wouldn’t have been pleased to see a mentally defective vampire with a penchant for cat blood, but I’d become fond of Bubba.
“When did you get back in town?” I asked. Bubba had gotten caught in New Orleans during Katrina, and he’d required a long recovery. The vampires were willing to accommodate him, because he had been one of the most famous people in the world until he’d been brought over in a morgue in Memphis.
“’Bout a week ago. Good to see you, Miss Sookie.” Bubba’s fangs slid out to show me how glad. Just as quickly, they snicked back into concealment. Bubba still had talent. “I’ve been traveling. I’ve been staying with friends. But I was in Fangtasia tonight visiting Mr. Eric, and he asked if I’d like the job of keeping watch over you. I told him, ‘Miss Sookie and me, we’re real good friends, and that would suit me just fine.’ Have you gotten another cat?”
“No, Bubba, I haven’t.” Thank God.
“Well, I got me some blood in a cooler in the back of my car.” He nodded toward a huge old white Cadillac that had been restored with time and trouble and lots of cash.
“Oh, the car’s beautiful,” I said. I almost added, “Did you own it while you were alive?” But Bubba didn’t like references to his former state of existence; they made him upset and confused. (If you put it very carefully, from time to time he’d sing for you. I’d heard him do “Blue Christmas.” Unforgettable.)
“Russell give that to me,” he said.
“Oh, Russell Edgington? The King of Mississippi?”
“Yeah, wasn’t that nice? He said since he was king of my home state, he felt like giving me something special.”
“How’s he doing?” Russell and his new husband, Bart, had both survived the Rhodes hotel bombing.
“He’s feeling real good now. He and Mr. Bart are both healed up.”
“I’m so glad to hear it. So, are you supposed to follow me home?”
“Yes’m, that’s the plan. If you’ll leave your back door unlocked, close to morning I’ll get into that hidey-hole in your guest bedroom; that’s what Mr. Eric said.”
Then it was doubly good that Octavia had moved out. I didn’t know how she would have reacted if I’d told her that the Man from Memphis needed to sleep in her closet all day long.