It seemed to be commonly agreed that he was on his way to becoming a four-star general when cruel fate intervened in the last week of his third tour in Vietnam. He was a colonel by then, and was leading his brigade on a sweep, when he bent over to pick something up, and, no kidding, got shot right in the ass by some Vietcong with a nasty sense of humor and a crossbow.
Sounded kinda funny, but the doctors didn’t think so. He spent a year in the hospital as the doctors kept chasing infections and trying to repair the various internal canals that had been punctured. When they were done, his insides had been rearranged in some pretty nutty ways and his military career was over. No more punishing early-morning runs. No more daily dozens. No more troops to push around or medals to be earned.
He wasn’t bitter, though. He took a job selling cars, because he needed the kind of work where he could dash off at least once an hour to purge in a bathroom. And damn, did he sell lots of cars. He spent fifteen years pushing autos and crapping his brains out, until he ended up owning three dealerships and being worth a small fortune. His dealerships were something else, too. They were the tidiest, most orderly car lots anybody ever saw. Every car was spit-shined daily and lined up, dress-right-dress. The salesmen popped to attention and nearly saluted anytime they approached a potential buyer. I always got nervous when I stepped on one of his lots, but most customers seemed to like it.
My brother, who was a year older than me, knew from birth he didn’t want to be like my father. He grew his hair long, registered as a Democrat when he was only six, got tattooed, wore earrings, and was in trouble with the military police almost habitually. About three years ago, he sold the Internet company he founded and retired at the ripe old age of thirty-seven. He has about a hundred and fifty million in the bank and spends every day sitting in the backyard of his huge house, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean, smoking dope nearly every waking hour and laughing his ass off at the way it all turned out.
I was smarter than him. I followed in my father’s footsteps. I took an ROTC scholarship and chose a career that paid squat, that treated its people like cannon fodder, that had no qualms about ending a career over a stupid thing like a reporter with a nasty grudge against a tight-lipped Army lawyer.
I hadn’t had a good strong drink in over a week, and things being what they were, very badly wanted that rectified. Tout suite, as they say. I lifted up the phone and asked first Delbert, then Morrow, if they wished to join me downstairs in the bar.
Delbert begged off, saying he wanted to prepare his questions for tomorrow.
Morrow said, “Sure, be down in ten minutes.”
I’d be lying if I said this was a disappointing outcome.
I was on my first scotch on the rocks when Morrow arrived in tight jeans and a loose-fitting knit shirt. I decided on the spot that if this woman ever wanted to get out of the legal field, she could make a pretty good go as a model. Or, better yet, in my suddenly frenzied imagination, as a stripper. I wasn’t the only one who noticed, either, because there were lots of Italian men in the bar, and Italian men aren’t exactly reticent about showing their admiration of the opposite sex. They sure as hell weren’t pulling their punches when they saw her.
“So what will you have?” I asked as she slipped into the chair across from me, trying to act oblivious to the drooling fools who were whistling and catcalling in some strange tongue. I halfway expected her to order an Evian bottle with a twist of lemon or some such obscenely healthful drink.
“Scotch on the rocks,” she said, which nearly threw me off my chair.
I stuck my finger up for the bartender to send over one of the same, then turned back and decided it was time to reappraise Miss Morrow. I sniffed the air once or twice and the odor of lilies filled my nostrils. We were dealing with an oxymoron here. A man can always tell a lot about a woman from her choice of perfumes, and lilies are something I always associate with the wholesome, midwestern variety of her gender. The ones who stay virgins till they’re twenty-one. The ones who call their mothers every week and still send money to their old 4-H clubs. The ones who don’t go near scotch.
“That your normal drink?” I asked.
She sort of smiled. “No. Usually I’d just order an Evian with a twist of lemon, but I wanted to surprise you.”
I guess I blinked once or twice, and she giggled, apparently delighted that she’d beat me at my own game.
“Yeah, I usually drink Evian, too,” I finally said, thinking I was being witty.
“No, you usually drink scotch. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that you’ve never taken a sip from a bottle of Evian in your life.”
“And why would you bet that?”
“Because. Want to play a little truth or consequences?”
If I weren’t such an overconfident guy, I would’ve said no, right then and there. Instead, I stupidly said, “Sure. What’s the stake?”
“Point-by-point loser chugs a shot of scotch. Overall loser pays the tab.”
“All right,” I said, withdrawing a quarter from my pocket and flipping it. “Heads or tails?”
“Heads,” she said, and it came down heads, and I should’ve quit right then and there.
“Okay.” She smiled. “What’s your father do?”
“He’s a hairdresser,” I said. “Lives in San Francisco and works at one of those men’s hair parlors frequented by gays. He’s kinda fruity, too, but he had this one-time fling with a woman, and I was the result.”
“Drink!” she ordered me. “Your father is ridiculously heterosexual. In fact, if I was to guess, I’d say he was career Army.”
I wiped a few drops of scotch off my lips, stuck my hand up for the bartender to send over another, and did my best to hide my shock. “Why’d you guess that?” I finally asked, hating to think I was that easy to read.
“I wasn’t guessing. I was making a reasoned deduction. Sons of strong-willed men often become very rebellious and act like wiseasses. I know. A lot of them end up as my clients.”
“Okay,” I said, wanting an early victory to even the score, “where are you from?”
“Ames, Iowa,” she said. “I grew up on a farm, spent my childhood milking cows, plucking eggs from underneath hens, and praying desperately that I’d get into law school.”
“That’s true,” I declared. “Drink! And don’t forget the part about how you were crowned homecoming queen and almost married the captain of the football team.”
“You drink,” she ordered. “I’ve never been to Ames, Iowa, in my life. I’m from the Northeast, was born and raised in a city, and the closest I’ve ever come to a cow is digging into its broiled carcass on my plate.”
My mouth kind of fell open as I reached down for my shot glass. “Really?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“Really,” she said with a vague smile. “And for your information, I went to an all-girls’ private school. We didn’t have homecoming queens. Or a football team, either. We had a field hockey team, and I didn’t date the captain, because I was the captain.”
I gulped the scotch and considered the proposition that she had schemed on playing this game before she ever came down here. She must have deliberately doused herself in that lily-smelling perfume just to throw me off her scent. No play on words intended.
She still hadn’t touched a drop of her scotch. She grinned, then said, “Okay, why’d you leave the infantry and become a lawyer?”
I stared at the new shot glass that had just appeared and thought about that a moment. Finally, I kind of shrugged and admitted, “I guess I got tired of killing people. I went to war a couple of times and decided I really didn’t like it all that much.”
She studied me a moment, staring deeply into my eyes, and her face suddenly became very soft. Her eyes, which I already mentioned were abundantly sympathetic, acquired a few more notches of compassion. “Drink,” she said, almost remorsefully.
“Nah, you drink!” I shot back. “I had a great time at war. In fact, I nearly cried when they were over.”