“Now that’s a drink for a lady,” Chucky said.
“I meant a cocktail!” Kitty said. “That’s going to taste gross to her! She’s not used to it! She went to private school!”
“Let’s see,” said Ruth Thomas, and she drank down the whiskey Chucky gave her, not in one swallow, but pretty quickly.
“Very fruity,” she said. “Very sweet.”
The drink radiated a pleasant warmth in her bowels. Her lips felt bigger. She had another drink, and she started to feel incredibly affectionate. She gave Kitty Pommeroy a long, strong hug, and said, “You were always my favorite Pommeroy sister,” which couldn’t have been further from the truth but felt good to say.
“I hope things work out for you, Ruthie,” Kitty slurred.
“Aw, Kitty, you’re sweet. You’ve always been so sweet to me.”
“We all want things to work out for you, hon. We’re all just holding our fingers, hoping it all works out.”
“Holding your fingers?” Ruth frowned.
“Crossing our breath, I mean,” Kitty said, and they both nearly fell down laughing.
Chucky Strachan made Ruth another drink.
“Am I a great bartender?” he asked.
“You really know how to mix whiskey and ice in a glass,” Ruth conceded. “That’s for sure.”
“That’s my cousin getting married,” he said. “We need to celebrate. Dotty Wishnell is my cousin! Hey! Charlie Burden is my cousin, too!”
Chucky Strachan leaped out from behind the bar and grabbed Kitty Pommeroy. He buried his face in Kitty’s neck. He kissed Kitty all over her face, all over the good side of her face, the side that wasn’t burn-scarred. Chucky was a skinny guy, and his pants dropped lower and lower over his skinny ass. Each time he bent over the slightest bit, he displayed a nice New England cleavage. Ruth tried to avert her eyes. A matronly woman in a floral skirt was waiting for a drink, but Chucky didn’t notice her. The woman smiled hopefully in his direction, but he slapped Kitty Pommeroy’s bottom and opened himself a beer.
“Are you married?” Ruth asked Chucky, as he licked Kitty’s neck.
He pulled away, threw a fist in the air, and announced, “My name is Clarence Henry Strachan and I am married!”
“May I have a drink, please?” the matronly lady asked politely.
“Talk to the bartender!” shouted Chucky Strachan, and he took Kitty out on the plywood dance floor in the middle of the tent.
The wedding service itself had been insignificant to Ruth. She had barely watched it, barely paid attention. She was amazed by the size of Dotty’s father’s yard, amazed by his nice garden. Those Wishnells certainly had money. Ruth was used to Fort Niles weddings, where the guests brought casseroles and pots of beans and pies. After the wedding, there’d be a great sorting of the serving dishes. Whose tray is this? Whose coffee machine is this?
The wedding of Dotty Wishnell and Charlie Burden, on the other hand, had been catered by a mainland expert. And there was, as Pastor Wishnell had promised, a professional photographer. The bride wore white, and some of the guests who had been to Dotty’s first wedding said this gown was even nicer than the last one. Charlie Burden, a stocky character with an alcoholic’s nose and suspicious eyes, made an unhappy groom. He looked depressed to be standing there in front of everyone, saying the formal words. Dotty’s little daughter, Candy, as maid of honor, had cried, and when her mother tried to comfort her, said nastily, “I’m not crying!” Pastor Wishnell went on and on about Responsibilities and Rewards.
And after it was over, Ruth got drunk. And after she got drunk, she set to dancing. She danced with Kitty Pommeroy and Mrs. Pommeroy and with the groom. She danced with Chucky Strachan, the bartender, and with two handsome young men in tan pants, who, she found out later, were summer people. Summer people at an island wedding! Imagine that! She danced with both of those men a few times, and she got the feeling that she was somehow making fun of them, though she couldn’t later remember what she’d said. She dropped a lot of sarcastic comments that they didn’t seem to get. She even danced with Cal Cooley when he asked her. The band played country music.
“Is the band from here?” she asked Cal, and he said that the musicians had come over on Babe Wishnell’s boat.
“They’re good,” Ruth said. For some reason she was allowing herself to be held very close by Cal Cooley. “I wish I could play an instrument. I’d like to play the fiddle. I can’t even sing. I can’t play anything. I can’t even play a radio. Are you having fun, Cal?”
“I’d have a lot more fun if you’d slide up and down my leg as if it were a greased fire pole.”
Ruth laughed.
“You look good,” he told Ruth. “You should wear pink more often.”
“I should wear pink more often? I’m wearing yellow.”
“I said you should drink more often. I like the way it makes you feel. All soft and yielding.”
“What am I wielding?” Ruth said, but she was only pretending not to understand.
He sniffed her hair. She let him. She could tell he was sniffing her hair, because she could feel his puffs of breath on her scalp. He pressed himself against her leg, and she could feel his erection. She let him do that, too. What the hell, she figured. He ground himself against her. He rocked her slowly. He kept his hands low on her back and pulled her tight against him. She let him do all that. What the hell, she kept thinking. It was Old Cal Cooley, but it felt pretty good. He kissed her on the top of the head, and suddenly it was as if she woke up.
It was Cal Cooley!
“Oh, my God, I have to pee,” Ruth said, and pulled herself away from Cal, which wasn’t easy, because he made a fight to hold her. What was she doing dancing with Cal Cooley? Jesus Christ. She weaved her way out of the tent, out of the yard, and walked down the street until the street ended and the woods began. She stepped behind a tree, lifted her dress, and peed on a flat rock, proudly managing to not splatter her legs. She couldn’t believe she had felt Cal Cooley’s penis, even faintly, pressing through his pants. That was disgusting. She made a pact with herself to do anything she had to do for the rest of her life to forget that she had ever felt Cal Cooley’s penis.
When she walked out of the woods, she took a wrong turn and ended up on a street marked FURNACE STREET. They have street signs here? she wondered. Like the other streets on Courne Haven, this one was unpaved. It was dusk. She passed a small white house with a porch; on the porch was an old woman in a flannel shirt. She was holding a fluffy yellow bird. Ruth peered at the bird and at the woman. She was feeling wobbly on her feet.
“I’m looking for Babe Wishnell’s house,” she said. “Can you tell me where it is? I think I’m lost.”
“I’ve been taking care of my sick husband for years,” the woman said, “and my memory’s not what it ought to be.”
“How’s your husband doing, ma’am?”
“He doesn’t have many good days anymore.”
“Really sick, is he?”
“Dead.”
“Oh.” Ruth scratched a mosquito bite on her ankle. “Do you know where Babe Wishnell’s house is? I’m supposed to be at a wedding there.”
“I think it’s right up the next street. After the greenhouse. Take a left,” the woman said. “It’s been some time since I was there.”
“The greenhouse? You guys have a greenhouse on this island?”
“Oh, I don’t think so, love.”
Ruth was confused for a moment; then she figured it out. “Do you mean that I should take a left after the house that’s painted green?”
“I think you should, yes. But my memory’s not what it ought to be.”