But even in the most depressed areas, people need a place to throw back a drink or two. Domenick’s, housed in an end-of-group rowhouse, provided a clean, quiet place to do just that. The sign out front said only Bar, as if it were a generic place to drink. Inside, it proved to be just that. A place for regulars, this was clear to Tess when every pair of eyes in the quiet bar fixed on her. It was one o’clock, a little early to begin drinking, but not so early as to be ashamed of it. Besides, these were men and women whose days started earlier than most, if they started at all.
She took a seat at the bar and asked for a beer.
“What kind?” asked the bartender. He was a thin man in his middle forties, with a stoop and a very bad toupée. Hard to imagine telling your troubles to him.
Tess recognized the question for the test that it was.
“Not Natty Boh,” she said, “not after they left town. And I guess I can’t have a Carling Black Label either. What do you have on tap?”
“Michelob.”
“Michelob’s fine.”
“Not light beer, you understand. Just Michelob.”
“I never opt for the ‘light’ version of anything,” Tess said. “Do you serve any food?”
He tossed her a stained paper menu, which featured the usual bar delicacies and a few local specialties. Tess, who had been skimping on vegetables of late, soothed her conscience with an order of green pepper rings dipped in powdered sugar. Then she sat back and studied her surroundings, trying not to be obvious, given that the other customers continued to steal looks at her.
It was a plain, no-nonsense bar. One television set, tuned to ESPN and muted. The lower part of the walls was paneled, while the upper portion was covered with gold-flecked mirrors, which may have been intended to make the bar seem wider than it was, but the mirrors were now so smeary with age that they had a funhouse quality. A minimum of neon signage, a cigarette machine, two video poker machines, with the usual disclaimers about being for recreation only. Right. The booths along the wall were filled, mostly with men. One woman, maybe in her sixties, with dark hair and a doughy face creased by a lifetime of Luckies. No one was speaking, and no one else was eating. The only sounds were the bells and whistles of an old-fashioned pinball machine, over which two stringy young blond men were practically davening.
Perhaps no one ever ate here, for the young waitress who brought out her green pepper rings was clearly overwhelmed by the task. She held the tray out in front of her, arms locked, eyes almost crossed in concentration. She traversed the short distance from the kitchen door to Tess’s barstool as if walking across ice. No wonder-she wore ridiculous shoes for a waitress, lace-up platforms with four-inch heels. Tess had waited tables off and on during college, and she knew you had to sacrifice style for comfort. This girl would learn.
“Green pepper rings?” she asked in a sweet, high voice. Well, it was clear why she was hired. She was extraordinarily pretty in a fresh, wholesome way that made Tess feel craggy, old, and tough as leather. Pink cheeks, shiny brown hair, big blue eyes, and an almost comically perfect figure, an hourglass perched on long, coltish legs.
“Just put ’em down, Terry,” the bartender said, obviously unimpressed with her skills.
She placed the plate in front of Tess with a hard clatter, so the pepper rings jumped, and she did, too. Then she scurried back into the kitchen.
“You the owner?” Tess asked the bartender, fairly sure of the answer.
“Manager.”
“How long you worked here?”
“Off and on since it opened.”
She pulled her wallet from the knapsack she carried in place of a purse-a wallet thick with bills, she let the bartender’s eyes take that in-and showed him her license, then the sketch. Even before she could explain what she wanted, he was shaking his head. “No one I ever knew.”
“What about the other folks here?”
He held up the sketch. “Anyone know her?”
A few customers squinted at the sketch, but no one got up to take a closer look.
“Sorry.”
“Is the owner around?” she asked.
“The owner?”
“ Lawrence Purdy. I checked your file at the city liquor board.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because this girl, the one I’m looking for, told someone she worked at a place with a name like Domino’s. When I checked the files, I found Domenick’s and thought that might be it.”
“Well, it wasn’t.”
“Anyway, Lawrence Purdy-”
“He’s not real active. Bought the place as an investment, I run it. Never shows his face around here. He probably couldn’t pick me out of a lineup.”
“Interesting figure of speech,” Tess said. “You ever been in a lineup?”
The bartender’s eyes met hers, and he grinned. “Nope.”
Her fingers were caked with powdered sugar. She wiped them off on the paper napkin as best she could, then counted out several bills for the check that the bartender had left by her plate. Five dollars total. Not bad for such a nutritionally complete lunch.
As she stood to leave, the waitress skittered out of the kitchen and began clearing her place. She almost made it back to the swinging kitchen door before she dropped the plate on the worn linoleum floor, where it shattered into dozens of white shards.
“Your tip will just about cover that,” the bartender told the girl, and the patrons in the bar laughed, with the exception of the guys at the pinball machine, who didn’t seem to notice anything but their game. The girl flushed, but she did not look particularly embarrassed, or cowed. More puzzled than anything else, Tess thought. It was as if she had awakened from a dream and found herself in this musty little tavern, wearing an apron and waiting tables, but she couldn’t quite believe it. She had the look of a girl who was waiting for her life to begin.
Tess wasn’t going to be the one to break it to her that it already had.
chapter 8
TESS WANTED TO GO IN SEARCH OF LAWRENCE PURDY, Domenick’s owner, that very afternoon, but she had a long-standing date to go Christmas shopping with Whitney.
“I’ve done most of my shopping,” Tess had objected, when Whitney demanded her company. “I did it early so I wouldn’t have to go into a mall this time of year.”
“But I need moral support,” Whitney had said. “Besides, you can use the time to browse, figure out what you want for Christmas. Crow told me he’s asked you a dozen times what you want, and you always say nothing.”
“I tell my parents the same thing,” Tess said. “Can I help it if I’m the girl who has everything?”
She really was having trouble coming up with a list of anything she needed, much less wanted. Having lived close to the bone for a few years-although not quite as close as she now remembered those times-Tess had broken herself of the habit of desiring things. Besides, knowing you could afford what you wanted made these items less urgent. The problem was, she was scared to invest her money; she kept everything in her checking account, so her bank balance was now almost embarrassingly large. Even Whitney was impressed; she whistled when she saw the balance on the ATM slip. Whitney being the sort of friend who would look, unself-conciously, at a friend’s ATM slip, if it were left out in public view. Tess caught her reading it when she came back from the bathroom.