Joe Page 7

  Michael handed Trey his beer and his twenty. “I told you the drinks were on me, dude,” Trey said, shoving the money back at Michael.

  Michael stuffed the bill in Trey’s shirt pocket. “They were free.”

  His best friend’s eyebrows drew together. “Free?”

  “Yeah, I go to school with the bartender,” Michael explained.

  Trey’s eyes went to the raven-haired girl behind the bar, and Michael noticed that his friend also stared at her for a moment too long, not as though he found her beautiful, but in a way that suggested he found her too interesting for just a passing glance. Michael came to the conclusion that the girl named Joe must have that effect on everyone.

  “Did you see those girls standing over by the door? Dude, the one in the blue tank top was checking you out,” Trey said, giving Michael a little shove. “I’ll take the brunette next to her. Come on, let’s go get on that.”

  Michael allowed Trey to pull him away from the bar and over to the group of girls. As Trey introduced them both, the girls giggled and batted eyelashes. That was really Michael’s only observance of the conversation and the ladies from that point on. He couldn’t take his mind off the girl behind the bar. He wondered if the name Joe was short for something, like Josephine or Jonessa. He wondered if she didn’t speak much because she was self-conscious about her stutter, which occurred to him as he stood catching peeks at her over his shoulder. She danced around behind the bar, moving with grace and intent, flipping up liquor bottles and slinging beers. She seemed to him at that moment a whole different species, exotic and foreign. That was her allure, he thought, the otherness about her was so complete.

  The blond that Trey had picked out for him was in the middle of some tale about her dog when Michael glanced back and saw that Joe was no longer behind the bar. In her place was an older woman with blond hair and blue eyes. He recognized her from when he used to come here with his father. She was the owner, and the one who used to give him extra cherries in his Shirley Temples. Her name was Susan, in case the name of the bar didn’t give it away.

  Michael swept his eyes across the small bar, looking for the girl. He spotted her moving through the crowd very quickly, but calmly. He couldn’t explain it, but the sudden urge to follow her overtook him, and he excused himself from his friend and the group of girls. By the time he made it to the exit, Joe was already out of sight.

  He pushed through the door and out into the night. The weather was getting warmer, so there were swarms of insects flying under the pools of light surrounding the parking lot. Behind him he could hear the music of the bar and in front of him the sounds of Highway 71. His eyes swept the parking lot, looking for the girl.

  He spotted her passing quickly between two cars and toward the other side of the parking lot. Jumping off the third wooden step, he followed her lead. He considered whether or not to call out to her, but decided he didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t say why he was compelled to follow her, but he was.

  Michael had always been hyper-aware of the feelings of others, noticing the tiny indications most folks displayed that showed their true colors. He didn’t overlook things. He paid attention to the actions and reactions of everyone he encountered and analyzed them so as to better understand. It was part of what made him a writer; everyone was subject to becoming a character in one of his stories. Somehow Michael knew that the raven-haired girl, Joe, was not only an interesting character, but also probably held an interesting story as well.

  He thought he was being stealthy, but as he passed between a truck and a SUV, Joe, who was just up ahead of him, stopped and swiveled in her tracks. Her head whipped to the side and her silver-blue eyes locked on him before he had a chance to think about ducking or hiding. Half of her face was in shadows, but the light reflecting from one of her strange eyes gave voice to her annoyance at Michael’s tailing her.

  Michael didn’t know what to say, but he opened his mouth anyway, wondering just what was going to come out of it. Before he could form a thought, the girl turned on her heel and continued on in the direction she had been heading. Before he could stop himself, he continued following her.

  He stopped when he saw her destination, halting at the backs of two cars. Joe was in the middle of one of the exit lanes, next to another young woman in a short black skirt and red tank top.

  “Huh-hey, you okay?” Joe asked.

  The young woman was bent forward, her hands clutching her knees and her sweaty blond hair hanging in her face. Her head tilted up a fraction, and the perspiration coating her face, as well as the pallid color of it, showed that she was ill.

  She began retching, and Joe took a step back. After a few gags, the woman began spewing up the alcohol she’d consumed. Joe looked back at Michael, who just stood there watching the whole thing in utter confusion. Joe looked back to the young woman.

  “J-j-just muh-move over here, would ya?” Joe said, gesturing the young woman toward her.

  Michael wasn’t sure what to think of the whole scene. It seemed to him as though he were missing something here. He continued to watch. The young woman was fully in the clutches of regurgitation now, and Joe’s face was pinched up in disgust, but she also looked nervous.

  “Ma’am, p-please, muh-move out of the street!” she demanded.

  The woman lifted her right hand from her knee and held up her middle finger. Everything that came next seemed to happen so fast. Michael heard the squeal of tires and the sound of drunken laughter. The blinding glow of headlights came next. He was too far away to be any good, and the young woman with throw-up running down her shirt was right in the path of the oncoming vehicle, which was moving way too fast.

  He couldn’t be sure, but he thought he heard Joe utter a bad word, and then she took off at a sprint, hit the woman hard in the side, and tackled her out of harm’s way a split second before impact. The driver of the vehicle blasted the horn, shouting expletives out of his the window, and fish-tailed out of the parking lot.

  Michael looked over at Joe, who was now crawling to her feet. The knee of her jeans had torn and her t-shirt was ripped on her right sleeve, where blood was rolling down from her shoulder and falling at the crook of her bent elbow. The other young woman was also regaining her feet, and she was all but shouting.

  “Holy shit! Jesus Christ! Oh my shit! That fucker almost ran me over!” she said, pulling herself upright for the first time since Michael had seen her. The shock must have knocked the weak stomach out of her.

  Joe was glaring at the girl, and Michael thought that she might just tell the idiot off, but instead, she turned on her heel and began heading back toward the bar.

  “Hey, wait!” The lady said. “You saved my life. Thank you.”

  Michael watched a little of the tension go out of Joe’s shoulders, but she didn’t turn back around. “Come sit on the st-st-steps,” she said to the woman. “I’ll cah-call you uh-uh-uh cab.”

  He ran to catch up with Joe, the drunken woman stumbling behind him. When he caught up to her he realized that he didn’t know what to say, so he just walked beside her. Joe didn’t look over at him at all. She seemed frustrated and still a little nervous.

  When his arm brushed hers, he heard Joe’s teeth click together, and realized he had bumped against her wound. Finally, words came to him. “Oh, sorry. Are you okay?” he asked.

  She was cradling her arm against her stomach, but no pain showed on her face. “Be fuh-fine,” she said.

  Before he could stop himself, Michael grabbed Joe’s arm gently. “Let me see,” he said, examining the arm that she’d fallen on. “This is pretty deep. I was in pre-med before I decided to major in Literature. You should let me clean it up. I have a first-aid kit in my car.”

  When he looked up from her injury he saw that she was staring at him with her brows drawn together, not in anger, but more so surprise at his contact. He released his hold on her and cleared his throat. “I mean, if you want me to,” he added. “I don’t mind.”


  Her silver-blue eyes studied him for a long moment, and he was all but sure she was going to refuse. Finally, she said, slowly, “Okay, where?”

  As Michael led Joe over to his car she pulled out her cell phone and called a cab company for the woman who was now slumped down on the steps of the bar. He opened the passenger door of his car for her and ran around to his trunk to retrieve his supplies. Kneeling down in front of her, where she was turned sideways with her legs out of the passenger door, he placed the first-aid kit on the ground and opened it up.

  Joe was silent as he cleaned her arm and applied disinfectant, though Michael knew that it had to sting. He was inexplicably nervous, so he tried to make conversation. “This one could use stitching,” he told her. “Did you fall on some glass?”

  She shrugged. “Don’t have insurance,” she said slowly, “but, yuh-yes, glass.”

  “Okay, well, I’ll put some liquid bandage on it and close the laceration by squeezing it with my fingers. It might hurt a little, but if I don’t do it you’ll end up with a pretty big scar.”

  Joe sighed. “By ah-all means,” she said.

  Michael did as he said he would, and still the girl was silent. She really was a tough one to converse with, but he liked hearing her speak. “So, that was pretty badass,” he said.

  One side of her mouth pulled up. “Yep, it was grrr-reat.”

  Michael laughed as he finished sealing the cut. Then he took out some gauze and tape to protect his liquid stitches. He really would have made a fine doctor, he thought. Maybe even a better one than his father, but the two had different passions. Michael liked helping people, but he believed his true gift was with words, and that sometimes they could mend things better than medicine. His father had been of an opposite mind.

  “Try not to get this wet for a couple days,” he said. “May I?” He gestured toward Joe’s knee, where her jeans had ripped through. She nodded, but shifted a little in what he thought was discomfort.

  Gently sliding the denim up her leg and past her knee, he examined the scrape she had there, and began to clean it. Again, he couldn’t think of anything to say.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  Michael looked up and smiled. “No, thank you for the drinks,” he replied, reaching up to the dashboard for the bottle of disinfectant he had placed there. He was busy looking at Joe, and his hand knocked the open bottle off of the dashboard. He cringed inside instantly.

  It would have spilled all over her lap, but instead, Joe reached out and caught the bottle before it fell. She sighed again and set the bottle down, shooting what Michael thought was a nervous glance at him.

  “Wow. Good reflexes,” he said.

  This made Joe smile, but he thought it was the kind that was meant for an inside joke, like she knew something he didn’t know. Michael stood up and held his hands out to her. She took them and got out of the car.

  “All done,” he said. She nodded and began heading back toward the bar. Michael hurried after her, searching for something say.

  “Joe! You okay?” said a woman’s voice. Michael looked up and saw the owner of the bar, Susan, heading toward them.

  Joe nodded. “Yes, ma’am, juh-just fine,” she said.

  “What happened to your arm? Oh, who’s your friend?” Susan asked, looking at Michael and smiling, but he noticed that she shot a nervous glance at Joe as she said it.

  “Michael, ma’am,” he said. “You may not remember me, but I used to come in here with my father when I was little. Peter Wilkens?”

  Susan smiled. “You’re Pete’s son? Sure, I remember you. Shirley Temples, right? How’s your father doing?”

  “He passed five years ago,” Michael said, swallowing around the lump that always formed in his throat when he spoke about his father.

  “Sorry to hear that. He was a good man.” Susan looked Joe over, taking in her injuries. “Joe, you can go on home, honey. I’ll collect your tips. We close in an hour anyway.”

  “That’s okay. I can fuh-finish up,” Joe said.

  Susan nodded. “Okay, come in whenever you’re ready.” She smiled at Michael. “Good to see you again,” she said.

  “You too,” Michael agreed. Susan headed toward the bar, tossing glances at them over her shoulder the whole way. Michael turned to Joe. This was probably his last chance to say something.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but at that moment Trey came out of the door to the bar. He spotted Michael and began heading his way.

  “Well, see ya,” Joe said.

  Michael smiled. “Yeah, um, when do you have class?” he blurted out.

  Joe gave him a look of confusion. “Muh-Monday through Friday,” she said.

  “Oh, I only see you on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I guess I’ll see you then,” he said. He felt like an idiot.

  An odd look came over her face for just a moment, and then it was gone. Then, she gave what he thought was a sardonic smirk. He really was good at reading others. “Huh-hopefully,” she said, and headed into the bar.

  Trey raised an eyebrow at the girl as she passed by. “So that’s what you were doing out here. You had me worried for a minute, bro,” he said.

  “You ready to go?” Michael asked.

  Trey shrugged. “I guess. Who was that?”

  “Joe.”

  “Joe?” Trey asked.

  Michael nodded. “Yeah, her name is Joe.”

  Trey laughed. “Okay, well, did you get her number?”

  Michael shook his head. “Why do you think I’d ask for it?”

  “Because you’re obviously interested in her. You should have invited her to your poetry thing at the campus on Monday. Chicks love that shit.”

  Michael laughed and began heading back to his car. “Something tells me she’s not the type to be wooed with words,” he said.

  “Wooed? Who the hell says ‘wooed’?” Trey said. “Well, don’t worry, I’ll be there to snap my fingers or whatever it is people do at those things.”

  They drove back to their apartment, and Michael could think of nothing else but Joe the whole way. The events of the night were distracting him as well, and he wondered if the raven-haired girl always had such interesting occurrences. Maybe he would invite her to his poetry reading at UMMS on Monday.

  Life could always use a healthy dose of interesting, if you asked him. Mondays especially.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Joe

  “He likes you,” Aunt Susan said.

  I looked up from the glasses I was polishing. The bar had closed thirty minutes ago, and the last customer had finally left. I was exhausted, and the arm I had fallen on while tackling the drunk lady was beginning to throb. It had been a long day.

  “Hmm?” I said. “Wuh-what makes you think that?”

  Aunt Susan gave me a droll look. “You said that when you ran outside to save the drunken idiot, he followed you. Then he offered to tend your wounds. Then he asked about your schedule. Sounds to me like he likes you.”

  I shook my head. “He was being pa-pa-polite. The puh-point is, he sssaw everything. Wuh-why would he follow me?”

  Aunt Susan crossed the bar to stand in front of me. “That’s not what’s bothering you, honey. You’ve got something on your mind.” She held up a hand when I opened my mouth to deny it. “Don’t try to lie to me, Joe. I know you too well. What did you see? By the way you’ve been acting I would guess it’s something big.”

  I sighed, returning a beer mug to its proper place on the shelf behind me. I considered for a moment whether or not I should tell her about the shooting that was going to happen at UMMS. In fact, as I stood there, the urge to unburden myself was overwhelming. When my eyes started to gain moisture, I took a deep breath and turned back to face her.

  “It’s nuh-nuh-nothing,” I lied, forcing a smile to my lips as to reassure her.

  She released a heavy breath. “It’s not you against the world, you know. I know you think that because you’re the one with the gift that you have to be the one to dea
l with its burdens, but that’s not true, Joe. Tell me, and I’ll help you any way I can.”

  Again, I felt my eyes begin to water, but I forced back the emotion that was welling up in me. Crying wouldn’t solve anything, and if I broke down right now, Aunt Susan would never stop pestering me until I gave up the goods. I couldn’t tell her, no matter how bad I wanted to, because then she would insist on being foolish with me. One fool in the line of fire was enough. I couldn’t allow her to risk her life. She had too kind a heart to die so young, whereas I have multitudes of demons.

  I smiled again, but my fists clenched a little at my sides. “Everything is fuh-fuh-fine. I puh-puh-promise,” I said.

  Aunt Susan stared at me a moment, then moved off to complete the rest of the closing tasks. I released a heavy breath. “You stutter more when you lie,” she tossed over her shoulder, and disappeared into the kitchen behind the bar.

  On the drive home, I did cry. I am not ashamed of this. I was all alone, the world dark outside of my car windows, the road under my tires the only sound other than the rapid pace of my heart. My foot fell heavy on the gas pedal, though I never make a habit of speeding, but it seemed as though my life was racing forward with the El Camino, every minute ticking by just counting down to what could be my last.

  So, yes, I cried, but not just for me. I was a fool, and folks don’t cry over fools. I was crying for the people who I could fail on Monday, whose lives were also speeding toward an untimely demise. I cried because none of them even knew it. No one plans on dying, you see. No one should have to.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The Decider

  Thursday night was endless. For most of it, he sat out on the balcony of his apartment and smoked cigarettes until his head throbbed. The plan was in motion, and things were going well, but the waiting was nearly unbearable.

  He thought about the events of his day as he sat there, staring out at the night sky and the small wooded area behind his apartment complex. He had picked up another tool for his mission on his way home from school, a semi-automatic machine gun that was just small enough to fit in his black backpack. When he touched it for the first time, his nether regions had gone stiff and bulging. Monday could not come soon enough.