TWO
As Angela crossed the room with a tray of beers for the table of Hispanic men, the two older men passed her on their way out. They cast disapproving glances her way as they went by. Despite their silent scorn, they usually came in on the nights she worked and sat down at the end of the bar, nursing a beer or two as they talked sports and stared at her cutoff shorts over the tops of their beers.
They may have considered her dress and decorum improper for a young woman, but they couldn’t help being drawn by her raw femininity. She noted the irony but it didn’t really matter to her. Nothing much mattered to Angela.
Except men like Owen.
The four Hispanics had all fallen silent as she approached—not that she could have understood a word of what they were saying anyway. Spanish wasn’t all that common around Milford Falls. It struck her that they didn’t want to be overheard, even if they didn’t think she could speak their language.
By their furtive glances and whispers, it was clear that for some reason they didn’t approve of her any more than the two older men did. It was a different kind of disapproval, though, somehow more visceral, more vicious, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Even so, it didn’t matter to her any more than the scorn of the two older men.
There was something about all their eyes that bothered her. They weren’t like Owen’s eyes, but still, she knew that she didn’t like what she saw. But she couldn’t concern herself with it. She had something else on the front burner.
“This is going to have to be your last round,” she told them as she set down the beers. “It’s closing time.”
She could just read part of a receipt sticking up from the shirt pocket of one of the men. It was for the Riley Motel. She wondered which kind of guest they were, the by-the-hour kind, or by-the-week.
One of the men closest to her, the one who’d spoken for them whenever they’d ordered drinks, had dozens of moles all over his face. Some were large black lumps, while many more were as tiny as grains of sand. The largest number were clustered around his dark eyes. They made it hard for her not to stare at him.
As she set a beer down in front of each man, Mole-face smiled up at her. It wasn’t a friendly, or even polite, smile. It was a creepy, confrontational smile.
As she reached out with her free hand to take the ten- and five-dollar bills he was offering her, he ran his other hand all the way up the back of her thigh.
Before he could grab her ass, Angela stepped back, breaking the contact. At the same time, she snatched the two bills from between his extended first two fingers.
All four men laughed uproariously, as if it had been the punch line to an inside joke. She could only imagine what they must have been saying.
Mole-face grinned. “Keep the change.”
“Thanks,” she said. “Now I can finally buy that bar of soap I’ve been wanting and wash my leg.”
Three of the four men laughed. Mole-face didn’t. She noted that they understood English well enough. She also noted that up to that point they had acted as if they didn’t. She couldn’t imagine what difference it made, except that maybe it allowed them to play ignorant and eavesdrop.
Angela was rarely rude to customers, even the ones who occasionally got lewd or grabby, but there was something about the looks of these four men that she didn’t like.
Mole-face said something in Spanish and they all laughed again.
“Problem?” Barry called from behind the bar.
“I was just telling them it was their last round for the night,” Angela said on her way back.
“How about you,” Barry said as he gestured to Owen. “Last call. You want another?”
Owen lifted a hand to turn down the offer. Apparently, he was not as eager to take a beer from Barry as he had been to take the drinks Angela had offered. He slid off the stool, unsteady on his feet, his fist pulling his camo slicker off the seat next to him.
As he turned to leave, Owen smiled at Angela. She could read the message in that big grin and deliberately didn’t return it. She briefly glanced at his eyes before openly ignoring him. She walked around the bar, put the tray away, then put the ten and five in the register. She didn’t take her tip from the two bills. She didn’t want any money from those four.
Owen paused in the doorway to look back. She could feel his eyes on her but she didn’t turn to look at him. She already knew what was in those eyes.
She wanted him to get the impression she had dismissed him and had no further interest in or use for him, that he had been no more than a customer, a source of a tip. She knew that the simple rebuff of indifference would be enough to take him from a simmer to a low boil. He finally turned and went out the door.
After the other four men left, Barry turned off the music and the rotating light, breaking the spell, leaving the barroom simply old and rather decrepit, smelling of spilled beer, sweat, cigarette butts, and the urine on the floor of the men’s room. The quiet, at least, was a relief.
Angela dumped out the ashtrays and washed them along with the glasses in the bar sink while Barry counted the money from the till. After wiping down the bar, she did a quick job of sweeping the floor.
“Been pretty slow this week,” Barry told her as he handed her some folded bills. “Sorry it isn’t more, Angela. I know you could use the money to help your mother and all …”
“I know. Not your fault.”
No one and nothing could help her mother. Nothing ever could. As far as the money, she usually made good money at the bar, so she couldn’t complain about an occasional slow week.
“The other girls already blocked in on the schedule are enough to handle the place for the rest of this week.”
“Sure,” she said. “I understand.”
He hesitated, thinking of how to fill the silence, before he pushed the register closed. “Why don’t you come in next Friday and see if we can use you? Okay? Hopefully things will pick up soon and then we’ll get you back to your usual hours.”
Angela didn’t count the money he’d handed her. She knew that with as few hours as Barry had her working it wouldn’t be much. She nodded as she stuffed the bills in the front right pocket of her shorts along with her tips. They didn’t amount to much, either, and she’d paid for the drinks she gave Owen out of them. They were usually respectable, but with business being slow her tips had slowed down as well.
On her way to the door Barry called her name. She turned back.
“Be sure to wear some of those shorts next time you come back in to work. I think they were the only thing that kept that last guy buying drinks. They may have been the only thing that kept me in the black tonight.”
And kept Owen from slipping away.
Angela smiled back. “Sure thing, Barry. Can do.”