Bill followed Mary into the kitchen. He was going deep into tripping now and imagined inside Mary’s clothes. He couldn’t help but stare, but he wasn’t actually staring at her. He was seeing things inside her, looking through her.
For her part, Mary couldn’t help but feel his eyes. She smiled to herself, said “Like my ass boy?”
Bill reached out and felt her up, then he pulled her to him and started grinding on her. Mary leaned into him. She wanted the thrill but she wasn’t about getting cheap thrills in the kitchen. She was about getting some. So she told him cut it out which he finally did but not until after he’d fondled bare flesh. All the while, Bill thought her flesh melting in his fingers and he saw tatoos she didn’t have dancing on her arms.
“Three trays of fish, five trays of shrimp,” she said. “Get to work.”
Bill kissed Mary before he stepped to where the breading station was set up. He forced his tongue to meet hers and kept her to him so he could keep kissing her. She struggled at first, but then she kissed back. His eyes closed, two snakes intertwined and danced before him amidst millions of starburst dots in rainbow colors.
“Goddamn it boy,” she finally said when they broke apart, “what the hell is wrong with you?”
“Nothing a trip to the store room wouldn’t cure.”
“Wrong time honey. We got work.”
“F–k it.”
“Yeah sweetie,” Mary said. “You’re pretty and I might be willing. But I ain’t getting fired for stupid shit. And I’m too old to be getting scolded by anyone.”
“Damn,” Bill said.
He stepped up to his work. The fish was first. He opened the reach-in and took out the first tray. Mary had been kind enough to tray it up for him and she set about traying up the shrimp while he was starting on the fish. He put the tray on the table to the left of the breading materials and placed a clean tray on the right. He lined the clean tray with waxed paper and spread some breadcrumbs on the paper on which to place the finished pieces. In between the two trays were a pan of flour, a huge mixing bowl filled with egg wash and then a pan of breadcrumbs.
Mary had taught him. Flour, egg wash, breadcrumbs. Always keep one hand dry. She’d taught him and showed him and he’d availed himself of an opportunity to cop a feel as soon as her hands were shmutzy. She’d smacked him afterwards because she hadn’t decided if she was gonna let whatever happened happen.
“Want some music?” Mary asked.
“Yeah.”
“Rock?”
“Yeah.”
Mary stopped laying out the shrimp and went over to the radio. They played music in the kitchen whenever they could. Mary owned the radio and she controlled it too. Her asking Bill if he wanted rock was a concession of sorts. Truth be told, she hated doing the breading and was glad Bill was doing it. Truth be told, she planned on sticking it on him now any time she could.
One of the more famous rock songs came on. Bill hadn’t started breading yet, but the tray was all set.
“Turn that up,” Bill said.
Mary did then she took a moment to look at this white boy Robert had brought in to Suburban. He was skinny and pretty and wild and crazy. He was shy and reserved on one hand, but he was desirable and even promiscuous on the other. He was a college graduate workhouse alumni. Smart and stupid all at once, she thought.
She watched Bill, studied him. He seemed like he was in slow motion, lost somewhere maybe. She couldn’t recall ever seeing him this way and her interests were piqued.
Henry Lee was not in good space. He and Marie had had a fight the night before and Henry Lee was about calling it quits with her. She was ringing him up in the meat room every five minutes and begging him not end it. She knew if he did he’d get her fired because she’d have cause to be spiteful and let it slip to Alfreda. That was not happening.
So Henry Lee was mad, drinking much too fast and smoking weed on top of it. Bill was relatively straight. He had brought an acid tab with him, one his friend had given to him with an avid personal recommendation. The acid was in his pocket and he was thinking if he should pop it or not. He remained undecided until they were up on the line for lunch, when Mary told him they needed to bread fish, shrimp and onion rings during the afternoon lull. That was a meaningless, boring task, two or more hours of dipping stuff into flour then egg wash then breadcrumbs. Two or more hours of laying the breaded items on trays and setting the trays onto the shelves in the reach-in freezer along the wall at the fryer end of the line.
Knowing his afternoon work made the acid decision easy. Bill waited until most of the lunch rush was over and then swallowed the tab. He drank a coffee and together with Henry Lee they finished out the orders.
They sat in a booth in the side dining room for lunch. Bill ate rare roast beef on a hamburger bun with tomato and mayonnaise. He drank a beer with the sandwich. Mary and Henry Lee ate shrimp salad sandwiches. Shrimp salad was one of the daily specials. Bea ate tuna. She sat next to Bill and kept close to him. Bill was starting to trip and he didn’t care. His senses were heightened and he was feeling frisky.
Finished eating, Mary excused herself and went back to the kitchen. She told Bill she was going to set up the breading. Henry Lee, still unresolved about Marie, went down to the meat room. Bill sat a moment with Bea. They didn’t talk, but Bill, now coming on to the acid, slid his hand down between her legs. Graciously, Bea spread them for him. She would have sat there with him all afternoon if she hadn’t gotten an order.
Before he reported to Mary, Bill went down to the meat room. Henry Lee was already cutting meat but that didn’t stop him from going into the deep freeze with Bill. They smoked a fat doobie then drank some more bourbon. Bill sadly and slowly walked the stairs back up to the kitchen.
He was now deep into the throes of the chemicals that were interacting with his brain. He felt cognizant of multiple worlds suddenly existing simultaneously within and around him. He could feel the effects of the speed parts of the acid at work, the grip on his head, the buzzing in his ears, the hazy lights surrounding his eyes. He watched the kaleidoscope effect of his vision.
“I am so buzzed,” he said to himself in the hall upstairs. He lit a cigarette and sat down on a lettuce case where he proceeded to stare at the wall opposite him. He saw the circus in that wall, the menagerie, a whole parade of animals being led by the bearded lady.
“You all right?” Bea asked. She had come out for some lettuce and found him just staring at the wall.
“Never better,” Bill said.
“Mary’s wondering where you are.”
“Here I am,” he said. “Just resting.”
“Well take your skinny white ass inside and get to work.”
“Give me a kiss,” Bill said. He stood up.
Bea kissed him once. She was ready to take him downstairs too but Mary found them.
“Breading’s set up,” she said.
“Damn,” Bea said.
Bill would never get used to the idea of being followed, of being watched. He remembered the undercover cop in the paddy wagon, the guy who was let out of the holding cell first, only about a half hour after they were put in, they guy who later tried to sell him weed in the street. Was he being followed then? Now he wondered.
Being followed made him more cautious, but it did not stop him from doing some of the things he’d done before. Or, he was still stupid sometimes. He did not stop smoking weed and sometimes he still had it in his house. He still drank. Every now and then he still took acid.
When Henry Lee’d come in this morning, about nine, he’d sent Bill to the liquor store up Delta Road. Even if the cops saw him buy alcohol, if he didn’t drink it and then didn’t have it in the car when he went home at night, he was relatively safe.
The morning was quite ordinary. Bill knew most of the prep cooking they did at Suburban now. He knew the grill, all the line cooks’ jobs, the pantry, Bea’s job, how to carve a round and prime rib, even how to make Grandma’s fried chicken, although she never let him.
Bea was still after him. They’d had their moments of teasing, but nothing else. She was even more on his case once she found out he and Mary were fooling around. Robert had smacked Bill upside the head when he’d discovered it. Bill was cheating on the wife he hadn’t even married yet—not a good omen—doing it with Evelyn and one other waitress too. That was not good, but it was allowable. Mary was over the edge. Robert reminded Bill that Mary attended the same church as him, that she sang in the choir he sang in and also directed. He reminded Bill that Mary had a boy just a few years younger than him and sometimes they were all sitting together in the same pew at the church. Lord Have Mercy!
Mary couldn’t help herself. They’d had the time in the meat room Tommy caught him up her dress and a few other times changing clothes downstairs when Bill had taken liberties. Once, in his underwear while they were changing he’d taken Mary’s hand and put it on him inside. Mary hadn’t shied away. She’d lectured him plenty about Eleanor and about being a good partner to the girl he lived with, but she was tired of lecturing and tired of fighting him and tired of not getting any in her own life. She could have had plenty, really, from Drenovis and Henry Lee and others including Alvin, but she wasn’t having that. Bill was different. He wasn’t going to be there forever, she knew that. He was young and wild and crazy and smart. And he was white. She’d never had a white boy and she was curious.
It had only been a matter of time, a matter of finding the right time and the right circumstance. A place was easy. Any of the places they used in the restaurant would do. Sometimes, if she worked at night, Bill drove her home. When he did, all she could think about was him stopping and… She’d close her eyes while he drove and send him vibes. Kiss me, she repeated silently over and over. Lean over and touch me. Kiss me, touch me, feel me.
One time he did kiss her. They’d pulled up at her house and she was about to get out. Bill stopped her, told her wait. “I’m gonna kiss you,” he said. He leaned in and they spent a few minutes at it. They kissed, they touched. Mary sighed and moaned.
“What took you so long?” she asked. She decided that if all else failed, his little Toyota would do. When all was said and done, it did do once.
We are losing our minds. It’s quite clear and it’s been clear for some time. The Democrats have totally lost it. The silly videos by the Hollywood left confirm it. We must be really careful not to allow them to lead us over the precipice.
For too long the progressives have been moving this country toward abandoning the principles upon which it was founded and toward the ideological ideals of the socialists. History has shown that socialism does not work and will not work because the underlying premise is akin to the notion of the least common denominator and that means the poor, who are almost everyone, work for the few rich, like the Soviet Politburo was/is. Why else would Al Gore and the Clintons and more than half of our ruling class cherish and hoard money, that is practice capitalism to its extreme while telling us, the others, we must be global citizens and support the peoples of the globe by continually paying higher taxes (the 51 % of us in America who actually do pay taxes) so they can perpetrate their socialist redistribution of wealth, which is everyone’s wealth but theirs?
The progressives’ intent is clear, to reduce us to zombies, which we already are (see Why There Are So Many Zombie Movies, June 2016), and for them to live in the gated cities a la The Hunger Games series or the Resident Evil series. George Soros, their chief funder, major funder of Obama’s presidential campaigns, Hillary’s record-costing campaign and now the left’s anti-Trump, violence-ridden protests, cares nothing for America. He actually detests America. He makes his money unsettling countries, by causing chaos then swooping in to take economic advantage of the chaos.
So here we are. Recently, I’ve stayed away from political writing because I’ve come to doubt whether it’s worth the time and effort anymore. Irrational minds have taken over on the left. The left’s only game is destruction of President Trump, and even worse, they continue to hold to the unsupported notion that they have a mandate to do this. Obstruction, obstruction, destruction: that is their game. They claim they are the morally correct position, the advocates of the First Amendment. Yet they do the most immoral things and are the least tolerant of differing opinions. They are supported and encouraged by an openly biased media who no longer deny their own aim of destroying President Trump.
And so have we irrationality squared.
One of rules of AA is not to try to talk to an alcoholic while s/he is drunk. There’s no point in it. It’s kind of the same situation here. Part of the country is drunk on anti-Trump vitriol. That part is blinded by an insatiable thirst for the blood of he who dared to defeat she who they believed was the heir apparent. They call him Hitler, yet only they perpetrate Hitler-like tactics. That their social and economic policies have proven to be failures and promise to enslave us all to insurmountable debt seem not to matter. That their bank-rollers are hoping to benefit from our decline seems not to matter as well.
This is complete irrationality and tantamount to insanity. There’s little point in even attempting to talk to them
The election of Donald Trump has momentarily put the brakes on their momentum. Looking at current trends in Europe, the backlash to the irrational left may be happening there as well.
Let’s hope the progressives finally come to understand that their goal is to work toward a strong, free America. They were not elected to support the world and to take from the American taxpayers to do so. Let’s hope they come to understand that if they continue to break America the world will lose what is already it’s greatest benefactor ever.
But then that’s rational. Being blinded by their irrationality and their irrational thirst for power, they probably will miss the opportunity to actually do good for the country they claim to love.
Bailey was a regular at Suburban West. He ate there a lot, often for free. He ate lunches there almost every day and did his business lunches there as well. If he did not have to pay sometimes, he made up for it by bringing Mr. Bowman a lot of business. Many of his colleagues ate there, did business there, recommended the place to other city workers and their friends. Suburban West, only ten minutes from downtown, was a local favorite and a well-known businessman’s haunt. Suburban East, on the other hand, was a good half hour to downtown, another ten minutes to home for Bill. It got the surrounding-business lunch rush, but not the downtown Columbus one.
It came to Bill’s attention quite by accident one night when he left work. They had late orders and he hadn’t gotten out until after midnight. Usually he was gone a good half hour earlier.
This night he happened to note a cop car sitting across from the parking lot when he turned onto Delta Road to head back into town and up to the campus where he and his girlfriend lived. Suburban East was outside Columbus proper, out of the city limits. Bill’s probation did not permit him to be out after midnight. It did not allow him to leave the city limits without permission. It completely forbid him to leave the state without written consent. Doing so was immediate grounds for probation violation.
He’d seen cop cars before and hadn’t thought much about it. But this night the police car followed him to the town limits and was met there by Columbus police. The Columbus police car followed Bill home. The police made no attempt to hide what they were doing. They parked in plain sight and watched as Bill got out of his car and went into his apartment.
Bill thought this strange, very strange. His instinct was to get rid of all his weed, but he held off. He wondered about it as he showered and got ready for bed. He slept fitfully, tossing and turning all night. In the morning, early like always, he was up to go to work. Nothing outside seemed unusual.
He put in a call to Bailey and told him what had happened. Bailey wasn’t a bit surprised. He was only surprised that this was the first time Bill had seen it.
“Dude,” Bailey said, “they’re following you all the time. They pick you up at work at night and make sure you get home. They don’t do it every night, but they do it randomly, several times a week.”
“Why?”
“You’re on their list. But I’ve told them your itinerary and cleared your working out there with them. They’re just doing their job. They won’t interfere with you. They won’t come in your house or bother you. Just go straight home and don’t do anything stupid in public.”
Bill was not a happy camper. He was not allowed to drink, or to be more accurate, he was not allowed to go to bars. He could drink if no one was around, if he was inside at home or inside at work. Still, it felt wrong being followed. It felt wrong being watched. It all felt wrong all together.
Something else to worry about, he thought.
Ordinarily, the newest waitresses were assigned to the side dining room. During the week it never filled up and was not used until the front room was fairly occupied. Consequently it was a good place for new waitresses to break in, to learn the ways of the restaurant and familiarize themselves with the menu items. On weekends all bets were off since both rooms generally ran full.
Bebe embarrassed Norma. She chose a moment when there were no customers in the side dining room to catch her in there along with several other waitresses assigned to the room. One of them was Eleanor.
Bebe laced it into her for messing around at the staff meeting. “Think I didn’t know what you were doing? I was sitting right next to you. You should have just leaned down and given him a, a you-know-what. I’m sure he would have liked that more than your hand.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t act stupid. You know what I’m talking about. That boy is like married. Bad enough he messes with the kitchen girls. Worse, they mess with him. But really? At the staff meeting? In front of Eleanor? That’s another story. If it was up to me, I’d fire both of you.”
Eleanor watched and listened. She didn’t say anything. She couldn’t blame Bill for not stopping Norma. What guy would have? At least Norma wasn’t getting steak.
“Drenovis told me to do it,” Norma finally blurted out. “He said he wanted to fire you, Eleanor, and he was hoping to start some shit between us.”
“And you’re stupid enough to fall for that?” Bebe asked.
“He promised me weekend shifts and everything in the main dining room.”
“Now I know why I keep getting the side room,” Eleanor said.
“That goes back to what happened out west,” Bebe said. “He’s hell-bent upon getting back at Bill for being embarrassed by Robert. He’d fire Bill if he could. He would have done it that night if Robert had let him. Now there’s no stopping Bill. They’re gonna make Bill a manager once he knows all the kitchen work.”
“How you know all this, Bebe?” Eleanor asked.
“Because Tommy tells me everything. He’s one hell of a nice guy. He’s also my father-in-law. I guess it’s time for that to come out. And I’m telling both of you now, it’s time to cut the crap. Norma, soon as Drenovis is through with you in his back seat, you’re out of here. I’ve seen it a hundred times. Eleanor, I’d be looking for a job if I were you. You’re a good, seasoned waitress. There’s other steak houses around where you can do better than here. Not only did you not succumb to Drenovis, but you caused him shame and you keep rubbing his nose in it.”
“Not on purpose.”
“Doesn’t matter. Only thing matters is what he can do, and he can minimize you, make sure you don’t make any money. For now, that’s better than firing you.”
“What the hell was with you and Norma?” Henry Lee asked.
“She started it,” Bill said. “I just did what I did.”
“Well, here’s to you.” Henry Lee took up the bourbon and took a drink. “I ain’t never been that bold or that stupid.”
“What’s with Bea?” Bill asked. She insisted upon watching me change.”
“Boy,” Henry Lee said, “she’s in the midst of her midlife crisis. She ain’t getting none at home. She looks at you like you’re her boy-toy. You ought to just do her and get it over with. It ain’t so bad, believe me.”
“What you mean?”
“Figure it out, stupid.”
“Goddamn,” Bill said.
“Yeah. Goddamn,” Henry Lee said.
Coming soon, a new novel.
Carla and Murph return.
Rose Friedlander tells her story, a story of murder and depravity, a story about what goes on behind closed doors in the worlds to which we are generally not privy.
Money and privilege have allowed the people in Rose’s life to create their own rules. Worth nearly a hundred million dollars herself, Rose believes her father has killed her twin sisters and her mother. The man she marries has unusual proclivities, a gross understatement. Rose is about to detail how even the most sacred of sacred can be bought and how the weakest and most vulnerable of us are never truly safe.
Rose’s story will open your eyes, hurt your heart and restore your resolve.
Look for Rose’s Story to appear during the spring.
Drenovis was working on a way to fire Eleanor. Unfortunately, he had not been able to actually catch her doing anything wrong. He knew she and Bill were fooling around. He knew they’d used the storeroom, the staff bathrooms downstairs and the party room. He knew she was bringing Bill beers from Bebe and Bill was feeding her steaks to eat. But no one in the kitchen would give them up and none of the waitresses would either because they respected Eleanor for adamantly shunning Drenovis.
Plan B: Norma.
Drenovis mostly kept his waitress games quiet but Norma was different. He called her an “anywhere” girl and at least for a while he was pacified by her. The back seat of his Buick Riviera had been host to many waitresses. Norma made many guest visits. It was like a big old love boat, one of those gargantuan automobiles of the seventies. In comparison, Bill’s tiny Toyota fastback was like a toy, even a miniature car. He and Mary used it once, but the back was too small so they used the passenger seat fully reclined.
The plan was to have Norma sit by Bill at the staff meeting. She would flirt with him, piss Eleanor off enough to cause a rift between her and Bill and start a fight between her and Eleanor. Drenovis swore he would support Norma and get rid of Eleanor.
Suburban held a staff meeting every Tuesday out east, every Wednesday out west. They started promptly after the lunch and lasted for half an hour or so.
Bill and Henry Lee were high. So what else was new? Bill would spend the bulk of his twenty-some-odd years in the kitchens high. They’d been drinking bourbon. When Bill came out the side dining room door he sat in the booth where Mary was, opposite her. Henry Lee was already next to her and Bea next to him.
Quickly, Norma grabbed the seat next to Bill, hurrying before Eleanor could get it. But Eleanor never sat by Bill at the meetings or went near him in public except to do business. So Bebe, who had come in early for the meeting, sat next to Norma.
It appeared innocent at first. Norma’s leg brushed Bill’s. Then Norma reached down to scratch her knee, spreading her legs and lifting her skirt, accidentally of course. Not. Accidentally, of course, her hand brushed Bill’s lap on the way up. Bill, not shy and having learned his worth versus that of a waitress, took her hand and settled it in his lap, forcing her to touch him. He also reached into her lap, under her uniform dress and up to there.
Norma was just supposed to make Eleanor angry. She wasn’t supposed to like it. But she did. Bill was a good fifteen years younger than Drenovis, a good fifty pounds lighter, skinny and lanky and young and horny. And, as Bill would learn, she was an anywhere girl.
Drenovis could sense his plan going south. Eleanor didn’t seem to care, or at least she wasn’t putting out any vibes. Norma seemed to be quite content, and Bill too, especially since, as per the plan, Norma had removed her underwear and Bill’s path was wholly unfettered.
And so it went.
Bill had to throw away his soaked underwear and change his uniform pants. Bea gave him a hard time about it, but finally she relented, only she insisted upon accompanying him downstairs rather than giving him the key to the linen room. Stubbornly, she refused to leave when he stripped to change, despite him asking her to. Bea had her own agenda and she wasn’t about to let Bill get away with what she, Mary, Henry Lee and Bebe knew had happened at the staff meeting.
Bill and Norma might have gotten away with it completely if Bill hadn’t needed new pants and Norma hadn’t shivered and shuttered at Bill’s touch. Norma had almost gasped aloud but she managed to hold that in check. Bebe, however, one tough barmaid, had felt Norma’s quivers and was destined to give her hell.
Tommy didn’t go in to call orders until he had to on this day. He knew better. He knew to stay out of their way and let them do their jobs.
While Henry Lee greased the grill and cooked off hamburgs and bleus, Bill helped Mary. He went around to where she was, catching her from behind at first, reaching around her and feeling her up. He put his hand inside the open collar of her kitchen dress, reached inside her bra and felt away. Mary, happily high, closed her eyes and let him feel until it was enough. “Get the baked potatoes out,” she finally said.
Bill kissed her on the back of her neck, went to the convection oven. He took the potatoes out two at a time in each hand. They stung his left hand, but he had no feeling in the fingertips of the right hand, one of the benefits of having suffered that burn on his first day as a cook.
Potatoes out and set into a steam table insert, he covered them with foil and brought them around to the line. Then he went back for au jus, Bordelaise sauce, vegetables and soup.
Henry Lee was all set up. He greased the broiler a second time now that the burgs and bleus were off then went into the hall to smoke a cigarette. Bill double checked to make sure he had enough French-fries, fried shrimp and pickerel. Satisfied, he joined Henry Lee in the hall and lit himself a smoke.
“Yeah, Bill,” Henry Lee said. “What it is.”
Bill didn’t say anything. He was pretty blitzed. He stood quietly and was leaning against the wall when Bea came out. She stepped past Bill to sit on the empty milk cases but stopped to grab a feel of him. Her hand lingered on him and she fondled him unabashedly.
“Damn, Bea,” Henry Lee said.
“Love them white boys,” Bea said.
“Ordering,” Tommy called from inside the kitchen. They all went in without delay.
Of course their little escapade made quite a stir. Tommy called over to Robert who called back to Mary who apologized, not for what they did but for getting caught. Henry Lee would never apologize. This was during the time he was doing Marie, and later that afternoon he took Marie into the bathroom and did her against the sink. Bill had his way with Eleanor. She had her way with him too. They used the party room.
The only one who wasn’t happy was Bea. Bea wanted some of Bill and Bill wasn’t paying her any mind and this ticked her off. She felt him up every chance she could. Bill let her and sometimes he made comments. Bea was never adverse to his sexual suggestions but he never followed through or initiated anything with her.
Curiously, Drenovis didn’t say anything. Tommy put it up to the night manager who carefully suggested they halt such activities. In turn, they said they were only playing around, goofing. The manager said he was talking about the drinking and smoking.
Unbeknownst to anyone, Drenovis was out on his split shift banging Norma in the back seat of his Buick Riviera. She was the newest waitress. He showed up out East about eight o’clock with his usual stupid face poking into the kitchen to see what was going on. He was going to say something, but he thought better of it. He was figuring other ways to play the power game.
The more comfortable Bill got at work, the more he relaxed. The raise for being an experienced broiler cook was forty cents an hour, so working a typical seventy-hour week, Bill was making a hundred seventy-five bucks. He and Sue got ahead on the rent. They started paying off the debts to Bill’s father and brother and they bought an old ’67 Rambler American that ended up leaking water when it rained heavily. It would quickly be replaced by a cool Toyota fastback coupe.
Henry Lee taught Bill a lot more than cutting meat. He taught him where the liquor store was on Delta Road. He taught him where the bourbon was in the party room downstairs, the room across from the meat room where Bill would eventually meet Mary every now and then to fool around. He taught him to get high in the deep freeze. They would don the arctic parkas and quilted freezer mitts and go in to smoke a big doobie. Then they would drink bourbon. Then they would go up on the line to do the lunch. The quilted mitts showed plenty of burns where the roaches had singed them.
Henry Lee taught Bill he could do about anything as long as he could put up the dinners and push out the orders. He taught him that the managers wouldn’t say squat. He taught Bill everything a good cook who was good at his job should know. Years later, in New York, Bill’s friend Francisco would tell Bill that any cook who could do his job and wasn’t afraid to work didn’t need a union.
This particular day, Eleanor was working lunch. Henry Lee had brought a quart of bourbon with him and before they started drinking they smoked a fat doobie to get high. Then they cracked the seal on the bottle. Mary came in to tell Henry Lee she needed a couple of things. She saw the bottle and took a long drink. Then she smelled the weed on them and asked if they had more, so Bill rolled another joint. She sat up on one of the stainless steel counters and smoked, Bill standing away so he could look up her legs.
“Boy, what you doing?” she asked.
“Looking up your legs. Spread ’em some more.”
“You crazy?”
“He’s horny,” Henry Lee said.
“Love to kiss right up those thighs,” Bill said.
“I dare you,” Henry Lee said.
Bill stepped up to Mary and kissed her on the lips. Then he reached to her legs and pushed her back on the counter. He spread her legs wide and kissed up the insides of both thighs, completing his mission with a humongous kiss-lick on her privates.
Mary was laughing so hard she choked on the smoke. She did her best to clamp her legs around Bill’s head to keep him there. Bill didn’t mind. He dug his face in deeper. She was still laughing wildly and still coughing when Tommy walked in.
Tommy saw everything, took in everything, understood exactly what they were doing and what was going on. But Tommy was no dope. He smiled at Mary and asked if they were wrestling then he turned around and walked out.
“Shit,” Mary said. She sat up and straightened herself out.
“Have another drink,” Henry Lee said, handing her the bottle. “Finish the doobie too.”
They all took another drink. They smoked another joint too. Then Mary went back upstairs. Henry Lee and Bill, both pretty wrecked at ten-thirty in the morning, made hamburgs and bleus and carted up the meat trays for the lunch service. At eleven-thirty they stepped on the line to do the meal.
