They did know. If Bill could have seen them he would have known they knew because they sat there and openly talked about how he was going off to get laid. Bea thought it was funny. Henry Lee kind of wished it was him cause he didn’t have a girlfriend now that Marie was gone. He was on the lookout, particularly, as he told Bill, with the girls at church. Or, as he had said, not the girls of course but the married women.
Mary was a different story. She cared. She cared about Bill. She more than cared about him. She loved him. So she was jealous. She was jealous of Arlene’s youth, of her figure, because Arlene was skinnier and taller than her. She was jealous because he was off with Arlene while she still had to work and she wanted it to be that she had dressed up for him and he was off with her. She wanted him to be up against her, not someone else, on top of her, touching her, kissing her, not anyone else.
If Bill could have seen it, if he could have heard it, he would have seen Henry Lee looking into Mary’s eyes from across the booth where they sat. He would have seen Henry Lee recognize that Mary was somewhat hurt, maybe more than just somewhat. He would have heard Henry Lee ask Mary what was up, and then, when she declined to respond to what he asked, he would have heard Henry Lee invite her downstairs into the deep freeze to get high. He would have heard Henry Lee tell Mary that Bill loved her and that he’d told him so many times. He would have heard Henry Lee tell Mary that Bill had remarked how messed up it was that he was engaged.
And so it goes.
And so it went that right after they got up from the booth in the side dining room they went into the kitchen. Mary took a moment to check everything she had on the stoves and to make sure it was all okay. Then she went downstairs into the meat room and accompanied Henry Lee into the deep freeze where they smoked a joint. Done with the joint, having hung up the parkas and put away the mitts, she helped herself to a good swig of bourbon before plopping her butt down on the stainless steel counter in her usual fashion.
If Bill were there, he would have seen all this. He would have joined them in the deep freeze to smoke a joint and he would have taken the bottle from her and helped himself to a good long swig. Then, after she plopped herself down on the counter he would have approached her, probably spread her legs apart, kissed up her thighs. She would’ve slapped him upside the head and told him to stop, but secretly, deep inside, she would have wanted him to keep kissing and to kiss up further.
If he were there, he would’ve heard her say, “Goddamn shit,” which is what she said. Then he would’ve heard her say, “I’ll fix his skinny white ass.” He would have heard Henry Lee guffaw and smack his lips at Mary as if to say “yeah right.” Then he would’ve heard Henry Lee tell Mary that he knew she would fix him by giving him her ass. “What it is,” Bill would’ve heard Henry Lee say to Mary. “The way you gonna fix that boy is by making sure you do him better than Arlene ever could.”
If he were there, he would’ve heard Mary say, “Yeah, right,” and he would have heard Henry Lee laugh, a loud throaty laugh. He would have heard Henry Lee say “Goddamn right I’m right.”
