14

Nine

Nashville, Tennessee Tuesday, December 16 10:30 p.m.

“C an I get you another Corona, Jane?”

Jane Macias looked at the clear bottle, the lime shoved through the neck. Maybe another sip left. “Yes, please, Jerry.”

“Sure thing, kid.”

The bartender moved toward the cooler situated to his right, plunged his hand into the ice and pulled another beer free. He snapped the lid off and placed the bottle in front of Jane, then slipped a thinly cut lime wedge into the neck for her.

“Voila.”

“Who knew you were so worldly, Jerry? Thanks.” She smiled warmly at the older man. He’d been nice to her, not prying, not hitting on her, just serving her beer and leaving her alone, which was what she wanted.

Jane went back to her book. There was something horrifying about sitting alone in a bar reading, but she needed the break and the beer was half price tonight. Her roommate’s gargantuan linebacker boyfriend had come over-a benchwarmer for the Tennessee Titans, and Jane knew there would be no rest in their cramped apartment tonight. So she’d grabbed a novel off the bookshelf and headed down here, two blocks and a lifetime away from her normal haunts.

She’d been slipping into the bar next door to the VIBE strip club more and more often lately. Called Control, it was quiet, usually empty, and there was something homey in the atmosphere. Granted, next door the music throbbed and the lights flashed while not-so-beautiful women slid up and down the stage in five-inch Lucite platforms, but hey, it could be worse. She could be the one up on the stage. Instead, Jane sat in the semi-darkness of the anonymous R-rated bar next door, feeling warm and fuzzy as she sipped cool beer and forced the noise from her mind. The clientele was good for the mental novel she was writing, anyway-she needed a fictional population and she certainly was exposed to it here.

Control gave her the added advantage of anonymity. People from work and from her apartment building wouldn’t be likely to frequent this place. It was nice to know she could be alone. Though Jerry knew her first name, the place turned over so many times during the course of an evening that there were rarely faces present for an entire night. People peeked in after leaving VIBE next door to see if anything was hopping, but not a lot decided it was worth their time to stay. She should have found a nice coffee shop to hang out in; there was a Starbucks right around the corner, but Skip would find her there. He’d never in a million years venture anywhere near this bar, housed in the same building as the sin factory.

Skip Barber. Poor sap. A struggling songwriter, he followed Jane around Nashville thinking she was going to make it big time. When she professed the desire to just go to work, not land a recording contract, Skip thought she was kidding.

He’d seen her in a weak moment, down at Tootsie’s, tipsy and singing karaoke like her life depended on it. Jane’s voice was sweet and true, built for the microphone. She’d been told several times since she made her way to Nashville that she should pay her dues and become the next Julie Roberts or Faith Hill. Jane just smiled and nodded. She didn’t want to be a singer, she wanted to be a writer. She had no desire to be on the stage, was more than content to have her words on the page, read by others. A singer? Hell, no. She was a writer. She aspired to a Pulitzer. She wanted to win a George Polk. She wanted to turn the world upside down with her insights.

She didn’t care that the printed word was supposed to be dead. That the Internet had blown traditional journalism, that people went to their computers for news instead of the paper. That didn’t matter. She could always find a way to present a story.

That’s why she’d taken the job at the Tennessean. It used to be one of the last bastions of pure investigative journalism. Tennessean reporters Nat Caldwell and Gene Graham had won a Pulitzer, taking on the United Mine Workers. David Halberstram and Tom Wicker had worked there. John Seigenthaler had been the publisher for many years. They were great men to emulate.

But Skip, well, he wanted her to go for it, become a recording artist. Like hell she would. She kept telling him to go home, to leave her and his dreams for her alone, but Skip was still convinced he could change her mind. He’d write the words and she’d sing them. They’d go on to glory and fame. As if.

Her cell phone rang and she glanced at the LED display. God, it was him. Would he never take the hint? She ignored the call, not in the mood to deal with the man. She just wanted to read quietly, just for a couple more hours.

She’d just gotten lost in her book when a group of women blew into the joint, all smiles and flash. Bachelorette party from next door, Jane thought. On a Tuesday night, too. When did it become au courant for women to go to a strip club for a bachelorette party? Eyeing the room, the leader of the group, a tall, well-shaped brunette, spied three chairs free near Jane’s hideout. Well, crap.

The three tipsy celebrants made their way over, weaving a bit. Obviously not their first stop of the evening. They fumbled to the stools and clambered in, shouting and whooping like they’d never been allowed out of doors before. The leader called for Jerry.

“’Scuse me, bartender? We need some drinks down here.”

She turned and eyed Jane, her dark eyes cool. Jane could see the thought process. Competition? Nope. Jane was dismissed after a moment without a second glance. Good.

But they were loud and drunk, and Jane couldn’t help but hear the conversation going on.

The middle woman, the bride, it looked like, was drunker than her friends. When Jerry attended the group, she leaned over the bar, fake tiara sliding off her strawberry-blond curls, and brayed, “Hey. Din’t you used to be on Gilligan’s Island? ”

Her cadre cracked up, and Jerry, who was a bit of a ringer for Bob Denver, rolled his eyes good-naturedly.

“What can I get you ladies?”

The bridesmaid on the left, an anorexic bottle-blonde with roots showing, announced they would be having cosmopolitans.

They then broadcasted their presence to the nearly empty bar, the dark-haired bridesmaid doing the introductions.

“Yoo-hoo, y’all. I’m Coco, the redhead down there is Barbie, and this bee-utiful gorgeous creature in the middle here is Sierra. Sierra’s getting married, y’all. Buy us a drink!” Separately, the names were all fun and unique. Coupled with this group, they seemed more like naughty burlesque pseudonyms, a compilation from the game “Get Your Porn Star Name”-matching your first pet’s name to the first street you lived on. Jane wondered if they had normal last names, or something bizarrely exotic to match.

Jerry went to do their bidding and the women turned away from the bar, sighting on any available man in the premises. Jane looked over her shoulder; there were only two other patrons in the bar, one a lonely-looking older man who’d been staring into a glass of beer for the better part of an hour and a handsome, military type with a wedding band. Jane smiled. He seemed like a sweet kid. She figured his friends were all next door, and he was just being true to his bride.

An anemic surplus for the bridezillas to choose from. Maybe that would assure that they’d leave sooner rather than later.

But no. Unaffected by the lack of male companionship, the women were getting louder by the second. Jerry brought their drinks, which they slurped back, and immediately demanded seconds. Coco, Barbie and Sierra didn’t seem to care that there weren’t any real targets for their affections; they turned to each other, closer than regular girlfriends should be. The brunette brought out a pack of cigarettes shaped like penises, which bowled over the other two women. Bellowing laughs like water buffalo, soon all three were sucking down the smelly cigarettes. Noisy, smoky drunks. Not what Jane had signed up for tonight.

Jane got tired of sitting near them and moved, closer to the jarhead. He seemed to be minding his own business, maybe he’d leave her alone.

But the jarhead leaned in when she sat, a conspiratorial smile playing across his handsome features.

“Didn’t know that when you built up enough seniority at the strip club, you get Tuesdays off, did you?”

“Ouch,” Jane replied. “That’s kind of harsh.”

The man blushed and Jane felt bad. “Harsh, but funny. They’re a trip. I hope I’m never so ridiculous in public when I decide to get married.”

The man lit up. “You’re not married?”

“No, hon, but you are.” Jane looked pointedly at his gold band.

“Yeah, I am. Well, sort of. She left me. I just got home and found out.”

“Home? From?”

“Oh, you know, I can’t really talk about it.” He colored slightly. “Sorry, it’s just one of those things.”

“Of course. I understand.”

Jane dismissed him by sticking her nose back in her book. Maybe he’d leave. He was cute, but she didn’t need another male situation. She already had Skip panting after her, though he didn’t seem to get it. No career singing, no girlfriend to Skip. He just never truly believed.

“Troy.”

Annoyed, Jane mentally marked her spot, again, and met his eyes. “Excuse me?”

“My name. It’s Troy.” The soldier was giving it one more go.

“Nice to meet you, Troy. Now, if you don’t mind, I need to…”

“Sure, yeah, totally, I understand. Tell you what. Let me buy you a beer.”

Jane frowned at her bottle. Gosh, it was almost gone. She must have been sipping while she watched the bachelorette train wreck. She looked back at the bar. Barbie, no, it was the bride-to-be Sierra, had started to loosen the ties to her halter top. She was trying to climb out of it and into warmer climes: Jerry the bartender’s lap, as if she just realized that it was clearly an inappropriate outfit for the cold weather. Jane giggled out loud at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.

“Sure, Troy, you can buy me a beer. But after that I need to get to get back to my studies.” Studies. She nearly blushed. She was reading a bodice-ripper she’d snatched as she walked out the door; it was hardly keeping her attention.

“Great. I’ll be back in a flash.”

Jane watched as Troy went to Jerry, held up two fingers and turned back, leaning against the bar in a casual “I don’t notice the three drunk and half-naked women crawling around on the bar next to me.” He smiled at her, but the three women glommed onto him immediately, and Jane shook her head. It might take a few minutes for Troy to get her beer back to her.

Jane tried to smile back, but her head was getting foggy. Man, how many beers did she have? She remembered the two, but her head felt like she was bombed. Wow, her equilibrium was gone. A little voice inside her said get up and walk it off, but her body wasn’t cooperating. She felt something clawlike and hard, a hand under her arm, saw a vague outline of a face, and realized the older guy had come to her rescue.

“Thanks, I’ve got it,” she tried to say, but the words came out garbled, nonsensical.

There was a brief moment when she realized that this was no good, that she needed to yell out to Troy. He was big and strong and could fight off this creepy man with the wispy hair, help her break free, but the moment was lost and she swam away into the ether, feeling nothing.