his Merits. My chest tightens a little.
“Where’d my mom go?”
“Bathroom.”
“How’s the pie?”
“Gone.”
I sit down next to Beth. I kiss her on the lips, more to just sneak a taste of the pie. “Don’t be like that.”
“Did they win at least?” Beth asks.
“Would I have this cheesy-ass grin on my face if they lost?”
“I don’t know.” Beth licks the last of the whipped cream off her fork. “All your grins are pretty much cheesy-ass.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Tell you what…” I run my thumb along the bottom of her chin, picking up a small dollop of banana filling and whipped cream. I stick my thumb in my mouth. “Let’s go out and celebrate tonight.”
“Celebrate?” Beth’s eyes perk up.
“Why not?”
“What are we celebrating?”
“Everything…” I stand up. I take her plate, depositing it in the kitchen sink. “Notre Dame’s big win, us.”
“Us?” Beth leans over the table and kisses me. I taste the banana cream pie on her lips. “Is there an us?”
It’s a valid question, for which I don’t have a valid answer. Laura is at Bucknell, out of sight and out of mind, but we have been talking on the phone. I’ve neglected to mention this to Beth. I pretend Beth didn’t say anything. “Claire says she and Hatch are talking about going out to Abe’s Place tonight. You in?”
“You sure about that?”
“What’s wrong with Abe’s?” I ask. “It’s safe, secluded…”
“And out of control.”
I smile. Beth smiles. It’s decided. We’re going to Abe’s Place.
Chapter twenty-two
Abe’s Place is a hundred-acre plot of trees and farmland along the Sycamore River, about ten miles outside of town. It’s owned by the Abel family but on weekends presided over by their oldest son, a stocky, near-sighted redhead named Horace Abel. Horace, or Abe as we call him, is the Ridge’s starting nose tackle. He sticks chewing tobacco inside his mouthpiece at the beginning of every game and swallows the spit. Talking with a pronounced good ol’ boy drawl, he hurls indecipherable expletives at his teammates like, “Kick ‘em in nuh fuckin’ hey-yid.”
Abe’s Place can get out of hand. But if the knives and guns are locked up before Horace breaks into the whiskey—and granted, that’s a big “if”—there isn’t much of a problem. Abe’s Place sits far back from the highway, accessible only by a two-mile long, winding, and rutted dirt path. It’s perhaps the one spot in Empire Ridge where our nothing-better-to-do police force will never visit.
We all come in the Subie—me, Hatch, Claire, and Beth. The party is hopping, what you’d expect for ten o’clock. The real partiers are just finding their groove, while the underclassmen with curfews are starting to peak, especially the girls.
The freshmen and sophomore girls are always the easiest ones to spot—trying too hard to fit in, drinking too fast. About a dozen of them huddle around a large bonfire, plastic cups of keg beer in hand. In the middle of this sea of estrogen, two very average-looking guys are playing guitar. Jerry Randolph and Clem Hogan are their names. Jerry and Clem are downright homely, and yet, solely based upon their ability to strum a few notes on a piece of mahogany, they’re poised to walk away with the hottest girls at the party.
The bonfire pulsates in a small clearing of tilled-over corn. Four old aluminum travel trailers rim the campsite where the clearing meets the tree line, tucked among a patch of silvery sycamores. The trailers are small, not one of them longer than ten feet. The green splashes of moss on the faded white siding and the cracked tires speak of their conversion into semi-permanent single room hunting cabins by Abe’s family.
Jerry and Clem have started up a group-sing rendition of “Over the Hills and Far Away” with two of their freshmen concubines, one of whom looks to be more of a Taylor Dayne or Salt-N-Pepa fan and knows Led Zeppelin as “that old ‘Stairway to Heaven’ band from the sixties or something.”
I’ve already lost Beth in the crowd.
“Come on over here, Hy-ink.” Abe waves at me from the opposite side of the bonfire.
Abe has always pronounced my first name as “Hy-ink,” dragging the word out to two syllables like my Grandma Eleanor’s cousins in Kentucky.
I circle the bonfire. Abe stands up. I shake his hand. “Abe, my man. How you doin’?”
“Oh, all right I guess,” he says. Abe is wearing an orange hunter’s vest over an insulated flannel shirt. The bonfire reflects in his glasses, illuminating the hundreds of freckles that blanket his face and frame a bushy red mustache, all of it crowned by an old Cincinnati Reds baseball cap.
“My mom says your grades are up.”
“I s’pose they are.” Abe’s left cheek is filled with wad of Red Man Loose Leaf Tobacco. He spits a stream of tobacco juice on the ground near his feet. “How’s your family doin’ these days?”
“Fantastic, couldn’t be better.”
For someone who hates animals, my mother has a soft spot for lost causes when it comes to her students. She’s been Abe’s guidance counselor at Empire Ridge since he was a freshman, transforming him from a drunken casualty of a broken home into a straight-C student.
Abe isn’t a casualty anymore, but he’s still a drunk. He tips his cap to me. “I got somethin’ for ya, Hy-ink.” He reaches into his coat pocket, pulls out an unopened fifth of Johnnie Walker Red Label.
“What is that?”
“Been savin’ it for ya, Hy-ink. Fuck that bourbon shit. Real men drink Scotch whiskey.” Abe cracks open the bottle and powers down multiple swallows, the tobacco still firmly entrenched in his left cheek. He hands me the bottle. I take my first cautious sip.
Barring a large cup of Mountain Dew to chase things down with, I’m not a whiskey drinker. I don’t care whether it’s from Scotland, Ireland, Kentucky, Tennessee, or Bigfoot’s ass crack. The peaty flavor of the Johnnie Walker hits my tongue, sliding to the back of my throat. It’s an immediate struggle not to vomit it right back up. I cough, trying to clear my throat. I take a slow, deep breath through my nose.
“Clear a path, folks. We got a live one here!”
I raise my hand and shake my head. “Fuck you, Abe.” I tilt the bottle and choke down a couple more shots in one drink.
Abe pats me on the back. “Now that’s what I wanna see. Fuckin’ pony up, Hy-ink!”
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