Oregon Duck fan to only wear green and yellow—a virulent combination that should be outlawed if it isn’t game day. I realized, belatedly, that I only tolerate Chuck because he frequents the Coffee Nook. This is definitely not enough to form a friendship on. I thought about several responses, chief among them being “Shut up, asshole,” and decided to smile tightly and keep my own counsel. If you can’t think of something clever to say, don’t say anything at all.
I’d read that article, too, as it happens, and it was about the sound of sizzling sausages being something comforting as we headed into winter with all its bleakness and cold. But I kept that information to myself, deciding I could play passive/aggressive with the big boys.
“You still meeting Jenny and Julie at Foster’s?” Chuck tossed into the silence.
You would have to torture me for hours to make me give up that information to Chuck. I reminded him, “I’ve got business to take care of later. Can’t meet them.” Before he could press the issue, I said to Josh, “Somebody told me that their sister smashed her car into a tree, and the tree savior people arrived before the ambulance.”
“Was your friend all right?” Josh asked.
“Concussion, I think. Tree had extensive damage. Might have had to be put down.”
Josh said mildly, “I take it you don’t agree with the city’s tree ordinance.”
“I just struggle with people who use the tree ordinance to further their own political agenda.”
“Whaddaya mean?” Chuck asked.
“Like that neighborhood association that tried to stop the guy building that huge house on the lake? They tried everything to stop him. Used the tree ordinance as one means to delay. Had nothing to do with the trees themselves.”
Chuck said, “Who cares? Let’s go hang around the bars, see if we can give somebody a DUI.”
“It’s a little early,” I pointed out.
“Hey, my friend Sonny got picked up at nine-thirty. Jesus, he blew like a .16. Shit hit the fan, I’ll tell ya. Wife kicked him out and now he’s got all these crappy classes where he has to say he’s got a problem. My day, the cops caught you, they just drove you home.”
I gazed at the back of Chuck’s head. “You wanna bust somebody for DUI, but you’re grousing about your friend’s luck?”
“Sonny’s a good guy.”
Josh said to me, “Have you thought about joining your own neighborhood association? Then you’d have some say in the decisions. You could make a difference.” He looked at me through the rearview mirror and I hoped my horror didn’t show on my face.
“I may be moving,” I said. Like, oh, sure. Me in the neighborhood association. I had a mental image of do-gooders of all ages, earnestness oozing from their pores. “And I’m a renter.”
Chuck singsonged, “Bor—ing.”
I decided that Chuck was right and changed the subject. But Josh regarded me thoughtfully in his rearview for the rest of our trip. I found this unnerving. It was lucky Chuck was so all about himself that he neglected to bring up that I was a private investigator. Somehow I didn’t think that would go over well with Josh. Unless his sister Cheryl had already spilled the beans, which was highly probable the more I thought about it.
I said good-bye to them both at the Lake Chinook Police Station. Josh headed inside the building and I gazed after him. It wouldn’t be a bad thing to know someone on the force, but he struck me as one of those by-the-book, ultra-sincere types that never seem to get me.
Chuck ambled over to his car, an even older Volvo than my wagon, a sedan in pretty decent condition. I’d just about written Chuck off, but now I thought I might have to reevaluate. Volvo drivers feel absurdly like kin to me. I might have to give him a second chance, but it wasn’t going to be tonight.
After Chuck drove away, I ignored my own car and walked from the police station, which is on A Street to Foster’s, which is on State, the street that runs parallel to the Willamette River. There’s terminally difficult parking near Foster’s, so I figured I wouldn’t bother. It’s not a long walk, but it was windy and chilly and I was shivering like a plague victim by the time I blew into the front bar. The back patio’s closed this time of year, for obvious reasons, so I entered the low-ceilinged front room with its bloodred Naugahyde booths, cozy tables with flickering, votive candles and sunken bar at the west end. Patrons sit at room height around the bar, while the bartender and servers are working several steps below. This is because the bar is street height and the restaurant slopes down a half-level toward the rear dining room and patio, which are lake height. In February 1996 the greater Portland area flooded from a massive amount of rain. The Willamette River crested at the top of its banks, and Lake Chinook, which is fed by the Tualatin River, ran more than a few feet beyond its highest point, spilling water through the businesses that lined State Street and running across the road to damn near meet up with the river. Sandbags around the buildings saved them from devastating ruin, but from all accounts, it was one massive mess. Fortunately, Foster’s was saved.
Julie and Jenny were in a booth near the pane windows that look onto State Street. Those windows have exterior white lights surrounding them all year and illuminate passersby, so Julie and Jenny had seen me coming. They waved at me and I realized Jeff Foster, owner of Foster’s, was flirting outrageously with them. I pulled up a chair and asked for a Screaming Orgasm. Foster smiled at me and left.
“What’s in a Screaming Orgasm?” Julie asked.
“Vodka, Bailey’s and Kahlua. You need high-quality vodka or the Bailey’s may curdle. We’ll see what Foster brings.” My days as a bartender serve me well from time to time.
Jenny said, “Oh my God, bring me two.”
Jeff Foster served me up a Screaming Orgasm himself. No curdling. Unfortunately, he expected me to pay for the drink, which I grudgingly did. I let Jenny have a taste and she upped her order to three. I looked around for Manny, my favorite bartender, the one who sometimes comps me drinks when Foster isn’t looking, but the bar was being tended by a young woman deep into eyeliner and red lipstick and a metro sexual guy whose shirt and hair were military perfect. A gas fire, faced with that layered narrow rock that is so popular it’s everywhere, was heating the place up like an oven. It was cheery, though, and I felt myself relax in that bone-melting, apres-ski way that seems to only come from a combination of warmth and alcohol.
They wanted to know about my evening with Chuck and I gave them the pertinent details. Jenny finds Chuck funny in that I-can-enjoy-an-ass way, but I think he just gives Julie a headache though she’s too polite to say so about a paying customer.
A group of men and women suddenly exited together. I overheard something about the civil war game between the two Lake Chinook high schools and I remembered my promise to Dwayne. “I’m going to have to go,” I said regretfully, swigging down the end of my drink and standing.
“What? You just got here.” Jenny pointed at my vacated chair. “Sit down.”
“I’ve got a job to do.”
“Oh, sure.”
“I know it’s hard to believe, but I really do.”
“Then you have to give us the details Monday.”
“I’ll
