In the Cheap Seats

With a pull of the string behind the dust clotted curtain the Warwick and Gansett neon signs buzzed to life, then the previous night’s stale kegs rolled down into the cellar, and before long the tavern’s daily routine started all over again. By early afternoon a crowd gathered to rub elbows on the long varnished maple counter, and to drink, slowly, glasses of scotch mixed with the detergent that ran through the washer.
‘Hold your hand baby, I wanna’ – he sees and feels the magic, then bites off a chunk of pulled pork hero sandwich, spinning the dial for another bottle of the ale of the day. He is a regular. The regulars ask for pickles. Now and again, a pair of paint chipped pots quake quietly back in the kitchen, boiling a stew, while the music up front rattles and rolls on for hours.
The choir looks at the microphone when they sing, nailing the anthem’s high registers hard to reach in a strong spring breeze. They draw smiles from the crowd. The remote fumbles between innings and nervous wrecks watching the rookie hurl at the screen; to the viewer and to the batter the ball gets larger. A raspy ump, weighing the options, decides on strike one. The boys on the bench watch intensely, holding their hats, squeezing, wringing out every drop of luck so the old Captain can hit just one more.
Everywhere on the television faces shine, especially the young groundskeeper’s, his cheeks taut and angular, scarred slightly from that nightmarish night the evening news could not look away from. The soaked weary men who came to put out the blaze said that water started the fire.
He moved down to the Cape with Jess before the high season and the crowded ferries came. Now he lives alone after Jess quietly left that February. She didn’t like how the planes flew low in the sky. The breakfast tips at the deli were generous enough and she liked it how folks slumped in the booths after eating their hash and eggs, feeling well-fed and gazing sleepy-eyed out the window as she brought the bill to the table. Later, she would wipe the tables clean and return the plastic card trays to the spot on the shelf above the mustard.
When it was really slow, she did crossword puzzles, only doing well if the clues were related to shopping. Jess, when she concentrates, drums the counter with a chugging downbeat, keeping time with the same songs she always plays whenever she drops a quarter into the jukebox. Slowly the memory of that sex tape scandal wears away, slowly. The brick wall outside bears a faint trace of last summer’s graffiti. One of these crazy old nights the words could reappear.