Chapter 12
PRIDE
“Enough standing around—we have party prep to do. Can you run out to my car and grab the streamers?”
And that’s how our prep for the Pride party started.
It was only too perfect that the anniversary of the Stonewall riots fell on a weekend this year.
We scrubbed the bar top to bottom and hung rainbow streamers from every free surface.
Midas even painted a giant watercolor portrait of Marsha P.
Johnson that we mounted next to the bathrooms. It wasn’t good, exactly, but it was so earnest and reverent that it took my breath away.
“Special delivery,” Baker said on Saturday afternoon, breezing into the bar in her veterinary scrubs. She pulled a package from her tote bag and shot an excited look at Hannah. “Look what came.”
“Finally!” Hannah said, dropping the broom. “Louisa, c’mere a sec.”
I joined them at the bar top, where Baker had placed the beaten-up plastic package. It contained something lumpy and soft. “Go ahead,” she said, gesturing to me.
“It’s for me?”
“Just a silly little something,” Hannah said, but I could tell from her tone that she was chomping at the bit for me to open it.
I ripped the package open and pulled out the cloth item inside. It was a big navy T-shirt. I flipped it around to see the front and—
“Oh my god. You didn’t.”
It was a sketch outline of a state that I assumed to be South Dakota, but the caption read SOUTH DAQUEERTA in bold, rainbow lettering.
“This is the stupidest, most amazing thing I’ve ever seen, you assholes. Where the hell did you find this?”
“That’s a trade secret,” Hannah said.
“Etsy,” Baker said over her.
I pulled the shirt over my head. It was snug with my button-down beneath it, but I knew it would fit perfectly on its own. “How do I look?”
“Absurd,” Hannah complimented.
“I’m gonna wear it tonight.”
“Yes, I was hoping you would!” Hannah high-fived Baker like it was the best thing they’d ever done together.
“Thank you so much.”
“You’re very welcome,” Baker said warmly.
“It was four hundred dollars,” Hannah said dryly. “We’ll take cash.”
Baker elbowed her so she’d shut up.
Hatch rounded the corner and drew up short at the sight of us. “Am I interrupting a lesbian convention?”
Hannah didn’t even look up. “No, that’s at Home Depot later. What do you think of Lou’s shirt?”
I turned and spread my arms wide for Hatch to see, too giddy to care what he thought.
“What am I looking at,” he asked in a flat voice.
“Da-queer-ta. Queer-ta, Hatch! Come on,” Hannah said in a put-upon voice.
“Otis is on his way,” Hatch said, rolling right over our conversation. “He wants to help set up.”
I raised my eyebrows. “You two made up?”
“Don’t push your luck, Wade.”
“Not to be rude,” Hannah interjected, “but how exactly is Otis going to help us? He’ll just get in the way.”
“He’s bringing a pinata. Won’t shut up about it.” Hatch flicked his fingers over the three of us. “Just help him however he needs.”
“You’re pawning him off on us?”
“I’m informing my employees about another task.”
“Not an employee,” Baker pointed out, though she rounded the counter and poured herself a fountain Diet Coke.
A few minutes later, Otis Penny burst through the door with the biggest pinata I’d ever seen. It looked more like a parade float than a party accessory.
“The fuck,” Midas muttered under his breath.
“Party City!” Otis yelled, as if we were all dying to know. “Did you know such a business existed?”
“Yes,” we said in unison.
“Here, Lou-ella, take this,” Otis said, pushing the gigantic pinata into my arms. “Hatch, how about a Mule before we get to work?”
“I already made it, Mr. Penny,” Midas said, dropping a lime on the finished concoction.
“Thank you, handsome,” Otis said suavely. I wondered if he had any clue what Midas’s name was.
“Well, Otis,” Hatch said, “I’ll leave you to it. The girls and Midas can help with the pinata.”
“Don’t you want to help me get it up?” Otis asked sincerely, and Hannah snickered into her hand.
Hatch ignored her. “One more thing. The mechanical bull will be here in forty-five minutes.”
Hannah, Baker, Midas, and I froze.
“Ex-cuse?” Midas asked.
“I told y’all that,” Hatch said cagily.
“You very well know you did not,” Hannah said.
“Be on the lookout. They’re coming from Atlanta, big truck, big trailer. Make sure there’s room in the parking lot.”
I was still digesting this sudden information, but Hannah was jumping with questions. “How big is this thing, exactly? Where are we supposed to put it? And why are they coming from Atlanta? Nobody closer had a mechanical bull?”
Hatch gave her a hard look. “These things come with mandatory attendants. Nonnegotiable, for safety reasons. I wanna make sure we’re getting attendants we can trust. If we’re gonna have fun, it better be safe.”
I understood what he meant by safe. It wasn’t liability Hatch was worried about: It was bigotry. He wanted his patrons to know beyond a doubt that they could be their full authentic selves in front of the attendants.
“And we can trust this company?” Midas asked warily.
“A guy I know vouched for them,” Hatch said vaguely. “Owner has a trans daughter.”
“It’s all in the family, then,” Hannah said. She and Baker gave him a fond, appreciative smile.
Hatch seemed to recoil from it. “Get back to work,” he grumbled, marching back to his office.
Forty minutes later, with the pinata successfully hung up in a far corner, we stood outside and watched for the mechanical bull.
Hannah kept dithering about the parking spaces, worrying she needed to move her car again.
Baker had scooped a glass full of ice cubes into her watered-down Diet Coke and was pressing it against her heat-flushed face.
Midas bounced on his tiptoes and rolled his shirtsleeves under his armpits.
Even Otis had come outside to join us, though he seemed ready to sneak back inside, judging by the way he kept mopping his bald head with his embroidered handkerchief.
At last, a monstrous navy truck slowed and pulled into the driveway, towing a gigantic metal trailer that rattled and clanged as it made its way to our front door. Two white men jumped out of the cab, a ruddy-faced young one and a hound-like older guy with a belly that hung low over his jeans.
“This the Freaky Cricket?” the older man asked, adjusting his waistline.
Hannah rushed to shake his hand. “Frisky! Yes! Welcome!”
The younger guy blinked in the sunlight, his cowboy boots scraping against the pavement. Both Otis and Midas eyed him with interest.
“Are you Marion Hatchet?” the older man went on.
“No, he’s in his office, I’ll grab him—”
“Just show me the layout of the place, if you don’t mind, and we’ll figure out how to get the old girl inside.”
It was a long process. Our doors remained open, letting the sweltering heat inside as the two men hurried back and forth to the trailer, bringing tools, tarps, all kinds of equipment.
Hatch emerged from the office to shake the owner’s hand and sign the paperwork, then disappeared again.
The rest of us tried to stay out of the way and busy ourselves with other tasks, except for Midas, who kept asking if any extra muscle was needed.
“I’ve been doubling down on arm day,” he told the younger guy, whose named we learned was Brian.
An hour later, the mechanical bull was finally set up and ready to go. She took up so much space that I worried our patrons would resent the loss of the dance floor, but Hatch didn’t seem bothered. His blue eyes were bright in a way I’d never seen before.
“What’s her name?” Hannah asked, running a hand over the bull’s fake hide.
The guy named Brian squinted at her. “She dunn have a name.”
“Well-she-needs-one!” Hannah said in a rush. She raced across the bar and grabbed Baker by the shoulders. “Babe. The mechanical bull. What’s her name?”
“Am I supposed to know?”
“Help me think of one!”
I found myself caught up in Hannah’s giddiness, but Baker must have been used to it, because her countenance didn’t change. She furrowed her brow, considering the task, looking more like an analyst than a bar patron.
“Bull-bra Streisand,” Hannah rattled aloud. “James Bull-dwin. Katharine Hep-bull.”
“Let’s give the puns a rest,” Baker said easily, and Hannah rolled her eyes.
“She never had a name before,” Brian said uncertainly.
“A travesty,” Hannah muttered.
“Be nice,” Midas said through his teeth, shooting a clandestine look at Brian.
“All right,” Baker said finally. “Her name is … Shane.” She paused. “Because everyone gets a ride.”
There was a shimmer of a moment while the joke registered for Hannah, and then she burst into raucous laughter and shook Baker delightedly. “Oh my god, I love you. Genius. No notes. Marry me?” She kissed Baker and twirled away.
“What is she on?” I asked.
Baker shrugged. “Vibes.”
“Who is Shane?”
Baker took a leisurely sip of her fresh Diet Coke and smacked her lips before she answered. “You need to watch The L Word, kiddo.”
In the opposite corner, Hatch was propped on a step stool with more rainbow streamers in his hands. He seemed oblivious to Hannah’s hyperactivity, or maybe just immune to it. He was trying to juggle the streamers in one hand and the adhesive tape in the other.
“Here,” I said, appearing at his shoulder and ripping off a strip of tape.
“I got it, thanks,” Hatch said gruffly, ignoring my proffered piece of tape.
I clucked my tongue. “Otis Penny is right. You are one stubborn old queen.”
“Skedaddle,” Hatch said, shooing me. “Let the grown-ups work.”
“I want to help somehow.”
“Is Ru’s litter box clean?”
I grumbled and shuffled off to empty Her Highness’s bathroom, but not before Hannah called, “Oh, and while you’re at it, see if you can wrangle her into her dress!”