Chapter 7 An Experiment in Talking to Strangers in Panel Vans #2
He rolled down the window when we arrived, rather than stepping out like a normal.
“Hiya, Jackie. Good to see ye.”
The man in question—Arnold, I presumed—had a massive, booming voice that made my eyes water. His face was an alarming shade of tomato, and his hair was whiter than the retinal damage you get from staring directly at the sun.
“Arnold! Glad to see you again. Thanks for coming up all this way to meet our Maya here.” Wait! Jackie had met this man before? And thought we could be a good match? He was as old as my father.
I laughed nervously. “How far did you have to come?”
“I’ve come up from Connemara. It’s about two and a half hours from here.” Shit! I’m not getting out of this one easy, am I?
“Oh! Two and a half hours is a long way for a woman you’ve never met, right? Why would you do that?” I laughed because I was dying inside. Was that rude?
“Aye, well. Jackie has good taste!”
That voice! It could peel the paint off a moving bus. At least I could understand him, though, that was a blessing, at least.
Jackie clapped him on a big shoulder encouragingly. “Why don’t you go ahead and get out of the car, Arnold, and we’ll go find you a drink?”
Arnold took a second, and I hoped for a blessed moment that he might refuse for some reason, but then he nodded and stepped out. He was a big man. Taller than I was, with a rib cage like a barrel. He wasn’t bad-looking, if I was being objective, but for a woman in her fifties or sixties.
We all three walked back to the Ritz in excruciating silence. As Jackie opened the door to the pub, to my horror, Arnold put his hand on my lower back and kept it there as we walked to the bar, as if I were already his.
Bad touch! It crawled up my spine. I sidestepped out of his reach.
“She’s a fine-looking girl, Jackie.”
Oh, good God! He’d said this—out loud—for all the souls in the pub to hear, as if Jackie had shown him a horse that he was considering buying.
“What’ll you have, Maya? I would really like to buy you a drink.”
That was a weird way to put it. “No. Please don’t buy me anything.” Backpedal! “I mean, that’s nice of you, but this is still quite full. Thank you, though.”
“Are ye sure?”
“Yes.”
“All right, then. Just a lemonade for me, please.” Well, that was something. At least I didn’t have to worry about him getting drunk and handsy. But what about sober and handsy?
I looked to Jackie. Save me! I said with my eyes. He gave me a look that was the facial equivalent of high-five emoji, eggplant emoji.
“Now, why don’t you two have a little seat just there and get to know each other. I’ll be back after a dance or two.”
I didn’t want that. I had thought Jackie was my friend and ally. How could he leave me with the loud van man? I would only name a bad cat after him now!
Arnold and I both listened to instructions like we didn’t have two brains of our own, and sat at a table with two chairs that were far too small to be comfortable for anyone larger than the Lollipop Guild.
The single square foot of terrorizing Formica shook as Arnold adjusted against the wall.
I snatched our glasses and held them to safety until he settled.
Then we stared at each other. Then we stared at our hands.
Then our eyes darted around the room uncomfortably, until I could stand the silence no more.
“So, um.” Oh my God. Is he going to make me do this? Because I was almost certainly going to make it a hell of a lot worse. “So, um. So. Do you like to drive?” Oh my God.
“Sure, sure. Driving’s fine.”
I gave it a minute, just in case he decided to take charge. But no. Of course he didn’t.
For a woman who loved to wrap herself in cozy, comfortable silences, I hated nothing more than awkward silences; they were my nemesis, they were my downfall.
When I found myself stuck in one, I, very much against my better judgment, did everything I could to fight my way out.
And yet time and time again, they were quicksand, and for all my flailing, I sank all the faster.
Did I learn anything from this? No. No, I did not.
“So when you drove, like, up here today, did you have your radio on? Or like a CD or something?”
“Radio.”
“Ahh, right. Radio.” I nodded wisely, like I’ve heard of radio. “And do you, you know . . . do something?”
“Do something? When I’m driving?” He almost sounded angry. That makes it sound dirty! No no no! Don’t picture it! I pictured it.
“Oh! Um. No, I mean, like, for work . . . or something.” Why was it that I always sounded like an idiot?
I mean, I knew myself to be a woman fully in possession of a brain and a decent vocabulary.
And yet . . . “Something worky? Like work? Or, like, are you retired?” Shit sandwich, I did not just say that!
“No, no. I work for the power company.” He grunted and adjusted uncomfortably in his seat again, making the wonky table move and splash our drinks. I guessed at least he was just as awkward as I was. Maybe he didn’t even notice.
“And what about books?”
“Books?”
“Yeah. Do you have some?”
“Uhh—”
“Oh. I mean, I think what I’m asking is—do you like to read?”
“Yeah. I read.”
“Oh, you do?” My voice went way too high. “Great!” I laughed. Oh, thank God! This I can work with. Should be able to kill ten minutes, at least! I waited for a moment, hoping he would elaborate on his own without handholding. But no. “And, uh. And what do you like to read?”
“I read the papers. Every morning.”
My voice went right back down to suboptimal-enjoyment levels. “The papers.”
“Yeah.”
“Oh. The papers.” I nodded again, as in Oh yes, I’ve heard of newspapers.
“It’s always good to keep abreast of current events.
” Please do not use the word “abreast” ever again.
“But what about books? Like fiction, maybe? A good swashbuckle. Or, say, I dunno, Bigfoot erotica?” I laughed giddily, thinking, hoping, that he might laugh also. But this did not come to pass.
He gave me a tight look, worried, most likely, for my sanity. “No. I’ll read no erotica,” he boomed. I winced.
“Oh, that . . . that was a joke. I like laughing. But what about . . . other stuff?”
“I don’t read books. I gotta keep moving, ye know? Can’t understand people sitting around doing nothing.”
I had a quiet aneurysm, then involuntarily let out a big breath that sounded suspiciously like a sigh. Arnold looked at his watch. Sweet Lord, let him be ready to go home!
“Well, I’d better go.”
“Oh, wonderful!” Shit! Don’t say that, Maya! “I mean, oh no. Already?” No! Don’t say that either!
“I’ll just be a few minutes. I forgot to lock my van.
And there are a lotta foreign people moving over these days.
It’ll be hard to drive you home if they steal my van.
” He said this. Out loud. And his voice was the loudest voice in all the land.
I cringed my spine into a knot and slid down in my seat.
“Oh, no. You can’t. Wow. Please don’t say that. ”
“’Fraid so. Can’t trust ’em!”
“That’s . . . not what I meant.” Ooookay. Well, we’re done here. If the book hating weren’t a mood killer, casual xenophobia would certainly do it.
Conclusion: date unsuccessful.
Uncontrollable variable: date suffered from insidious medical condition where one’s reason is taken over by fecal matter.
Arnold, ignoring my objections—or perhaps not hearing them, as they had been at a normal decibel for human ears—left, keys in hand, and I jumped up immediately to find Jackie. I had to beg him to break this off. This man wanted to drive me home, for Christ’s sake!
The pub was getting more crowded, and I wove through the people toward the back room where the music was coming from.
And there was Jackie, dancing with a beautiful older lady.
They were laughing, and he was spinning the taller woman effortlessly.
I hated to ruin his dance, but desperate times called for desperate measures.
What if Arnold returned before the song ended? I couldn’t bear it!
I waved at Jackie. I dodged through the people and tried to make eye contact as they spun and shifted and wove through the other dancers.
It didn’t work. I made a big, weird smile and widened my eyes for explicit eye contact.
This also did not work. Then I moved my arms in a high X wave. Totally normal.
“Jackie?” I called out.
Everyone looked. Except for Jackie.
“Jackie!”
“Are ye mad? What are you doing?”
There was a voice. A deep voice. A familiar voice.
A slow, dangerous rumble of a voice that turned my blood to ice.
The biggest hand in the world wrapped around my wrist, which, at that moment, was at the highest point of the X.
“Jesus! You nearly lamped that poor woman. Would you stop waving your arms like an eejit?”
I whirled around, wrist still in his hand, and it looked for all the world like we were mid-dance, only his grip was tight and accusatory, and his face—surprise, surprise—was angry.
My mouth opened as I looked up into Tadhg’s face, and we froze there, stock-still on the edge of the dance floor.
The music slurred and swam in my mind for a moment, as if I were underwater.
His brow was drawn and creased, looking even more furious than when I’d last seen him and said he tasted like asshole.
“I . . .” I started and stopped, forgetting the mechanics of how to form a sentence, until a dancer spun past and bumped into me, pushing my body into Tadhg’s.
We jostled against each other for a second.
His body was every bit as granitelike as I had imagined it to be .
. . multiple times. His arm came around my back to stop me from falling.
I put my hand on his chest for purchase.
It was warm and so deliciously solid. My fingers splayed themselves wide.
He inhaled, and his mouth looked angry too now, not just the brow.