Chapter 4

“I feel seasick,” Doober said.

“We’re standing on the dock, you moron,” his brother said.

“Don’t be a dickhead, Freddy.”

“The name is Fred, moron, and I can still beat the snot out of you if I must. I am the older brother. I’m smarter, I’m better looking, and I get laid more than you do.”

“Your wife is a lovely woman, Dickhead, and I’ll say nothing bad about her except to mention her poor eyesight. Lord knows, you ain’t the prettiest pea in the pod,” Doober said. “I could barf.”

“Too much beer,” Richard said.

Doober shook his head and squatted. He braced himself with hand on the wood plank, hoping that the sensation would fade. He dropped his head and took a deep breath. When the nausea receded, he stood back up and pulled his jeans back up onto his waist.

“I haven’t had a beer in ten weeks,” Doober said. “When I don’t drink, the dreams don’t usually come as often or as strong. One sip too much and the nightmares won’t stop.”

“Jeez, you’re a regular whacka-doodle.”

“Yeah, that’s why ma insisted we come out for a visit,” Doober said. “Getting out of town is supposed to be good for me; get me away from all the things that trigger me. I’ll drive twenty minutes out of my way to avoid Gary’s house because every time I see that rundown piece of crap I start to cry.”

He stared out at the small lake. Houses on the other side poked out between trees and clumps of bushes. Some of them were fancy and some were regular houses looking weather beaten and dated. The neighborhood dock could have used a few new planks and a paint job too.

“Doober, I never thought you would be such a pussy,” his brother said, shaking his head.

“Fuck you,” Doober said with heat. “You haven’t ever seen a corpse in your life, much less three with their guts blown out and their brains dripping down the wall. You would’ve been screaming like a little girl and pissing your pants.”

Doober stormed off the dock. Looking his brother in the eye, he said, “You keep telling yourself that you’re a man’s man and you don’t cry and nothing can break you. You never took a chance in your life on anything except for leaving and even then, you were following everyone else with your nose up their butt cracks. You are a little fat man, a little fat mind, and a growing beer belly. You ain’t shit.”

He walked up to the road, going the opposite way from the house. At the front entrance to the neighborhood, he turned left on the berm of the state road. Dodging the garbage and the weeds, he strolled down to the gas station with the little diner attached to it. The diner was mostly empty after the lunch rush, which suited Doober fine.

He sat on a stool at the counter, not bothering to pick up a menu. When the waitress sauntered over, he ordered a slice of grasshopper pie and a cup of coffee. All the tourists who were renting houses on the lake would bring their dumb kids to the diner and offer them grasshopper pie. “Does it have real grasshoppers in it?” the brats would squeal with horror.

The answer depended on the parent and not the kid. Doober’s theory was that if mom or dad was an asshole, the answer was “yes” and if they were only sometimes an asshole, the answer was “maybe.” His brother was an asshole and that was all the confirmation Doober needed to substantiate his theory. His brother’s kids were going to grow up to be assholes too.

The waitress slid the plate by his elbow and plopped the cup and saucer in front of him. “Milk and sugar?”

“Just milk,” Doober said as he sat up straight and picked up his fork. He took a bite, closing his eyes and letting the green mint fill his mouth with joy before gently chewing the chocolate graham cracker crust. He opened his eyes, realizing that this bite was the first thing he had really tasted in the past three months. He put his fork down and took a sip of coffee; the brew was a step above sludge and a small step at that.

“Holy cow,” he said.

“Brings back memories, don’t it,” the waitress said, watching him as she leaned against the back counter. “I know that pie will rot the teeth out of your mouth and put an extra ring around your belly, but damn, I can’t resist a slice somedays.”

“It’s a kind of magic,” Doober said, after taking another bite. “You got your jalapeno nachos and your chili fries, and even a double cheeseburger with mayo and catsup, but there is nothing like a taste of grasshopper pie on a dog day in the afternoon.”

“Fat, fat, and more fat,” the waitress said. “I sense a theme from you.”

As he slurped his coffee, Doober realized that the woman was flirting with him. He had been feeling ugly and scruffy for weeks, standing under the showerhead with the water beating on his skull without lifting a bar of soap. No longer able to look at himself in the mirror, he shaved when he remembered. He put down his cup.

She looked like she was thirty-five, maybe forty. Her roots were showing, and her eyes looked tired and unfocused. The way she was leaning back against the counter reminded him of an act of surrender, like life had beaten her into quiet gestures of futility. ‘Another dead-end job,’ he thought to himself with a restrained shudder.