Osprey Island

She put her hand out across the bar toward him—didn’t touch him, but made the gesture, the movement toward the touch. “I am not making fun of you.”

Morey appeared then with food, and Suzy drew back her hand as though she’d been caught at something illicit. Morey deposited Squee’s dinner before him, then passed the other basket to Roddy. He reached under the counter, withdrew a handful of plastic packets, and slid them across the bar: tartar sauce and lemon juice.

Suzy looked down toward Mia, who still had an inch of grenadine fizz in the bottom of her glass.

“You know?” Roddy said, his composure returned, a clam strip dangling between his thumb and forefinger, “I had a crush on you in high school.”

“You did?”

“Big one.” He nodded at his clams.

Suzy sat there, dumb.

“Yup,” Roddy said, still nodding.

“I have to say,” Suzy managed finally, “that was sort of a surprise there . . .”

“Yeah?” Roddy stuck a clam in his mouth and chewed.

“Yeah.” She laughed.

“Sorry.”

“That’s OK.” She laughed again, nervous. “Well, you have definitely succeeded in making me feel very uncomfortable now, so maybe, while we’re even, I’ll just take my leave.” She drained the last of her Maker’s, called to Mia—“Hey, kid, let’s hit the road”—slapped a few dollars on the bar for Morey, and stood to go. Mia slid reluctantly from her stool.

Roddy chewed his lip, then said, “It wouldn’t be too hard to have a big crush on you now.”

She stared at him for a second, as long as it took him to blanch and turn back to his food. Then she let out another laugh—a laugh of bafflement—and clapped a hand on Roddy’s back like a football buddy or a frat brother. “We’ll be seeing you, Roddy,” she said. “See you, Squee. Morey. Let’s beat it, kid.” And Suzy opened the door and followed Mia out into the disconcerting sunshine.

The kids arrived early that night, so it was Morey who got them started on their drinks and made quarter change for the pool table. By the time Merle Squire showed up for her shift the air was thick with smoke and the din was as dense. Merle wasn’t particularly in the mood for summer to begin. Summer folk didn’t tip worth shit, and though some customers were better than none, she wasn’t sure she even cared. She didn’t mind tending bar when it was just George Quincy ordering his same old Jack and Coke for hours every night before he stumbled back up the hill, or the girls from the IGA who came in after work. But the summer folk set her on edge. They didn’t even try to fit in. The summer folk treated the year-rounders like mosquitoes: summer pests, inevitable but tolerable if you slathered on enough repellent and didn’t wander out of your screened-in gazebo. One summer Merle had gotten to talking with a chatty and particularly stupid housekeeper—and in Merle’s opinion those Irish girls were as bad as the New York lawyers and their skinny wives. The girl had asked where Merle lived.

“Here,” Merle told her.

“No, but during the year,” said the girl.

“Here,” Merle said again, her patience rapidly waning.

“People live here?” The girl seemed genuinely surprised.

“What do you think?” Merle asked. “You think it’s like Disney World? You think we shut down after Labor Day, pull the docks in out of the water, put a big tarp over everything and pack up and go home?” The girl listened, drunk and bleary-eyed. “Like this is some summer camp for assholes? And what am I? An actress? They pay me to dress like a waitress and pour beer!” Merle laughed loudly, and clearly to herself.

The first person Merle spotted when she arrived at Morey’s that night was her own son, sitting by the bar, drinking a Coca-Cola as though no one knew why he carried his drink with him out to his truck or what he added to it there.

“Hi, Ma.”

“Lance.” Merle nodded. She poured herself a shot of tequila, drank it down, and chewed a lime. Lance glared disapprovingly. “Save it,” Merle told him. He turned back to the Irish girls who swirled around the pool table, carrying their cues like scepters. Merle didn’t know the redhead approaching the bar, but Lance practically jumped out of his skin offering drinks, offering anything. Brigid accepted a beer— Guinness, two of them, actually, both of which Lance paid for— thanked him, and then stepped away.

“You can’t let them know,” Merle told her son.

“Huh?”

“They don’t want to know—ones like that—how bad you want them.”

“Shut up,” Lance said. He was watching Brigid, who handed one of the beers to a college boy skulking in the corner.

“Don’t tell your mother to shut up.”

“Well, shut up, then.”

They were quiet a minute, until Merle said, “So how’s Lorna these days?”

Lance looked at his mother, then pushed his drink away. He shook his head, pulled the glass back, and took a big swallow. “Drunk,” he said.

“Lorna,” Merle said, “or you?”

But Lance didn’t answer, just stared into his drink, shaking his head no.

Brigid had run into Gavin, the waiter she had her eye on, that afternoon behind the staff barracks where he’d sat, smoking, on the fire escape steps. “A gang of us are planning to head over this evening to Morey’s Dinghy, that pub, there . . .”—she pointed—“at the end of the beach, you see?” Gavin had nodded, holding smoke in his lungs,