Love in a Nutshell

“Beer table for the first stop,” Ella said.

“I don’t suppose there’s a wine table?”

Ella shot her a dubious look. “You’re not serious, are you?”

She had been, but she’d never admit it.

Ella had a conspiratorial look in her eye. “I have a plan for you.”

“And beer is part of it?”

“If you don’t want a beer, just make sure you grab something to drink, because you’re going to need it.”

“That sounds marginally dangerous.”

“If it’s only marginally, we’re doing pretty good,” Ella said.

They rounded food tables packed with the kind of calories a sensible woman would avoid, but which Kate considered staples. She looked away from the temptation, but suddenly the evening’s danger factor rose. Matt stood at the beer table, and something way hotter than hunger for ham casserole rippled through Kate.

“Hi, Matt!” Ella called.

Matt very slowly turned his attention from Kate. This was a first, since usually when Ella called, guys hopped to.

“He’s into you,” Ella said to Kate in a low voice.

Kate shook off the moment. “Punch sounds good. Really good.” She moved on to the table directly to the left of Matt.

Ella lined up with Matt, got a cup of beer, and chatted a little with Clete Erikson.

Kate investigated the punch. Clearly, this was the grandma drink, complete with the obligatory island of orange sherbet slowly melting in a sea of bright pink liquid studded with chunks of melon and strawberry. Not her beverage of choice, but still about ten thousand spots ahead of beer. She ladled herself a big plastic cup, trying to avoid the fruit. If anyone was going to have the bad luck to create a scene with a public fruit-choking incident, Kate knew she’d be that person. To make up for the fruit, she added a little more punch, plus some of the orange stuff.

She glanced over and caught Matt watching her, a broad smile on his face.

“You sure you want to drink that?” he asked.

“Not really, but I’m going to give it a try, anyway.”

“Note the people lining up for the beer and note the continuing absence of people at your table. What does that tell you?”

“That Keene’s Harbor is a haven for beer snobs?”

He grinned. “Live and learn.”

She raised her cup of sludge in a sketchy toast. “That’s my general plan.”

Ella, who’d been watching, fought back a laugh. Kate glanced into her cup again. It wasn’t the prettiest stuff she’d ever seen, but it couldn’t be that bad.

“We need to get moving,” Ella said. “We’ll catch you later, Matt.”

With that, she snagged Kate by the wrist and began hauling her and her foaming punch back past the sirenlike lure of the casseroles.

“You still sing, right?” Ella asked.

The summer they were sixteen, they had nothing better to do than drive around town and sing along to the radio. Kate had a shiny new driver’s license and a less shiny hand-me-down car. And when they’d needed money for more gasoline, Ella had played the guitar and Kate had sung on the street corner until they had change for a few gallons or the police told them to close up shop.

“Not even in the shower. I keep the water temperature set too low to carry a tune,” Kate replied.

They passed through what was obviously a silent auction area. Kate halted K. Kure set t at a collection of old vinyl albums up for bid. Her parents had stuck their ancient stereo at The Nutshell. There was nothing Kate would like more than to mix a little retro Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin in with the Frank Sinatra and Barbra Streisand already in residence.

Ella nudged her along. “No time to window-shop. You’ve got music of your own to make.”

Kate noticed the small stage at the back of the long hall. About a half dozen people were in a line to the stage’s left, and Marcie Landon was onstage aligning a microphone stand behind a monitor of some sort. She seemed to be giving the arrangement the same OCD level of scrutiny she gave the shelves at her market.

As they came closer to the group, Kate started picking out the particulars. Junior Greinwold, with his trusty blue cooler at his feet, was flipping through an aged three-ring binder while a guy and another woman Kate didn’t recognize were peering at it from either side of him. A liquor-tinged memory of a party in someone’s basement and a lot of really bad versions of “Pour Some Sugar on Me” came back to her.

Kate stopped dead. “Karaoke? No way!” Ella settled a hand on Kate’s arm and drew her to the edge of the room. “You wanted to know how to become part of the town again, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then rule in karaoke.”

“You’re kidding. I thought the only place you could still find it was in ratty college bars.”

“It’s become the favored competitive sport in Keene’s Harbor. See those chairs?” Ella pointed to three chairs lined up at the far edge of the dance floor in front of the stage. “Judges. Olympic scoring. The whole thing. Now, come on.”

Kate looked around. “Isn’t there an arm-wrestling or kielbasa-eating challenge I could do instead?”

“Just get on up there,” Ella said.

“What, alone? You’re going to make me do this and you’re not singing?”

“I still can’t carry a tune, but you can. Do this, Kate. I’m telling you it will help.”

When she’d asked Ella for help in being accepted as one of the locals, she’d been thinking of something that might have taken a bit less effort and potential for humiliation on her part. But she trusted Ella. And what had dignity ever gotten her, anyway?

“Okay, then. Just stick by my side until I get a song under my belt.”

“I’ll be your personal assistant, I promise,” Ella said. “Let me hold your drink for you.”

They joined the field of karaoke Olympians.

“No cuts,” said a woman at the back of the line.

Kate blew out a sigh. Kw o height= “No problem.”

Ella drew Kate back a few steps, her voice lowered. “That’s Deena Bowen. She’s about five years older than us, so you missed out on her when we were kids. She’s also the town’s undisputed karaoke queen, among a couple of other less perky titles.”

“Such as?”

“Psycho revenge queen. She’s always verbally gunning for Matt, and from what I’ve heard, they only had one date. Though I guess she lobbied long and hard even for that one.”

“She’s a little spooky. Do you think she’d ever do more than just bad-mouth him?” Kate asked Ella.

“I don’t know. She’s bitter, for sure, but I think she’s just acting out over a whole lot of bad stuff in her life.” Ella paused long enough to give her a teasing smile. “Why? Are you worried about being in the line of fire if you date him?”

“You don’t have to be dating a guy to want to see him stay in one piece.” She inclined her head toward Deena. “And you have to admit she’s somewhere south of hostile. It rolls off her in waves.”

Ahead of Deena, Junior was pacing back and forth, shaking his arms and repeating “ma, me, mi, mo, mu” as his apparent warm-up exercise. Deena hissed at him to shut up before she had him sedated. Junior picked up his cooler and walked away from Deena to practice next to Kate.

“How’s it going, Junior?” Kate asked.

Junior glanced at Kate and hugged his cooler. “Fine.”

“Don’t you want to know how things are going for me?”

Junior hugged the cooler even tighter. “I guess so.”

“Well, I’m glad you asked. I’ve been trying to call you for two days. The ‘improvements’ you made to my toilet and shower leaked all over my entire house. The contractor was there today. Do you know what he found when he pulled up the floor?”

Junior looked a little ashamed. Kate suspected it wasn’t his first plumbing disaster. “Dooky.”

“That’s right. Lots of dirty dooky and mold. There were guys in hazmat suits in my house for eight hours