stiffly.
“Vinnie, what happened to you?”
“Nothing. Come on, let’s do it.”
“Stop,” I said. I went over to him and grabbed him by the shoulders. Up close I could see the bruise on his face, just outside his left eye.
“Who did this?”
He looked away. “It’s nothing.”
“You got clocked pretty good here. Who was it?”
“Some guys at the casino. We had a little altercation last night.”
“Some guys? How many?”
“There were three of them. They were all at one table, getting totally lit up, making a racket. I asked them to turn it down a notch, but they didn’t seem very cooperative.”
“Three men, you say?”
“Yeah. One of them looked underage. The other two were real hard cases. I eventually had to ask them to leave, and I tried to escort them outside personally. That’s when things got a little out of hand.”
“Just out of curiosity, was one of them rather large?”
He started rubbing the side of his face, where the bruise was. “Yeah, one of them.”
“Did they happen to leave on a boat?”
He stopped dead. “Yes, they did. How did you know that?”
“You’re gonna hate me for this,” I said. “But I think I helped save their lives.”
We started on the stairs. I told Vinnie I was just humoring him, but deep down I knew he was right. He usually is. We got in a couple of hours, but I was working on an empty stomach. So we left everything where it was for a while. I asked him if he wanted to join me at the Glasgow. He probably spent more time there than anybody, not counting Jackie and myself, but today he begged off. He wanted to go down to the rez and check up on his mother. Ever since his brother died, it was something he made a point of doing at least once every day or two. I couldn’t even imagine how many times he got asked why he wasn’t living on the rez himself now. Sometimes I wondered what his answer was, when it was just Vinnie and his family and they really wanted to know why he was living up here in Paradise.
He told me he’d be back after lunch, that he’d meet me there. So I went down to the Glasgow on my own. Past my empty cabins, with the wood split and stacked next to each front door, waiting for somebody to decide it was worth making the trip again. There’s a spot right where you turn onto the main road-you can see the lake through a break in the trees. The wind was kicking up three-foot breakers now. The sky was such a dark shade of gray, it was like you couldn’t even imagine the sun ever coming out again.
I pulled into the lot and went inside. The place was empty. I stood there in the doorway wondering where Jackie was, until finally he came out of the kitchen, carrying a case of beer.
“It’s you,” he said. A typical greeting. Born in Scotland, he had come to Michigan as a teenager. Fifty-odd years later, you could still hear a slight burr in his voice.
“Where is everybody?”
“Who the hell knows? If they live here, they’re probably at home in a deep depression. And if they don’t live here, they’d be crazy to come.”
That pretty much summed up Jackie’s attitude these days. He was taking it hard. Not just because there weren’t any tourists around. Hell, he probably didn’t mind that part at all. But Jackie loved the summers up here, maybe more than anybody I could think of. He’s the guy who would pull his car over to watch a sunset.
Maybe it was in his blood, some Scottish thing. A better appreciation for the kind of day they didn’t often see back in Glasgow. Or maybe he was just a tough old bird who had made it through another winter and expected a little sunshine.
“And where were you last night, anyway?” he said. He set down the beer and started putting the bottles in the refrigerator below the bar.
“Any chance of me getting an omelet?”
“Go right ahead. You know where the kitchen is.”
“Come on, Jackie.”
“The one night I actually could have used some company,” he said. He banged another bottle in the refrigerator. “There wasn’t a single soul in this place. Can you believe that? First night I’ve ever seen that happen.”
“Cheese and ham. Green peppers if you have them.”
He stopped what he was doing, just long enough to glare at me.
“Come on,” I said. “It’ll take your mind off your troubles.”
“Use the small pan,” he said. “And don’t burn anything. It only takes a couple of minutes.”
“Jackie…”
“Why are you limping, anyway? Did you go find some trouble somewhere?”
“You can ask Vinnie about it later. He’s the one with the bruises.”
“I’m asking you.”
“Jackie, are you seriously not going to make me an omelet?”
“Two eggs, Alex. It’s so easy even you can do it.”
“Fine. You’re obviously too busy out here with all your customers.”
He slammed the case down, a little clue that maybe I was pushing my luck. I went back into the kitchen and started rummaging around. I found the right pan, then I took out two eggs and broke them.
Not a minute had gone by, and Jackie was right there next to me. “What are you doing? Didn’t you ever learn how to break an egg?”
“It’s not that hard.”
“Get out of the way.” He pushed me aside and started taking the little bits of eggshell out of the pan. “You don’t have the heat high enough, either. I swear, you’re the most useless human being I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, I forgot to say…Good morning.”
He threw in the green peppers. “You need to wait with the cheese, too. Until the very end. You getting all this?”
“If I start doing all this for myself, you won’t even have a reason to get out of bed in the morning.”
He took his spatula and worked it around the edges. This was the part that always threw me. This was when I’d usually give up and just scramble them.
“Have you talked to her?” he said.
I didn’t answer. I was surprised he had even asked. Jackie was the veteran of a bad marriage and an even worse divorce, and at this point in his life I didn’t figure he’d be changing his opinion on relationships with the opposite sex.
“Not in a while.”
He nodded. “It’s hard. Toronto’s a long way.”
“There’s more to it. She’s working.”
“It’s a long way, Alex. There doesn’t have to be any other reason.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to that. Or if I could even argue his point.
He put the cheese in and folded the omelet perfectly. “Get out of my kitchen.”
“You’re a prince.”
“Yeah, yeah. Go sit down.”
“I think Vinnie might need one, too. He’ll probably be here later.”
“Is that right?”
“Yeah. Your customer service needs a little work.”
I left the kitchen before he could hit me with the pan. I sat down in one of the overstuffed chairs, put my feet up by the fire.
Jackie came back out with the omelet. He set the plate down on the little table. He stood there looking a little lost for a moment, like he didn’t know what to do next.
“You should be enjoying this,” I said. “Nobody else to worry about for a while. Hell, you could even close the
