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As Johnny held up his nephew’s new shirt, checking its size and admiring it, a dark-haired man who had been seated
down near Papa got up, said a quick good-bye, and took a slow, wobbly, deliberate walk toward the front door. Then
he was gone. Up until that point, Annie had been very calm, polite, and friendly, so no one at the bar knew that
something had been brewing deep inside the large frame of the former North Atlantic fisherwoman. Without warning,
her demeanor became as violent as a nor’easter blowing in hard off the ocean, whipping calm waters into frenzy.
Like those unpredictable storms, no one could tell how long her anger would last.
“That little fuck.” She snapped her bar rag at the newly empty
seat. “He sits there drinking all day and then has the nerve to
get up and not tip me. I’m talking nothing, not a single dollar, not
a fucking red cent.”
Everyone got silent as her tirade built up a full head of steam.
“And the worst part is that the little prick drinks on Vinnie’s dime.
He doesn’t pay for the beer he drinks, and the little fuck can
drink like a fish too. I was here one Saturday a few weeks ago,
and he sat there all fucking day and put away a case by himself,
and I didn’t get a fucking tip after it was all over. I’m tired of this
shit. I don’t give a fuck who the fuck he is and if he’s related to
the owner or not. I’m telling Vinnie when he gets back from
fishing in North Carolina that this shit is gonna stop. It’s over—no
more.”
Annie ferociously threw her bar rag into small sink, pulled a
cigarette from her pack near the register, lit it up, and breathed
in the smoke deeply. It was over. The storm had passed almost as abruptly as it had struck, and the conversations
around her started up again.
The Hunter asked once more if the channel could be changed to the one showing the basketball game. This time
Papa just said no, and that ended that. Papa’s laid-back dominance in the smoky room was becoming more evident
to me. He was the senior man on this beached little ship. Annie might be at the helm, pouring the drinks and
collecting the money, but Papa was the captain of the crew.
Johnny rolled up the Montauk T-shirt, tucking it under his arm, and then took a gulp from his frosty longneck. He
started talking again, just as if we’d never left off. “It’s the same thing as Hurricane Katrina down in New Orleans.”