Of course, she was more inclined to find friends in the fruit bowl than the ashtray, but would she fit in? She’d never claimed an identity for the same reasons she’d never gotten tattoos: she couldn’t imagine settling on anything. In the early nineties, when she’d had the energy for such things, she’d flirted with the idea of getting avocado halves tattooed on her elbows and embracing her bisexuality, but it had all been so rigid back then, so black-and-white, such a commitment, and avocados and bisexuals weren’t as cool as they were now, and only seemed to come from California. No one had wanted them on their toast, certainly. It was a consistency thing. They were treated with apprehension at best, or else outright discrimination from both the straight and gay communities. But now that she was oldish, the crowd in there youngish, and it was finally acceptable to be gayish, she might as well sit at the counter and eat some octopus. Right?
She walked into the ashtray instead. The drop ceiling was lit up with strings of colored lights—Christmas in late June—and there were a few small TVs showing harness racing, and a large flat-screen playing a boxing match. Everything was coated in sticky dust. Most of the stools were occupied at the horseshoe-shaped bar, but she found an empty one along the curve.
No one acknowledged her, not even the bartender, the only other woman there. “Caught Up in You” started playing through the speakers, and Greta studied the bartender for nearly the entire song, unnoticed. Her strawberry blonde hair had long white roots, and she wore low-rise jeans and a pink T-shirt with a desert-island cartoon printed on the front—a tiny island with a single palm tree, no castaways—over which ICELAND was printed in frosty blue letters. She was maybe fifty. Greta spent a little too long wondering if her shirt was a meaningless novelty, or if it was about climate change, or if she’d actually traveled to Iceland, and if so, what she’d done there. She had a habit of resting her hands on her hips when she talked to her customers, all of whom resembled old newspapers, and of laughing at her own jokes. Her laugh was manic and grating.
Without looking at Greta, the man sitting next to her said, “What’re you having?”
“Vodka soda,” Greta said.
“Vera,” he called to the bartender. “Get her a vodka soda.”
Greta expected a dirty look, but the bartender smiled benignly at her while pouring vodka into a pint glass.
“Lime?” the guy asked.
“Lemon,” Greta said, and the guy, her translator, paused before relaying the information, as if she’d asked for passion fruit or lychee. The guy was tan, broad, and muscular, with a creepy little ponytail, and he was watching the boxing match closely, as if he had money on it. He seemed to be drinking seltzer, but since the drinks came in pint glasses, maybe it was gin or vodka.
Vera delivered Greta’s drink. “Is my brother bothering you?”
Greta smiled and said no.
“Lemme know if he does,” Vera said, and wandered away.
A long minute passed during which Greta could feel individual hairs on her head turning white. She hadn’t anticipated sitting next to him. She’d been looking for Harvey Keitel in, say, The Piano, minus the face tattoos, because that’s who Big Swiss said he resembled, but of course Keith looked nothing like Harvey Keitel. Since his eyes were still glued to the TV, she risked a closer look. He didn’t look like anyone. Well, maybe James Caan? Taller, though, younger. And poorer, obviously, but with good posture. He wore a tight white tank top and fitted gray dress pants. Hadn’t Harvey Keitel worn something similar in Taxi Driver? She could see the resemblance now, though Keith wouldn’t have been caught dead in a fedora or pinkie rings. He was more like Mr. White from Reservoir Dogs, without the shirt and tie. He had presence, she decided, and seemed aware of every muscle in his body, including the ones in his hands and feet.
His hands. Red, swollen, very wide. Inevitably, she pictured them wrapped around Big Swiss’s pale neck, squeezing and releasing, and her own throat tightened. It was easy to imagine his hands doing violence but hard to imagine the look on his face. He had a calm, reasonable face, though she was only seeing his profile. He had yet to look directly at her. And sociopaths can be calm—c’mon. Look at Hannibal and his low heart rate.
She thought of Pi?on, hopefully conked out in the antechamber, where she’d left him. They’d spent nearly every minute of the last two weeks together. Tonight was the first time Greta had left his side for more than twenty minutes. He wasn’t bouncing back the way he used to, and if the vet had reported the incident to the police, they’d never contacted her.
It occurred to her now that Keith was staring at the TV to avoid looking at her, that he couldn’t have cared less about boxing, that he knew exactly who Greta was because he’d been stalking her and Big Swiss for months, that he’d shot Greta’s dog in cold blood, and that he was hyperaware of his body because he was a bundle of nerves. But why had he spoken to her at all? To see if she knew who he was. She hadn’t known, obviously, but she knew now. Maybe he could sense that she’d recognized him and was praying that she wouldn’t call him out in front of his sister and all these newspapers. Of course, she wasn’t positive that he’d tried to kill Pi?on, but it would be telling to see how he reacted if she said his name.
“Keith,” she said.
His face turned toward her slightly but his eyes remained on the screen.
“Huh?”
“That’s your name, right? Keith.”
“Uh-huh,” he said.
“Do you recognize me?”
He reluctantly glanced at her face and then quickly back at the screen.
“You recognize me, right?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Maybe,” he said. “Should I?”
“Well, yeah,” she said. “I’m Greta.”
He gave her a warm look. He thought he was being flirted with. She could mention Big Swiss and watch his face fall, or at least redden, or she could just cut to the chase.
“You shot the wrong dog,” Greta said.
“Excuse me?”
“You shot the wrong dog,” Greta repeated. “Two weeks ago. You meant to shoot the big silver one, but you shot the little guy instead. My guy.”
He laughed as if he’d misheard her. “Slow down. What now?”
“You shot my dog,” Greta said slowly. “With a gun. In the leg? Not hers—mine.”
Now he swiveled toward her and looked her in the eye. “Where you from, hon?”
“Oh, you know,” Greta said. “You know exactly where I live. Next to the firehouse. I’ve seen your truck across the street. You’ve probably seen me with her.”
“Who?”
“Her,” Greta said.
He winced and swiveled back to center. “Really not in the mood today, lady.”
“Yeah, well, you should know that my dog suffered. This was a really big setback for him. And me.”
“I love dogs,” he said. “I’d never shoot a dog. Never in a million years.”
He finished his drink, and Vera came over.
“One more?” she asked Keith.
“Twist my arm,” Keith said.
Vera walked away and poured too much gin into a pint glass.