Mitzi set her glass down. “What, I should publish it in a newspaper?”
Sewanee felt Adaku’s fingers claw into her forearm, her breath hot in her ear, the giggle in her voice. “I’m never leaving.”
“Just wait,” Sewanee whispered back, then fed the fire: “Hey, Mitzi! How’s the hip?”
“Terrible. This one gets better, this one gets worse.” She slapped her left thigh and then her right. “The only good thing about getting old is nothing. But I don’t complain.” She went to take another sip, found it empty. “Goddamm it.”
Dan smiled. “’Nother?”
“What am I, a camel?”
“Hellooooo!”
All four women turned to see Birdie, a Midwestern Mrs. Claus–looking woman in a Champion sweatshirt with Westie appliques on it. “Are we having a party?”
“Oh, Christ,” Blah and Mitzi said in unison, turning back to the bar.
Birdie stepped up to them. “If I’d known we were having a party, I would have brought dip.”
“Not the dip!” Mitzi barked.
Birdie leaned in to Adaku. “I don’t think we’ve had the pleasure. I’m Bertha, but everyone calls me Birdie.”
Sewanee cut her off at the pass. “This is my best friend, Adaku, but everyone calls her A.”
“You couldn’t have told me that?” Mitzi, again, barked.
“How lovely!” Birdie chirped. “We both have nicknames!”
“Yes, lovely,” Adaku concurred.
Birdie turned her attention to Sewanee. “And how’s my dear Swan?”
“You always remember my name, Birdie.”
“Well! As the saying goes, ‘birds of a feather’ . . . do something.”
Blah was gazing down at the bar. “Dan, we need a refill.” Sewanee clocked her half-drunk martini. “And please remember the olives this time.”
“Sure thing, Blah.” Dan took the glass without comment. “Birdie? What can I get you?”
“Oh, you know me, I’m a teetotaler. But since we’re having a party! Vodka, rocks, twist.”
“Coming right up.”
Birdie tapped the bar. “Dagburnit, I wish I’d brought my dip.”
“Birdie, why don’t you tell A about your dip?” Sewanee suggested, to which Blah and Mitzi cried, “Oh, Christ!”
Birdie had blue eyes that were wide and dim, though–if Sewanee were being cruelly honest–perhaps no dimmer than they’d been her entire life. She looked at Adaku now with those fathomless-lake eyes and said, “Would you like that?” and Adaku was toast.
“Please!”
“Well. You’ll need sour cream. A good-sized tub of it.”
“Okay.”
“You might want to write this down, honey. You wouldn’t want to forget something.”
“Of course, good idea.” Adaku smiled, pulling out her phone and going to her notes app. “Ready!”
“Where was I?”
“A good-sized tub of sour cream.”
“Yes! Now, you don’t want one of the huge tubs, mind you, because then the ratio gets thrown off. Just a good, normal tub. Next comes the taco seasoning. You can find that in the Mexican aisle. I don’t mean to offend you.”
Adaku came up from her phone. “Why would I be offended?”
“I don’t think I’m supposed to say Mexican anymore. My daughter is trying to help me be more appropriate. But what’s wrong with being a Mexican anything? Even seasoning?”
Adaku patted Birdie’s hand. “Nothing.”
Birdie raised her other hand to her chest and exhaled. “Phew.” Then she paused. “Where was I?”
“Taco seasoning.”
“Yes! The Mexico aisle. You’re going to want to look for a small package about this big and it’s going to say: Taco. Seasoning.” She watched Adaku type this while Dan delivered the fresh drinks.
He pointed at Mitzi’s empty glass. “You sure?”
Mitzi talked right over Birdie’s lecture. “Jack and Coke.”
Blah said, “I thought you weren’t drinking?”
Mitzi gave an eye-rolling nod in Birdie’s direction. “That was before the dip showed up.”
Birdie heard Mitzi and stopped her recital. “Do you want the recipe, Mitzi?”
“Oh, Christ.”
“Now, the package tells you to put it in ground beef, but don’t. No . . . ground . . . beef.”
“No . . . ground . . . beef,” Adaku parroted.