Mary-Alice
felt her heart pounding as she guided her beloved Oldsmobile 88 along the
narrow dirt-and-crushed-shell road. She was nervous about the prospect of
walking into one of the roughest bars in the bayous. But Mary-Alice’s main
worry was her car. Gertie’s Cadillac wasn’t reliable enough to make a quick
getaway, so Mary-Alice had volunteered to drive. But as the road narrowed, the
bristling blackberry thickets on either side menaced her metallic paint.
To
make matters worse, Mary-Alice felt she could barely breathe, thanks to the black
vinyl corset that Gertie had laced her into before they left.
“You
can’t walk into the Swamp Bar looking like you just came from a ladies’ prayer
breakfast,” Gertie had explained. “You have to blend in.”
In
addition to the corset, Mary-Alice sported fingerless lace gloves,
leopard-print leggings, and a spiky platinum wig complete with black roots. At
least Mary-Alice’s feet were too small for Gertie’s shoes. She was able to wear
her own comfortable tennis shoes, thank goodness.
Gertie
had gone in for Harajuku style. Beneath a frilly pink-and-white mini-dress,
white lace thigh-highs gripped Gertie’s bony legs. Tarantula eyelashes and
thick liner ringed her eyes. A huge white satin bow teetered atop Gertie’s
candy-pink wig.
Mary-Alice,
who was unfamiliar with Japanese fashion, assumed Gertie was dressed as Bette
Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
Just
as Mary-Alice was wondering whether she had gotten them hopelessly lost in the
black woods, Gertie cried, “There it is!” Mary-Alice glimpsed light through the
trees. The narrow road opened up to a crushed-shell parking lot. Gertie climbed out and led the way into the
building, crunching across the cracked white oyster shells in her pink
high-heeled boots.
“Gertie,”
Mary-Alice asked, “are you okay? Those heels seem awfully high.”
Gertie
was taking tiny, mincing steps, her knees bent and her arms held out for
balance.
There’s
no beauty without pain,” Gertie said.
“Wherever
did you hear that, Gertie?”
“At
a toddler pageant. One of the mothers said it.”
At
least Mary-Alice’s feet were comfortable in her sequined tennis shoes. The rest
of her, not so much. The platinum wig made her scalp itch, and the hooks of her
mobile-sized earrings tugged on her earlobes like a cheese-cutter.
The
Swamp Bar was a one-story building on the edge of the bayou. It had a
rust-splotched tin roof, tiny windows, and a general air of hopelessness.
Mary-Alice had parked close enough that her car was in the light, but not so
close that drunks would bump into her car or be tempted to relieve themselves
on her tires on their way out.
It
was so dark inside the Swamp Bar that Mary-Alice felt like she was stepping
into a cave. A cave that reeked of stale booze, drugstore cologne, and a hint
of vomit. For a moment, the only light she could see was from Gertie’s
glow-in-the-dark heart-shaped earrings.
Mary-Alice
gripped Gertie’s shoulder and followed her in.
“I
can’t see a thing,” Mary-Alice whispered. “Is the power out?”
“No,
it’s like this on purpose. So you can’t get a good look at the cockroaches. Or
the customers.”
Sinful's newest resident, Mary-Alice Arceneaux, is starting to catch on to the fact that the Sinful Ladies' Society does more than brew 100-proof cough syrup to sell at the church bazaar. So when Ida Belle gets into serious trouble, Mary-Alice wants to help the SLS in their quest for justice. But this means that the sweet-natured Mary-Alice will have to endure a visit to the Swamp Bar (where decent ladies don't go) and go up against her vindictive cousin, Mayor Celia Arceneaux. Will Mary-Alice's sweet nature and unshakable faith in humanity endure?
More info →
Mary-Alice’s
eyes adjusted as she followed Gertie over to the bar. Sunday was a relatively
slow night at the Swamp Bar, so Gertie was able to get the bartender’s
attention. He wore a too-big green t-shirt with “Swamp Bar” printed across the
chest in crooked iron-on letters. He wore his sandy hair in a mullet, cut short
in front, and long down his back. Tattoos covered his skinny arms, and his
nails were crusted with dirt.
“What’ll
it be, ladies?”
“Bourbon,
straight,” Gertie cooed coquettishly. “Make it a double. Mary-Alice, what’ll
you have?”
“I’ll
just have a Coke, please,” Mary-Alice said. “I’m driving.”
“Yes,
ma’am. Diet or regular?”
“Whatever
you have in a can. Thank you so much.”
“Don’t
act too prissy about germs,” Gertie whispered when the bartender had moved on
to the next customer. “We have to act like normal Swamp Bar customers.”
“I
know, but did you see his fingernails? He looks like he’s been digging up
graves with his bare hands.”
“You’ve
been reading those vampire mysteries again, haven’t you? Oh, there, I believe
that’s Leonie.”
It
wasn’t hard to spot Leonie Blanchard. She wore a halter top that showed off the
lioness tattoo covering her bare back. She coquetted with the men at her table,
tossing her auburn hair so it brushed her bare shoulders. When Leonie turned
her head to the side, Mary-Alice caught a glimpse of a hardened but
still-pretty face, caked with pale makeup that didn’t quite match the skin on
her neck.
“I’m
going in,” Gertie said. “Cover me.”
Mary-Alice
perched on a bar stool and watched Gertie totter over on her ridiculously high
heels, pausing now and then to straighten her pink wig as it listed to one side
or the other. Leonie seemed to recognize her former third-grade teacher despite
the latter’s exotic disguise. She half-stood to give Gertie a hug, one of the
men pulled out a chair, and soon Gertie was part of the festive group.
When
it was clear Gertie would be a while, Mary-Alice strolled around the perimeter
of the bar. Occasionally a man would pop out of the darkness to accost her with
a boozy “Evening, darlin’,” or “Hey, now, Blondie.” She responded each time
with a polite “How do you do?” and continued on her way.
Once
Mary-Alice had completed her circuit, she decided to check on her car. She
pulled the front door open a crack and peered out to the parking lot.
“Go!
Go! Go!” Gertie slammed into Mary-Alice’s back, and they tumbled out onto the
wooden porch.
Gertie
was only wearing one high-heeled boot. She yanked it off and flung it
tomahawk-style back into the darkness of the Swamp Bar.
“Ow!”
cried a woman’s voice, followed by a stream of curse words. Gertie pulled
Mary-Alice up by the elbow, and the two women sprinted across the lot.
Mary-Alice heard a loud crack of splintering wood, followed by the babble of an
excited and intoxicated crowd.
“Nice
job,” Gertie panted. “She slipped on your Coke can and busted the railing.”
They
jumped into the Oldsmobile, Mary-Alice floored the accelerator, and they peeled
out in a spray of oyster shells and dirt.
Neither
woman spoke until they were well out of range of the Swamp Bar.
“How
are your feet?” Mary-Alice asked, surprised to hear her voice crack. She
cleared her throat and tried again. “Are your feet okay, Gertie? Those broken
shells are sharp.”
“I
wore thick socks.” Gertie propped one fuzzy, dirty foot on Mary-Alice’s
dashboard. “I thought I just might have to make a run for it. So I came
prepared.”
Mary-Alice
glanced at the rear-view mirror, but saw only the red glow of her taillights
illuminating the blackberry bushes and kudzu that crowded the road. She gripped
the steering wheel tighter to keep her hands from shaking.
“Don’t
worry, no one’s behind us,” Gertie said. “She just had to make a big production
back there. I suppose she did make her point.”
“It
seemed to me that you were getting on well with Miss Leonie,” Mary-Alice said.
“Why did she chase you out of the bar?”
“Oh,
that wasn’t Leonie after me.”
“Well,
who on earth was it, then?”
“I
ran into an old friend, is all,” Gertie said primly. “He was happy to see me,
and was just giving me an innocent little old hug when his girlfriend walked
in. She didn’t think it was such an innocent hug, I suppose.”
“My
goodness, Gertie. You’re quite a femme fatale.”
“You
too, Mary-Alice. You look smoking-hot as a platinum blonde.”
Mary-Alice
didn’t much feel like a femme fatale. Her scalp was itching like crazy, and her
corset felt like a particularly vindictive boa constrictor. Most unglamorous of
all, she really had to pee.
You must be logged in to post a comment.