Mindy
It had been another long day on her feet—twelve hours that crawled by and seemed like days—and the shower felt invigorating. Hot water ran over her smooth body until her white skin had started to turn a light salmon pink. Mindy knew she wouldn’t get out of the shower until the water heater ran cold. The shower seemed to be the only place she could escape everything for a while. All the disappointments, all the second-guessing, all the hopelessness she felt every day. She looked down at her paunch and pinched the extra flesh between her fingers. Could definitely pinch more than an inch. She made a promise to herself to start exercising again. Jogging, maybe. It was too cold right now, but maybe in the spring when the weather warmed up. When she turned thirty-five, she had made the same promise to take better care of herself. Exercise, better diet, better choice in men, the whole nine yards. That lasted a few days before she was back to the same old bad habits. The cigarettes, the drinking, the crap fried food, even assholes like Mike. Maybe this year would be different. Birthdays were always a good place to try to start. At the very least, she knew she should quit drinking so much beer. Stick to wine for a while.
Forty years old. I’m officially an old maid.
Mindy hated spending birthdays alone. She had a few girlfriends who offered to take her out, but she wasn’t really in the mood. Shelly and Rhonda had invited her to go with them to the Cork and Bottle up in Towanda, but she’d declined. Too far to drive and she had to work in the morning, she told them. She enjoyed the company of men better than women anyway—Shelly and Rhonda usually ended up talking about their kids or their lousy marriages or the jobs that they hated. Bitch, bitch, bitch. Mindy just wanted to have a little fun and forget about her troubles and not worry about all that was missing in her life. Men were just more fun to hang with. Funnier and laid back and didn’t get all petty when they went out drinking. But she wasn’t in the mood to hang out with men tonight either. She’d had about enough of Wyalusing men for a while.
Mindy’s mother had invited her over for dinner, but she knew that it would only lead to her mother’s favorite—and Mindy’s least favorite—conversation topic. Settling down and getting married. It’s not that she didn’t want to find someone to spend her life with, but it was slim pickings in Wyalusing. Mike definitely wasn’t the answer. It had been fun at the beginning. The partying, the sex. He was wild and unpredictable. That might be fine in your twenties, but she wasn’t getting younger, and what did she have to show for herself? A trailer her folks had bought her, a car that broke down more often than not, and a job slinging eggs and hash browns.
Great. Sounding like my girlfriends now.
Part of her couldn’t deny that she was still drawn to Mike, but the smarter and more sensible part of her was scared of him. He had a short fuse and drank too much. Besides that, he didn’t respect women. That much was clear.
God, I hate this town. Should’ve moved out of here after high school, when I had the chance. Maybe when Mom’s gone.
She squeezed some cream rinse into her palm and ran it through her long hair. Maybe she should cut her hair real short. A little change would do her good. Any kind of change would do her good.
Mindy knew that she’d probably never leave Wyalusing. Where would she go anyway? And what would she do to make ends meet? All she knew how to do was wait tables. Been doing it ever since graduating high school. She had given the Friedenshutten twenty years of her life and would probably end up giving it twenty more. She thought about poor old Dotty—almost sixty now—hustling plates of food for maybe twenty dollars in tips on a good day. Dotty would probably be waiting tables at the diner until her hips gave out. Mindy shaved one of her legs and wondered if that was what she had to look forward to.
Maybe Prince Charming would roll into town one day and sweep her off her feet.
And maybe pigs will fly.
She started to shave the other leg and thought about putting in an application over at Taylor’s. Half the town punched the clock over there, but the thought of working the kill floor, shooting a steel rod through the heads of beef cattle, or working the processing line for eight-hour shifts and coming home smelling like blood and cow shit didn’t really seem like something she wanted to do. Mindy figured that waiting tables beat that kind of nonsense. Besides, with all the kids in town graduating high school and willing to work for minimum wage, Mindy knew she’d be hard-pressed to even get a job.
The water started to run cold, so Mindy turned off the shower and stepped onto the thinning bathroom mat that she’d had since forever. She wrapped herself in her favorite lavender robe and began drying her hair when the pounding on the door nearly made her jump out of her skin.
“Jesus Christ. Who the hell?”
She tightened her robe belt and walked out into the living room. She peeked through the curtain and saw Sokowski and Carl standing outside. Mindy could tell that they were both shit-faced.
“Goddamn it, Mike.” She stomped over to the front door and swung it open. She was about sick and tired of this bullshit.
