Margie thanked the waitress when she topped off her coffee. Sandy held her hand over her cup and shook her head gently. She rarely drank coffee and when she did, only a little of it.
“To tell you the truth,” Margie said, “I have to wonder how a guy like that ever got through med school and residency. Such a priss. One of those, oh, what to call them? Sort of, the overgroomed type, if that makes sense. Every hair in place. Thin little beard, all so carefully trimmed. Always a tie on under his lab coat.”
Sandy grinned, nodded, and dabbed at the pool of egg yolk on her plate with a half-eaten piece of toast as Margie continued.
“I don’t know, there’s just something off with someone who spends that much time and effort fussing with himself. One time he’s in with a patient, and the woman’s having a reaction to the antibiotics he’s got her on. And while he’s examining her, well, she hurls all over him. Oh god, he goes running out of the room, tearing his lab coat off, screaming for a towel, and gagging like he was going to barf too. All I could do to keep from laughing. If I hadn’t been busy trying to take care of that woman, I’d have been rolling on the floor, howling. I swear, he shrieked like a little girl. Seriously, how does a weenie like that get through medical school?”
“I’ve come across a couple like that,” Sandy said.
Margie slid a forkful of home fries into her mouth and pointed her fork at Sandy’s plate. “You gonna eat that bacon?”
“It’s for Stink,” Sandy said, and glanced out the diner window to see Stink in the truck cab, his nose sticking through the three inches of open window. “But if you want it, go ahead.”
“No, no. Wouldn’t want to take food out of your child’s mouth. Besides, I’m getting fat and stuffed enough as it is. Not used to these big, greasy diner breakfasts.”
“Something to last you through a day of fishing.”
“More like last me into next week.”
Sandy smiled and wrapped Stink’s bacon in her paper napkin.
“Really, honey,” Margie said, “I’m so glad you called. Your timing was perfect. Not to mention it’s been weeks since I’ve heard from you.”
“Well, busy with work. The usual.” Sandy shrugged, even winced with a bit of guilt in her face, knowing full well she shouldn’t run the risk of falling out of touch with the only real friend, other than Edith, she had.
“We all have work and other shit to attend to. We do, if we’re lucky these days. That’s not what I worry about. I worry about you reverting to a wild state, spending so much of your life out there in the wilderness, just you and James and your smelly dog. I half expect to hear that you’ve been found wearing animal skins, living off raw meat you’ve killed with your bare hands, keeping house in a cave.”
“Oh, stop it,” Sandy said. She chuckled, but knew the image had a certain appeal to her as well.
Only rarely did Sandy ever see anyone other than herself and Keefe up along the headwaters. Perhaps an occasional pair of day hikers or particularly ardent bird-watchers, only once that she could recall, another fisherman willing to trek up the rugged slopes for such small fish. No practical place to park outside the fire-road gate. The fire road itself, steep and badly rutted. The trail along the river, little more than an old game trail, snarled with exposed tree roots and stone outcroppings. Forbidding terrain for the casual visitor. Margie was closer to the truth than she might have imagined.
“It’s not a wilderness and you know it,” Sandy said.
“Pretty close. Plus it can get a little weird out there in places. Some spaced-out back-to-nature hippie commune or these toothless fucks out there in their so-called hunting camps.” Margie formed quotation marks in the air with her fingers. “J.D.’s told me about coming across that sort of kooky shit from time to time.”
“Nothing like that up near us.” Sandy startled herself by speaking of her and Keefe in the first person plural. She wondered if Margie had noticed and quickly moved the conversation on to cover her odd phrasing. “You afraid to go fishing up there in the wilds today?”
“Wild horses couldn’t keep me from it, honey.”
“How is J.D. these days?”
“Bless his heart, what an insufferable grouch he’s been lately.” Margie caught the eye of their waitress and pointed to her empty coffee cup. “Budget cuts are just giving him fits. Laid off a bunch of people, so there aren’t enough wardens in the field. Poor baby, now he’s responsible for the better part of three counties. And if that isn’t enough, they’re expecting him to be on the lookout for that guy that went missing a couple weeks ago. You hear about that?”
“Yeah, I heard about it. God, that’s really too much to ask of one person.” Sandy smeared a glob of the diner’s homemade blueberry jam on her last bite of toast.
“No shit.” Apparently caught off guard by Margie’s language, the waitress paused abruptly before filling her coffee cup. “Thanks so much,” Margie said to the waitress. “We can have the check now.”
Margie took a sip from her fresh coffee and continued.
“So he’s overworked, worn out, and cranky. Not that I can blame the poor guy, but he’s been a royal pain to live with lately.”
“I’m sorry he’s in such a state,” Sandy said. “He’s such a good man. Doesn’t deserve that.”
“Oh, he’s a sweetheart. Don’t I know it,” Margie said. “But sometimes lately, let me tell you, it can test a person. And now he’s all worked up about bear poachers or some such.”
“Bear poachers?” Sandy knit her brows and leaned back in the booth.
“Yeah. About a week ago someone found a dead bear. Guts cut open and its paws cut off. That just flat out made him furious. Says poachers sell the gall bladders and paws to Asia, for aphrodisiacs, of all things. That’s about put him over the edge. The boy has an unnatural love for bears.”
The waitress stopped at their booth and laid their checks face down on the tabletop, one in front of each of them. “Thank you. And have a blessed day,” she said, and turned to another booth.
Margie leaned across the table, motioning Sandy closer, and whispered behind her cupped hand. “‘Blessed,’ my ass. I swear, these religious kooks work my last nerve. Surely not living in the same world I am. But I have to admit the food’s good. Then again,” Margie said, resuming a normal tone of voice, “my children are in school, wreaking their havoc on their teachers for the day, my loving but cranky husband is off doing his game warden thing, and I get to hang out all day in your wilderness with you. Maybe I am having a ‘blessed’ day after all.”
After they each paid for their