Isn't It Romantic?

“Very nice. Good. Excellent.” She hesitated.

Carlo and Opal stared at her. He folded and crimped his origami. Opal continued to iron. Carlo got the fold he wanted, put his hand flat over it, and pounded on his hand with his fist.

Natalie skittishly jumped. She asked, “This afternoon, has anybody been in?”

The trucker said, “I’m here.”

Natalie considered him, puzzled but polite. She crossed to the bulletin board and pinned on a note. All perused her. Carlo raised his eyebrows at Opal, who shook her head from side to side. Natalie spun around, as if paranoid, and they all averted their attention. She speedily exited.

Carlo wended his way to the bulletin board and hawkishly peeked at Natalie’s note.

The trucker opined, “Time was when a lady had a right to her privacy. Not no more apparently.”

Carlo read, “My room. Number four. Twelve o’clock.”

“One of them group things,” the trucker said.

Opal asked, “Would that be A.M. or P.M. do you think?”

And then handsome Dick Tupper appeared through the front door, giving everyone a pained smile.

Without enthusiasm, Opal asked, “So, Dick. What brings you here?”

“Wanted to look at the bulletin board.”

“I gotta get me one of them things,” the trucker said.

Dick pulled a handwritten note off the board and looked around as those with him in the café stared. Carlo went back to his origami. Dick asked, “That a peacock?”

“No, it’s paper,” Carlo said. “Folded many times.”

“Well. Have a nice evening, you all.” Walking out the door he stopped to peruse the area at his feet. “Cereal on the floor here.”

Opal shot the trucker a look. Sheepishly he commenced returning the Captain Crunch, one-by-one, to their little box. When he completed his clean-up, he held up the box, but when he shifted his feet, they heard a small crackle.

And then Pierre walked into the café in his tuxedo. He seemed stunned to see everyone peering at him expectantly.

“So,” the trucker from Sidney said. “You got a note?”

25

At Owen Nelson’s bachelor party that night, Pierre was both horrified and fascinated as he looked at the foods: Cheez Whiz, Slim Jims, Hostess Snowballs, beef jerky, caramel popcorn, Chex party mix, Vienna sausages in cans, boxed Ritz crackers with peanut butter pre-applied, Suzie Qs, malted milk balls, mashed potatoes and gravy, French bread pizzas, and, just for Monsieur Smith, escargots. Still in his tuxedo, he sniffed each food item, including the Cheez Whiz can, while Owen, in party clothes, tapped a keg of beer. Hearing trucks drive up, he smiled expectantly and one man after another walked in: Carlo Bacon, Dick Tupper in his finest cattleman’s clothes, the Reverend Dante Picarazzi of Saint Bernard’s Church over there on Third Street, Orville Tetlow of the highway crew, the huge doughnut lover named Biggy, the trucker fond of Captain Crunch, Bert Slaughterbeck, the winner of the demolition derby, Chester Hartley, who won the Kiss-a-Pig Contest, other Main Street Café habitués, and, strangely, the guys in the scuba gear Pierre first saw on the See America bus. Each yelled as he entered, “Go Big Red!”

Orville said, “Wow! You really lay out some table, Owen. Looks like you got the whole shebang here.”

Admiring his food, Owen said, “Well, maybe half a she-bang.”

And Dick said, “Probably closer to a kit and kaboodle.”

At Mrs. Christiansen’s shower for Natalie, Chopin’s piano music was playing as a variety of Seldom’s older women clunked their aluminum walkers along the hallway floor and handed wrapped presents to Natalie. She was flabbergasted by their generosity and she smiled as they said, “Good evening!” “What a pretty dress!” “Oh, I love showers!” “What’s that I smell cooking?” and so on. Natalie, with each gift, said, “Merci.” She said, “It is very nice being queen of The Revels.”

Owen hunched forward in his chair and his audience hunched forward on the sofa to hear him over the noise. “A guy scores tickets to a Nebraska football game. Full house as usual, third largest city in the state and so on. All the fans wearing red. Chills run up and down the guy’s spine. Tears well up in his eyes. But I digress. The guy notices that amid the hordes there are thirteen empty seats, all in one spot, with one fella sitting alone, smack dab in the middle. Well, he was too curious to let it go so he goes down to that row of seats just before kickoff and he asks the fella why they’re empty. The fella gets this forlorn look and explains that he and his wife—”

“From?” Carlo asked.

“Elgin,” Owen said.

“Up there by Neligh,” said the trucker from Sidney.