Brian's Luck

“Five, six, aaaand… seven,” said Jennifer, panting slightly.  She stood straight for a moment, then pinched Brian's shirt sleeve for balance as her ear canals caused the world to twist.

“What was that about?” said Brian, touching his arm lightly where her hand had been.

“I forgot and touched that chair,” said Jennifer.

“The rocking chair?” said Brian.

Jennifer nodded solemnly.

“Well, I mean, so what?” said Brian, looking up and down the Cracker Barrel stoop in case he had missed something.  There were a multiplicity of small signs.  “I’m pretty sure it’s what they’re there for.”  

“They’re for people to buy,” said Jennifer, “or to sit in.”  

Pushing open the heavy door, she led the way into the gift shop, beelining for the hostess station and so cutting ahead of the less experienced groups, who had allowed the country-time glitz to lead them astray.  Brian kept firmly in her wake.

“I don’t mean to be obtuse,” said Brian, as they ordered their coffees.  “But, if you’re allowed to touch them with your butt, then surely it's okay to use your hands.”

“Biscuits or cornbread?” asked a woman with a little frying pan on her shirt.  It said, ‘Mildred,’ in fake chalk script, and Mildred had heard it all before.  She was not about to let herself be scandalized.

“Biscuits,” said Jennifer with a sad face.

The waitress did not bother writing it down.

“I wish they had good cornbread here,” whispered Jennifer, as though Mildred might somehow hear and be offended.  “I love good cornbread.”

“I know,” said Brian.

“Anyway,” said Jennifer.  “It’s nothing to do with using your butt, or your hands, or anything else, it’s about rocking an empty rocking chair.”

“What about it,” said Brian, beginning a creamer tub pyramid, for which he did not have nearly enough tubs.  It was destined to be a ruin.

“Bad luck,” said Jennifer.  “You’re never supposed to rock an empty rocking chair.”

“And that’s why you…” said Brian.

“That’s right,” said Jennifer, “That’s why I spun clockwise seven times, to break the bad luck curse.” 

“What, bad luck curse?” said Brian.

“The bad luck curse from the chair,” said Jennifer.

“Oh,” said Brian.  “I thought maybe you were suffering under some sort of… general affliction.”

“This is serious stuff,” said Jennifer, only half serious herself.

“I was talking with my mum and she said she had been cursed in love by bad luck.”

“That is serious,” intoned Brian.

“Indeed,” agreed Jennifer.  “Imagine, she waits her whole life for just the right guy to come along, waits until she’s 22 years old, and then, just because the minister backs out a week before the wedding and they have to get married by a Justice of the Peace, she gets bad luck and he gets hit by a train.”

“Sounds like he got the bad luck,” said Brian.

Jennifer looked at him in a way that she had.

“When did it happen?  On the honeymoon?” Brian said quickly.

“No,” said Jennifer.  “They were married for three years.”

“Here we are kids,” said Mildred, who had snuck back up on them unnoticed.  

Placing a basket filled half with cornbread and half biscuits on the table, alongside two somewhat full mugs of coffee, she gazed at them speculatively.  Brian frowned and tried not to look shifty.

“Just the coffee then?” said Mildred, after a moment.

“Un-huh,” said Jennifer, gazing obviously into the middle distance.

“Yes, sorry, just the coffee; we’re not very hungry,” added Brian.

“That’s fine, hun,” said Mildred.  

She reached into her apron and brought out a handful of creamer tubs, scattering them next to his wall.  They made it look more like a ruin than ever.

Silently, each buttered a biscuit.  Brian sacrificed a creamer to his coffee, Jennifer only an unimportant pink packet, stirring with the handle of her spoon.

“You think about love a lot?” asked Brian, closely examining the triangular peg game.

“Of course,” said Jennifer.  ‘I mean, I didn’t used to, not like, all the time or anything; I’m not obsessed.  But it’d be nice to fall in love, I think.  It’ll probably happen someday, and I’d just like the man I marry not to be hit by a train slap off the church step, is all.”

“Three years…” said Brian.

“Same difference,” said Jennifer blithely, biting down through the flaky layers of her biscuit. 

Brain hesitated, started to say something, then stopped and assiduously added the strewn tubs onto his architecture, gaining another level and some degree of grandeur.  Withdrawing his hand, he dithered, then pushed the top of the open creamer container fully inside and placed it on top.

“There,” he said, with a ridiculously triumphant expression and, pulling back again, knocked over the salt shaker, disgorging a minor white dune onto Jennifer's placemat.  She shooshed it off with her napkin, dabbing at her buttery lips before tossing the soiled paper onto the table.

“It’s started raining,” said Brian.

“So it has,” said Jennifer, confirming the fact through the water streaked window.

“You don’t mind?” said Brian.

“No,” said Jennifer.  “I like rain well enough, if I’m inside, that is.  I don’t particularly fancy getting wet.”

“You don’t think it’s… unlucky?” said Brian.

“No,” said Jennifer absently, then, “Do you?  Do you think I should?  It’s not like I’m going to open an umbrella inside a house, or anything.”

“No,” agreed Brian.  “I don’t think you have anything to worry about.  It’s just that we have to get going, one way or another, and I didn’t want you to do anything unlucky and miss your, ‘perfect man.’”

Jennifer laughed.

“Looks like I’ll just have to chance it,” she sighed.  “One can’t wait inside forever, besides,” whispering again, “I think Mildred wants our table.”

Brian laughed too and they rose.

“I’m pretty sure they sell umbrellas in the gift shop,” he said.  “I could buy you one, to open outside, if you don’t want to get wet.”

Jennifer shrugged and pushed in her chair.  “It’s fine, I’ll dry,” she said, “besides, it doesn’t look... Brian; did you just put my dirty napkin into your pocket?”

“Hmm?  What?  Oh, did I?” said Brian, looking confused.  Reaching reluctantly into his pants pocket he drew out the crumpled paper.  He had folded it.

“Well, I...” said Brian, looking out at the rain again, “it still has a lot of good use left to it, you know.  They clearcut whole forests to make these.”

“So they do… bastards,” said Jennifer, absently turning out her own pockets, one after the other, until she came up with a single, triumphant dollar.

“Ah ha!” she said, and slapped it on the table.

Brian smiled and looked at his feet.

“Same time tomorrow?” he said.

“I shoooould be able... to,” said Jennifer, biting her lip.  

She took a step away from the table, stopped, and, seizing up the salt shaker, dashed a ration over her left shoulder.

“Don’t know what I was thinking,” she said, shaking her head, then, “Will you be here?”

 Brian looked at her for a long moment, then he nodded.