Girl at the Edge by Karen Dietrich

Author:Karen Dietrich
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: None
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2020-03-02T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-One

We consider going to Weeki Wachee after all but decide to spend the rest of the day in Ybor City, a historic section of Tampa that was once the center of the cigar-rolling industry. We park at the top of the parking garage, and Clarisse lights the joint she’d stashed in her bra at home, before handing it to me. We take turns, passing it from our lips to our fingers and back, getting higher and higher until it’s gone.

We get out of the car and hold hands as we walk down the stairs and onto the street. I feel like I’m walking on air, my legs warm and flexible, my cheeks hurting from smiling so much.

We eat at the Columbia, which the menu states is the oldest restaurant in Florida, family owned since 1905. We’re seated in the Patio Room, with high ceilings and a sky light above that bathes us in white. There are colorful Spanish tiles on the walls and a marble fountain in the center of the room—it looks like a young man riding a fish, with the creature’s tail and the man’s legs intertwined. When I point it out to Clarisse, the waiter tells us the piece is called “Eros and Dolphin,” and it’s a replica of a statue found in the ruins of Pompeii, buried in volcanic ash.

“Who is Eros?” Clarisse asks, and I swear the waiter blushes as he explains that Eros is the god of love. We order two Cuban sandwiches, a slice of key lime pie, and a piece of mango mousse cake. I ask for lemonade, and Clarisse orders a beer with the confidence of a stoned seventeen-year-old. She winks at the waiter, and he nods and smiles and starts walking away, and for a minute, I think she may have actually charmed him into it. But seconds later he is back and asking for some ID, which Clarisse pretends to look for in her tiny bag until she finally looks up and tells him a café con leche would be just fabulous.

After we’re finished eating, Clarisse pays for everything with cash her mother gave her for the day, which she will say she spent on the mermaid show and the glass-bottom boat ride. We step back into the brutal sunshine and walk down Seventh Avenue. It’s the main drag of Ybor City, lined with bars and shops and restaurants. Two men walk past us smoking cigars, and I breathe in the woodsy scent that reminds me of hickory, of a bonfire burning on the beach at night. There’s a tattoo parlor on the corner, and we turn our hands into makeshift binoculars, using them to cut the glare so we can peer through the glass to see inside, where a woman lies on her stomach while a tattooed man presses a contraption to the back of her thigh, purple and black ink smeared on her tanned skin.

When we make it back to the car, we’re hot and sweaty from the sun.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.