Natchez at Sunset by Terry Engel

Author:Terry Engel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fiction, novel, literary fiction
Publisher: Adelaide Books Publishers

Jessica finished touching up the sculpture and drove back to her house. Her tank top was sweat-soaked and the air conditioning on the Subaru had stopped working. The dark vinyl seats burned her skin when she opened the car. She passed Tip’s Bar, another old house converted into a business where college students liked mixing with locals. She pulled into the parking lot on a whim.

On the outside, Tip’s looked like a meth house, but inside dark paneled walls covered with old concert posters, dart boards, and neon beer lights made for a good place for early drinkers to spend the afternoon. The bar was fronted by old toilets with padded lids fastened down for bar stools. Part of the appeal was that it looked dangerous. The house had been partially gutted to make the inside roomier for dancing and pool tables.

Jessica sat down at one of the barstools and ordered a beer. The place wasn’t crowded yet. The beer was cold and Tip had the thermostat turned down low. Jessica had always liked Tip’s. It reminded her of a place in Pascagoula, where she had met Annie just after high school and the bartender just nodded at her fake ID. Jessica pulled out her pen and pad and doodled while she drank her beer. It was as good a defense against men inviting her into a conversation as a book, which wouldn’t have felt right at Tip’s. After a while Tip came over and asked if she wanted another drink and she nodded.

“Grocery list?” Tip asked. He looked like a stereotype, a character out of somewhere between Deliverance and The Walking Dead, but Jessica knew that he still took morning classes at the university and he had written some of the few letters to the editor supporting Caleb’s op-ed pieces. Jessica smiled at him in appreciation, though he wouldn’t know why.

“Just thinking.”

“Don’t go thinking too much,” Tip said. “It’s bad for the bar business.”

“I was just thinking about being eighteen,” Jessica said. “A long time ago.”

“It’s hard not to when you hit a certain age.” He smiled and looked like he was thinking about it himself. “That kind of thinking is good for the bar business,” he said. “This one’s on the house.” He set the beer down and moved to wait on a couple of guys who’d just walked in.

Jessica couldn’t remember the name of the bar in Pascagoula. She had graduated high school and just started out at the shipyards as a welder’s helper, courtesy of her father’s pull with the union. She spent the day stretching cords, fetching welding rods, tacking plate, getting cursed at, hit on, and cleaning up. She worked the three to eleven shift, the most unpopular shift—except for people who wanted to have affairs—since it took away anything like a normal social life. There was nothing for Jessica to do after work but go home and try to be quiet while her parents slept, so she started going to the bars that

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