Page 14 of Four Weekends and a Funeral

“Yes, I understand. Now, hand me the image page. Laura Dern needs to make her guesses before the live questions start.” I take the sheet from Mara and analyze the iconic horror villains for clues.

“I’m buying him out!” A splotchy-faced, sexy minion runs to our table. I assume she’s lost until she presents her phone to Chelsea. “I wrote the email and everything.”

Chelsea takes the stranger by the hand. “Sadie, you’re doing the right thing. If he didn’t respect you as a girlfriend, he won’t respect you as a partner in your hemp water business. But maybe leave that email in the ‘drafts’ tonight?” she advises with a one-eyed squint.

Chelsea’s the kind of drunk who has profound conversations in women’s bathrooms. Even when she’s sober, lost souls tend to find Chelsea wherever she goes.

With the interloper gone, Mara rubs Chelsea’s shoulders like a cornerman with his champion boxer. “Okay, Chels. Eat some pizza and look alive. We’ll need you sharp out there.”

Chelsea’s responsible for earth science, math, and reality television; I cover general pop culture, TV, movies, and geography; Patrick is our resident academic; and Mara is in charge of politics, music, and basically everything else. Sports is our team’s Achilles’ heel.

We tend to stick to official Twin Cities Trivia League events. At participating bars throughout the Cities, league hosts provide each team a blank front sheet at the start, with the back covered in a series of images based on a theme. The night always ends with a music round. No phones are allowed, and host rulings are always final.

Top-ranked teams qualify for a yearly tournament on New Year’s Day. Besides happiness for her friends and success in her career, winning that tournament is the thing Mara wants most in this world.

By the time we get to the halfway point, Chelsea is mostly herself but without volume control. Every answer she gives is followed by Mara’s and Patrick’s loud shushes. When she yells out “Scream 2!” during the third round, Patrick covers her mouth and tells her with an easy laugh, “Chels, you’re giving away the farm!”

Mara knows most of the songs in the final music round but hums one to herself, hoping the last elusive ditty will come to her before the host grabs our sheets for scoring. Patrick asks over Mara’s musical mutterings, “How’s the railroad business, Al?”

Patrick always asks me about work in what I suspect is a fishing expedition to figure out what I do. If pressed, he’d probably admit that he thinks I’m a Gilded Age railroad tycoon who wears a monocle to the office. In reality, I’m a transportation consultant, specializing in public transit systems, but I’m too pleased with his vision of me as a Monopoly character to ever fully explain it to him.

“Booming.” I pantomime twirling my mustache. “But we’re all very concerned with the rise of zeppelins.”

His face crinkles into a smile before turning uncomfortably serious. “I was sorry to hear about Sam. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

I tilt my head side to side as if the movement will arrange my thoughts. “Yeah, it’s still hard to believe he’s gone.”

“He was a good guy. Chelsea said you were at his house today?”

“His friend and I are getting the condo ready to sell,” I tell him between bites of room-temperature pizza.

“Why?”

“She’s Sam’s girlfriend again!” Chelsea announces at top volume.

“Like a Patrick Swayze Ghost situation?” he asks.

Chelsea claps like an excited toddler. “That’s what I said! But Devon Sawa.”

He turns toward Chelsea with a wide grin. “Classic film. Or Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense.”

“Or Casper Meets Wendy.”

“Now you’re just naming Casper movies.”

“You took the other ghost movie I know.” Chelsea grabs his arm playfully, her face stuck in a beatific smile.

He tears his eyes from hers when his phone buzzes. “Shit. Mara, can you turn in the answer sheet? I need to use my phone. Josie left like ten messages.”

Chelsea’s face goes slack. Mara grumbles but catches the host on his way to the front. Patrick is dialing before he’s shaken off Chelsea’s hand.

Mara gestures at an exiting Patrick. “This mind-meld thing you two do is adorable, but it isn’t helping the situation with Josie.”

“We’re just friends. He’s been dating Josie forever, and I have several Petfinder profiles bookmarked on my web browser. There’s an elderly Russian blue that’s really ticking all my boxes.” Chelsea sniffs a pepperoni and sets it back down, her face green around the gills.

I grab her hand across the booth. “What happened to Ritter?”

“We broke up.” Chelsea waves off my supportive friend assault, and the movement loosens a lock of hair from her braid crown. “It’s for the best. I told him my love languages were gifts and acts of service, so he bought me an NFT of a meme he had to explain to me.”

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