Page 44 of Sharkbait
Calliope offers, “In the case of no official vowel, the letter Y becomes an honorary vowel.”
“Eh.” Wally takes another sip. “That’s some bullshit.”
James pours the last glass with care and ensures it has just the right amount of foam on it. Who am I kidding? I don’t know if it’s the right amount of foam. I don’t even know if it’s called foam in this instance. Beer people have some beer language I don’t pretend to understand. But it’s clear he takes special care with each glass.
He slides them past me, where two of the four guys are waiting at the end of the bar.
I help hand the glasses to them before they head to their table.
“Those glasses were kind of warm,” I say to James. “Isn’t beer supposed to be cold?”
“Stouts are more of a warm brew, Cold Brew.” His voice islow and rumbly.
“Are you still calling me that?” I ask in a near whisper.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
He leans a little closer. “Are you still calling me Hottie McKegstand?”
I shoot daggers at Calliope, who I can tell is hanging on our every word.
She shrugs, not at all apologetic.
“Hey, Wally.” Ralph gets up and moves to the opposite side of the bar. “If it helps? I always sound out jeopardy to get the spelling right. It’s like geo party but with a J instead of a G and a D instead of a T.”
I guess he’s done with the protective older brother stuff. Or maybe his drink has just loosened him up. He’s always been a lightweight.
“That does help. Thank you very much.”
“Ralph used to be all about geo parties.” I laugh.
“What’s a geo party?” Calliope asks.
“Oh, you’d love it, babe.” Ralph pulls her up to stand and wraps her in his arms while he talks. “My geology professor in college always threw us an end-of-semester celebration. Served us Earth-inspired food like rock candy and little dirt pudding cups with gummy worms. Oh man! One time, she even constructed this volcanic fondue dispenser that erupted with chocolate every ninety seconds!” His eyes roll back in remembered ecstasy. “Blew my mind and coated my strawberries.”
Calliope cocks her head to the side and looks up at him. “That’s not a euphemism for…?”
“No, baby, it’s not.” Ralph strokes her cheek and drops his voice to a purr. “You know the only one who coats my berries is—”
“Stop speaking,” I blurt. “Stop speaking right now.”
Ralph scoffs. “Oh, I see how it is. You draw your line at ‘coats my berries,’ when I say it, but you can say ‘raw dogging’ in the presence of your brother, and that’s just fine.”
Mabel raises her hand. “Ralph, in fairness, I was the one who said raw dogging. I’ve learned my lesson, though, and I won’tsay raw dogging again. Except for just now. And the time before that. But I’m done now, and I will not say raw dogging again.”
“When are we getting a dog, Ralph-alpha?” Calliope croons.
“This again?” Ralph looks over at me. “She’s been gunning for a dog ever since we moved into the new apartment.”
Calliope says, “Well, we have more space now, and there’s a cute little dog run right down the street...”
“Dogs are just so much work.” He strokes her hair and tries to change the subject.
“How would you know?” she says.
“We had one when I was little,” I answer for him.
