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By Emmanuel Williams

They passed her one, sometimes two at a time. On the way to their freckly faced daughter’s karate championship, flying to the night shift or to sports games and then peaknuckle with the elderly dames of Harden Hill. None of them drove as fast as Kara.

She let her foot grow heavy on her gas pedal until the headrest forced itself upon her bright yellow scrunchie. A maiden out of hell. It was exhilarating. It was righteous. It was just what she needed.

The lot was half-packed when she arrived. She’d never been alone here, but there were more pickup trucks with what she believed were far too many stickers on them. A few red ones, and two white ones, both with rattlesnakes in the lower right corner of the window behind the cab. Texas, she thought. And what the hell are cowboys doing in the mountains?

She parked 3 spaces away from her usual spot and gathered her cash. Her acceleration had obviously lingered because she was flashing her ID at the bouncer and was at the bar without remembering to breathe, step, or catch anyone’s eye in particular.

“Jack and Coke, Johnny.”

“Johnny’s busy, bitch. Wait your turn.”

She was big. Too big. Her dirty blonde hair was long and curly and her skin was sunburnt and all pink and brown in places. A twenty dollar bill was slightly folded in half longways and was pointing at the bartender who was not only sporting a handsome shoulder-length black pony tail, but actually noticed Kara walking in and was already fetching her the usual. He set it on the bar and asked if she was opening a tab.

The big blonde made no attempt to hide her displeasure and pushed over Kara’s Jack and Coke onto the black, hard wood counter.

“I said wait your turn, bitch.”

Kara could fleetingly taste the cold drink the entire drive over, fueled by liquid courage just over the horizon. Now, with splashes of dark liquid on her work polo, and the skin beneath rising in gooseflesh at its temperature, her vision flashed completely white for a moment. And when she came to, the woman’s back was to her as she filled her spot at the bar. Over her shoulder, Johnny’s face stared at her like a stone sculpture. She saw shame and powerlessness in his eyes.

Her arms shot forward and yanked two fistfulls of blondie straight backwards, and was able to place a forearm under her chin. 

“I’ll give you bitch, ho…”

Blondie kicked back at Kara’s legs, but Kara had been taking self-defense classes. Being pretty sometimes meant defending yourself against women who were jealous, and men who were arrogant, angry, or just downright psychotic. So she knew to drag the woman back and keep her arm right where it was.

Men tried to pull her off. It was too much they said. It wasn’t worth it. One of them, it must have been Blondie’s male counterpart, was throwing his friend’s beer bottles at Kara since he couldn’t get through to the main event. By the time he had mad the sad decision to thrown his own, and made it through the commotion, his woman had been dragged clear across the bar and out past the bouncer.

It was he who stopped the action.

“Kara, let her go or don’t come back.”

She thought about what it meant to her. How much she loved this bar, how conveniently it was halfway between work and her apartment up Allen road. She still hadn’t had gotten her Jack and Coke, and seriously hoped there was one waiting for her now back inside.

She let go.

“Don’t tell me I did anything wrong, Butter. She had it comin’, ask Johnny.”

Butter was the bouncer’s name. Something about his ‘finesse’ in the streets. Blondie was rolling on the floor trying to catch her breath when her husband came out and made straight for Kara. Butter beat him there.

“This ain’t got nothin to do with you, boss.”

“I think you got it backwards. You are your lady here can kick rocks. And from the looks of it, she may need medical attention.”

Kara didn’t skip a beat. She nearly pivoted like a Marine in formation and walked right up to the bar. Ignored the room just like the first time, and held Johnny’s gaze like she was coming to jump his bones.

“Jack and Coke, Johnny.”