angora sweater from a shopping bag.
Nan stared at me. “She doesn’t have any family here. We’re all she’s got. Come on.”
I held the sweater against my chest, feeling the tickle of it along my neck. “You go ahead. You know her better anyway,” I said. I knew even then I was shirking my foundling girlfriend role. Living with women had set me on edge. I didn’t know what to expect from them or what they expected from me. Men were just so much more reliable. Besides, I couldn’t pretend it mattered to Kathy if I showed up.
I was pulling the pale suede jacket from another bag so I couldn’t see Nan’s glare before she turned and slammed the door on her way out, but I felt it smash against me and rummaged around for the matching boots.
Three-inch heels. Mom would be proud. “Never wear flats outside your own house,” she’d say. The floor of her closet was a wreck of strappy sandals and high leather boots. “You wear flats, people will think you don’t have any pride in your stride. Got that?”
No flats. No flats.
Kathy was released the next day. Nan brought her home and tucked her in bed before she told me to leave. I knew I could still salvage the situation, but I didn’t want to. I needed out.
I packed up my two boxes of stuff and my Nordstrom’s loot and moved to Super 8. I got through to Thad the next day on the ship-to-shore radio.
“I ran into some trouble here. I need to move on.”
“Move on?”
I’d chosen the wrong words. Words that telegraphed too much. I lay back on the motel bed and stared at the ceiling. “It’s just not working out for me right now. Nothing to do with you.”
He paused, and I listened to the static across the curving surface of ocean between us. “Why don’t you come out to Dutch?”
When I didn’t respond, he continued. “Brandy, it’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. It will blow you away, I promise.”
“That’s not what you said before. I remember you calling it the rainiest, windiest hellhole on earth.”
“Well that’s true too. But I’ll be coming in every few weeks.”
Perhaps he understood me better than I knew. What I needed was him, any him, just someone to steady myself in. I thought about the alternative, finding a cocktail waitressing job, waiting. I knew if I said yes, I would cross some threshold. I’d been following men a good deal of my life. I’d followed one to college for a couple years in Seattle. I’d followed another to Austin, Texas, for five months, another to Redwood City, California, and, of course, Thad to Anchorage. I tried to count the number of times I’d gone somewhere simply because I wanted to. The answer—zero. But until now, I’d never considered following a man someplace so remote, so far from what I knew. It clarified my situation; I had no place, no plan, no pride. I’d drifted so long, I was willing to drift anywhere.
“Will there be anything for me to do?”
“You can see me,” Thad said. “We’ll be coming in pretty soon, taking a week break.”
I sat up, planted my feet on the beige carpet, and said it. “I’ll be on the next ferry.”
I left on July 2. Three days later, I was in Dutch.
The next day I was the Elbow Room’s one and only cocktail waitress.
The Elbow Room began in the 1940s as a military bar, the Blue Fox Cocktail Lounge. Unalaska was buried in military buildings at the time, as American forces beefed up defenses along the strategic swoop of the Aleutians during World War II. The bar was all but forgotten in 1966 when two guys bought it for six hundred dollars and renamed it the Elbow Room. They had to haul crates of burlap sandbags, camouflage netting, and C ration cans to the dump, but soon Unalaska’s three hundred residents had a sit-down place to drink. By the mid-seventies, the crabbing boom hit Dutch and transformed the Elbow Room. It was big money, loads of drugs, and hot tempers. It entered legend. Nearly every book or article about king crab
Nan stared at me. “She doesn’t have any family here. We’re all she’s got. Come on.”
I held the sweater against my chest, feeling the tickle of it along my neck. “You go ahead. You know her better anyway,” I said. I knew even then I was shirking my foundling girlfriend role. Living with women had set me on edge. I didn’t know what to expect from them or what they expected from me. Men were just so much more reliable. Besides, I couldn’t pretend it mattered to Kathy if I showed up.
I was pulling the pale suede jacket from another bag so I couldn’t see Nan’s glare before she turned and slammed the door on her way out, but I felt it smash against me and rummaged around for the matching boots.
Three-inch heels. Mom would be proud. “Never wear flats outside your own house,” she’d say. The floor of her closet was a wreck of strappy sandals and high leather boots. “You wear flats, people will think you don’t have any pride in your stride. Got that?”
No flats. No flats.
Kathy was released the next day. Nan brought her home and tucked her in bed before she told me to leave. I knew I could still salvage the situation, but I didn’t want to. I needed out.
I packed up my two boxes of stuff and my Nordstrom’s loot and moved to Super 8. I got through to Thad the next day on the ship-to-shore radio.
“I ran into some trouble here. I need to move on.”
“Move on?”
I’d chosen the wrong words. Words that telegraphed too much. I lay back on the motel bed and stared at the ceiling. “It’s just not working out for me right now. Nothing to do with you.”
He paused, and I listened to the static across the curving surface of ocean between us. “Why don’t you come out to Dutch?”
When I didn’t respond, he continued. “Brandy, it’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. It will blow you away, I promise.”
“That’s not what you said before. I remember you calling it the rainiest, windiest hellhole on earth.”
“Well that’s true too. But I’ll be coming in every few weeks.”
Perhaps he understood me better than I knew. What I needed was him, any him, just someone to steady myself in. I thought about the alternative, finding a cocktail waitressing job, waiting. I knew if I said yes, I would cross some threshold. I’d been following men a good deal of my life. I’d followed one to college for a couple years in Seattle. I’d followed another to Austin, Texas, for five months, another to Redwood City, California, and, of course, Thad to Anchorage. I tried to count the number of times I’d gone somewhere simply because I wanted to. The answer—zero. But until now, I’d never considered following a man someplace so remote, so far from what I knew. It clarified my situation; I had no place, no plan, no pride. I’d drifted so long, I was willing to drift anywhere.
“Will there be anything for me to do?”
“You can see me,” Thad said. “We’ll be coming in pretty soon, taking a week break.”
I sat up, planted my feet on the beige carpet, and said it. “I’ll be on the next ferry.”
I left on July 2. Three days later, I was in Dutch.
The next day I was the Elbow Room’s one and only cocktail waitress.
The Elbow Room began in the 1940s as a military bar, the Blue Fox Cocktail Lounge. Unalaska was buried in military buildings at the time, as American forces beefed up defenses along the strategic swoop of the Aleutians during World War II. The bar was all but forgotten in 1966 when two guys bought it for six hundred dollars and renamed it the Elbow Room. They had to haul crates of burlap sandbags, camouflage netting, and C ration cans to the dump, but soon Unalaska’s three hundred residents had a sit-down place to drink. By the mid-seventies, the crabbing boom hit Dutch and transformed the Elbow Room. It was big money, loads of drugs, and hot tempers. It entered legend. Nearly every book or article about king crab
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