Fight Song A Novel - By Joshua Mohr Page 0,14

belts out, “What’s Brent doing?”

Brent is straddling the minister and eating fistfuls of intestines.

“Well, what’s he doing?” Erma asks.

Coffen and his mother-in-law aren’t exactly bosom chums. There’s never been any kind of confrontation or anything because Bob kowtows to her. He tries to communicate with her in simple and direct ways, like this: “He’s gaming.”

“That game is gross,” says Erma, then specifically to Brent, “Turn that off while G-Ma’s here.”

“Mom, please,” Jane says.

“But I’ve almost beat my all-time high score!” Brent says.

“Fine,” Erma says, “beat your all-time high score. Ignore your G-Ma. Pretend your G-Ma’s not nearing the end of her life.”

“Mom,” Jane says.

“What? I won’t be around forever. They should appreciate me while I’m still alive.”

Brent’s avatar is up and off the minister, slowly cornering an Amish-looking woman.

Then there’s a tooting car horn out front.

“Schumann’s here,” Coffen says.

“Schumann?”

“Our chauffeur,” Coffen says with a huge smile. “We worked out an agreement for what happened the other night.”

The horn toots once more.

“This is weird,” Jane says.

“Dad, I thought you hated Schumann,” says Margot. “I heard you say he’s a douche.”

“What’s a douche?” Brent asks, outfoxing the Amish lass and now gnawing her thigh to the bone.

Coffen ignores this and asks Jane, “Shall we go, dear?”

She rolls her eyes, goes to get her coat, pats the many braids on her head so as to verify proper geometry. “I guess we shall,” she says.

“Might I say,” Schumann says to Jane, talking with a French accent, “that your sexuality is palpable this evening. If Bob wasn’t here, I’d make my play to pleasure you.”

He’s been laying it on absurdly thick since picking the Coffens up. Talking with that canned French accent, bowing when he opened the car door for Jane, making a big show of it. He’s even dressed like a stereotypical chauffeur—black suit, black hat.

Every TV show or movie Coffen has ever seen in which there are servants, these people know how to keep their traps shut, don’t speak unless spoken to, be seen and not heard, etc. So where in his right mind does Schumann think he should be spouting off sexually explicit plans? Bob may not be any kind of chauffeur expert, but come on, this seems like Servitude 101: The help should keep focused on the task at hand.

“Um, thanks,” she says.

Both Coffens sit in the SUV’s backseat. Bob tries to catch Schumann’s eye in the rearview mirror to give him a face that means Are you seriously being serious right now—palpable sexuality? You’re supposed to be a submissive role player, Schumann. Tonight, I’m the quarterback.

“I don’t know about you two,” Schumann says, “but my wife and I love a romantic glass of champagne in the park. It’s a perfect night for it. I brought a couple champagne flutes and a bottle in case you two were in the mood.”

“That does sound nice,” Jane says, “but I shouldn’t drink any alcohol. I’m going for the treading-water record again on Monday.”

But before Coffen can muscle a word in, there’s Schumann yammering, “It doesn’t sound nice, Jane. It is nice. A few sips won’t kill you. Coach used to let us have a few beers when we were in training to blow off steam.”

She laughs. Is she flirting with him?

“She was talking to me,” says Coffen.

“My bad,” he says.

“Let’s go for it,” she says. “Just a few sips.”

“That a girl,” says Schumann.

There are certain things that the blue-ribbon douche might have mastered. And romantic drinks in the park are one, because honestly, this is an idea that never would have occurred to Coffen. Yet look at Jane now, reclining on a blanket in the grassy area as Schumann stands pouring both of them glasses of champagne.

It’s dusk. No other people in the small park, which is located inside the subdivision’s electric fence. The park is built between the two streets that fork to form the top half of the capital Y. Both Bob and Jane look around, though there’s not much to see. Playground far away. Grass and more grass. A couple barbecue pits. A concrete path wending through in great slaloms. There’s nothing in the way of distraction—no kids or bills or household maintenance or any other miscellaneous topics that keep Bob’s and Jane’s minds away from the distance between them. In a sick way, Coffen is happy Schumann is here, drawing so much attention to himself that Bob can bleed into the background a bit, not fixate on the fact he feels uncomfortable.

“Will you be requiring anything else, Monsieur and