Dumplin - Julie Murphy Page 0,34
for the last five years. He parks in front of me and hops out the minute the engine whines to a stop.
“Was I late?” He pulls me up by one hand, and I mean really pulls me up.
“No. No, not at all.”
“I figured because you were sitting out here, and I guess guys normally go to the front door to pick up their dates.”
“Oh,” I say, hiking my thumb back to our front porch. “We don’t use the front door. It’s been broken for years.”
His heads cocks to the side. “Well, you look real nice.”
“You too.” He really does. He’s wearing a too-long-even-for-him button-down shirt and starched jeans, like with a crease and everything. And boots. Not those pointy-toed cowboy boots you see in movies, but round-toed work boots. Gram used to say that you should never trust a man in clean boots.
The front seat of Mitch’s car is clean-ish with dust and lint deeply embedded in every crevice. But the back half is drowning in a sea of clothes—lots of camo and boots—and fast-food cups.
He takes me to a Chinese restaurant called Mr. Chang’s Chinese Palace, a local favorite in an old shopping center with fast cash loan offices, insurance storefronts, and one of those tax places that make their employees dress like the Statue of Liberty.
The hostess seats us at an iridescent booth that looks like one of those giant clamshells from The Little Mermaid that Ariel and her sisters hang out in. To my surprise, Mitch slides in next to me rather than across from me and I can’t stop the “oh” that slips from my lips.
The waitress comes for our drink order and Mitch asks, “Hey, you know those little crispy things? Could we get some of those and that orange sauce?”
“Um, okay,” says the waitress, a girl who I recognize as a senior from when I was a freshman.
Once she leaves, Mitch turns to me. “I used to hate coming to Chinese restaurants when I was a kid because they never bring bread out or put crackers on the table, so my mom always asked for those crispy things—”
“Wonton strips.” I have to stop myself smiling. “That’s what they’re called.”
“Yeah. Well, they’re delicious.”
We look over the menu in silence. As the waitress approaches with our drinks, Mitch leans in and whispers in my ear, “You can order whatever you want.”
I’m tempted to point out to him that everything on the menu is about the exact same price, but instead I thank him.
Once the waitress takes our orders, Mitch holds a wonton out for me. “You want one?”
I shake my head. “I saw that you guys won last night.”
He nods. “Just barely, but, yeah. A win is a win.”
We sit in silence for a moment as the local radio station plays over the speakers and our feet brush up against each other.
Mitch coughs into his fist. “So I guess Ellen Dryver’s your best friend, right?”
I reach for my glass of water and do that thing where your mouth can’t quite find the straw. “Yeah. She is.” I tell him some about Lucy and Mrs. Dryver and how Dolly Parton brought us all together.
“You’re, like, a die-hard Dolly Parton fan? I mean, isn’t she really old?”
I don’t know if there’s a how-to-go-on-a-first-date-without-making-a-total-fool-of-yourself handbook out there, but if there is I’m pretty sure ’fessing up to your weird Dolly Parton obsession is not on the do list. But I feel this intense sense of loyalty to her that I can’t shake. “Okay, so here’s the deal: yes. I am a huge Dolly Parton fan. But there’s something you have to understand about Dolly Parton fans: we’re nuts. And since there’s such a high level of crazy amongst all of us, I am, in comparison, not as batshit as most others. Like, there are people out there who have devoted their lives to creating ceramic Dolly Parton dolls. Some people even leave their jobs and families behind just to be near her.”
“Okay,” he says. His brow crinkles together, and I can see that he’s really making an effort to understand. “Okay, but on, like, a scale of one to ten?”
“On a scale of one to ten, ten being total nut job, I guess Ellen and I would be fours. Maybe fives? Mrs. Dryver is a total eight, but not quite a nine because she hasn’t had plastic surgery. Yet. And I guess Lucy was about a seven.”
“Was?” he asks.
The memory of her sinks through me and settles deep in