Jack shrugged his shoulders and waved to Frank, "See you at dinner."
As Jack rolled up his driver side window, his brother-in-law focused on his slacking employees. He jumped from the hood of his truck and went on the warpath.
"Jesus, Mary, and Father Christmas! What in the feck's name do ya think you're doing?! The mountain isn’t going to plow itself! The father friggin’ idiot weatherman says we’re gonna get like three feet of snow! Let’s go!"
At the sound of Frank's booming voice, the men began stomping out cigarettes and scrambling to their trucks to begin putting the chains on the plow trucks. Jack laughed at the sight. Frank Kilpatrick was no man to trifle with.
“Oy! I’m not kidding! I got me some dinner plans tonight!” he continued to yell across the street at his workers.
“I like how you injected some holiday spirit in there,” said Jack, grinning widely.
“It’s the holidays… I really try to be nice,” replied Frank with a sarcastic smile.
About a half hour later, after the chains were secured on the tires of the trucks, Frank sent his crew in to get a late lunch and to pick him up a turkey club on rye. Frank kept a steady eye on the door of Monte’s Cafe at the end of Mountain Road. All eight of his workers disappeared through its doors twenty minutes ago, with no turkey club in sight.
Frank’s eyes perked up as he heard a rumbling noise coming down the road. The noise grew louder as it approached. Frank raised one eyebrow as a smirk began to appear. Struggling over the hill at the top of Mountain Road was a faded green junker of a car. The car continued sputtering and stalling down the hill. As the car approached, Frank’s smirk evolved into riotous laughter, amusement painted across his face. The car’s engine choked out a final death rattle as it came to a slow halt directly outside of Monte’s Cafe. Frank let out a howl of laughter as he watched the green car choke to a halt. Frank jumped off the hood of his truck and began making his way over to the distressed car.
From the embattled car emerged the clearly disgruntled driver. Dressed in a khaki winter coat with white gloves, scarf and hat, she was clearly prepared for wintry weather. She moved quickly, almost running to the trunk of the car. She began to rummage through her trunk that was overflowing with shopping bags from various stores. After several minutes of searching, she pulled an old set of jumper cables from the crowded trunk and slammed the door shut. Frank approached the car with a friendly smile.
"Miss, do you need some help?" asked Frank courteously.
"Francis Kilpatrick! You know damn well I do not!" fumed Bridgette Kilpatrick at her husband. “I was just going to see if I could get a jump from Mr. Piedmonte and I'll be on my way.”
Frank, confused by his wife's present mood, spoke clearly, "Bridgette, I can give you a jump."
"Francis, I can do this myself," assured Bridgette.
"I know you are quite capable, but I can help," explained Frank getting agitated at his wife's unbridled independent spirit.
"You could have helped if you would have purchased a reliable used car and not this green piece of shit!" Bridgette’s rant was interrupted by the sound of a speeding black sports car as it passed. As it zoomed by, snow flew towards them. About a quarter of the way up Mountain Road, the driver of the flashy car came to a skidding halt, poked his head out of the window and began to back up the car.
"Oh, here he comes... Mr. Congeniality," Frank mentioned to his wife. Frank peered down at his much shorter wife, as he rolled his eyes. A smile came across Bridgette's frozen face as she gave Frank a knowing look. She was in total agreement with Frank's sentiment. Angus Morrow wasn't the easiest person to deal with. She flitted back to the front of her ailing vehicle. Reaching inside the driver-side door she reached and popped the hood. Moving quickly, she lifted the hood as smoke poured out of the vehicle towards Bridgette’s face. She coughed several times as she waved the smoke away with her hand. “Blech!” complained Bridgette. Disgusted at this point, Bridgette ripped off her gloves, tore off her scarf and used them to remove the grime and dirt from her face.