“She bites,” warned Rachel. Laverna responded by baring her teeth.
After dinner, the majority of Flood Girls wanted to find single men and dance. The minority (the Sinclairs) did not, as they had cable television in their room. Laverna sent them away with Frank, and instructions on how to find the porn channels.
With Athena and Rachel as designated drivers, the Flood Girls invaded Missoula. At the Forest Lounge, Laverna once again commandeered Athena, because she was a really good listener, and she had no desire to flirt with the dirty hippies and the rowdy fraternity brothers.
Laverna brought Bucky to help out, but he was useless after his third margarita. She had never seen him drunk before; apparently drunk Bucky had issues with gravity and depth perception. Terrified, he took refuge on the top of a Def Leppard pinball machine, and Ginger and Rachel took turns babysitting.
All night long, Laverna tried to be a good coach. She had finally found an excellent assistant coach, and her name was Margarita. When Laverna caught Diane and a hippie smoking marijuana in the women’s bathroom, she snatched a handful of the hippie’s long beard and flushed the joint down the toilet.
She bought Ronda six beers in total, and although Ronda did not speak, she smiled each time Laverna appeared with another bottle. The tequila filled Laverna with emotions, and she delivered a speech, thanked Ronda for her years of service and apologized for white people. Ronda stopped smiling, and escaped onto the dance floor. Laverna was shocked, but apparently Ronda had a thing for George Michael.
Ronda was the only person dancing to the beat. Tabby, Della, and Martha slow danced to “I Want Your Sex,” despite the tempo. They had been slow dancing to every song, clinging to a trio of pimply and overweight frat boys who couldn’t believe their luck. Laverna stumbled onto the dance floor every twenty minutes, making sure the boys did not get too handsy.
At some point, Laverna lost Diane. She and Athena checked every Suburban in the parking lot, but Diane had just disappeared into the night.
“I don’t care if she’s high on dope and howling at the moon,” said Laverna. “As long as she doesn’t get arrested. She’s the best shortstop I’ve ever seen.” Laverna began weeping, and Athena patted her hand, pulled her back inside the bar.
Red Mabel drank at the bar with the better-looking frat boys, all transplants from the Eastern Seaboard. Adoringly, they bought Red Mabel drinks all night long, and she regaled them with hunting stories. When a handsome boy from Pennsylvania dared question the veracity of Red Mabel riding on the back of a mountain lion, she got into the first and last fistfight of the night. Laverna knew she was justified, and was delighted when his fellow frat boys booed him and drenched him with beer. Of course, Red Mabel was victorious, and nearly broke the nose of the boy from Pennsylvania, careful not to injure her hand. There was a big game tomorrow.
When she wasn’t policing her softball team, Laverna continued her therapy session with Athena. When her obsession with layering was diagnosed as issues with intimacy, Laverna did not punch Athena. She held her tongue when Athena called her out for being a control freak, and a martyr. Instead, she wept openly, buried her face in Athena’s massive breasts. She apologized for being drunk, but Athena encouraged her to let it all out. So she did, and the rest of the Flood Girls were just as carefree and feckless.
An hour before closing time, Laverna had lost count. She was a bad umpire, as far as tequila was concerned. Ten? Twelve? She was loaded, just as she hoped the bases would be in the morning.
She could hear Athena counseling her, or maybe talking makeup secrets, as she was apt to do. It was just noise at this point. Laverna’s ears and eyes were full of tequila, and her senses narrowed to one corner of the bar. Rachel tossed her hair and massaged Bucky’s shoulders. Laverna leaped from her seat, could not feel the table slam across her thighs, hear the crash of shot glasses and the screech of Athena’s chair skidding backward.
Laverna had a handful of Rachel’s hair, and she screamed as she yanked her daughter away from Bucky.
“What the FUCK?” Startled, Rachel grabbed her mother’s forearm, and Laverna could barely register the pain as Rachel pinched until her mother let go. Now Rachel was standing, and Laverna was ready for this. This was why she did not drink tequila. Laverna alternated between quaking with sobs and blind rage.
“DON’T TOUCH HIM!” Laverna pointed to Bucky, who stared up from the floor, frightened.
“It’s okay,” he said, in a small voice.