Acre Under a Green Sky

The Royal Grill was the most beautiful place in the world. It was a mirrored jewel even before you entered it. Outside, glass brick and window surrounded a heavy red door. The facets of glass brick reflected red, blue and gold neon. Inside the Royal Grill behind the bar, a mirrored wall reflected row upon row of sparkling jeweled bottles. On the bar itself, squat crystalline glasses shimmered with diamonds floating in molten amber and quartz. Day or night, the room was awash in moon glow. Faces were starlit and beautiful. Music everywhere seemed to come from nowhere. The music buoyed the room like hot air in a garish balloon. It was a magical, bejeweled ice palace where everyone laughed and sang and told wonderful stories about wonderful people. And they served great burgers and fries.

Billy Kiernan was working the bar when we entered. Ordinarily, we would sit at one of the booths and have Gladys serve us, but the bar was empty except for Biff McCoy bent over his Kick In The Ass at the far end, so we climbed up on the stools at the opposite end of the bar near the entrance. My father was anxious to speak to Billy anyway.

Billy was an old man with eerie pale blue eyes and huge ears. You could bathe a baby in one of his ears. He knew us all by name and prided himself on having your order down before your butt was. The burgers and fries were working, and three cokes and a draft were sweating in front of us. Billy could make Baby Ruth laugh with just a look, and he and Danny used to play catch with an ice cube. You had to be fast, because the last man to get off a sliver of the melting ice won. I just wanted to hear him talk.

It was Billy who invented the Kick In The Ass. It was supposed to be a hangover remedy, but Billy confessed to us that, ". . . it does nothing but taste really awful. Man wakes up with a hangover, he wants punishing."

Billy had a stool back there behind the bar, and if you were one of the chosen few, he would pull up the stool and sit leaning with one elbow on the bar for "some chit chat". It always felt like the supreme compliment when he did that, though we kids tended to go unnoticed to the point of disappearance when Billy got started. Children very often are the proverbial fly on the wall.

"You're sitting on his stool," Billy told my father, "We ought to have a plaque."

"What?"

"That's Luka's place right where you're sitting now. And Gwen used to sit right here next to him. Haven't seen her in months though."

"Were you working the night it happened?"

"Graduation night? Hell, yeah. That's a big party night. Had to be here. What a night! A good time was had by all."

"And Luka was here?"

"Right where you're sitting now. Closed the place. It was 1:30 on the dot. No mistake about it. Luka was always the last to leave, and I poured him outta here and closed that door at 1:30AM."

"How did he seem to you when he left?"

"Like always. Drunk as a skunk. Oh, it was a wonderful night. You shoulda been here, Josh. Everyone had a ball."

"Luka, too?"

"Especially Luka. No one loves a party better than Luka." Billy burst out laughing just thinking about it. "You know that little Patty McIntyre girl? What a little beauty! Well, she graduated; believe it or not, where does the time go? Anyway, she sorta latched onto Luka because her date passed out in his car somewhere and the two of them sat here and had a good old time. The whole bunch of them came in around 11:00 after that dance at the school, and it was three deep at the bar. Her and Luka danced and joked it up. Beautiful girl in her white gown and she had this orchid pinned on her, and Luka was saying how her other tit should get flowers, too. Well, it was funny at the time. She's quite a little flirt, you know. She put that orchid behind his ear, and someone else put one of those black graduating caps on his head, and he did a jig with her to some Elvis Presley crap on the juke box. You know, Luka loves to play the fool. The kids loved him. He's a kid himself, for Christ's sake. At heart, he is. He picked up her skirt. You know, one of those parachute things with miles and miles of gauze or shit down to the floor. He picks up her skirt, and crawls in under there like it's a pup tent, and she screams and laughs. But it was good-natured fun. It was a real pleasure to see those two together having fun and all. Reminded me of the old days with him and Gwen in here. I miss her. I really miss her."

His eyes suddenly glistened like jewels. He seemed startled by his tears and jumped up and moved on to the other end of the bar where he stood leaning with both hands on the bar until our food order was put down in front of him. He was all right when he came back with the food.

"Luka didn't do it," he said, reaching for the ketchup. "One thing I know for sure. Luka doesn't have a mean bone in his body. Drunk as he gets, I woulda seen it, believe me. You can't hide that kind of temper from a bartender. If it's there, it's damn well gonna come out sometime. No, sir. He did not do this thing!"

It was about then my father caught sight of Joe Scarceletti passing through the bar on his way to the office in back. My father called out his name, but Joe pretended not to hear and kept right on until he was out of sight. Billy gave a shrug and shook his head.

"I don't know," he said, "I don't know what's wrong with him. He never gets behind the bar anymore. Been a year or more. Doesn't talk to anybody. Never got over that Martha Brennan business, I guess."

Two men sat down at the bar, and Billy left us to serve them.

"Who's Martha Brennan?" I asked my father.

"When you're older."