Chapter 6: Short-Handed

Blue Hour had three bookings left in June.

A wedding on the north shore Saturday. A resort's anniversary on the twentieth.

A retirement party on the thirtieth that I'd quoted cheap because the man used to drive my school bus.

I had four crew at seven o'clock Friday.

By seven forty I had two.

On Saturday those two were already up at the resort, setting a pier show for the anniversary rehearsal.

That left me and Patty and one wedding barge.

"We've done it with two before," Patty said, loading mortar racks onto the trailer at noon.

"We were twenty-three and fifty-two."

"I'm still fifty-two in my heart."

"Your heart's fifty-eight and smokes."

"My heart is very proud of you, kid. Lift with your legs."

The wedding was at a summer house with a lawn that ran down to the water.

There was a white tent and string lights.

The bride had hugged me at the consultation and told me she'd cried at our show last Labor Day.

Her mother called me at two.

"Is it true Dustin left? Are you still coming?"

"I'm on the barge right now."

That was a lie. I was in the truck.

At three, I was on the barge.

It's a forty-foot steel deck with no shade. By four, the sun was cooking the plywood and I'd sweated through my shirt.

We had sixty racks to set and wire. Every cue had to be tested, every line checked, every tube seated.

Patty did the heavy racks. I did the wiring. We stopped talking around five because talking cost water.

At five thirty, a boat motor came across the bay toward us.

I stood up with a fuse puller in my hand.

It was a flat gray work boat with MOSS BROS. stenciled on the bow.

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