Just Past Oysterville: Shoalwater Book One by Perry P. Perkins Page B

shouted,
lowering her voice quickly when heads at the nearest tables turned
their way, “I mean yes! I mean…that’s not what I mean. I just need
to get to Washington!”
    Cassie felt herself on the verge of tears. Her head was
spinning from the convoluted dialog, and the knot in her stomach
had tightened into a hard, solid ball that threatened even further
unpleasantries if she didn’t find herself in a less stressful
situation soon. It was such a simple question, why couldn't she
just ask it?
    “ The lady doth protest too
much, methinks…” he said softly.
    “ Huh?” she replied,
wondering if she could possibly sound as stupid to this stranger as
she did to herself; she was fairly certain that she
must.
    “ Hamlet”
    “ I…uh…” Another brilliant response, would this never
end? She would happily walk all the way
to Oysterville, barefoot, if it meant that she could just get away
from this table and hide her crimson, burning face.
    “ You do know who Shakespeare was?”
he asked, closing his book and seeming genuinely interested in her
for the first time. Cassie was able to keep her mouth shut this
time, and was grateful for that small blessing.
    “ Well,” the man said at
last, “if you’ve never heard of Shakespeare, I don’t want to know.
Have a seat.”
    Cassie sat.
    A moment of silence stretched into two and
finally the man leaned forward and, waving a hand in front of her
eyes, asked in that same low voice, “Well?”
    “ Um….” Cassie groped for an
answer, “Thank you?”
    He laid a weary hand over his eyes and
sighed.
    “ Okay,” he said, looking up
and smiling for the first time. “Let’s try rowing this boat in
another direction, shall we? Can you give me one good reason why a
pretty young gal like yourself would be doing something as
stupendously idiotic as asking to ride halfway across creation with
a strange man?”
    At last, Cassie’s embarrassment had found
its limit and, unable to become any more humiliated, she found
herself growing annoyed at the man’s seemingly unending
sarcasm.
    “ And are you?” she asked,
her eyes starting to spark.
    Now it was the stranger’s turn to look
confused. “Am I what?” He asked.
    “ A strange man?” Cassie
answered sweetly, with the same smile that had driven the cashier
at the Greyhound ticket desk nearly to distraction. Two could play
this little game!
    The man across the table merely looked
amused. “The tales I could tell you, kid.” Cassie knew she
shouldn’t, but the haughty way he had quoted Hamlet, as if she were
some ignorant country bumpkin who had never read a book, had stung.
Cassie Belanger, as any number of the fine folk in Bowie, Arizona
could tell you, didn't like to be stung.
    “ Tales told by an idiot?”
she quoted, in that same sweet voice, “full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing?”
    That caught the man off guard. “Wha…” he
started.
    “ Macbeth?”
    He gaped at her.
    “ You do know who Shakespeare was?”
she finished innocently.
    Silence descended on the table, and Cassie
was sure that she would soon resume her wait at the bus stop.
Suddenly the man slammed both hands down on the tabletop, threw
back his head, and roared with laughter. This went on for some time
until, finally, Cassie began to giggle herself as the older man's
face turned bright red and he pounded the table, snorting for
air.
    Soon, despite the curious glances from the
diners around them, both were doubled over, laughing uproariously,
tears streaming down their faces. Cassie laughed and cried at the
same time, her sides aching, and her breath coming in short
hitching gasps. The knot in her stomach loosened as some measure of
the tension of the last week began to ease. It felt as though a
small hole had pierced the dam within her as the pressure that had
begun to leak out through the cracks and fissures of her spirit
dissipated.
    Their laughter was finally interrupted by
the waitress who quickly set a cup of black coffee and a