Free A Wedding on the Banks by Cathie Pelletier Page A

as a flower bud. He had wanted to sink down into that softness, that pinkness, to nibble at it, collect it in one place like a pile of coins. He had wanted to own it. But Albert had been a sexual pawn, Violet’s instrument to strike back at Sarah Pinkham and the Mattagash Eviction Committee that had formed to oust her. When Sarah caught Albert inside number 3, with his pants literally down, she had taken their daughter, Belle, and left him. That’s when Albert changed the name from the Albert Pinkham Family Motel to, simply, the Albert Pinkham Motel. He had to, expensive as it was. He had no family left. The family had left Mattagash. At the time, Albert felt as though his life had shattered, an icicle falling. But he and Bruce had adjusted well to bachelorhood. Belle visited in the summers. And Albert certainly didn’t miss Sarah’s nagging, wagging tongue. After years of servitude, he was now able to toss his work shirts into a pile near the foot of his bed. To tromp all over the house in muddy boots. To allow the dirty dishes to pile up in the sink. To let Bruce paw the sofa at will. Albert was even known to put on a Sunday shirt while it was still Saturday night and sit out a few beers on a bar stool at the Watertown Hotel, leaving Bruce to wait outside in the truck.
    Yet a little companionship would be nice now and then. Sometimes, and no one in Mattagash knew this, when Albert Pinkham had a beer too many, he found himself back at room number 3, sitting on the edge of the bed, remembering the wonderful pink moments in Violet’s bed before Sarah had knocked. He had even let the room remain pink. Hunters didn’t mind. It was just a lighter shade of blood. And on those nights, Albert often wondered what he might say to Violet La Forge if he ever had the opportunity to run into her again, face-to-face. He might say thank-you, even before he said hello. But no one at the Watertown Hotel ever knew what happened to Violet. Rumor was she got on the Greyhound bus for downstate, from whence she had come, and never bothered to look back. She was swallowed up by the new interstate that was slowly inching north to meet her. She was swallowed up by the passage of time. It had been ten years now.
    â€œSkipped the light fantastic,” Albert told Bruce, as the dog rolled over on his side and placed his huge head on Albert’s old brown boot. A breeze rushed through the budded lilac bushes, rattled the leaves, stirred them up like old memories. Yes, sirree, Albert Pinkham had fallen into bachelorhood just fine. Now if he could only figure out why his business was in the seasonal pits. He had just heard through the grapevine, which in Mattagash was the telephone wire, that Amy Joy Lawler was getting married. June Kelley had rubbered in when Sicily, distraught as hell, called her sister Pearl down in Portland and told her. May first. That could mean a motelful. The money would be nice, but Albert wouldn’t count on any wedding guests as juicy as Violet turning up.
    â€œNumber 3,” Albert said musically, as he tugged a burr from last year’s crop out of Bruce’s coat. Bruce was perplexed. He raised his head and tilted it at Albert, questioning.
    â€œThe stripper with the big tits,” Albert reminded him, and Bruce yawned again, a long and lazy yawn, and remembered.

THE ANCESTRAL ACHE IS PASSED ON: FROM WHITE PINE TO OLD SPICE
    In the pines, in the pines
    Where the sun never shines
    And we shiver when the cold wind blows.
    â€”“In the Pines,” a traditional American folk song
    Amy Joy flipped through Bride magazine. She would have liked to browse, but none of the magazine’s contents applied to her, really. How could she plan on ordering anything when her wedding was only two weeks away? This saddened her. She had always imagined herself in a swirl of delicate lace, the train falling like a path of pure Maine snow behind her. She had, many times, envisioned her name in