Recluse Island

Chapter 39

February 2014

Alfred Jagger flipped the Open sign to Closed on the door leading into the Left Boot, the only bar in Stormy Shore located next to Jamestown Drugstore at the end of Main Street and returned to cleaning up tables. They were scattered with empty beer bottles and glasses, peanut shells, and dirty napkins. He was nearly finished when he heard a creak on the stairs leading to his private quarters and Jossalyn Rosenthal appeared.

"Joss what are you doing? You know better. Get back upstairs!" Alfred admonished pointing a stained napkin at her indicating she should turn around.

But Joss didn't listen. And Alfred wasn't surprised. Joss had always had a mind of her own and that hadn't changed over the course of their twenty-six-year relationship. She proceeded down the remaining stairs and strolled into the bar area, hopped onto a stool, and grabbed a handful of peanuts. "So, what's new? Any word on the Lancaster's?"

Alfred sighed as he walked to the garbage can behind the bar and dumped the trash he was carrying inside. Joss always asked about the Lancaster's, the family that had taken her place in the Clinkirk Compound during the deportation in November 1988. Despite the many years that had passed her guilt hadn't lessened. Nor had Alfred's as he was the one who had helped Joss with her ruse.

At the time Joss was twenty the youngest child of Whitmore and Deborah Rosenthal. Her older brothers Anthony, Trent and Bart had all married by this point and started families of their own. As a result, Joss was the only one of her siblings still living at home which meant not only was she being sent to live underground she was also being torn away from her family. Joss's mother had died two years previously so it was just Joss and her father that would be leaving Stormy Shore. Alfred didn't really know Joss that well, he was somewhat acquainted with her father who occasionally stopped by The Left Boot for a beer but otherwise wasn't very familiar with the Rosenthal family.

After the ceremony instead of heading home to pack as was the general norm once a family had been chosen, instead Joss showed up at his bar, which Alfred had only opened the year before.

To become a business owner in Stormy Shore one needed to write a proposal to the court stating the intended business, its purpose and how it would benefit Stormy Shore. The magistrate would then review the case and determine if a business license would be issued. It had taken seven years before Alfred's proposal was granted. Though it was not lost on him that Stanley Ziesemer had never frequented his bar although that did not mean Stanley didn't love pointing out that being a business owner did not prevent Alfred from being deported. The bar was not large, and Alfred had decorated the decor with various paintings of boots. Everything from Go-Go boots to moccasins. Melancholy and in shock Joss had slumped at the bar when she arrived and promptly ordered a shot of vodka.

Alfred wasn't really inclined to do so, drinking was never the answer after all, but Joss wasn't a little girl anymore and denying her wouldn't accomplish much anyway. It wasn't as if there was a drinking age on the island.

After setting the shot glass in front of her she quickly snatched it up and gulped it down.

"Another please," she had asked, pushing the glass back toward him.

"Maybe you'd like to talk instead?" he suggested. At present Joss was his only patron, so there was no worry of them being overheard.

"I'd like a drink," Joss had answered with her large luminous eyes begging for salvation.

"I know you're upset. No one wants to get deported." Alfred had kindly replied.

"That's easy for you to say since you're not the one being sent to hell," Joss had retaliated vengefully.