Boy, did Lilly know about that, growing up half Korean in a predominately white small town.
"I'll be right back," Lilly said and turned toward the booth. As she walked carefully around the tables and patrons occupying them, she belatedly wondered if bringing Jaycee to the bar had been a good idea.
"Here you guys go," Lilly said as she set the tray down on the end of the table and put the pitcher of beer in the center. Mitch, who was sitting closest to her, grabbed the mugs and handed them out for her so she wouldn't have to reach.
"Thanks, Mitch," she said with a smile.
"No problem. Have you met these knuckleheads?" Mitch asked pointing to the two men Lilly hadn't recognized.
"Haven't had the pleasure," Lilly said, her smile widening.
"I doubt it'd be much of a pleasure when they commandeer the Karaoke machine later," Fish said with a laugh.
Lilly watched Mitch just shake her head and gesture to a mountain of a man next to her with bushy blonde hair and kind eyes. "Lilly, this is Chad Padgett, he just lies on the fires to put them out."
Chad shrugged and nodded and then gave Lilly a wide smile as he reached out his big hand to shake Lilly's.
"Nice to meet you, Chad," she said politely.
"Likewise, Miss Lilly," he said in a deep burly voice.
Fish spoke up, grabbing the other man next to him by the shoulder and squeezing playfully. "And this is Terrell Johnson, the freshest of the new meat."
"You can call me Terry, ma'am, nice to meet you," he said as he reached out his hand too.
"Nice to meet you too, but Miss Lilly, ma'am?" Lilly playfully teased the men with a smile.
"What can we say, Mitch has these boys trained well," Fish laughed.
"We were just raised right," Chad beamed and chucked Terry on the shoulder who nodded enthusiastically.
"I would certainly agree, but please, just call me Lilly. Anything else makes me feel kind of old," she chuckled.
"All right, Lilly. Do you really have Karaoke tonight?" Chad asked and Fish cuffed him on the back of the head.
“We do, Chad. I’m sure Fish can show you the ropes,” Lilly said and winked at Fish before heading back to the bar. She caught eyes with Jaycee who looked at her, eyebrows raised.
“So, am I going to meet the famous Mitch?" Jaycee asked once Lilly was within earshot.
Lilly watched her face and saw nothing but genuine curiosity. She didn't know why she felt so strange about them meeting. Or at least she didn't want to think too hard about why that was so.
"Of course. I'll ask her to come over when I bring them another pitcher," Lilly said, buying herself a bit of time.
She didn't get the chance to because a few minutes later Mitch came up to the bar with the menus in her hand.
"Hey, is it okay if I just order from here? Thought I'd save you a trip."
Lilly smiled at her consideration. "Sure," she said as she grabbed her pad and a pencil. She scribbled down their order and handed it to Sherry, one of the two servers on the floor who was heading toward the kitchen. She noticed Jaycee staring openly at Mitch and Mitch trying to appear not to be looking over at Jaycee and knew she better make introductions.
"Mitch, I'd like you to meet Jaycee... my girlfriend," she said, stumbling on the last two words much to her consternation.
Jaycee didn’t appear to notice though as she stood and came up to Mitch holding her hand out and giving her a polite smile.
"Ah, the infamous Mitch. I've heard a lot about you," Jaycee said, speaking loud to overcome the music and competing voices at the bar. Lilly's eyes narrowed at Jaycee's flippant greeting as Mitch's eyes widened for a moment before taking Jaycee's hand and shaking it.
"I hope it was mostly good,” Mitch said with a wan smile. “It's nice that you could be here for Lilly.”
An awkward silence fell between the two and Lilly tried to come up with something to break it because it seemed Jaycee had no inclination to. Before she could, Mitch looked at her and gave her a curt nod. "I'll leave you guys to it, then. Thanks for putting in our order," she said and turned and headed back to the table. Lilly watched her go, her heart sinking at the perplexed look in her eyes.
"Woman of few words, huh?" Jaycee laughed lightly as she took her seat. Lilly didn't respond though. She was still trying to get over Jaycee's somewhat churlish reaction to Mitch.
As the night wore on and her group was on their third pitcher of beer after polishing off their burgers, Mitch kept looking over at Jaycee, wondering what she'd done to cause the woman to act so cool toward her. She wondered what Lilly had told her.
"How are you doing?" Fish asked near Mitch's ear. Terry and Chad had gone up to the small DJ stand to look through the Karaoke song list, leaving the two alone.
"I'm all right," Mitch said. Encounter with Jaycee notwithstanding, the beers had given her a pleasant, 'fuzzy around the edges' effect, but she knew there was a balance. If she had much more to drink, she'd become moody and she certainly wanted to avoid that.
"You sure?" Fish asked, looking at her now intently.
She pushed her mug away and sat back in her seat. "Yes, Fish. Thanks," she said with a sincere smile.
"I bet she can't even replace a lightbulb," he said as he cut his eyes toward the bar.
She couldn't help but laugh but then she sobered and frowned. "Pretty sure that wasn't a requisite for Lilly," she said with a bit more bite than she intended.
She felt his eyes on her, studying and she rolled her head toward him, pinning him with a stare that begged him to drop it. "It is what it is, Fish."
He gave her an understanding nod and patted her leg. "Come on, let's go show these rookies how to put on a show."
Mitch gave him a dubious look, not sure she wanted to cut loose in front of Lilly and her girlfriend, but she soon found she didn't have a choice as she was bodily dragged out of the booth.
Lilly was pouring a gin and tonic when she heard the Karaoke mic click on and Marshal, a regular who volunteered to MC Karaoke nights, announced the first singers.
She looked up when she heard him say Mitch and Fish's names and smiled widely when the first notes of 'Islands in the Stream' started.
She set the bottle of tonic down and watched, laughing at their antics as they danced back to back and then turned to sing to each other as they looked dreamily into the other's eyes.
The crowd loved it and Lilly couldn't help but feel a small sense of pride at how Mitch had them all eating out of the palm of her hand. But she had no more claim to her than any other person in the bar. A memory of Mitch singing to her from that very stage ten years ago came to her and the smile slipped off of her face.
"So, what exactly happened between you and Mitch?"
Lilly held in a sigh and turned toward Jaycee, regarding her for a moment. When she and Jaycee were just friends, she'd talked about Mitch off-hand because she was such a big part of her life for a lot of her formative years. But she never talked about how their relationship ended. She really didn't want to talk about it now, either.