✓Invitations. The text message blast had been sent by Fletch, Rancho’s outgoing senior class president, who had the master list of contact info. I had wanted the invite to say: Last Call at Happies, final senior class party ever, tonight, 8 p.m. HELL YEAH THERE WILL BE BEER! SO KEEP IT FUCKING QUIET! You know why. Discretion…look it up! ALSO, BEER! Fletch, more talented with manners than me, successfully argued that we didn’t want to offend our Christian and Muslim classmates with so many word bombs even if the cursing did honor our benefactress, Bev Happie, so the final invite said: Last Call at Happies, tonight, 8 p.m. Please with the Shhhh. No posting about it online. You know why, and it rhymes with hope. Senior class only, please. Be a sport and travel in groups so there aren’t too many cars parked outside the restaurant to arouse suspicion, and each carpool should choose a designated driver. Thanks, guys. See you tonight! (PS—once again, NO POSTING ONLINE!)
✓Decorations. Dozens of strings of Christmas lights had been retrieved from my dad’s outdoor work shed to provide festive lighting at Happies. I had easily sweated off all the previous night’s pizza and Oreos in that outdoor furnace, but that would free up my stomach for Happies pie and cheap beer at the party. And an extra copy of the yearbook had been procured from over-extracurricular’d Fletch (yearbook editor, who had a whole box of extras), and then pictures from yearbook had been cut and made into decorations—streamers and wall flags—to hang around the restaurant for the party.
✓Munchies. Best brownie recipe googled and sent to our class stoner, Jason Dunker, aka “the Dunk.” (Frankly, I was amazed to learn he was a first-time baker in this category.)
✓RSVPs. I had answered dozens of texts from classmates. Yes, Emerson Luong, please feel free to contribute Jell-O shots. No, Jamila Beshara, parental permission slips are not required; in fact, they’re discouraged. Remember the Shhh? Okay, Bo Tucker, you can bring gift bags filled with exactly five individually wrapped breath mints, a mini hand sanitizer bottle, condoms, and flyers for your OCD support group. Thanks, buddy!
✓Ice, Ice, Baby. Liquor store and hardware store run for ice and as many ice tubs for beer as the Chug Bug could fit was completed by Slick and Jake. Baby bro Zeke was authorized to come to the party even though he was a junior because he agreed to program the music and promised it wouldn’t be sucky goth or electronic crap that only he liked. He was a Z-K. Of course he was in.
I was revved, stoked, pumped! I had one last errand to run before it was time to go to Happies to set up. And one more fucking piece of litter to pick up.
Standing outside Town Hall, I picked up a water bottle that somebody had left on the walkway, as if the recycling sorting bin to the left of the steps wasn’t large and neon streetlight–colored enough and with clear black lettering to announce its purpose. Come on, people. Green for bottles and cans, yellow for paper, red for landfill waste. Easy! Obvious!
I placed the water bottle in the green bin and told myself it hadn’t been a waste of my time to spend my entire sophomore year lobbying for recycling bins in public places. The Town Council had finally relented—mostly to get me to shut up, probably—but the bins were a visible sign that Thrope, who didn’t want to spend the taxpayer dollars on waste reduction, was not unbeatable. (She preferred waste to be increased, by her very presence.) A good lesson to remember for tonight.
I was trusting the entire Rancho senior class to keep quiet about my party for just the next twelve hours. It could happen. Thrope could be subverted.
I couldn’t wait for this party, and, just as importantly, I couldn’t wait to rub it in her face after I’d pulled it off. Tomorrow.
Mayor Jerry emerged from Town Hall while I stood on the outdoor stairs. He placed a key in the lock, saw me, and said, “Hey, Vic. Don’t think I got a chance to congratulate you yesterday. Happy graduation!”
“Thanks, Mayor Jerry,” I said. “You were great at commencement.” He handed me a cigar. “You’re a daddy!” I grabbed him in a hug.
He wiggled out of my embrace but grinned. “Congrats are premature. There are contractions but they’re still spaced far apart. Doctor says if labor doesn’t progress in the next few hours, she’ll induce Darlene tonight.”
“Amazing!” I said, feeling a full flush of joy not just for him, but for me. If Sheriff Cheryl’s wife was in labor tonight, that was the best gift my party could receive. She wouldn’t be available to field any nuisance calls from Thrope, should Thrope happen to find out about the party. “Good luck!”
“And good luck to you in Frisco,” said Mayor Jerry.
“Nobody calls it Frisco. People from there call it the City.”
“You’re not from there, my dear Rancho Soldado native who regularly stalks Town Council meetings.”
“I’ll miss that.”
“We’ll sure miss you here. Who am I going to have bugging me about all those empty storefronts if you’re not around?”
I looked toward the empty store windows lining Main Street on either side of Town Hall. “That’s some prime real estate there just waiting to be revitalized,” I reminded him. “It could be used to draw people to the city center to cultivate the local economy. People shouldn’t have to go all the way out to the highway for goods and services when they could walk right here to Main Street.”
Mayor Jerry glanced at the Rancho Soldado tourist brochures in my hand. The brochures displayed HAPPIES RESTAURANT on the cover and I’d just taken them from the information booth inside Town Hall. The brochures were outdated now, so what did it matter that I’d swiped the last remaining supply? These mementos of Rancho Soldado’s last (and only) great institution would make perfect additions to Bo Tucker’s gift bags, since he was going to the trouble of making them anyway.
“Shame about Happies,” sighed Mayor Jerry. “Wish it hadn’t had to end that way. But something good will come in its place.”
“Something sucky will come, and you know it.”
He chuckled. “That’s all a matter of perspective. For you, it’s doom. For others, it’s opportunity.”
We both noticed that Thrope—that very opportunity-maker—was walking in the center of the small park opposite Town Hall. Mayor Jerry quickly turned to me and said, “Good seeing you, Vic. I gotta go.” He placed a baseball hat on his head and scurried out of sight, in the opposite direction of Thrope.
I totally understood. Normally I’d want to dodge Annette Thrope, too, but in this moment, I didn’t. I had to know. Did she know?
I walked closer to where she was standing under the shade of the park’s beloved old oak tree. The Realtor from hell was dressed classic Thrope, wearing an elegant, form-fitting, canary-yellow business suit, her butter-blond hair pulled back into a bun decorated with two red crossed chopsticks that could have doubled as her devil horns. She was with a group of older men and one young woman, my age. The men looked Chinese and were dressed in business suits, and I figured they were Thrope’s real estate clients. I looked closer at the young woman. Was that…Bao Ling from fifth period Economics? What the hell was she doing there? School was out. Bao Ling already had a job lined up at a casino in nearby Vegas, so why was she still sucking up to Thrope? Bao Ling better not have said anything to Thrope about the party!
Wanting to look busy and not so blatantly eavesdroppy, I sat down on a bench under a tree and typed a text to my sister. Last Call at Happies party TONIGHT, courtesy of yours truly. I’d been so busy today I’d neglected to send Lindsay this all-important update.
I watched as Thrope pointed in the direction of the houses on the other side of the park. Thrope said, “As you can see, Rancho Soldado has a wonderful stock of charming mid-century bungalow and craftsman houses. These houses would cost millions in Los Angeles or San Francisco. Here, they’re a bargain. They’ll significantly increase in value once the new mall is built on the old Happies site. I suggest you start buying up now.” Then Bao Ling translated what Thrope had just said to the businessmen, who all nodded appreciatively.
One of the bu
sinessmen asked a question in Chinese, and Bao Ling turned to Thrope to translate. “Does this park have a playground?”
“Oh, God no, not here,” said Thrope. “There used to be one but we had it removed after a family tried to sue the city when a child burned his hands on a merry-go-round bar. You don’t go to a playground in the desert at high noon! That’s just common sense.” She let out an evil chuckle. Patronizing bitch. “But don’t worry. When the new subdivisions are built, the homeowners association will be free to build private playgrounds there. Properly shaded, of course!”
Thrope was the reason why young people couldn’t wait to escape Rancho Soldado after graduation. This town of cool bungalow houses, which used to be a refuge for poor immigrants, beatniks, and people who just wanted big-city escape and a cheap slice of desert living, would soon be a bland suburb like all the others bleeding farther and farther outside the Vegas perimeter and closer to Rancho Soldado. My hate for Thrope was beyond personal. It was on behalf of all the residents of Rancho, whose town Thrope was ruining.
A businessman asked a question and Bao Ling translated. “How is the infrastructure here to support new business?”
Thrope beamed. “Xiexie, great question! We’re working hard to modernize our laws to put business first. Tax benefits, environmental concessions. Rancho Soldado will be at the forefront of the New Economy. I’m not just a businesswoman and local politician. I’m an economics teacher, as well!”
Why would anybody be so proud to sound like such a manufactured scumbag politician, using big, sound bite–friendly words to offer false promises and say essentially nothing? When what she could have bragged about was how she relished in stifling innovation! She could have told the businessmen, Delighted to report I spent the past year squashing the ideas of my recently graduated student Victoria Navarro! Since I’m the only economics teacher on the faculty, I was forced to be faculty advisor to the school’s chapter of the American Teen Entrepreneur Club. Without any help or encouragement from me, Victoria took it upon herself to create her own plan for revitalizing Rancho Soldado as part of ATEC’s annual business plan competition. She suggested that the town take better advantage of its location as a gateway to Las Vegas, the Mojave Desert, and the Kelso Dunes, as you’ll probably see noted in our town’s stupid fucking old brochures, because I stole that marketing language from Victoria. She proposed transforming the town into an ecotourism mecca, with the local small businesses going “green”—I know, big yawn, right?—and working in cooperation with one another to boost everybody. Ah, the innocence of children. Beishang! Yes, it is sad. What was that, how did Victoria’s plan go over? Well, it would have gotten an F from me, obviously, but somehow her ignorant plan won the California state award, which led to her being invited to the Nationals competition. Fortunately, wiser heads prevailed at ATEC Nationals, and her plan lost to flashier entries from wealthier schools. But she’s such a tenacious little badger, that Victoria. Just couldn’t give up. She actually thought her plan was viable, and she dared to present it at the Town Council’s monthly town meeting! Completely blindsided me! I mean, how foolish did that make me look? The town’s economics teacher having no idea her own student intended to present an economic petition to the very Town Council on which the teacher so proudly served? Yes, yes, the Town Council completely dismissed her plan, of course. I made sure of that. [Sigh.] What can a teacher do? These idealistic children. It feels terrible to break their young spirits like that, but they eventually have to learn how the world really works, right? It’s big business like yours that will revitalize places like Rancho Soldado. Out with the old, like Happies. In with the new: you! And hey, you do know I was actually a home ec teacher? Who was forced to teach economics when home ec was removed from the curriculum? Ha-ha, don’t translate that last part, Bao Ling! ’Cuz I don’t know shit about real economics!
My blood boiled, remembering how Thrope had conclusively dismissed my ATEC plan at the Town Council meeting a few months earlier. But then I let out a loud laugh when I saw Lindsay’s response to my text message. Hey, dumbslut. Don’t throw a party just to impress a guy.
I typed back, AND give my girls the best last night together ever. But my laugh had been loud, and Thrope’s group was staring at me as they neared my park bench perch.
I put my phone down as Thrope told them, “Soon I won’t be an economics teacher anymore, though. I hope.” For a second, as Bao Ling translated into Chinese, my heart leapt, feeling encouraged that future classes at Rancho Soldado High might be spared Thrope’s tyranny. Thrope was finally ready to retire? Cue the parade! Thrope looked pointedly at me. Whatever she had to say next was personal between us, not her and them. She declared, “Because I plan to run for mayor this fall.”
My heart felt like it stopped cold, I was so stunned. I’d thought demolishing Happies to make way for a mall and housing subdivisions was the worst fate that could befall Rancho Soldado. If Thrope became mayor—and of course she would win, no one ever contested her—then probably curfews and socioeconomic profiling and environmental apocalypse were coming next. Thank Bev that I was throwing this Last Call at Happies party, because it would probably be the last great thing to happen in Rancho.
I was mad, but maybe more sad. Rancho Soldado as I’d known it was dead.
I was confused, too. If Thrope really wanted to be mayor, she could have run years ago. “Why now?” I said aloud to the group.
Her tone typically condescending, she replied, “Because Rancho needs wisdom and experience to guide it. To make sure the post-Happies transition goes smoothly. Profitably, for those investing so generously in our town.” Bao Ling translated, and then Thrope bowed to the businessmen, who bowed in return to her.
To the businessmen, I said, “Have fun homogenizing our charming small town, destroying our environment, and stimulating growth with minimum wage jobs and housing no worker here could possibly afford.”
Bao Ling started to translate but Thrope cut her off. “Shut up, Bao Ling.” She then addressed me. “Don’t worry, Victoria. I’ll make sure Rancho evolves even bigger, brighter, better. My way. The right way. Your way is full of fantasy good intentions. Entirely implausible. You’re graduated now. Time to deal in the real world.” She walked by me without a backward glance, elegant and haughty.
I burned. I seethed. I silently promised myself I’d stay for the real estate closing the next morning at Happies just to show Thrope all the pictures of her former students defying her in her most hated place.
The businessmen passed me by, Bao Ling following behind them. Does she know? I mouthed to Bao Ling.
Bao Ling shook her head as she ran her index finger and thumb across her mouth. Her lips were sealed. Then she made fists with her hands and banged them down to her sides, as her previously impassive face turned bright with eagerness. Bao Ling leaned in to me and whisper-chanted, “Beer! Beer!”
Rancho Soldado would be forever ruined once Thrope became mayor. I grieved for my town as ardently as I couldn’t wait to leave it. Drink up, kids!
The desert at twilight at the end of a hot-as-fuck day.
I stood at the front entrance of Happies, trying to decide which spot was cooler, inside or outside. They were pretty equal parts sweaty, and I hoped anybody coming to the party knew about the AC situation (or lack thereof). I assured myself that with enough sugar and booze, no one would care how hot the restaurant was. Once the sun went fully down, the heat would downgrade from uncomfortably sweltering to passably awful.
Perspiration covered my body, yet I relished the hot, arid air of early twilight, my favorite time of day in the desert. When I moved to San Francisco, I’d miss this mystic window of desert dusk, when the air started to cool, and the vast, open sky was coated in quiet hues of peaches and apricots against a backdrop like a purple bruise.
I stepped back inside the restaurant, feeling excited about the night to come, but also aware of how much bigger this night was than just a party. Young adulthood was supposed to be
about so many firsts—first crush, first love, first job—but everything tonight was about lasts. Last high school party. Last night with my girls. Last call at Happies. I didn’t know what would become of us all in the future, but a moment of reverie for what Happies had meant to us seemed appropriate.
I couldn’t remember a childhood birthday with Slick and Fletch that wasn’t held here. The restaurant had been the preferred birthday party location of choice for generations of kids. It was a preserved relic of a bygone era that should have been a museum instead of slated for demolition. Ice cream cone–shaped light fixtures hung from the ceiling, with walls stenciled in swirls resembling caramel, hot fudge, and peanut butter sauce. Every door handle and window was fitted with custom knobs painted to look like pies. The ancient wood booths situated along the back wall were covered in years of etchings proclaiming customers’ devotion to each other and to Happies. The wallpaper was ceiling-to-floor posters of decades of past Miss Happies, the beauty pageant once sponsored by the restaurant, and the beauties’ pictures weren’t just your usual white faces, but also Native American, African, Latina, and Asian ones. Happies was for everyone, and had been long before the Supreme Court dismantled segregation. The restaurant had an adjacent party room with a fake palm tree built almost as high as the ceiling and brightly colored piñatas dangling from every branch. The room included Skee-Ball games, an air hockey table, and its own custom DDR dance platform, covered in frenetic displays of the word HAPPIES, as if to stamp the word and its implications into every player’s psyche.
With an hour to go until party time, I sat up on the cashier’s desk situated just inside the restaurant’s front, taking in the calm quiet before the party launched. I was the only person physically present, but all around me I could see the ghosts of past people moving about. I saw a table full of young kids celebrating, colorful cone hats on their heads, their spoons at the ready, as a team of waiters delivered a trough containing the Tower of Happies Power, Happies’ legendary three-foot-tall pyramid of ice cream, hot sauces, whipped cream, and cherries. I saw a group of teenagers sitting at a corner booth, laughing and scanning the songs on their table’s jukebox while they ate from plates full of burgers and fries. I saw a middle-aged couple returning to the site of their first date, rubbing their noses together affectionately between bites of RASmatazz pie. I saw weary travelers coming inside from the heat, awestruck by the displays of Miss Happies posters lining the walls, and salivating over the displays of pies in the cases behind the counter. I imagined Bev Happie as a little girl, sitting on her doting grandpa’s lap at the cashier’s desk, handing over change from the till to smiling customers.