That irritated Sylvie, for some reason. “I’ll just have one of those,” she decided, pointing to the tray of oyster shooters that a waitress was preparing behind the counter.
Oyster shooters were a Louisiana specialty featuring a single raw oyster in a shot glass covered with enough Cajun lightning, or Tabasco, to peel the skin off the tongue. They were tossed back and down the throat in one smooth motion, followed immediately by a chaser of straight, one-hundred-proof bourbon.
I can handle that.
I think.
“Uh… I don’ think so, Sylvie,” Luc cautioned.
Sylvie lifted her chin defiantly.
“Trust me, this is not a good idea.”
“Maybe I’ll have two.”
Luc shook his head hopelessly at her. “Have you ever had an oyster shooter?”
“Of course,” she said. Well, she’d watched other people toss them back like peanuts, and they’d seemed to enjoy them. And she did eat raw oysters on occasion. And she did like her food on the spicy side. And, although she preferred a cool zinfandel, bourbon had to be good if so many people drank it, right? “I can handle it,” she concluded with only slightly faltering confidence.
Luc held three fingers up to the bartender, and Blackbeard placed a set of oyster shooters in front of each of them.
“Not me,” Charmaine said with a laugh, waving a hand with gold-speckled, blood-red fingernails of an ungodly length. Gator slid Charmaine’s set of shooters over in front of Sylvie.
Then everyone turned to watch Sylvie. It appeared she had no choice. She put the first shot glass to her mouth and knocked it back cleanly. Without any chewing, the oyster slid down her throat and landed in her stomach with a thud. The voyage was smooth, but the passage was red-hot. Sylvie thought her mouth and throat and stomach lining were going to burst aflame. Not giving herself a chance for second thoughts, she tossed back the bourbon chaser, hoping to extinguish the flame, but what it did, instead, was fuel the fire. Certain that her eyeballs were steaming, Sylvie exhaled repetitively with short, rapid puffing sounds, much like a mother in labor.
Luc was laughing uproariously, while Gator just stood watching her with arms folded over his chest and an expression on his face that translated into; “Lady, I’ve seen dumb twits before, but you take the cake.”
Charmaine passed her glass of ice water over and advised, “Here, try this, honey,” immediately followed by, “The first thing you gotta learn in bayou country, sweetie, is never let a Cajun man goad you into nothin’… if you know what I mean. Just take my second husband, Justin. He could charm a woman up one side and down the other till she didn’t know her engine from her caboose. When he left, he took everything, including the gumbo pot. I made sure my third husband wasn’t a Cajun, but Lester left, too, and good riddance; that man was booooring. By the way, Sylvie, who does your hair? I’d love to give you a little more pouf.”
Pouf? Pouf? At a time like this, she’s thinking about hair, of all things. Geez! My hair doesn’t need pouf. It already feels as if it’s standing on end.
As Sylvie chugged down the ice water and motioned for another, Luc patted her on the back. “Next time, maybe you’ll listen to me, chère.”
That was the wrong thing to say. “Could you possibly be more smug?” Sylvie commented. Then she sighed woefully because his smugness was forcing her to do just the opposite of what he recommended.
Sylvie prepared to toss back another oyster shooter, followed by the bourbon chaser.
“Oh, swell!” Luc muttered.
This time she only hyperventilated a little. Luc followed suit with his own oyster shooter, and didn’t show any reaction at all other than an appreciative “Whoo-ee!” accompanied by a single pound of his closed fist on the bar and a fierce shake of his head.
“Let’s dance, chère,” he suggested, abruptly straightening himself from his leaning position at the bar.
At first, Sylvie thought she’d heard him wrong. After all, there was a loud buzzing noise in her head, and her earlobes felt numb. But, no, she hadn’t been mistaken. Luc turned her with a hand on her elbow, about to guide her toward the minuscule dance floor. She wanted to protest, but her tongue was in rigor mortis. The minute she stepped away from the bar, her knees gave way. Luc chuckled and held her up with an arm wrapped around her waist.