It was 1995 and I was hitchhiking my way across the South, staying in youth hostels and paying my way by slinging burgers in restaurant kitchens as I went.
I had been working in a restaurant/bar just outside of Tuskaloosa for a few days. While eating at a table after my shift, I witnessed the merger of the most perfectly matched couple I would ever see in my life.
Maureen tended bar at the “The Saddle Sore.” Standing five foot eight and with long dark hair, she was ornery and hardened. She might have been in her forties or fifties, it was impossible to tell. Maureen was substantial both in size and personality and with the kind of attitude that told you she both loved and loathed you in equal measure. I never did get her last name.
It was nine o’ clock exactly when the oak door swung open and the largest man I’d ever seen filled the frame. He was barrel-chested with wild black hair. He wore dark leather and had a massive black beard that swallowed his entire face. All I could see for eyes was the glint from two black ball bearings, set in a protruding brow.
He strode across the room in two steps and heaved himself onto a barstool that trembled with fear. His eyes met Maureen and there was a pause as the smoky air was sucked from the room. Everything went quiet for a moment. Somewhere on the other side of the galaxy, a star went supernova as the mournful howl of a lone wolf sang from the woods behind the bar. The man was emanating some kind of male musk that was eliciting awe and respect from the other patrons.
The silence in the bar was broken as Maureen demurely asked the man what he’d have. When he almost whispered the words “whiskey, neat” they rumbled up from inside him like they were churned out in a factory that hadn’t run for a century.
Maureen grabbed the bottle and just as she was about to pick up a glass, the man stopped her gently and somehow produced two thick glasses from within his beard. He asked for the bottle and poured two drinks. One for him and one for Maureen. They hadn’t taken their eyes off each other for even a second.
Without breaking her gaze, Maureen picked up a rotary phone on the wall behind her and dialed a number. She mumbled something and hung up. A few moments later, the owner of the bar appeared at the kitchen door and gave her a knowing nod. She slipped off her apron, grabbed the man’s prodigious paw and her glass and they floated across the bar and squeezed into a booth across from me.
For the next couple of hours, I was mesmerized as I listened to them weave their stories. His name was Kurt Browning. He rode a Harley and was a retired polecat farmer. She had spent her youth traveling Eastern Europe and doing Tarot readings. The only time they weren’t looking at each other was when Maureen vanished into the kitchen for a moment and returned with two plates covered in meatballs the size of my fist. I watched as the two of them devoured the meatballs while they locked eyes and streamed conversation. I spied the hint of a smile peaking out from Kurt’s beard.
I couldn’t hear everything but I swear that at one point Kurt claimed he had been raised by black bears.
After all the talk was done, I gawked as the two of them got up and started walking out of the bar. Then I was dumbfounded as Maureen suddenly turned to me and handed me the keys to her 1973 chevy truck. She said “Here, kid, now you don’t need to hitch anymore.”
I could barely mutter a thank you and I watched through the window as they got together on Kurt’s massive Harley. Instead of sitting behind him on the bike, she sat in front, hugging him and burrowing into his chest.
They rode off in a cloud of smoke and dust and musk. And somewhere over the Black Warrior River, Maureen was absorbed by Kurt and they became a single soul.