Bellucci’s Parton Me, Donald

Bellucci’s Parton Me, Donald…Chapter OneDolly at St. Charles“La memoria non ha bisogno di silenzio. A volte ha bisogno di musica, zucchero e una stanza piena di gente.”Memory does not require silence. Sometimes it needs music, sugar, and a room full of people.

“A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth.”

— Ecclesiastes 7:1

Lord, let remembrance remain love without becoming spectacle.

Guide our hands so what we preserve is worthy of the life we honor. Amen.

Zodiac: AriesTarot Situation: Six of CupsTarot Action: The MagicianTarot Outcome: The World

Chapter Food: Big MacChapter Dessert: McFlurry with OREO CookiesChapter Cannabis Strain: Dolly Dynamite Haze

Dolly was already on the shirts before the first serious crowd arrived.

That was how Vinny wanted it.

Not balloons.

Not a room drowned in pink glitter.

Not cardboard cutouts blocking the registers.

Not one of those corporate memorials where every available surface was covered until the person being honored disappeared beneath the advertising.

The McDonald’s on St. Charles Avenue still looked like Vinny Bellucci’s McDonald’s.

That mattered.

The skulls stayed.

The dark polished surfaces stayed.

The chandelier stayed.

The McDonald’s arches remained where they belonged.

The restaurant had not been transformed into Dollywood.

Dolly had been invited into Bellucci territory.

There was a difference.

Valeri stood a few feet inside the dining room and let her eyes move slowly across it.

Black Dolly shirts.

Everywhere.

One vampire wore his beneath a McDonald’s apron.

A werewolf near the back had needed a larger size and still looked as though the cotton had entered a disagreement with his shoulders.

Two human employees moved between them without paying either one much attention.

The crew had adapted before the customers had even arrived.

Vinny came from behind the counter and stopped beside Valeri.

He was wearing the shirt too.

Black.

Dolly’s face across the chest.

Dark pants.

No attempt to make himself look like anybody’s idea of a country-music fan.

He simply wore the promotion.

Valeri glanced down at her own.

“Everybody?”

Vinny looked toward the kitchen.

“Everybody.”

“No exceptions?”

“No.”

A werewolf tugged at the hem of his shirt.

Vinny saw him.

The werewolf immediately stopped.

Valeri looked sideways at Vinny.

“You didn’t even say anything.”

“Didn’t have to.”

“That’s disturbing.”

“It saves time.”

She looked back toward the werewolf.

The werewolf pretended he had never touched the shirt.

Valeri smiled.

The memorial had been built around simplicity.

Dolly shirts for the crew.

Dolly merchandise for the customers.

Dolly-themed Happy Meal prizes.

Collectible figurines.

Commemorative single CDs.

T-shirts.

The restaurant was still selling McDonald’s food because Vinny had no intention of confusing a promotion with a complete identity crisis.

People would come for Dolly.

They would still order burgers.

That was business.

The first Happy Meal boxes were stacked and ready.

Vinny had counted everything.

Of course he had.

Valeri watched him look toward the merchandise display.

“How many times have you counted those?”

“Enough.”

“That means more than once.”

“Yeah.”

“How many figurines?”

He gave her the exact number.

“CDs?”

Another exact number.

“Shirts?”

He knew that too.

Valeri shook her head.

“You know people are going to buy the shirts just because they see everybody else wearing them.”

“That’s the point.”

“So you admit the employees are advertising.”

“They’re working.”

“And advertising.”

“Same shirt.”

“That is not an answer.”

Vinny looked at her.

“It can do two things.”

There it was.

Tre Quarti thinking applied to cotton.

A uniform.

Merchandise.

Camouflage.

Memorial.

Advertising.

Same object.

Different register.

Valeri looked at the vampires.

That was where the shirt became more useful than anybody outside their world could possibly understand.

One of the vampires had pale skin that would have looked theatrical even without makeup.

Black hair.

Dark eyes.

Still posture.

A face too composed for somebody about to spend hours taking fast-food orders.

Put him alone beneath ordinary fluorescent lights and people might stare.

Put Dolly Parton across his chest and a McDonald’s apron around his waist and suddenly the public had an explanation.

Actor.

Costume.

Promotion.

New Orleans.

People loved explanations that prevented them from having to reconsider reality.

The werewolves benefited even more.

Valeri looked toward the largest one.

There was no realistic version of him.

The fur was too dense.

The muzzle too complete.

The ears moved independently.

The hands were hands until somebody looked too closely at the nails.

But New Orleans had trained tourists to accept spectacle before breakfast.

Give them a werewolf behind a McDonald’s counter and somebody might panic.

Give them a werewolf behind the same counter wearing Dolly Parton and suddenly people wanted pictures.

Vinny followed her gaze.

“They’ll think costumes.”

“I know.”

“Let them.”

“I know.”

That was the whole protection system.

Not hiding.

Framing.

Information was more valuable than money because the first explanation usually won.

If the first thing people heard was Dolly memorial promotion, then everything that followed entered through that door.

The wolf was part of the promotion.

The vampire was part of the promotion.

The skulls were part of the restaurant theme.

The shirts were merchandise.

The Happy Meal prizes were collectibles.

Nothing supernatural had to be denied because nobody had asked the right question yet.

Valeri walked toward the front display.

The figurines were small enough to disappear inside a hand.

The CDs had been stacked neatly.

The shirts were separated by size.

She did not touch anything.

Vinny noticed.

“You can pick one up.”

“They’re organized.”

“I know.”

“I don’t want to mess them up.”

He looked at her for a second.

“You own books.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“You touch things without destroying them.”

“That’s different.”

“Because?”

“They’re books.”

Vinny gave her a look.

She ignored it.

Behind them, the kitchen began finding its rhythm.

Fryers.

Metal.

Packaging.

Shoes against flooring.

A register drawer opening.

The ordinary mechanical language of fast food.

The smell came next.

Hot oil.

Salt.

Bread.

Beef.

Pickles.

Onions.

Sauce.

The smell of McDonald’s was almost aggressive in its familiarity.

That helped too.

A person could be standing three feet from a vampire and still feel safe if the room smelled like fries.

Valeri breathed in.

“You hungry?”

Vinny asked.

“I wasn’t.”

“And now?”

“Maybe.”

He nodded toward the kitchen.

“Big Mac.”

She looked at him.

“For me?”

“For the chapter.”

She smiled.

There was something absurdly Bellucci about treating a Big Mac as if it belonged in an archive.

But that was exactly what they did with things.

Food was never merely food once Vinny paid enough attention to it.

A burger became timing.

Construction.

Consistency.

Demand.

Memory.

Public expectation.

Vinny had spent enough of his life around kitchens to understand that a recipe was a form of controlled information.

People thought they were buying taste.

They were also buying repetition.

A Big Mac in one city was expected to resemble a Big Mac somewhere else.

Same architecture.

Same sequence.

Same promise.

That thought would matter later.

Valeri did not know how much later.

For now, she watched Vinny unwrap one.

The sesame-seed bun released a warm, slightly sweet bread smell.

Two beef patties.

Cheese.

Shredded lettuce escaping toward the wrapper.

Pickles.

Onions.

The pale sauce appearing between the layers.

Nothing elegant about it.

Nothing needed to be.

Vinny handed it to her.

“You take the first bite.”

“Why?”

“You’re staring at it.”

“That’s your answer for everything.”

“Works.”

She took the burger.

The first bite compressed the layers.

Warm beef.

Soft bread.

Sharp pickle.

Onion.

Cool lettuce.

Cheese.

Sauce carrying sweetness and acidity between all of it.

The flavor was so familiar it almost bypassed thought.

Valeri chewed.

Vinny watched her.

“Well?”

“It’s a Big Mac.”

“Exactly.”

She laughed.

He took it when she offered it back.

That was the point.

Not culinary revelation.

Recognition.

Nobody ordered one because they expected mystery.

They ordered it because they knew what it was supposed to be.

Valeri looked toward the supernatural crew again.

Maybe that was why the visible-quarter strategy worked so easily here.

McDonald’s was built on expectation.

The public walked into a place where they already knew what everything meant.

Counter.

Menu.

Fries.

Burger.

Happy Meal.

Uniform.

Promotion.

Costume.

Once categories were established, people resisted anything that required replacing them.

Vinny took another bite and returned the burger to her.

“You’re thinking too hard.”

“That’s rich coming from you.”

“I’m eating.”

“You’re calculating sales while eating.”

“I can do both.”

“Tre Quarti Big Mac.”

He almost smiled.

“Don’t start.”

The doors opened.

The first group entered.

Eyes immediately went to the Dolly display.

Then the skulls.

Then the werewolf.

Exactly as Valeri expected.

One customer stared at him.

The werewolf stared back.

The customer’s face moved through confusion.

Then recognition.

Then delight.

“Oh, that is insane.”

The werewolf did nothing.

The customer pulled out a phone.

Valeri looked toward Vinny.

Vinny kept eating.

“See?”

“Costume.”

“Yep.”

The customer moved closer.

“Can I get a picture?”

The werewolf looked toward Vinny.

Vinny nodded once.

The werewolf stood beside the customer.

The phone rose.

Picture.

Done.

No screaming.

No revelation.

No emergency.

The customer immediately turned toward the Dolly display.

“What comes in the Happy Meals?”

An employee explained the promotion.

Figurines.

Single CDs.

T-shirts among the promotional prizes and merchandise.

The customer picked up one of the boxes.

That was it.

The impossible had been absorbed by commerce.

Valeri looked down at the Big Mac.

“People are weird.”

Vinny swallowed.

“People are easy.”

“That sounds worse.”

“It’s not an insult.”

“It sounded like one.”

“They like a story.”

Valeri looked toward the werewolf.

“And we gave them one.”

“Yeah.”

The story was Dolly.

Everything else fit underneath it.

Within the next hour the restaurant filled.

Phones appeared everywhere.

People photographed the merchandise.

Then the shirts.

Then the skull décor.

Then the employees.

The vampires adjusted faster than the werewolves.

One smiled for cameras without showing too much tooth.

Another learned to keep moving instead of becoming unnaturally still.

The wolves required more management.

One of them tried to perform being human after realizing customers were recording him.

That made everything worse.

His shoulders became stiff.

His arms moved deliberately.

He looked like a werewolf pretending to be a man pretending to be a werewolf.

Valeri crossed the room.

“Stop.”

He looked at her.

“Stop what?”

“That.”

“What am I doing?”

“Walking incorrectly.”

The werewolf looked down at his legs.

Vinny was close enough to hear.

He turned away.

Valeri knew he was laughing without actually seeing his face.

“You’re thinking about the cameras,” she told the werewolf.

“They’re watching.”

“I know. Quit helping them.”

His ears moved.

“Just be normal.”

He stared at her.

Valeri corrected herself.

“Be your normal.”

That worked.

His posture loosened.

He walked away naturally.

A customer filming him laughed.

“That costume is incredible.”

Valeri looked toward Vinny.

He raised one eyebrow.

She returned to him.

“Not one word.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You were about to.”

“No.”

“You had a whole speech in your face.”

“I got a face.”

“There it is again.”

He handed her the last section of the Big Mac.

She took it.

Another Happy Meal left the counter.

Then another.

The first Dolly figurine disappeared into a customer’s bag.

Vinny noticed.

Of course.

Valeri saw his eyes shift toward the display.

“One.”

“What?”

“Figurine.”

“You’re counting them while talking to me?”

“Yeah.”

“Romantic.”

“Inventory.”

“That was sarcasm.”

“I know.”

The second figurine sold.

Then a CD.

Then another Happy Meal.

Then the first adult walked up and bought a Dolly shirt without purchasing food.

Valeri looked at Vinny.

“There.”

“I saw.”

“I told you.”

“Yeah.”

“The shirts are going to move because they see the employees wearing them.”

“Yeah.”

“You could at least pretend this information is new.”

“It’s not.”

“You are exhausting.”

“So sit down.”

She stared at him.

He stared back.

That was Vinny.

No unnecessary performance.

If she was tired, sit.

If something sold, count it.

If demand increased, order more.

If a werewolf could pass as promotional entertainment, let him work.

People complicated things.

Vinny usually reduced them back to function.

The dessert came later.

A McFlurry with OREO Cookies.

Cold enough that condensation began forming almost immediately.

White soft serve folded with dark crushed cookie pieces.

Some crumbs fine enough to gray the ice cream.

Others large enough to remain crisp.

Vinny set it in front of Valeri.

She looked at it.

“You trying to bribe me into staying?”

“No.”

“That sounded suspiciously fast.”

“Eat.”

She took the spoon.

The first bite was colder than she expected after the warmth and salt of the burger.

Sweet cream.

Chocolate cookie.

A slight bitterness from the cocoa.

Then another spoonful with a larger cookie piece that still had enough texture to crack before softening.

Simple.

Familiar.

But the contrast worked.

Hot food.

Cold dessert.

Salt.

Sugar.

Valeri leaned against the table.

“That’s better than I remember.”

Vinny took the spoon from her.

“Because you were hungry.”

“I already ate.”

“You ate half a burger.”

“That counts.”

“Not with you.”

He took a bite of the McFlurry.

She reclaimed the spoon.

The OREO pieces had begun softening into the ice cream.

The texture changed as it sat.

That caught her attention.

“What?”

Vinny asked.

“Nothing.”

“You got that face.”

“I got a face.”

He looked at her.

She smiled.

“Now you know how irritating that is.”

He ignored her.

Valeri looked at the black-and-white mixture.

There was something almost too obvious about it.

Light.

Dark.

Separate until mixed.

Then impossible to return to the original state.

Public quarter.

Hidden three.

She did not say it.

Vinny would accuse her of turning dessert into philosophy.

He would be correct.

A vampire crossed behind them carrying a stack of Happy Meal boxes.

A werewolf followed with supplies.

Both wore Dolly.

A child waved.

The werewolf waved back.

The parent took a picture.

Nobody screamed.

The McFlurry softened.

The crowd grew.

The memorial worked.

By afternoon, the Dolly shirts were moving faster.

The figurines were moving fastest.

Vinny adjusted the display.

Not dramatically.

He simply moved more of what people wanted closer to where they could see it.

Information.

Attention.

Inventory.

One quarter of the restaurant was commerce.

One quarter was memory.

One quarter was camouflage.

One quarter was whatever stood behind the costume explanation and watched the customers leave believing they had understood the entire room.

Tre Quarti.

Three quarters hidden.

Valeri watched a vampire hand a Happy Meal to a family.

The mother thanked him.

He smiled properly this time.

No fang.

The child stared at him.

“You’re a vampire.”

The room seemed to hold still for half a second.

The vampire looked at the child.

Valeri looked at Vinny.

Vinny did nothing.

The child’s mother laughed.

“He’s pretending.”

The vampire smiled again.

“Yes.”

One word.

Technically useful.

The child continued staring.

Then looked at his Dolly shirt.

“Why does Dracula like Dolly?”

The vampire considered the question.

Valeri had to look away.

Vinny answered from where he stood.

“Everybody likes Dolly.”

The mother laughed.

The child accepted that.

And the moment disappeared.

Valeri turned back toward Vinny.

“That may be the best explanation you’ve ever given.”

“It worked.”

“That doesn’t make it philosophically sound.”

“I wasn’t trying to be philosophical.”

“Obviously.”

Another customer stepped toward the counter.

The restaurant swallowed the moment.

That was what Valeri liked about places like this.

There was always another order.

Another person.

Another distraction.

Nothing was allowed to become sacred for very long.

Maybe memorials needed that.

Dolly’s death had created the reason for the promotion, but the restaurant refused to become a funeral home.

There was music.

Food.

People laughing.

Children opening Happy Meals.

Adults buying shirts.

Collectors inspecting figurines.

People holding CDs they would probably never throw away even after they no longer owned anything that played them.

Grief had entered commerce.

Commerce had given grief physical objects.

Valeri understood that better than most.

Publishing did the same thing.

A person died.

A story remained.

Paper held it.

Ink held it.

A spine carried the name.

People placed the object on a shelf because memory felt safer when it occupied space.

A Dolly CD.

A shirt.

A figurine.

A book.

Different containers.

Same instinct.

“Doll.”

Valeri looked up.

Vinny had come closer.

“You tired?”

“A little.”

He nodded.

No lecture.

No insistence that she prove otherwise.

She appreciated that.

“I want to stay another few minutes.”

“Okay.”

He did not tell her fifteen.

He did not start a clock.

He simply stayed nearby.

The restaurant continued operating.

A werewolf laughed too loudly from the kitchen.

A vampire told him to keep it down.

The werewolf laughed again.

Customers thought it was part of the entertainment.

Valeri smiled.

Maybe that was the real secret.

The supernatural did not always need darkness.

Sometimes it needed fluorescent lighting and plausible branding.

By late afternoon the figurine count had fallen enough for Vinny to stop pretending supply would hold.

“We need more.”

Valeri looked toward him.

“You said that yesterday.”

“I’m saying it again.”

“Order more.”

“I did.”

“Then why are you announcing it?”

“I’m talking to you.”

She smiled.

“Look at that. Full sentence.”

He shook his head.

The McFlurry cup sat empty now.

Only streaks of softened vanilla and dark OREO crumbs remained along the inside.

The chapter dessert had done what dessert was supposed to do.

Closed the meal.

Shifted the palate.

Left memory behind after the actual food was gone.

The cannabis belonged to another register.

Dolly Dynamite Haze.

Not in the restaurant.

Not passed around beneath McDonald’s lights.

Not treated like another Happy Meal promotional item.

Vinny and Valeri’s cannabis use remained separate from the public St. Charles operation.

The name belonged to the chapter because the strain carried the same contradiction as the day: bright, celebratory Dolly imagery wrapped around something intended for adults, private ritual separated deliberately from public hospitality.

Dolly Dynamite Haze was not part of the children’s promotion.

Not merchandise.

Not restaurant inventory.

Different register.

Different boundary.

Vinny maintained boundaries because the rest of his world only worked when things could carry multiple meanings without becoming the same thing.

That evening, the strain would remain private.

The restaurant would remain McDonald’s.

The Dolly Happy Meals would remain public.

The vampires and werewolves would remain whatever the public had decided they were.

Costumes.

Actors.

Promotion staff.

Good.

The visible quarter had held.

Valeri stood beside Vinny and looked across the room one more time.

Black Dolly shirts.

McDonald’s uniforms.

Skulls.

Happy Meal boxes.

Figurines.

CDs.

Fries.

Burgers.

Families.

Phones.

A werewolf answering a customer’s question.

A vampire wiping down a counter.

A child carrying Dolly home inside a paper box.

None of it belonged together.

That was precisely why it worked.

New Orleans had never required things to match.

It required them to coexist.

Valeri glanced toward Vinny.

“She would’ve laughed.”

Vinny followed her gaze toward the werewolf wearing Dolly across his chest.

“Yeah.”

“At all of this.”

“Probably.”

Valeri smiled.

The doors opened again.

More customers.

Vinny immediately checked the line.

Work returned to his face.

“What?”

Valeri asked.

“Nothing.”

“You’re counting.”

“Yeah.”

She looked at the diminishing figurines.

“More?”

“More.”

“What about shirts?”

“More.”

“CDs?”

“Enough.”

“Happy Meal boxes?”

“Fine.”

She nodded solemnly.

“Big Macs?”

Vinny looked at her.

“We’re McDonald’s.”

She laughed.

“That was the correct answer.”

He moved toward the counter.

Valeri remained where she was another moment.

Dolly looked back at her from nearly every direction.

The woman was gone.

The image remained.

The music remained.

The affection remained.

And now, for a little while on St. Charles Avenue, so did the merchandise.

That was not immortality.

Valeri knew better.

It was something smaller.

More human.

People taking pieces of memory home.

A shirt folded over an arm.

A CD inside a bag.

A figurine clutched by a child.

OREO crumbs at the bottom of a McFlurry cup.

A photograph of a werewolf nobody understood.

A vampire smiling carefully beside a McDonald’s register.

A restaurant full of people who believed they had seen everything.

They had seen one quarter.

That was enough.

For now.

END OF CHAPTER ONEBellucci’s Parton Me, Donald…