Bella picks up a rag and begins wiping the barstools down. “Did you hear about the party going on after hours tonight?” she asks.
“I didn’t hear about it.” I drop my bag behind the counter and then kick it into one of the bottom cubbies. “Who’s having it? Glen or River?” Glen’s the owner of the place and River is the manager, although it’s just a side job for him until he gets out of grad school.
“River? Seriously?” She gapes at me because River hates parties and drinking. He’s a recovering alcoholic, something I discovered by accident one day when I crossed paths with him coming out of an AA meeting down on Broadway. At the time I was coming out of my support group meeting, which was coincidently next door. He was extremely nervous and somewhat agitated that I suddenly knew something about him that he kept from almost everyone except his brother. He told me to please not tell anyone at the bar. When I asked how he even was able to work at a bar without melting from his addiction, he simply said that some stuff had happened that made it nearly impossible for him to drink again. That’s what they all say, I’d thought, but on the outside simply smiled and I’d kept his secret just like he’d asked. After that, he started talking to me all the time during work hours, calling me up to his office for the vaguest reason, like to find out if we needed to order soap. I wasn’t stupid. I could see the way that he looked at me. He wanted to f**k me and eventually he put a move on me. Even though we haven’t screwed yet, we still fool around all the time and I know he’s waiting for me to give it up, which makes me never want to give it up.
“Maybe River decided to step out of his comfort zone,” I say as she shakes her head, giving me a dirty look. “Oh fine. No more jokes. Who’s party is it?”
She continues to wipe the sticky residue that we all pretend is alcohol, when really it’s a mixture of that and the residue leftover from sex encounters that go on after hours at the bar. It’s what made this place so intriguing to me in the first place. Dancing/bar until midnight then it shifts to a whorehouse. There are two sides to this place, just like there are two sides to me, and sometimes I wonder if there are two sides to everything.
“It’s one of Glen’s acquaintances,” she says, making air quotes, because acquaintance means some rich guy who comes here to f**k around with women, do drugs, and pretty much everything that’s illegal. She tosses the rag onto the countertop and turns to face me. “His name’s Leon. I actually new him in high school. He was arrested for drug trafficking or something, but he pretty much paid everyone off so he could get out of it.”
“Leon…that name sounds familiar. Has he been here before?” I ask, slipping my jacket off and shoving that into the cubby with my bag.
“Not since either one of us started working here.” She shakes her head as she plops down onto the stool, props her elbow on the counter, and rests her chin on her hand. “I did hear that he just got acquitted for trafficking.”
I try to shake off the unsettling feeling that’s rising in my body. A feeling like something’s set off a trigger in me, the hairs on my arms and neck standing on end. It happens sometimes, usually when I’m being reintroduced to something from my past and I glance around the bar to see if there’s anything out of the ordinary. There’s a guy in the back corner working on the ice machine, but he doesn’t look familiar. Other than that, everything looks normal, yet I feel like it’s not, like there’s something else here I haven’t seen before and it’s seeing me. What is your problem?
“So he’s innocent, then… if he got acquitted?” I wiggle my neck and then pop my knuckles, trying to get myself… Lily… I can’t tell who, to settle the f**k down. “I mean, no cops are going to show up and take this place down, right?” I’m hoping not because I need this place.
“Yeah, he’s innocent according to the trial.” She pats my arm, like she can sense I’m getting worked up. “Don’t worry, Maddie. Everything’s going to be okay. Just another day at the bar.”
“I know… I just… I just need this job and I don’t want anything to ruin it,” I say, reaching for two shot glasses.
“The bar will be fine.” She glances around, then leans over the counter, lowering her voice. “But just to let you know, I’ve heard rumors that he got in pretty deep with trafficking and that someone tried to kill him and everything. The guy is super hardcore.”
“Sounds dangerous and kind of mobsterish,” I joke, trying to make myself feel less like I’m about to slip out of my skin, but it’s not working.
“Yeah, it does,” she says, biting her lip as she deliberates something then mutters, “Although, I do find it really weird that he got mixed up in it at all.”
“Why?” I ask. She taps her fingers against the countertop, dazing off at something behind my shoulder and I wave my hand in front of her face. “Earth to Bella.”
She blinks out of her trance and then laughs. “Sorry, I was just zoning off, thinking.”
“About what?” I grab a bottle of vodka and unscrew the cap.
She shrugs. “High School and stuff. I used to know Leon back then and he never did seem like the type to turn into a criminal.” She tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. “In fact, he was sort of a nerd, even through college.”
“So you know him, then?”
“Kind of. I mean we went to school together, but didn’t run in the same group or anything. This will be our first time seeing each other in about ten years.”
“Well, maybe his being a nerd was just a facade.” It makes me wonder what I was in high school—a good girl like my mom says I was, or maybe that was my facade. “Sometimes people aren’t what they seem on the outside. Plus, that was over twenty years ago. A lot can change over a couple of decades.”
“Yeah, I guess, but still. It’s so weird. Like he completely changed into a different person. Like he had this dark side and suddenly it came out of him.”
She’s making me feel really uncomfortable, to the point that I’m starting to sweat. I feel like I have this giant crazy sign flashing above my head. I’m about to change the subject when she does it for me.
“Alright enough reminiscing,” she says, her upbeat personality returning. “Pour me a drink.”