“I’ll take care of it,” he said, unlocking from his paralysis. The beerwent to its rightful owner, and he would be grateful to have something to do. To fix a problem, as he always had.
“I’ve got the bar,” I said.
Alex lifted the hatch in the counter to go get his tools and I slid behind the bar to take over. Marisa lingered near the corner of the bar near Silent Jim.
“So I see Alex is still weird,” she mumbled.
I let the hatch fall back in place with a gunshot bang. All heads turned my way. Pascal, loading clean glasses at the back bar behind me, paused. Ned appeared at the pass-through to the kitchen.
“If you want to get yourself kicked out of his pub,” I said evenly, “or pick up a boot heel–shaped bruise on your B-side, I invite you to keep talking.”
Alexhadbeen strange lately—twitchy, like he was building up to say something to me. About getting my act together, probably.
But Marisa couldn’t know that, and that’s not what she meant.
“You okay, Doll?” Ned asked.
But Ned might be reporting back to Joey. “All good, Ned, thanks,” I said tightly.
Marisa angled herself against avid Jim attention. “I just wanted to talk with you,” she pleaded.
“I have to work.” I tucked my guitar under the bar for safekeeping and grabbed an apron from the back wall. “But you can talk to me from one of the stools, same as anyone, if you buy a drink.”
Marisa finally climbed up on the corner stool. “What do you have? Coke?”
She had pulled out her wallet, showing lots of bills lined up pretty. When I could look away, my eyes were hot in my head. “Coke? Isn’t that what you always liked?”
She looked up, a fifty half out of the wallet. “Coca-Cola.”
“Put your Monopoly money away,” I said. “We don’t want it.”
“You said buy a drink.”
Pascal watched as I angled the soda gun, probably making sure I didn’t use a dirty glass. Or spit in a clean one.
Pascal was pie-faced but thin, with a little gel curl that dipped over his forehead no matter how hard he tried to contain it. Ned gave him a hard time for being small, but Pascal worked like a mule and still covered for Ned when he was late, which was pretty often lately.
“Get you something, buddy?” I asked.
“You going to be ready for the show, Doll?” Pascal said, glancing uneasily toward Marisa.
“I’m always ready for a show.”
Except last week, but Pascal didn’t say so. He finished with the glasses and took the rack back to the kitchen.
I plunked the Coke glass on the bar in front of Marisa.
“I don’t drink alcohol anymore,” she said, her eyes sliding around to avoid meeting anyone else’s. “Or… the other stuff.”
“Congratulations,” I said.
“I know it doesn’t make up for anything,” she said. “I just thought… you might like to know.”
I couldn’t think of a thing I’d like to know about Marisa, or hear from her mouth. Anything she might say or do, even begging, the way I’d always imagined, would make me angrier. I was already so mad at Joey, and Cam for nabbing my vinyl collection, and the guy in the alley negging me, and whoever had broken the door, I hardly had the mercury left to rise any higher.
“Actually, it’s important tomethat you know,” Marisa said.
“Well, if it’s important toyou,” I said.
