The incident happened on a Saturday.
I wasn’t there for it.
I was at the clinic doing weekend rounds, checking on the parking lot kitten, who had graduated from a splint to a soft wrap. She had been named Gremlin by the staff because she still hissed at everyone who came near her. I respected this as a boundary-setting strategy that reminded me of someone I lived with, though the someone in question usedglitter and volume instead of hissing.
The effect was roughly the same.
Benji called me at 11 p.m., which was unusual because Benjinevercalled.
He texted. He sent voice memos that were four minutes long and contained no usable information.
Benji communicated through every available mediumexceptthe actual telephony part of the telephone, because phone calls, he’d once explained, “required you to process language in real time without the safety net of editing, and that’s a psychological vulnerability I’m not willing to accept.”
So when my phone rang and his name was on the screen, I picked up immediately.
“What happened?” I asked without saying, “Hello.”
“I’m fine. Everyone’s fine. I need to preface this by saying that everyone is fine and the situation has been resolved and nobody was hurt.”
“What happened, Benji?”
“A guy got aggressive at the bar. It’s not a big deal.” He paused. “He’d been cut off and he didn’t take it well. He grabbed Jacks by the shirt when Jacks tried to walk him out. I stepped in to help, and it escalated for about thirty seconds before Rod came out of the kitchen. The guy finally decided he had somewhere else to be.”
I was already standing.
I’d been at my desk, not writing, and now I was on my feet with my keys in my hand.
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine. He shoved me, but I’ve been shoved harder by bachelorette parties. Jacks has a torn collar and his ego is bruised. Rod is in the kitchen stress-chopping onions, which is his version of therapy. Mark and Finn are on the phone with somebody about security options.”
“You should have a bouncer.”
“That’s literally what Rod said forty-five minutes ago. Verbatim. He said, ‘You need someone on the door,’ and Finn agreed, and Mark is apparently already looking into it.”
“Good.”
“Peter.”
“What?”
“You don’t have to come here. I heard you picking up your keys.”
I looked down. My keys were in my hand. My shoes were by the door.
I’d been moving toward the exit without making a conscious decision to do so, operating on the same instinct that moved me when an animal was in distress. It was the automatic, physical response to a problem that needed solving.
“I’m not coming there,” I said, putting the keys on the counter with a deliberateness that I hoped communicated, to myself if no one else, that I was a rational person who did not drive to bars at 11 p.m. because his temporary roommate had been shoved.
“Good. Because I’m already on my way home. I’m in the car. Jacks is closing up. I’ll be there in fifteen.”
“Drive safe.”
“I always drive safe.”
“You drive with one hand on the wheel and the other holding a phone. That’s not safe.”
“I’m on speaker, you telephonic Nazi. It’s hands-free, legal and everything.”
