Reminders of Him

Her fingers recoil from mine and she puts her hands in her lap. I pull the empty glass of soda away from her, as well as the full glass of wine, and she doesn’t even look up to ask me why. She sighs, like maybe she’s relieved I took the wine away. Why did she even order it?

I refill her soda, and when she isn’t looking, I pour the wine in the sink and wash the glass.

She sips from the soda for a while, but the eye contact stops. Maybe I upset her.

Roman notices me staring at her. He leans an elbow onto the counter and says, “Divorce or death?”

Roman always likes to guess the reasons people come in alone and seem out of place. The girl doesn’t seem like she’s here because of a divorce. Women usually celebrate those by coming to bars with groups of friends, wearing sashes that say Ex-Wife.

This girl does seem sad, but not sad in a way that would indicate she’s grieving.

“I’m gonna say divorce,” Roman says.

I don’t respond to him. I don’t feel right guessing her tragedy, because I’m hoping it isn’t divorce or death or even a bad day. I want good things for her because it seems like she hasn’t had a good thing in a long, long time.

I stop staring at her while I tend to other customers. I do it to give her privacy, but she uses it as an opportunity to leave cash on the bar and sneak out.

I stare for several seconds at her empty barstool and the ten-dollar tip she left. She’s gone and I don’t know her name and I don’t know her story and I don’t know that I’ll ever see her again, so here I am, rushing around the bar, through the bar, toward the front door she just slipped out of.

The sky is on fire when I walk outside. I shield my eyes, forgetting how assaulting the light always is when I step out of the bar before dark.

She turns around right when I spot her. She’s about ten feet from me. She doesn’t have to shield her eyes because the sun is behind her, outlining her head like it’s topped with a halo.

“I left money on the bar,” she says.

“I know.”

We stare at each other for a quiet moment. I don’t know what to say. I just stand here like a fool.

“What, then?”

“Nothing,” I say. But I immediately wish I would have said, “Everything.”

She stares at me, and I never do this, I shouldn’t do this, but I know if I let her walk away, I won’t be able to stop thinking about the sad girl who left me a ten-dollar tip when I get the feeling she can’t afford to leave me a tip at all.

“You should come back tonight at eleven.” I don’t give her a chance to tell me no or explain why she can’t. I go back inside the bar, hoping my request makes her curious enough to show back up tonight.

CHAPTER FIVE

KENNA

I’m sitting on an inflatable mattress with my unnamed kitten, contemplating all the reasons I shouldn’t go back to that bar.

I didn’t come back to this town to meet guys. Even guys as good looking as that bartender. I’m here for my daughter and that’s it.

Tomorrow is important. Tomorrow I need to feel Herculean, but the bartender unintentionally made me feel weak by pulling away my glass of wine. I don’t know what he saw on my face that made him want to take the wine away from me. I wasn’t going to drink it. I only ordered it so I could feel a sense of control in not drinking it. I wanted to look at it and smell it and then walk away from it feeling stronger than when I sat down.

Now I just feel unsettled because he saw how I was looking at the wine earlier, and the way he pulled it away makes me think he assumes I have an active issue with alcohol.

I don’t. I haven’t had alcohol in years because one night of alcohol mixed with a tragedy ruined the last five years of my life, and the last five years of my life have led me back to this town, and this town makes me nervous, and the only thing that calms my nerves is doing things that make me feel like I’m still in control of my life and my decisions.

That’s why I wanted to turn down the wine, dammit.

Now I’m not going to sleep well tonight. I have no reason to feel accomplished because he made me feel the complete opposite. If I want to sleep well tonight, I’m going to need to turn down something else I want.

Or someone.

I haven’t wanted anyone in a long, long time. Not since I first met Scotty. But the bartender was kind of hot, and he had a great smile, and he makes great coffee, and he already invited me to come back, so it’ll be simple to show up and turn him down.