by Annie Harper
“But…” Jack waved at the room, at the dance floor, the string lights, and the mistletoe.
Javi kissed him again, a quick brush of the lips that gently ended any hope of the night ending anywhere other than the Casa Blanca. “This was a good night, but we both know that it’s a bad idea.”
“Can I at least get your number?”
“You know where to find me.” He grinned. “I’m the guy serving cocktails from here to eternity.”
“Wrong movie,” Jack muttered. “If you’re going to end the night on a pun, at least make it from the right film.”
Javi took his hand, entwining their fingers. “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
He kissed Jack again and then stepped to the front of the bar. He turned off the neon light that welcomed the outside world and held the door open.
“I haven’t paid,” Jack said. “What do I owe you?”
Javi smiled.
“Nothing at all. Merry Christmas, Jack.”
After a year of sleepless nights, Jack’s nightstand played host to a menagerie intended to see him through the night. His phone doubled as a sleep machine, though the sound of traffic on the downtown slot of the 110 freeway was more soothing to him than an app of croaking frogs. The books were well worn and constantly cycled in and out of the nightstand pile. The laptop computer never really shut down and had become his reliable if somewhat unsatisfying surrogate bed partner. If the nightstand collection couldn’t cajole him to sleep, it could at least amuse him during his restless hours.
He shuffled into his bedroom shortly after midnight, pulled back the bed covers, and picked up a book. His mind had been racing when he left the Casa Blanca, but by the time he climbed into bed, the rush had subsided. He set the book aside, turned out the light, and slept.
He awoke far later than his usual routine allowed, thanks no doubt to a Christmas dinner of tequila, Cabernet, and Chex Mix. He flipped on the television just as the local news ended.
Boxing Day? Who does a story about Boxing Day in Los Angeles?
He opened his laptop to cycle through the Christmas news coverage and measure the success of his work. It was routine by this time in his career. He could wait for Monday’s evaluation, complete with impressions and analytics, but he liked the immediacy of looking up coverage and rating it positive, negative or neutral. It was old school, the Jack Volarde method, but it worked.
The mayor’s stint atop the news cycle began and ended at five on Christmas evening. A series of power outages across the city caused by the heat and an unexpected drain on the electrical grid settled that. Fair enough, lead with the breaking news. After that, it was a toss-up. The network affiliates covered the event on their Christmas night broadcasts. It had slipped by morning, when crews were sent to shopping malls to cover the early rush for discount gift wrap and electronics. He’d still score it in the win column.
He could dig deeper if he logged in to his metrics, but he folded his laptop closed. He’d do it later. Better yet, he could let his assistant do it. She had wanted to create the media impact reports for ages. Maybe it was time to let her.
Habit told him it was time for a run, then a shower, and then a suit. But this was a day off, and the office would be locked tight. He had a speech to write: a career-changing announcement that could keep him tapping at his keyboard most of the day, even if he wasn’t supposed to be working.
But something told him to set it aside, to take a break, to rest through the not-quite-a-hangover grogginess of a morning after. He got up and opened his bedroom blinds. The sun was already beating against the towers of the downtown financial district and, off to the west, the coast.
It would be another unseasonably warm December day, and the malls and movie theatres would be filled with holiday crowds. Maybe he would join them. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d watched a movie that wasn’t on either Netflix or a seatback monitor.
Go, get out of the city center. Get in your run; put in your miles. No one’s going to be in a bar at nine a.m.
Jack’s workouts were usually cursory. Do what you have to do; just get it done and get to work. He would run through the city, or on a treadmill at the gym down the street, solely for the sake of efficiency.
Not today, not on a day off.
He grabbed his gym duffel, running shoes, and car keys. He could jog along the waterfront in Santa Monica before the beach crowds set up camp and could shower at one of the stalls on the sand when he finished. He could change into jeans and a shirt at one of the beachfront hotels, maybe grab lunch.
He followed wherever the day led, from beach to al fresco lunch to movie, without a laptop in sight; a day without a plan, or a map, or a strategy, at least not a conscious one. As the sun set, he found himself back where he was before, standing on a hot sidewalk, waiting for the cool air of the Casa Blanca to welcome him back once more.
The Christmas lights and mistletoe were still up, but the bar’s owner was struggling to hang a Happy New Year banner. George was quick to tell people stories of his days as a college fullback, but age and knee injuries left him teetering awkwardly on the stepladder as he tried to string up the letters.
“What’s a guy got to do to get a beer around here?”
George turned toward Jack so quickly that he nearly fell.
“Jack Volarde, as I live and breathe.”
He scrambled across the bar and wrapped Jack in a bear hug. “I wasn’t sure I’d see you again.”
“It’s been too long,” Jack said.
George motioned him to a bar stool and pulled out a pint glass. Jack eyed the assortment of novelty beer taps that advertised a range from local craft brewers to international brands.
“I’ll have a Bohemia,” he said.
Daylight breathed life into the Casa Blanca. A few customers sat at the bar watching football, and a few more claimed tables, waiting to order bar grub for a happy hour dinner. Los Angeles may have rolled up its sidewalks for the holidays, but the downtown dwellers knew where they could always get a good taco.
George shared restaurant duties with longtime bartender Brenda, a surly veteran mixologist to whom he had once been married. They had separated years before and might have divorced—the story was a bit fuzzy around the edges and changed depending on who told it—but they continued to work the Casa Blanca together.
“Just the two of you today?” Jack asked.
“It’s a slow one today,” George said. “I really should send her home. Better yet, I should send myself home and let her handle it.”
“I heard that!” Brenda shouted, a disembodied voice from the kitchen.
The air was thicker, warmer than Jack remembered from the night before, when the air was chilled by persistent air conditioning. George must have been stingier with the electric bill than his employees.
“Mayor keeping you busy?”
Jack rolled his eyes. “You could say that.”
“Yeah, I figured,” George said. He angled the glass to the tap, methodically aerating Jack’s beer as he poured, then leveling it off near the top, creating a picture perfect head. Jack smiled. He’d been on the receiving end of the “pour is an art form” lecture many, many times.
George slid a coaster toward Jack and set the beer on it. He sank down, locked his elbows against the wood, and offered Jack his full attention.
“So how are you really doing?”
Jack raised the glass to his lips and stopped.
“Better,” he said. “It’s getting better.”
“Good. We worried about you when you stopped coming round.”
“I guess I just needed some time,” Jack said.
George reached across the bar and patted him on the arm.
“Understood, my friend. No hard feelings. I’m just happy to see you again. What finally brought you back?”
Was there a good answer to that question? Was it auto-pilot, or did the Casa Blanca trigger some sort of magnetic pull?
“I stopped by after the mayor’s thing yesterday for a drink, but you’d taken the day off. It got me thinking that I should stop by and catch up, I guess.”
“Yeah, good thing we were closed. That blackout would have forced me to shut down, anyway,” George said.
Jack stopped, mid-sip. He set down the beer.
“I just meant you weren’t here. The bar was open.”
George slapped the bar and laughed, turning away.
“You wish!”
“You were open. You didn’t really have any customers, other than me, of course. The new guy was working—Javi?”
George turned back toward Jack and tilted his head.
“Who?”
“Javier? The new guy. Dark hair, kind of young?”
George smiled as if he had heard a joke.
“I don’t know any Javier, but if he makes a decent mojito, let me know. I’ve been looking for an excuse to sack Brenda for years.”
“I heard that!” Brenda was uniquely skilled at hearing her name from any location at the Casa Blanca, only to tune out everything else.
“You’re pulling my leg, right?” George asked.
“Dead serious,” Jack said. “I stopped by yesterday afternoon. Didn’t leave ‘til late. It was just me and the bartender.”
Wiping her hands on a towel, Brenda emerged from the kitchen. She nodded at Jack. “You’re back.” She had little patience for niceties or small talk. “George, I think there’s something in the lost and found that belongs to Jack. I found an envelope with his name on it when I was opening up this afternoon.” She pointed at the drawer, making it clear that George should investigate, and then turned back toward the kitchen. She didn’t wait for a response.
“Good seeing you, Jack,” she said with a half-wave, and left.
George rummaged through the drawer and pulled out a small manila envelope. He rolled it between his fingers and then looked at Jack. He lowered his voice.
“We were closed yesterday, and I haven’t hired a new bartender in over a year. You okay, Jack? Have you been drinking already?”
“I haven’t been drinking. I was here yesterday. No one else came in. We watched the game and talked until closing time.”
George wiped his hands on a towel and stared at the floor. He spoke in a deliberate monotone.
“Jack, if you need someone to talk to… I know it’s been a rough year.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
“We were closed on Christmas. Locked up tight. I gave everyone the day off.”
When George lowered his voice, Jack countered with an increasingly determined tempo.
“I sat right there, had a couple of drinks after work. Check your security camera. I swear.”
George shook his head.
“There was a blackout last night. The power went down and took the camera with it.” George wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “The A/C was already shaky. Now it may be down for the count.”
He looked at the envelope again and put it down on the bar in front of Jack. It was a small jeweler’s envelope, thick with its contents, and sealed shut. In red letters, someone had scrawled, “Property of Jack Volarde.”
“Recognize this?” George asked.
Jack shook his head.
“Not my handwriting, and Brenda wouldn’t have bothered. Must have been in there a long time, eh?”
Jack stayed mute, his eyes fixed on the envelope. It was small, maybe two-by-three inches, like the one in which a jeweler had placed a ring after Jack had it resized a little over a year ago.
George pushed the envelope toward him.
“Have you thought about taking a vacation? I know they run you ragged in that job of yours.”
“I think I’ll just be going,” Jack said. He stood up, over-paid his tab with a twenty-dollar bill, and placed the envelope in the front pocket of his jeans. George tried to push the cash back to him, but Jack waved him off. “Keep it.”
“Jack? Don’t be a stranger, okay? We’ve missed you around here.”
“I promise,” Jack said.
He left, confused; his head throbbed. He stepped into the twilight heat and walked up the street to a curbside planter, which was just tall enough to rest against. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the manila wrapper.
He tore it open and poured the contents into his palm. The leather strand spilled out first, followed by the pendant that was strung on it—an old roller skate key turned brown with age.
Jack gripped the token and shut his eyes.
Breathe, Jack.
He opened his eyes as he inhaled, and looked up to the early evening sky. The setting sun cast tangerine shadows across the cityscape. Rising above its neighbors, the Library Tower’s panels had been switched from the red and green of Christmas to soft white for the New Year.
It’s okay. Breathe.
He slipped the key around his neck, covered it with his palm, and pressed it hard against his chest. He looked again at the tower’s peak, and cool breeze slipped past him: a gust of relief as tears flowed unfettered down his cheeks.
Overhead, the lights of the Library Tower flickered to life, a beacon to the heavens.
* * *
About the Author: Erin Finnegan is a former journalist and a winemaker who lives in the foothills outside Los Angeles. Her novel Luchador was named one of Publishers Weekly’s Best Books of 2016, and along with her 2014 debut novel, Sotto Voce, received both a Foreword Reviews INDIES Book of the Year award and a PW starred review.
Halfway Home
by Lilah Suzanne
Chapter One
Avery Puckett has no personal items on her desk to pack away. The woman from Human Resources offered her a box, along with a small severance package, while she stood, her face struggling to convey sympathy, at an uncomfortable distance from Avery’s tiny cubicle. She’d fired a dozen people that day alone, the HR lady whose name Avery never learned, with Avery gone today in round three of a never-ending cycle of layoffs at the company. Avery doesn’t blame the HR lady for her lack of sympathy. Such are the cold, churning cogs of corporate America. So no, she doesn’t need a box. She leaves the high rise building in glossy Uptown the way she came: empty-handed, unaffected, and wearing the same tan blazer with a mustard stain on the sleeve.
The traffic on her way home is bad, because it always is, and the radio plays one song for every seven commercials, but it doesn’t matter. It’s all noise. Avery inches along the commute that’s become second nature over the past year and two months. It’s mostly city streets, which is better than her last commute, which was highway. Avery slows to a stop across from the red glow of a traffic light. Maybe the highway commute was better. It doesn’t matter; a commute is a commute is a commute. The light turns green. Headlights flash in her rearview mirror, charging too fast and too close.
A tow truck takes her home.
“Sorry I’m late,” Avery calls, entering her apartment and being surprised, once again, to come home to lights on and the TV murmuring. Mary Anne moved in three months ago. Avery still isn’t sure if she likes it. She doesn’t dislike it, which is close enough. “I got into a car accident.” Avery sets a plastic bag on the kitchen counter as Mary Anne emerges from the bedroom.
“Oh, my god, are you okay?” Mary Anne likes vintage eye glasses, high-waisted A-line skirts, and NPR. She knows a great deal of 80s pop culture trivia, which is how her team won trivia night at the bar where she and Avery met—where Mary Anne walked up to Avery and announced they were a good match and should go out. Avery couldn’t find any reason to object.
“Hmm? Oh yeah, I’m fine.” Avery removes a carton of ice cream from the bag; it’s gone a little
soft in the time it took to get home. She should have eaten it right away. No matter, melted ice cream is still ice cream. “Is vanilla okay? The store didn’t have a lot to choose from.”
Mary Anne sighs. “I don’t like vanilla. We have this conversation literally every time you buy ice cream.” Behind her vintage, pink, cat-eye glasses, Mary Anne squints.
“Oh,” Avery says. She opens the spoon drawer, grabs one spoon, then hesitates. “So, you don’t want any?”
Mary Anne’s mouth sets into a tense line, shifting into a mood that Avery can’t read. Anger? Annoyance? Regret? Is one year and three months with one person long enough to know exactly what the tense set of their mouth means? Avery slowly closes the spoon drawer.
“What is with you?” Mary Anne says. “You’re mopier than usual.”
“Um,” Avery says. Usual? “Well. I got fired.”
“Oh. Shit.” Mary Anne frowns and follows Avery into the living room. They bought all the living room furniture at Ikea together; they piled heavy boxes onto a pallet and then had a snack in the Ikea cafe. Mary Anne had a cinnamon roll and coffee, and Avery had a vanilla ice cream cone. Did Mary Anne tell her then that she hated vanilla ice cream? Avery can’t recall.
“You liked that job,” Mary Anne says, perching on the far end of the Ikea couch.
“It was okay. Did you DVR I Love Lucy? It was the one where Lucy gets her foot stuck in a bucket of cement. With John Wayne?”
Mary Anne swivels to face her. “Avery, aren’t you upset about losing your job?”
“Um,” Avery says, eating a spoonful of ice cream to give herself time, because she’s pretty sure the answer should be yes. “Someone usually brought doughnuts on Monday mornings. I’ll miss that.” Avery stabs her spoon into the lumpy mostly melted ice cream and risks asking again. “So… did you DVR—”
“Forget about stupid TV shows, Avery! God. Feel something!” Mary Anne shoots up from the couch with her hands clenched at her sides. Her skirt has little cartoon foxes printed on it; it swishes and twists around her legs from the sudden movement.
