Second Round: A Return to the Ur-Bar

by Garth Nix

  “Will you accept the offering of the gods? If you accept, we will meet here every year to celebrate our work, to drink this ale and eat this stew and offer our thanks. You do have a choice. You can turn away, spend your remaining mortal days as you wish, and die like almost every man before you has done. Or you can join us in our service to the gods and help make this world just a little bit better.”

  Joe sat silently in front of the fire, considering the unbelievable. He thought of the doctors, encouraging him to continue the chemotherapy despite the horrendous side effects, trying to convince him that there was still hope for a cure when he decided to stop the treatment. He told them if chemo was only going to extend his life by a few months, but he would be sick and miserable during that time, he’d rather enjoy his last few months and see his Eleanor sooner rather than later. He thought of her last days, slipping in and out of consciousness, a ghost of her former self. He thought of his last real conversations with her those last days she was truly still aware, before disappearing into the fog of medication and death.

  I want you to go on, she had told him. I want you to be the best man you can be, the man I know you are. When the time is right and you have done everything you can to make the world a better place, we’ll be together again.

  Tears stung Joe’s eyes as he thought back to the best and worst days of his life with Eleanor, of her last words that now seemed like she had foreseen the opportunity before him. Nick handed him a soft red handkerchief without a word and set the full stein on the table near Joe’s elbow. Wiping the tears from his eyes, and with Eleanor’s words still echoing in his ears, he picked up the stein and stood, turning to face Gil, Nick, and the tablet, now glowing even brighter above the fireplace.

  “For my Eleanor,” he said, raising the stein and drinking deeply on the first Christmas Eve he would share with his new friends for many, many years to come.

  West Side Ghost Story

  Kristine Smith

  “Bourbon. Neat.” I waited for the bartender to ask which brand I wanted—every bar these days has a shelf-full and everyone makes a big deal like oh, I only drink this distilled by Kentucky elves under the light of a blue moon but I can’t tell the difference. I only drink it because it’s popular and taking it neat gets me noticed. I mean, isn’t that why you drink it?

  Be honest. Honesty’s important.

  Anyway, this guy didn’t ask. He just reached under the bar, pulled out a green bottle—tall and skinny, like for a liqueur, not a bourbon bottle at all—and poured something brown into a shot glass and slid it toward me.

  I stared at it. Sure, it looked the right color, but it was cloudy, swirly, and a bit glittery. Like shampoo. Like no whiskey I’d ever seen. “I asked for bourbon.” I looked the bartender in the eye, something I usually avoid because when you see them clearly that means they see you, too. “What’s this stuff?”

  Instead of answering, he disappeared into a backroom, emerging a few moments later with a bowl of lemons. He pulled a knife from a loop on his belt, then took a lemon from the bowl and started cutting it up.

  I inhaled—my mouth watered. Rich aromas had followed him from the backroom, roasting garlic and frying onions. Freshly brewed coffee. I debated ordering something, but I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction. “Excuse me? I asked you a question.” When he didn’t turn around, I wadded up a paper napkin to throw at his head, then stopped in mid-crumple. Somehow, he didn’t seem the type to take assault by paper product well. He wore jeans and a light blue button-down, this summer’s uniform for trendy bartenders, but no way did he fit the mold. Too tall, for one thing, six six at least, dark and bearded and block-out-the-sun broad.

  On top of being scary-big, he had an edge to him, but edge was the wrong word and yet I couldn’t think of a better one. It’s just the way he handled that knife, flick flick, turning that lemon into wedges and paper-thin slices before I could blink twice. He looked like he belonged over in Jersey, in some dive where he’d break up half a dozen fights a night and keep a sawed-off stashed under the bar just in case.

  He wouldn’t hurt a woman. I repeated that over and over as I sat up straighter, shoulders back to highlight my first line of attack. Pushed a hand through my hair—

  —and stilled.

  What the hell. My heart stuttered—I could feel the thrum against my breastbone. Stick-straight and shoulder-length and as silky as expensive conditioner could make it—that’s what I should’ve felt.

  Instead, I felt curls, springy and coarse. Terrier hair.

  I tugged at one spiral, pulled it straight until I could see the ends. Dark brown. No, they should’ve been ash blond, the lightest I could go and not risk my hair shattering like spun glass.

  I grabbed another curl, yanked it too hard, felt the weird popping sensation as strands came out by the roots. Counted to three, then looked at them.

  Damn. Dark brown wire, my Hair From Hell. It had covered my head like a pile of rotini until I moved to New York and Ginny taught me how to bleach and dye and use a flat iron. Better to not look like your driver’s license photo in our line of work, she said that first time, eyes watering from the ammonia stink of the dye.

  Call Ginny. Ginny Klimt. My best friend. My only friend, really. Trust is hard when you make your living by messing with people’s heads, but I know I can always trust Ginny. I reached out to the stool next to mine because that’s where I always set my bag—

  —and grabbed air.

  I looked over. No tan leather tote, which meant no phone, no ID. No emergency change of clothes, or makeup, or the scarf I used to hide my hair when I needed to disappear into a crowd.

  I took a deep breath and looked down. It was a work day, so I should’ve been wearing a dress. The peach one that belonged to Ginny, that went so well with the hair.

  Instead, I wore my favorite jeans, faded near to white and blown out at the knees, battered red high-tops, and the oldest of my Lou Reed T-shirts, black worn to gray from laundering, a souvenir of a concert years past.

  I slid off the barstool and wended my way through the maze of tables and booths to the far side of the room. Early afternoon sun streamed in through wide windows, flashing off the cars that shot along the West Side Highway, reflecting off the river beyond. At least I was still in New York.

  But why am I on the West Side? I always stuck to Midtown during work hours—the never-ending bustle meant less chance of me running into former marks. I looked back at the scatter of customers, fingers crossed there was no one I recognized: an elderly woman in an old-fashioned dress, a pair of younger women whispering over their drinks, a middle-aged man, jacket tossed to the side and tie loosened, staring into his coffee. As I watched, he drifted in and out of focus, then vanished with a sound like a sigh.

  I walked back to the bar, picked up the glass, and drank the shimmering brew in one gulp. It felt warm going down, like any hard liquor. But it tasted odd, herbal and sharp, the way pine trees smelled. I stifled a cough, waited for the ache in my throat to ease. “I have a question.”

  The bartender had moved on from lemon slaughter to polishing wine glasses. He turned, which allowed me to see his shirtfront, spotless except for three letters, handwritten in ink above one breast pocket, worn to gray by washings and time. Gil.

  “Hi, Gil—my name’s Sherry.” I smiled as I said his name—men like it when you do that. “I don’t have my phone. Could you please tell me what time I got here?”

  “A few hours ago.” Gil didn’t smile back.

  “But I just—” I wanted to say that I had just arrived, even though the sense dawned that it wasn’t true. Damn. “How much have I had to drink?”

  “Just that.” He jerked his chin toward my glass.

  “Did I come in here alone?”

  “Yup.” He stopped in mid-wipe, eyes narrowing. “Something wrong?”

  “Yeah.” I got back up on the barstool. “I’m supposed to be at Grand Central.”

  “Train to catch?”


  “No, no—” Heat flooded my face; I blamed the liquor. “I usually drink there.”

  “After work?”

  I started to answer. Stopped. Tried to think of weasel words, the lies that always flowed so easily. Then I looked Gil in the face again, his eyes like dark, cold stone. With some men, you know a lie would be a waste of time. “It is my work.” I slid my empty glass back and forth.

  One eyebrow twitched. “You drink for a living?”

  “I get people to buy me drinks.” Certain kinds of people. Men, mostly, the good suit and leather briefcase types, who could be counted on to cough up a few bucks to help pay the back rent or ransom the towed car or lost dog or otherwise act the hero in my manufactured crisis of the day. “I’m not usually dressed like this.” I looked down at my clothes and tried to remember what happened to the dress. It was Ginny’s favorite, a prized conquest from a designer sample sale. She’d kill me if anything happened to it. “I must be dreaming.” I pressed a hand to my chest. The ache in my throat had moved down. Just a little twinge, at first, like I’d strained a rib cage muscle.

  Then it ramped up fast, as though I had the wind knocked out of me. I grabbed the edge of the bar and held on. “Wow.” I had to breathe through my mouth—short, shallow gasps. “Never had a dream that hurt before.”

  Light flickered in Gil’s eyes. The barest softening. “You’re not dreaming.”

  I looked past him and caught sight of myself in the mirror that backed the bar. That damned curlicue hair. Apple cheeks and bare skin and the baby face that always got me carded.

  Then a dark spot appeared between my tits and I felt that weird sensation of warmth leaving my body. I looked down and watched as black spread through the gray cotton like ink in water, turning Lou’s face into a dark blob.

  I touched the stain—it felt warm, but dry. “Can you see this?”

  “Yup.”

  I pulled out the neck of my T-shirt and looked down, spotted the neat little hole just to the left of my sternum. “I’ve been shot.”

  “Yup.”

  “Is that the only word you know?” As snappy replies went, that was pretty weak, but irritation had given way to more immediate concerns. “So I’m not dreaming. That means I’m awake.”

  Gil started to speak, then shook his head.

  The pain and pressure had vanished. When I touched the hole, it didn’t even hurt.

  Sometimes I’m slow—I admit it. But I do catch up eventually. “Am I dead?”

  Gil flipped his towel over his shoulder and leaned on the bar. “Yes.”

  * * *

  I have to walk when I’m nervous. It would be fair to say that this was one of those times.

  If Gil knew how exactly I came to get shot, he chose not to share that information. I left him filling the ice chest, headed out the door, found myself in a tiny hotel lobby. An old lobby. Cracked tile floors. Pale turquoise walls. A battered wooden check-in counter, currently staffed by a man in an old-fashioned bellhop uniform complete with one of those little round hats. I usually had no use for shabby chic, but these signs of age calmed me. I recognized this place.

  The Emmaline. A former sailors’ hostel, with teeny tiny guest cabins and a rooftop bar and a ballroom where Lou Reed had once given an impromptu concert in the late 70s. When I arrived in New York, I compiled a list of locations where he’d performed over the years and had been visiting them one by one. But I hadn’t yet made it to the Emmaline.

  I boarded the elevator. I had to concentrate to push the button beside the tarnished brass plate that bore the word BALLROOM in Art Deco lettering, but finally managed to depress it just enough. I inhaled odors of pizza and stale perfume and wondered who had left them behind. Were they dead or alive? Could I see them? More importantly, could they see me?

  More smells flowed into the elevator when the door opened—pot and cigar smoke, grilled meat and the sharp stink of spilled beer—but the crowd I thought I’d see as I entered the ballroom proved nonexistent. I heard them, however, booming male voices and high-pitched female laughter, layer upon layer of sound, chronologic strata of parties past.

  And threading through them all, Lou’s baritone, half-speaking half-singing about a little girl listening to the radio.

  “Rock ‘n’ roll.” I sat on one of the round banquettes arranged at one end of the ballroom like velvet-upholstered spinning tops. Potted palms lined one wood-paneled wall, an immense bar spanned the far end, and a disco ball, of all things, shimmered above the polished wood dance floor. I counted the silver tiles as the ball rotated, tried to swamp the tangle in my mind with numbers even as I fingered the hole in my chest. It didn’t happen here. I’d have felt it, I’m sure. I’d have known.

  But why? I thought back to all the marks I’d scammed over the weeks. All I took was money. Money they could afford. And I gave them something, too. I flattered them, made them feel important. As for what happened before I came to New York, okay, I wasn’t the world’s best person. I took care of myself and maybe some people took exception. That was why I had to relocate.

  “You’re new.”

  I flinched, turned, and looked over the top of the banquette to find a man leaning against it. My age, mid-twenties, maybe younger, short and skinny with a ton of black hair and a lopsided smile. He wore white trousers, a blue and white striped T-shirt. Bright, clean clothes, but old. I could tell from the style. “You can see me?”

  “Yes. Of course.” He held out his hand. “Anastasios. But everyone calls me Tasso.”

  “Sherry.” I felt warm skin and bone and muscle and wondered if this was how ghosts ran into one another. Just strangers passing through, saying Hi. “Who’s everyone?”

  “Maybe you saw the twins in the bar, yes, and Dora? She’s the old lady. And there’s Sam from Hoboken and the Subway Girl—you’ll meet them, too.” Tasso cocked his head and studied me. “You’re like them. Like me. Sent here before your time. But don’t worry. The memories of what happened? They come back. I say this because you look scared. But you’ll be all right. Gil gave you the little drink, yes?” He held up his thumb and forefinger, then spread them an inch or so apart. “The green bottle?”

  “Yes.” I licked my lips, tasted the bare hint of pine. “What was it?”

  Tasso tapped the side of his head. “It helps the memory. It helps the fear.” He leaned forward on his elbows, hands draped over the top of the banquette. “Gil knows what to do. He’s been around a long time.”

  I watched Tasso’s fingers twitch. One second, the skin looked bruised, a forefinger crooked as though broken. The next, his hands looked flawless. “When did you get here?”

  “Fifth day of June. Nineteen hundred and five.” Tasso pointed in the direction of the river. “I drowned.” His voice lowered as his eyes narrowed. “Someone pushed me in. Someone I thought a friend.”

  “Why did they do it?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “I don’t know, maybe. It could’ve been because of something you did.” I stood and backed away from the banquette as Tasso’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry. That was bad. I didn’t mean it.” I swallowed hard as, just on the edge of hearing, I heard Lou again, singing about a perfect day. Really, Lou? Really? “What is this place? Hell? Please don’t tell me it’s heaven.”

  Tasso shrugged, palms facing up and fingers spread wide. “This is life. Your new life.”

  “What’s new about it? I’m in a hotel in the West Village.”

  “You are in a hotel in a West Village. Not like the one you knew but it shares space with it.” He covered his face with his hands, then looked at her through his fingers. “Gil explained it to me once. In Greek, even, and I couldn’t understand.” He lowered his hands, paced a tight circle, then stopped. “It is an afterlife, a world that is just different enough. It could be better than the old one. It could be worse. You do what you can and sometimes, like with your old life, you get a little help.”

  “You mean Gil? He hardly spoke to me, he just—”


  “Let you figure it out.” Tasso’s gaze softened. “It’s better if you figure out what happened for yourself. Because that means that, deep inside, you knew it all along.” He started to say more, then glanced at one of the ornate wall clocks and gasped. “I’ll be late—have to go.”

  “Go where?” Early, late, on-time—didn’t all that stop after you died?

  “Work.”

  “You’re kidding?” I started after him. “Where?”

  “Maybe you’ll see.” Tasso trotted towards the vast double doors of the ballroom entry. “Ya,” he called over his shoulder. “That’s Greek for goodbye. Maybe I teach you more Greek later.” Then, with a wave of his hand, he stepped through the portal and vanished.

  * * *

  I wandered the ballroom for a while, poked through the palms and behind the bar. Danced solo in the middle of the floor. Hotel staff came in a few times to clean or grab a smoke or just sit and stare at the disco ball. None of them saw me. At first I was tempted to give them a scare, tip over a tree or flap the curtains, but I decided against it. From the looks of things, they used the ballroom as a hideout from supervisors and I didn’t want to frighten them away.

  I rode the elevator down to the lobby, then froze as the doors opened and a trio of teenaged girls piled in. As they pushed through me, I sensed a weird vibration along my spine, the warmth of blood and the flutter of heartbeats. Read the thoughts racing through their minds. Can we—will she—does he—

  Head buzzing, I stepped out into the New York summer. Felt the sun on my face and smelled vehicle exhaust and fried food aromas from a nearby restaurant and wondered how in hell this all worked. Was I a ghost or what? Was this some alternate universe? Tasso’s words drifted through my head. Not like the one you knew but it shares space with it.

  I headed down Washington Street, my steps silent. The pavement felt weird beneath my feet, firm yet soft, like a lawn that needed rain. The scenery shifted in and out of focus, layers upon layers, horse-drawn wagons, cars from Model T’s to Teslas. Men in hats and round-collared suits, in shorts and flip-flops. Women in long skirts with bustles, cut-offs and camisoles.