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The bass player is almost thirty. It’s been ten years since a boy taught him to skate on an outdoor rink in a small town in the middle of a big forest. Since snowflakes landed on their skin, smoke clung to their clothes, and more stars than he’d ever seen at once filled the sky above them. He hasn’t been that far north since.
He remembers the first time he arrived in Hed. He had commented that it looked like nothing but trees as far as anyone could see, questioned if there really was civilization all the way up here, to which his cousin had responded that he said there were people here, a bar wanting a band, nothing about civilization. And that had been fine with the bass player. To be somewhere with patchy cell service, where if he had a few drinks he wouldn’t be able to type in and call a memorized number, could focus just on music, take a break from himself.
A boy with sad eyes and a wild heart wasn’t part of that plan. A rebound his cousin had jokingly called it before he’d nudged him toward the bar that first night armed with nothing but the coolest sounding drink order he could think up on the spot. But glances and smoke in the woods became moonshine and tangled limbs in a rundown rehearsal space until the bass player had to leave because it was exactly the sort of place you could get stuck especially when you’ve fallen in love with a boy who’s not like anyone else.
The bass player had gone home with a new number saved in his phone that his finger would hover over from time to time when he’d had too much to drink and started thinking about what it feels like when it snows in March. He thinks about that less each year.
But maybe it’s precisely because it’s March again and it’s been ten years and he’s turning thirty next month that earlier this week he’d dashed off a few texts rescheduling music lessons, tossed a couple items in a small bag, grabbed his bass and headed out with only the vaguest outline of an itinerary. He’s spent the last two nights in a familiar bar with the least imaginative name that hasn’t changed at all, searching for something he hasn’t fully admitted to himself yet, something he doesn’t expect to find anyway. So it’s with a bit of resigned desperation that the last night he plans to spend in the area becomes the first night he spends in Beartown. Ten years ago he was told that Beartown was so small it made Hed look big in comparison, but whether that was true then he can’t say now. The building he finally stops at has no real signage outside but he knows it’s a bar. He almost turns around and leaves at what feels like every pair of eyes on him the moment he walks in the door. This isn’t the sort of place that attracts strangers. He sits down at the bar anyway.
He waits, debates leaving again until a voice from across the bar with a familiar lilt and the sound of a lazy smile calls out, “What can I get you?”
The bass player’s heart jumps from his chest to his throat. The man behind the bar is drying a glass and hasn’t looked up yet. His long hair is pulled back making it look less messy than ten years ago. A tattoo of a bear peeks out just below the sleeve of his t-shirt.
“You hear me?” he calls out again. “I can’t read your mind now can I—” The easy smile drops from Benji’s face only to be replaced by a different smile entirely. “Hi.”
“…hi,” the bass player barely manages to choke out in response, trying to remind himself how to breathe, forgetting to even think about trying to hide his own smile.
“Do you, uh, still pretend to drink whiskey?” Benji asks, pressing his hands against the bar to keep them from shaking.
The bass player cringes, runs a hand through his hair, a flush of embarrassment creeping up his neck. “No, no,” he stammers, shaking his head, “beer’s fine.”
Benji snorts. “Good call. We have one whiskey here which makes it both the best and the worst.” He keeps his hands steady and grabs two glasses, fills the first and places it in front of the bass player who notices that he walks with a slight limp. Benji looks to the side and leans across the bar, lowering his voice like he’s sharing a deeply guarded secret, “It’s the worst. Really. Eating shit’s better.” He then goes back for the second glass and fills it for himself.
The bass player traces a line through the condensation on the side of his glass with his thumb. He takes a drink and looks at Benji with as serious of an expression as he can manage and asks, “You’ve got a lot of experience with both?”
Benji laughs, downs half of his drink at once.
A different person might have already asked the bass player what he’s doing there, but Benji doesn’t ask anything else, just watches him like he might disappear if he looks away for too long. The bass player feels like he’s looking right through him, like it makes perfect sense that he’s here when he hasn’t yet been able to explain this trip to himself.
“So is the hockey playing bartender just a bartender these days?” the bass player finally asks.
“Is the bass player just some guy in a bar in the middle of nowhere?” Benji retorts.
The bass player laughs. It’s almost like no time as passed at all.
When the bar closes the bass player stays. They move to a booth with a bottle of cheap champagne that based on the layer of dust and the faded label has likely been under the bar for more than ten years. It’s flat, entirely the wrong color, and smells more acidic than anything when they pour it into beer glasses, but they toast with it anyway, try not to spit it back out. Both of them succeed but barely. The bass player asks if this is better or worse than the whiskey. Benji says he thinks the whiskey might still take that title.
They smoke to chase the awful taste of flat, vinegar-like champagne, passing the weed back and forth, fingertips lingering longer than necessary, eyes gazing at lips as smoke curls and Benji swears for the fifth time that it’s fine they’re doing this inside because Katia will be the first one there to open and she’s still never been able to be truly angry with him.
Then they talk about everything and nothing all at once. The bass player is both surprised and not surprised that Benji did leave, did try to live another life in another place with no intention of coming back here. But as hard as it is to be yourself in a place that’s all expectations and being told who you are, it’s hard to be anyone somewhere else. He’s only sometimes a bartender, if he happens to be in town and his sisters need him at the Bearskin. Which, if he happens to be in town, his sisters always find reasons for him to be there. His limp has nothing to do with a broken foot from a final ten years ago, running towards fire as opposed to refusing to leave the ice, but he still watches hockey. That’s why he’s back now, his favorite player’s season just ended. She’s fourteen and one day she’s going to be the best. Benji doesn’t check his phone for messages but he does pull it out several times to show videos of Alicia playing hockey. The bass player still doesn’t get the sport, has been to exactly two open skates with friends since he was here last, but he understands enough. Benji’s not surprised the bass player is still playing the bass. Gigs in shitty bars, a few small tours, but when you’ve got something that means everything to you, you’ll find a way to keep playing.
At one point Benji gets up to go to the bathroom and when he comes back he sits on the same side of booth as the bass player. He takes the still partially full glass from the bass player’s hand and downs the last of the offending champagne, places the empty glass back on the table. Benji pretends not to notice the look the bass player gives him at that, acts like he believes it’s accidental when the bass player’s hand brushes his arm for the third time. The bass player tries to pretend the same with significantly less deniability when Benji reaches out to cup the back of his neck. They kiss each other as the first light of dawn creeps through the windows.
It starts snowing.