Work Text:
You don’t see the kid come in. He’s dressed like all the other guys in this place, a sea of work shirts and ratty flannel. But you notice when he gets carded. Not many guys here young enough to bother.
He slides over the license with the cheery bravado of a kid with a fake ID. No, scratch that. Of a kid who’s been handing bartenders fake IDs since he was about thirteen.
He’s got big eyes. Maybe he just looks young. His face is narrow. Not quite what your mom would call pinched, but definitely skinnier in the cheeks than you’d like to see. His Adam’s apple sticks out, an awkward bend in his otherwise graceful neck. He’s got a dark flannel shirt on - muddy colored, probably been washed too many times. It swamps him a bit, he’s clearly not filling it out all the way. Underneath he’s got long sleeves, even if it’s not so cold.
You lose track of him after that. Carson buys you a round, and you buy him one. Janine stops in with a kiss on the cheek for the boys and a hug for you - Will’s just been pronounced cancer free, and she’s giddy like a schoolgirl. You sip your Jack and Coke and pat her back as she laughs. Back in high school nobody thought Will and Janine would last, but that was thirty years ago and they’ve all got divorced while Janine stood by Will through Hell, high water, and chemo.
You catch the kid out of the corner of your eye as he stumbles. Can’t hold his liquor. Well, that’s a good thing at his age. Hopefully he’s got somebody to pick him up. But he’s not headed for the door. He’s headed for the pool table. You can see a couple guys trailing behind him. Older, wiser, guys that should know better. He keeps looking at them over his shoulder.
Balls click in the background as Carson chatters about work. You hear the kid giggling. He’s sloppy, fumbling with the cue. He’s all eyelashes. Looks up at the guys around him, grins at them like an idiot. You can’t help thinking he’s surrounded. Carson asks you if your manager could call him up so they could hash out the details of some interdepartmental stuff. Off to the side you see a flash of green. Okay. You turn toward the pool table, ready to get up, to stop all this. You know at least one of the guys playing with the kid, Andy, he’s your bank teller, and you don’t wanna see these guys taking advantage of some teenager. Except the kid’s not sloppy, not anymore. His eyes are newly focused, and you watch him sink each ball, one after the other after the other. Jesus. For a minute you’re scared. There could be a fight. But after a bit of grumbling, a hundred bucks change hands, and everybody walks away. No problem. The kid goes back to the bar. You order another drink.
The next time you notice him, he’s playing with the jukebox. Flipping the songbook around. Eventually he seems to settle, and Fortunate Son comes through the speakers. He just stands there for a bit while everybody else drinks. Not dancing, just nodding his head, eyes closed.
Carson’s in your ear about his wife’s garden again. He’s annoyed that she’s pulling up more of the lawn to grow squash. He hates squash. You tell him he’ll like it once he’s had it fresh from his own garden, and he scowls at you and goes back to his drink.
You hear Lori’s voice from across the room. Hands to yourself. When you turn to look it’s the kid again, same shit eating non-apology grin he’d given the pool players. This time it doesn’t work so well. Lori storms off to the bathroom. The kid doesn’t really seem fazed. Lori’s the youngest woman in this place. She’s been tending the bar for eight years.
You watch him settle in next to Andy instead. The guy he just swindled. They talk for a minute, then Andy hands May a few bills. You watch the shot glasses go down in lines, and May pours the vodka across. The kid stares Andy down as he tosses back one after the other after the other. Andy grimaces, only makes it four shots into his line before you see him gag. He flags May down again. She disappears into the back and reappears with a big basket of the shitty french fries that are always on offer. Andy doesn’t even touch ‘em. You watch the kid wolfing down the basket like, well, a teenager. Like he needs it to grow.
You excuse yourself for a piss, mostly just to get out of the noise. The ladies’ room in this place is always wrecked, but it’s quiet. You’re drunk enough that you can lean back against the plaster in the cleanest stall and it doesn’t make your skin crawl off. The graffiti in here hasn’t changed. FUCK YOU is still scratched just at your eye level, and there’s still three Sharpie phone numbers to your left and one to your right. The daffodil next to the latch has been there for four years. You always wonder who drew it, it’s pretty artistic.
The water from the tap is cold on your hands. It sobers you up a little. The way back to the bar takes you past the pool table. The kid’s at it again, alone this time. Looks like he’s practicing his shots. He’s lost the flannel somewhere, you don’t see it around. Now he’s just wearing a dark gray longsleeve tee. You see his eyes narrow as he pulls the cue back. He doesn’t seem to even notice you watching. He mouths along to the lyrics of Smells Like Teen Spirit as the cueball smacks the ten ball and it sinks into the right back pocket. He takes a swig of beer.
When you get back, Carson seems to realize that a bathroom break is a good idea. He leaves the stool next to you empty, and you don’t even pay attention, too busy nursing your drink, until somebody slides in next to you. It’s the kid.
“What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” He’s looking down at you, elbow leaned on the bar. Cool as a cucumber and twice as slick. His eyelids are lowered just the right amount. Bedroom eyes, not drunken ones. Still got the beer bottle in his hand, though you can see it’s empty.
“Kiddo,” you tell him, “I’m old enough to be your mama.” You’re old enough to be his great aunt, probably. Your sister’s got grandkids in high school.
“I like to say wine gets better as it gets older.” He keeps the same easy tone, and his facial expression doesn’t change. He lays a hand on your arm. You wonder if he can only talk in lines. His hand shakes a little, you can feel it against your skin. Up close you can see the ratty hem of his shirt. There’s a thread hanging off it at the bottom. Looks pulled on, like he plays with it.
“I say the same thing,” you tell him, and turn back to your whiskey.
“At least buy me a drink,” he says, and this time when you glance at him he’s pouting. Probably going for boyband sexy, but it just makes him into a little boy. He’s hard to look at, this close. You flag down May and order another Jack and Coke. For yourself, you take the roiling in your stomach as a cue to switch to club soda. Once he’s got his hands on the glass, the kid fucks off, just in time for Carson to reclaim his seat. You swig your bubbly water to keep from talking to him, and put your head on the bar, just for a moment.
A group of guys is having some impromptu karaoke at one of the tables. It starts with A Boy Named Sue, then meanders on to One Piece at a Time. By the time they’ve started up I Still Miss Someone, the kid’s joined them. They’re all standing up now, mostly drowning out the music with their voices.
It’s around the time of night when Carson starts making passes at you, even though he’s married, so before he can get up the momentum, you stand up and move to the other side of the bar. You ask May for another water, and watch the bubbles pop.
You hear the music switch from Johnny to Loretta, and your ears perk up. When you look, the kid is up on the table, in the middle of the crowd of guys, up on his knees. His shirt’s gone now, too, and your estimate of his age immediately plummets from something like nineteen to sixteen and no older. When he takes a breath to sing you can see his ribs. On his belly there’s a wide, pink scar the size of a palm. Maybe a scald from cooking on the stove. Up his arms you can see old scratches, like a cat’s but bigger, and near his left elbow there’s a surgical scar. Looks like he got a pin put in a broken arm. He sways a little while he butchers the vocals, voice cracking. He’d played sloppy before, he was sloppy now. You never take me anywhere because you’re always gone, and many a night I've laid awake and cried here all alone. He sings it like he means it, even if his voice is cracky, and that’s another thing that puts him somewhere around sixteen, if not younger. Guys at the bar are starting to shoot him glares. Maybe for his bad vocals, maybe for reminding them that they have wives at home who won’t like them coming in late and drunk. ‘Cause if you want that kinda love, well, you don't need none of mine.
You watch the kid take the swan dive. He topples off the table. Face first into the shoulders of one of the guys around him. Bob, from the corner store. He flings his arms around Bob’s neck as his feet slide their way to the ground. Bob lets the kid catch himself, but once he's got feet on the ground he doesn't seem to want to let go, clinging like a monkey. On the left side of his back, there's a wide, purple bruise. Bob yells at him to get off, shoves him and he goes sprawling, laid out on the table he just fell off. Lori yells at Bob to leave that kid alone, and he scowls but obeys. The kid doesn't seem to be getting up. You watch him blinking at the ceiling. See him press a coin into another guy’s hand. A minute later, you hear the opening chords of Ramble On.
It takes you a moment to stand up. Your back cracks by surprise, and you raise up your arms to wring yourself out. But someone has to do something about this.
“Hey, kid,” you say. “You want a lift home?”
-
He slouches in the passenger seat of your 1985 Ford Escort. He's kind of tall for it, nearly banged his head when he got in. He's managed to get his shirt and flannel back from wherever they went, and he's got his arms crossed against the night chill.
“I'm at the Super 8, couple miles up the road,” he says without looking at you.
“How did you get here,” you ask, curious. You find yourself wondering if his mom and dad dropped him off.
“I walked.”
You look at the trees at the edge of the road. The bed of permanent leaf litter. You could walk that, if you had to. Only if you had to, though.
Silence stretches.
“We could still fuck if you want.”
The flat sound of his voice make you twitch. The words make you almost slam on the brakes. When you glance at him, he's looking out the window, watching the trees pass by. You can smell the booze on his skin.
“I don't.”
He hmmms.
“Do you, um,” in the silence, under the streetlights, his slick bravado seems to have evaporated, “do you think you could get me McDonald’s?”
There's one up the road, just past the motel.
“Sure, hon,” you say. Might as well. He gets two Big Macs, a fry, and a Sprite. Devours one of the burgers with the same gusto he’d attacked the fries with, earlier. As you take him back to the hotel, you catch him staring at the bag, still. “You know,” you say, “the fries are no good cold.”
“They're not for me,” he says.
There's only a couple cars parked in front of the Super 8. You swing into a spot, and the kid hops out, clutching the paper bag to his chest. He runs to the door of a first floor room, and it opens before he even gets there.
“What have I told you about waiting for the knock?” you hear him say, into the doorway. Another child’s voice answers him, this one clearly prepubescent.
“Whatever.”
“I brought dinner,” is the last thing to hear him say before he steps inside.
Somehow, until he walked away from your car, you hadn't noticed the pistol shoved in the back of his jeans.