Painting Flowers

It took several minutes of laughter to realize Jack wasn’t kidding about being good for me. “Holy shit, you’re being serious,” I spoke nearly out of breath from exhausting my laugh. Sparks spewed from the cigarette as I put it out against the artwork on the brick walls.

“Of course. I’m a good boyfriend.” Jack puffed his chest outwards. The gesture made him look like a bird.

I tried not to laugh and only replied, “Well, I was under the impression that you were single. Or was inviting me over to your house to spend the night something a good boyfriend does?”

“That’s a bit of a sore subject right now.” He skillfully avoided answering any of my questions and ran a nervous hand through his hair. Jack was hiding something, that much was obvious. The thing that bothered me was that I couldn’t figure out just what he was keeping from me.

“Did your wife take your pick-up truck and leave you for another man?” I probed, while smirking. For some reason, I liked the way his lips turned up at the corners when I was telling a joke. “Hey, if you throw a line in there about your dog you’d have the beginnings of a great country song.”

With a smile, Jack only looked at me, “You’re ridiculous.”

I shrugged, “Nothing I haven’t heard before.”

“Are you this friendly all the time?” He asked, sarcastically while kicking an empty Sierra Mist can on the ground. “Jesus, you better sign me up for conversation for the next twenty years.”

Folding my arms over my chest, I replied quietly, “That’s a long contract to sign. We’ll both be middle-aged and playing golf on Sundays by that time.”

“That sounds like loads of fun. Better than anything I’m doing now.”

“Maybe it is,” I spoke. “For all I know you have a dead end job somewhere in the city making minimum wage. Just scraping by to pay your bills.”

Jack snorted, “Because that’s not what you’re doing?”

He motioned a hand at the crummy brick building next to us. I had to admit that the spray paint was subpar and the broken bag of trash decorating the sidewalk didn’t have much Fung shui. Suddenly, I turned my eyes on Jack, “What do you do then?”

“Pretty sure I already told you I was a guitarist.”

Instead of apologizing, I only laughed, “Was that before or after we got drunk off of red wine?”

Jack looked amused as he made his reply, “Before, I think.”

Shaking my head side to side, I made a move towards the confines of The Thunderbird. Before I made it too far, Jack managed to stop my progress with only a surprised laugh. “You’re just disappearing again?”

Keeping my eyes forward towards the bustling joint, I played off my earlier words, “Nothing I haven’t done before.”

He snorted with quiet laughter and closed some of the distance between us with one step, “I know. You left me the other day. My pride is still hurting from that.”

“Sorry to hear that.” I said, even though I wasn’t sorry at all. Jack was stopping me from going back inside, keeping me from flirting with Cain before things got busier at the bar. “Now I have to go so just go about your business. Have a drink or two.”

“Come meet my friends.” Jack urged, completely ignoring the fact that I was trying to leave him.

“Uh… that doesn’t sound like fun.” I admitted, unabashed at my honesty. There were few things I cared enough to lie about. “Anyway, I’m on the clock. Cain is a pretty liberal boss, but I don’t think he’d turn a blind eye to my knocking back a few shots with your friends.”

Jack chuckled musically, “It’s only a job.”

Snorting softly, I leaned my body up against the doorjamb. “Yeah, only one that’s going to help me pay the rent and put gas in my car. No big deal.”

“You know, your sarcasm is really annoying.” He smirked, linking eyes with mine.

I let a slow breath out, “Alright, I’m going back to work now. Goodbye.”

Before Jack could stop me, I slunk by him through the narrow doorway. The sound of rumbling laughter and humidity from body heat greeted me upon my entrance. A part of me would always love the gritty feel of bars with the guarantee of a good time with even better friends. The whiff of alcohol was heady near the bar and I felt my blood alcohol level rise purely from the scent.

While pouring out a colorful cocktail, Cain flashed me a sultry smile from the other end of the bar as I retook my position. I grinned widely in response before turning to tend the next customer’s order. As it turned out, the balding man was only looking for a public restroom so that saved me the trouble of mixing another drink if only for a moment.

A lapse in customers gave Cain the opportunity to stand too close beside me. With a nod of the head, he motioned to the back doorway where I had come from only minutes before. “That your boyfriend out back?”

“Not quite,” I laughed.

“One night stand?”

I teased lightly, “Getting warmer.”

“Hopefully not too close,” Cain chuckled and leaned against the counter to face the reflections in the bottles of alcohol on the shelf while I watched the crowd of people in the opposite direction. “I saw him follow you out there. Looked a little confused to me.”

One side of my lips turned upwards, “Sounds about right.”

“He looks like one of those kids who hang out at the mall and try to look depressed so girls will feel bad for them. I’d watch out for that guy,” Cain winked.

I rolled my eyes and wiped away sweat from a beer bottle, “I’m too strong to fall for that shit. And anyway, I’m not so sure he’s faking his depression. It seems to radiate off of him.”

“Any guesses on what it is?” My boss asked conspiratorially.

A took a moment to guess, “Maybe he used to be a serial killer.”

“Woah, Audrey. Don’t know if I’d take it that far,” Cain chuckled darkly, probably any number of grisly imagining scenes from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. He turned to face his customers and smirked, “There goes your boy now. Looks like he’s got some friends too.”

“Oh shit.”

“Better be paying customers, that’s all I know.”

I scoffed, “Oh, be quiet. You get enough business as it is.”

“Hey, just be happy you have a job. Don’t forget who hired you.” Cain reminded, lightly.

“Damn, I hate when you make sense.”

“I know,” he told me, and laughed again. “They’re coming your way, sunshine. I’ll leave this up to you.” With that, Cain strolled carelessly away into the backroom to make his daily supply counts.

Leaning crookedly against the bar, I allowed a measured breath of annoyance to escape from me and prepared myself for whatever was to come. Jack was steadily approaching with two of his friends. Unfortunately, I had already inadvertently met the pair of them – it was the couple that had almost caught me hiding in Jack’s kitchen.

To my surprise when the three of them made it to the counter, Jack ignored me. It was virtually a total one-eighty from just earlier that night. His mood had visibly darkened and the beginnings of a scowl were clouding his facial features. Even when laughing, Jack looked like he was in pain.

Because of the loud atmosphere, the girl with them whispered her drink order to her boyfriend and he was the one to repeat the drink to me. That little game of telephone set me on edge. It was probably a side effect to the recent breakup between Ethan and me. The relationship I’d love to forget about was the only one I could think of.

“I’ll take the same,” her boyfriend said, seeming distracted by the lure of her hair. He twisted the locks around his finger before he pulled out his wallet to pay for the beverages.

My smile was strained, “Is that all for you?”

“Jackie, get what you want,” The man said to his friend. “I’ll pay for this since you picked up the tab last time… or was that me?” He frowned.

“Nah, I paid last time, Alex. You paid for hot chocolate at that gas station.”

“Oh yeah.” Alex’s face lit up. “Best drink I’ve had in a long time.”

I paused in the middle of making the cocktails and eyed him, “That’s a little offense to the person mixing your drinks.”

Alex chuckled, “Shit, I’m sorry.”

“He’s an idiot most of the time.” Alex’s girlfriend joked, seemingly amused at the scowl taking over her boyfriend’s face.

I laughed, “Most men are.”

She joined in with my laughter, “That’s the truth.”

Alex groaned, “Tell them to stop bonding, Jack.”

I glanced over at the sullen guitarist and caught him staring longingly at Alex’s girlfriend. Jack seemed lost in his own little world and had to forcibly remove himself to reply to his friend in a reasonable length of time. His words were mumbled and I didn’t care to catch them all.

After a minute or two I finished up the alcoholic beverages and handed them out to Jack and his friends. It didn’t take long for Alex and his girlfriend to wander off and save a table. The two of them were in the middle of an animated discussion of some foreign film.

Before Jack got too far, I cut off his path between two tables and asked frankly, “Are you going to keep pretending you don’t know me?”

“I thought you wanted it that way,” Jack reminded as he took a sip of his ale. I paused at a loss for something to say, thinking that the guitarist was right. There weren’t many times I was rendered speechless. In fact, I could count those moments on one hand.

To distract myself from my tangled web of feelings, I asked Jack the pressing question on my mind in the most blunt way possible, “So how long have you been in love with your best friend’s girlfriend?”