least it was paid off. Money really wasn’t an immediate concern. While he splurged on occasion, growing up the son of a struggling farmer, he’d been too practical to waste money. A nice car, a nice watch, a nice place, but he wasn’t like his friends, getting an expensive car every few years, eating at expensive restaurants every night, filling every inch of their lives with stuff.
Money and even finding a new job weren’t the issues. He’d have headhunters calling him next week. It was his pride that lay bruised and bloody on the ground, not to mention the sneaking suspicion he’d somehow failed before he’d even lost his job.
What good was success if it could be unfairly ripped out from under your feet?
Christ, he needed a drink.
Normally that would mean heading back to the city, meeting friends. But heading back to the bustle and lights and his still-employed friends sounded a lot more painful than heading to an old New Benton townie bar.
Maybe he’d be able to remember how good he had it surrounded by people way worse off than him. He drove away from his parents’ house, past Dell’s warmly lit cabin, dissatisfaction uncomfortably digging deeper and deeper.
By the time he got to the Shack, an aptly named dilapidated building with neon lights that only half still worked, he was ready to get so drunk he wouldn’t even know his own name. Something he’d never done, not even in his college days.
Because he was Charlie Wainwright. He followed the rules. Did what he was supposed to. All so he could succeed.
And for what?
Those words kept haunting him. All day. Over and over. For what?
He walked through the smoky bar, low strains of old-time country music twanging in the air. The room was mainly filled with old men in overalls, older women in ill-advised leather and a few people who probably looked a lot older than they’d ever actually be.
He strode up to the bar, ordered two doubles of their best bourbon, which was not very good at all, then situated himself on a barstool.
It might not be the practical, sensible, Charlie way of dealing with a problem, but what did it matter? The practical, sensible, Charlie way of dealing had gotten him here—with nothing to show.
You’re pathetic, Wainwright.
Not something he was particularly proud of, but he’d give himself this weekend to wallow. Indulge in a few un-Charlie-like things. Monday he’d nip all this self-loathing, self-pitying in the bud.
But for tonight...tonight he was going to wallow. He knocked back the first drink, and then the second, before gesturing to the bartender that he wanted another. Once that third drink was comfortably downed, he looked around the dimly lit barroom.
The blonde in the corner caught his attention, first because her hair was a kind of honeyed blond, not the near white of the cougars in leather. Second because her arm, just barely visible, was streaked with color.
Hey, he knew that tattoo. Yes. He got off the barstool and made his way over to her, plopping himself down at her table.
“I know you,” he said, pointing at her. “Goat Girl.” Oops. Probably shouldn’t call her that. That wasn’t very charming.
Fuck charming. He didn’t feel like being much of anything.
“I prefer Capra Crusader for my superhero goat name,” she replied, unsmiling, though he was pretty sure it was a joke.
She was wearing a black dress, which made the colorful arm all that more bright and noticeable. Her forearm was the oddest antithesis to this bar. A sunny blue with white puffy clouds. He couldn’t make out what was above her elbow because the sleeve of her dress cut it off.
In the past he would have made a joke about the tattoos. Maybe not to her face, but at least in his head. I-don’t-want-a-job tattoos.
But her job didn’t require the level of respectability that his did. Oh, wait, he didn’t have a job. “Buy you another?” he said, gesturing to her glass.
She stared hard at the remnants of whatever her first drink had been. Then stared equally as hard at the bar behind him. “You’ve bought my soap, might as well buy me a drink,” she said eventually. “Can’t go back anyway,” she muttered.
He didn’t know what that meant, but it didn’t matter. He meandered back to the bar, got two drinks, belatedly realizing he hadn’t asked her what she wanted. So he ordered four different drinks. Couldn’t hurt.
He carefully carried the four glasses back to her table, only sloshing a little over his fingers.
“I bring variety,” he announced, the heat of the liquor quickly spreading from gut to his extremities.
A nice feeling all in all. Kind of numb and tingly. No heavy failure constricting everything. He felt light and fluid. Very nice indeed.
“So, what on earth are you doing here?” she asked, pulling one of the glasses close to her. “Don’t tell me you actually live in New Benton?”
“No. I don’t.” He sipped his bourbon, studying her. Her eyes were almost the same blue as the sky of her tattoo. Wisps of blond hair framed her round face. She didn’t look like she wore makeup except for the slight smudge of black under her eyes.
“Let me guess.” She linked her fingers around the glass. Long, elegant, but with blunt nails painted black. She was quite the contrast. “Central West End?”
“No. Downtown.”
She snorted, taking a big, long gulp of her drink. “Yeah, you’re that type.”
“Type?”
“Mr. Super Yuppie. That’s your superhero name.”
Perhaps sober, practical Charlie would be offended, but relaxed, inebriated Charlie found it funny. And true. It was like this day had separated him from his life and he saw what a joke it all was.
So he laughed and polished off that fourth drink no matter how irresponsible it was. How would he get home? How would Goat Girl, er, Capra Crusader, get home? Eh, he’d figure it out. Later. “Super Yuppie. Well, at least I’m super at something.”
She waved a hand at him. “Oh, please, I’m sure you’re super at everything. Like I said, I know your type. Silver spoon, right? Private school. Mommy and Daddy paid for college. Oh, I know all about your type.”
“If I’m all those things, how did I end up solo at a New Benton townie bar on a Thursday night?” Because for as much of a yuppie as he might have turned into, nothing was handed to him on a silver platter.
She finished off the drink in a quick gulp, put the glass down with a thud and then leaned forward. Her dress was modest, but still, the leaning and the way her arms were crossed under her breasts meant he had a decent view. Meant he wondered if she had tattoos in other places. Meant he wondered...
“My eyes are up here, sir.”
He closed his for a second. “Sorry. Can I blame booze for my lack of manners?” When he opened his eyes, training them on her face, she was smiling.
“Manners
