Seeing him twice like this in one day had to be fate; I had to work up the nerve to talk to him. But I couldn’t; he was here with his friend or brother or something.
Or… maybe I was wrong and he was dating that guy.
An unfounded jealousy began to swirl in my gut as I stirred the drink.
Then I realized I was being ridiculous — I didn’t own this guy — he wasn’t mine! He probably already had someone anyway… or worse, maybe he was straight.
The amount of times I’d been let down by hot straight guys made it so that I didn’t even want to try dating anyone anymore. And after I’d found the last guy that I was with — the one who caused the incident, I had sworn off dating forever. There was no way I was going to ever be able to trust someone again after what had happened.
I turned around to fish some ingredients out of one of the bins behind the bar and looked up to see the bookstore guy’s eyes dart away from me.
A grin curled across my face. He definitely wasn’t straight.
When all of the colorful drinks were sitting in front of me, I carried them to each table, feeling the bookstore guys’ eyes follow me.
I saved his drink for last, so I could linger.
“Here’s your drink,” I said to the lookalike, setting his tall Paloma down in front of him. “And here’s your gin and tonic, sir,” I said to the bookstore guy, daring to meet his eyes.
The power that came from our eyes meeting was like a laser between us. All the sound and bustling around me didn’t matter; there was only me and him in this room.
“Luke!” My manager Claudia said swiftly in my ear.
I jumped. She’d somehow appeared right next to me.
“Thanks for taking care of the tables… I need you at the bar now,” she explained. Then she glanced to her right and saw the bookstore guy. “Oh, hey Officer Brady, I didn’t see you come in! Don’t worry about the tab — drinks are on the house.”
The bookstore guy — Officer Brady — raised his glass to her in response, and then before I knew it, Claudia was whisking me away to the bar.
My mind was spinning with questions, but one piece of information stuck out to me: She knew about the guy at the table; the guy that had been tumbling around in my head all day.
Unexpectedly, my manager steered me to the small room we had behind the bar.
“Luke, I need you to do me a favor.” She said, meeting my eyes.
All the wind went out of my sails, and the fear started to vibrate in my gut again. “Am… am I getting fired?” I asked, my greatest fear coming to the forefront of my mind.
“What?! No, silly! You’re the best damn bartender we’ve got.”
Relief flooded through me.
She touched me on the shoulder as her eyes sparkled with tears. “I… I know this is going to sound unorthodox. But I need you to go spend time at that table out there we were just at. Those two guys.”
Alarm and joy surged through me. “What? Why?”
“One of those guys is… well, he’s my ex.” She admitted. “It got nasty towards the end, and I can’t handle it if he comes up to the bar and starts bugging me.” She was quiet for a second as she let that information sink in. “I’d leave, but it’s so busy tonight that I can’t get away. Would you do this for me?”
“Yes,” I answered without hesitation.
“Thanks… I really owe you one.” She said, then wrapped me in a huge hug.
I briefly thought of my mother’s hug from earlier — was she home yet? Surely she’d still be out… whenever she had these types of meetings, she was usually out until eleven. I glanced at my watch: the time was only eight-thirty.
I had plenty of time. And now, by some miracle, I got to spend a decent amount of it with bookstore guy.
My manager turned to leave, but I called after her. “Wait! What are those guy’s names?”
She turned back and answered. “My ex is Jake, the one sitting closer to the bar. The one in the corner — that’s his brother, Adam. Also known as Officer Brady.”
Adam.
The name echoed and bounced around in my head like an incantation.
“Okay, I’ll go distract them.”
“Thank you so much!” She said, walking backwards towards the bar and the noise. “And remember — just don’t let Jake come talk to me at the bar. I don’t want him to cause a scene.”
“Got it,” I said, nodding.
And just like that, she was gone.
A few minutes later, I was back out near the tables, steeling myself to go sit with this guy — Adam, who was apparently some kind of officer, and his brother. What the hell was I even supposed to say? I could barely speak to Adam when he talked to me in the bookstore!
I mustered up my courage and formed a plan in my head.
As I approached the table, I drew in a deep breath. What was the worst that could happen?
You could have another anxiety attack and collapse on the ground in front of all these people, hyperventilating, my inner dialogue answered for me.
I hushed it.
And what was the weirdest thing of all, was that when I sat down at their table across from them, I was able to ignore their looks of surprise. Something about being around this guy — Adam, made my anxiety take a back seat. My mind was clear; my heart was racing, but not in a bad way.
“Hey guys,” I said, trying to project an aura of confidence. “If each of you tell me a secret, you get a free drink.”
4
Adam
“A secret?” Jake asked from my right, immediately taking the bait. “What kind of secret?”
The angelic guy — who had somehow reemerged in my life twice
