I was bleary. I sat up sharply in the booth. I was sweating—I wasn’t used to being warm. I only knew gray days and wind snapping my rags. Half the lights in the bar were blown but the dim light was my personal sun. And I could feel my feet. I pinched myself. Nothing.
“Oi, Nipple! Been sleeping like a ‘ickle baby you ‘ave!”
I squinted across the room. Joq stood behind the bar flipping bottles, pouring amber and shaking steel shakers.
I shook my head and peered at the rotted oak between my fingers, then I got up and walked to the polished oak bar.
“Drink this.” Joq slid me a shot of something. I looked at it and pushed it back. “I don’t want this shit… I’m hungry.”
Joq raised his eyebrows, shrugged, and tossed it back. He squinched his eyes, smacked his mouth and shivered. He looked up leaned forward and belched in my face.
I clenched my teeth so hard it felt like they would shatter, but I was too hungry to retaliate. I sighed.
“So… Where’s the food?”
Joq took another shot before answering me (my nails bit my palms). “‘ere! Cool it Nipple… There ‘int no food in ‘ere!”
“No food? It’s a bar! What do you mean ‘no food’?
Joq rinsed, gargled, swallowed, and sighed. “How do I put this? ‘No’ means.... Argh—ha—oi!” He wriggled when I grabbed him by what was left of his rags.
“Listen you little shit. I get a grouchy when I’m hungry. Seeing as I live on Main Street, I’m eternally pissed. But I’m worse in the morning because I’m tired too. Now cut the shit and tell me something. Where do you get your food from? Huh?” The heat was making me borderline rabid so I took a seat.
Joq peaked his brows, brushed off his rags, and muffled a snigger in his shoulder. His face was red and snot dribbled down his lip.
I shook off the resurging urge to throttle him and went about locating the source of the sweltering, maddening heat. I felt Joq’s eyes following me like he was a chap-lipped, snot-nosed Mona Lisa.
“’int no food ‘ere Nipple. Poutin’ and lashin’ out at me royal Joqness ‘int goin’ to help.”
“It would help if you learned how to speak English.” I muttered. “Where do you get food? Just tell me Joq.” I pushed open a door adjacent to the bar and found myself in an identical room with booths. The room was lit by a smoldering fire. I walked over, stooped and watched the flames dance like little men in the rotted spots in the plank strips and jagged beams. The heat seared my face and I nearly passed out.
Joq’s voice drifted from the bar. “I steal o’ course! We’ve still gotta steal food like every other beggar kid in Easter City!”
We aren’t like every beggar kid in Easter city… I thought. I was drenched in sweat. I shook my heavy head, grabbed the pale of murky snow melt by the hearth and dashed it over the kindling. The fire hissed and simmered and went out. I sat in the dark, my breath shallow, until my head cleared. Then I got up and walked to the doorway of light.
Joq’s quaffing had slowed to little sips which were almost always accompanied by a face that belonged on a Wealthy Devil after a grievous loss at craps. Joq punched a glass in my direction, splashing booze over the bar.
“‘Am wealthy person’s son. ‘e’ll come get me.”
I sat at the bar and frowned. “What?”
“Me father. You don’ believe me. Don’ believe ‘e’s one o’ the wealthy, yeah?”
I shook my head. “We’re in a heated bar on a side street that’s invisible to Wealthy Devils. I’m ready to believe anything.”
Joq squinted as though he were trying to read me. I gazed between heavy lids. I was tired all of a sudden, and still hungry.
“Well ‘e is. ‘e is comin’ back! ‘Joq, if you is ever lost, I’ll find you, I will’. ‘is own words!”
I faded into heat-induced stupor as a vision of the man with the cane and the evil-looking kid and the black limousine snapped before my eyes. The man held out his hand and smiled when I got in the limousine “Found you!”
Snick. I was back in the bar. Joq was waving his hand and snapping. “Oi!”
When Joq saw that I had regained consciousness he clicked his teeth in disapproval.
“Found you!” he said and smiled in such way that resembled the man from my premonition, I nearly passed out again. But I shook my head, snatched a shot of something strong and tossed it back. I spluttered and coughed and near fell off of the stool.
Joq was giving me a curious look and I wasn’t up for explaining my dream about the man in the limousine, or how I’d seen Joq in another dream before we ever met so I blurted, “How did you find this place, anyway? I’ve never come across it.”
“Maybe you ‘int been lookin’ hard enough!”
“But a bar that…” I didn’t know any other way to put it. “…exists outside of time? You don’t just stumble on something like that.”
Joq shrugged. “Alice stumbled down the rabbit hole, yeah?”
“What?”
Joq put up his hands in bunny ears so I figured it was the booze talking and spun the stool so I was facing the door. The sky was still combing flakes down on Main Streets which settled around the square in drifts of white sky.
My stomach growled so I got up. It had been nice playing fantasy with the heat and safety, but I was hungry and booze doesn’t fill your stomach. “I’m going out.” I said. “And I’m not sharing with you this time, so if you’re hungry…”
Joq blinked, sighed, hopped over the bar. He patted my chest. “Tell ya what, Nipple. I’ll let you in on a ‘ikkle secret—scratch that, a ‘uge secret.”
I walked to the door and stopped. “The game’s up for me, Joq. I’m hungry.” I pointed out the window. “There’s food out there. Unless this secret has to do with food—”
“What if…” cut in Joq, at the top of his voice. “What if, this secret o’ mine’ll get us both food to last us a year?”
I laughed and grabbed the latch. Joq grabbed my arm. “‘old it Nipple! I’m serious, I am! This’s for real!”
I snorted. “Like your accent?”
Joq dropped my arm and I turned to see him dash across the room, slide behind the bar and start rummaging.
I sighed and looked around. “I’m leaving now.” I looked back outside again and cracked the door. Blistering wind whistled in and licked my arm.