Page 71 of Spring's Arcana
Oh my god, a divinity’s taking me to a roadhouse.It sounded like a Monty Python skit. Leo didn’t really understand their stuff, but he laughed when she tried to explain it.
Nat had to swallow, hard. “Is this place safe?”
“You withme,” Dmitri said, and knocked on the door.
A rectangular slot opened, a pair of bloodshot blue eyes peering out. “Fuck off,” a man growled.
“I strike you blind, you talk to me like that,” Dmitri said, pleasantly, and the menace under each word could have stripped the peel-bubbling paint from the entire wall. “Open the fuckin’ door and watch your shit-filled mouth, I have lady with me.”
There was a clanking of locks being thrown, and Nat tested the steps gingerly. They were solid. This place was maybe more than it appeared.
Looked like Nat Drozdova, her mother’s worst disappointment, was too.
LITTLE BROTHER
For all the urban legends and television jokes about biker bars it seemed pretty tame, though the jukebox music died as the door closed behind them. It certainly wasn’t the Elysium’s polished splendor; every surface looked sticky with neglect, even the pool tables crouched in cones of golden light under hanging green lamp shades. A thick fug of cigarette smoke—regular tobacco, worlds away from Dmitri’s almost sweet-smelling vapor—clung to every surface, and the floor was slightly gummy as well. Most of the booths were empty, all the other tables were chest-high, and the stools were particularly flimsy. A few neon beer signs buzzed dispiritedly on the walls, the only windows were boarded up, and the bar listed like a Fleet Week sailor trying to prove he wasn’t drunk by enthusiastically saluting while he swayed.
The bartender, a big balding beer-bellied man wearing a patch-festooned leather vest and a long gray beard, stared balefully at Dmitri as the gangster strode straight for him, and everyone else in the place, from women with teased hair and spike heels to men in leather-and-denim jackets and engineer boots, eyed Nat like a church full of widows with a drunken obscenity-yelling soldier in their midst.
In other words, it was definitely not Nat Drozdova’s usual scene, but she followed in Dmitri’s wake, trying very hard not to look at anyone directly and wondering if this was a divinity bar. Was there a god of bikers? If so, would he look like one of the men playing pool, or maybe the cocktail waitress hefting a tray crowded withbrown beer bottles, her gaze avid and her bright red lips curved in a half-familiar grin?
She looked a bit like Nurse Candy, and now Nat wondered if that divinity could, well, look through any of her “girls.” It sounded, like the prospect of Baba peering through snowflakes, incredibly exhausting.
The waitress even tipped Nat a heavily mascaraed wink, and Nat couldn’t help but smile a little and give a halfhearted wave, like greeting a school friend in a crowded hallway during the inadequate ration of passing time.
God forbid kids should have any time to think, or even walk at a normal pace between classes.
Dmitri chose a stool at the bar, glanced over his shoulder while indicating the seat on his left for her, and settled with the air of a man reaching an easy chair in his own living room after a long day at work. “Vodka,” he said to the bearded bartender, and tipped his head in Nat’s direction. “Two.”
The ’tender looked like he wanted to ask for her ID, and she was suddenly sure she liked this place better than the Elysium. It was grungy and the hall past the pool tables leading to what was probably the bathroom was full of deep gloom and likely more than one titanic, nausea-inducing smell, but it was…
Well, it washuman.
She should brave the bathroom, no matter how it smelled, and call home. But what would she say?Hi, Leo. I know everything, or at least the biggest things. All those times Mom said I was lying, all those times she said it was my imagination, and you just stood there. What was that? By the way, how’s she doing in the hospice? They won’t be able to help her, but you probably knew that, right? Anyway, nice talking to you, I’ll call in another day or so.
It wasn’t a conversation that would do any good.
So she eased herself onto the stool, one of its legs a little wobbly, and didnotrest her elbows on the bar. She even tried an apologetic smile at the bearded man, who flushed and coughed, turning hurriedly away to select a bottle from the mirrored shelves behind him.
All bars had glass behind the liquor. Maybe it was a cosmic law, divine regulations.
A laugh hit her sideways, got caught in her dry throat, and died. She shuddered, and Dmitri eyed her sidelong.
“Helluva kick, eh?” He wasn’t shy about putting his elbows on the tacky-sticky wood, and his dark hair gleamed in the dimness, combed back again, not a single strand out of place.
“You could say that,” Nat managed, each word scraping-dry.
Two indifferently wiped glasses were thumped atop square white napkins, and a generous measure of tepid vodka cascaded into each. Leo would have been scandalized; even Mom admitted vodka had to becold. Still, Nat barely waited before picking hers up and tossing it far back, hoping the booze would kill whatever germs were riding the glass.
It tasted just like always, hit her stomach, burst into forgiving warmth, and her eyes watered.
Dmitri made a small scornful sound. He touched his drink with a fingertip, and condensation bloomed on the glass. There was a thin singing sound of strain as the temperature shifted.
Nat swallowed, blinked several times, suppressed a burp, and felt much better. “Neat trick.”
“You like? I teach you.” He took another drag, twin threads of heavy white vapor curling out through his nose. “Want a smoke?”
She shook her head. Who knew what he had rolled in those shapechanging cigarettes? Maybe Nat could take up smoking. What about other drugs?
