Last Call at the Nightshade Lounge Page 8

  Trina disappeared into the dishwashing room with a flash of her middle finger.

  “That just leaves us in the trench together,” he said to Bailey.

  “Yup,” she said. “Together.”

  You don’t have a crush on Zane, she told herself. The real Zane wears For Dear Life T-shirts and hasn’t figured out how to shave. You just have crush on, I don’t know, three-piece suits and a stubble-free upper lip. Get over yourself.

  Maybe that was it. All she had to do was get used to the new Zane, really used to him, and things would go back to the way they’d been in high school. There was no way she ever would’ve gone out with him back then.

  Except it wasn’t back then. It was now, a bizarro world where Zane had a job and a decent wardrobe and a girlfriend and a doozy of a passion project, and Bailey had nothing to her name but a diploma and a collection of ex-boyfriends’ T-shirts. He was a grown-up, and Bailey was just a teenager who’d gotten old.

  “Hey.” Zane sidled up next to her, and Bailey jumped. “Penny for your thoughts?” He held up a coin from the cash register.

  “That’s a quarter.”

  “So keep the change.”

  She took the quarter and put it back in the drawer. “My thought is that it’s almost opening time,” she said, “and I want to get working.”

  “Ah, subservience. Another prized quality in my staff.” The light glinted off his glasses. “Let’s do this.”

  On the basis of the high-octane chaos that had accompanied her brief tenure as a barback, Bailey expected her first night as a bartender to put her through the wringer. But the customers stayed orderly, and the drinks stayed simple: scotch neat, draft beer, vodka soda. After spending the past day speed-reading through her shiny new copy of The Devil’s Water Dictionary, Bailey felt a little let down. She wanted to make martinis, not change for a twenty. Even Trina, reporting back from patrol, said it had been quiet out there.

  “Didn’t see a single one,” she said. “Which is too bad, because I was jonesing to rock my mojito powers.”

  Trina glanced around and then waved her hand over an ice cube, which melted to a little puddle. She snapped her fingers, and the puddle instantly froze. She pointed at it, and it instantly re-formed into a perfect cube.

  “Wow,” Bailey said.

  “It’s nothing,” Trina said, but Bailey could tell she was pleased. “Just the thing I’m awesome at.”

  The evening slowed down so much that Bailey had to check her phone to make sure time wasn’t going backward. But no, it was eleven thirty. Trina was carting in a case of clean glasses from the dishwasher, Zane was handing out credit cards and receipts to their respective owners, and Bailey was bored.

  But then, she thought, better bored than dead. Underpromise, overdeliv—

  “Bailey.” Zane clapped her on the shoulder. “Why don’t you man the counter solo for a bit?” he said. “Er, woman it. Whatever. I can’t get the card machine to take debit, and I’m gonna call the bank. Also, it’s changed the display to Spanish for some reason and—”

  “Wait. Solo?” she said. “Um, I’m not sure I’m ready—”

  “Not ready to do what?” he said. “Babysit Sleepy Ernie over there?”

  At a far table a half-conscious man raised his hand in a wave before it flopped down to his side.

  “You’ve got this,” he said. “You made it through big, scary college. You can handle an hour or two behind the bar. Trust me, it’ll be fun.” He coughed. “Also, you kind of have to, um, obey my every command and stuff.”

  “You just couldn’t wait to pull that one, could you?” She tried to glare at him but ended up smiling.

  “I deserve a cookie for holding out this long,” he said, heading for the office. “Try not to die, okay?”

  Bailey listened to his creaky footsteps receding on the old wooden floor. Safe was better than dead, she reminded herself. And if Zane wasn’t nearby, she could practice.

  In her twenty-two years Bailey had enjoyed a lion’s share of beginner’s luck. Made valedictorian in high school, got in early decision to her top-choice college, even won a raffle for a week’s worth of free pizza in her first week on campus. She didn’t get second chances because she didn’t need second chances. Practice was for people who weren’t good enough to stick the landing the first time. But here she was, stymied. Old fashioned number one had been a failure. A dud. Useless. It was going to take at least a second try. Which was fine. Where old fashioned number one had failed, old fashioned number two would be a glowing concoction that she could proudly point to and say—

  “Goddammit.” She’d dropped in the orange twist just like the recipe said, but once again she’d made a drink that was pretty, not glowy. She sipped deeply, just to be sure (one never could tell with the lighting in this place). It tasted just as good as the first one, but the flavor wasn’t the point. As she’d learned from her speed cramming, each of the five vital liquors had different effects, and whiskey’s domain was the mind. But her mind didn’t suddenly achieve higher consciousness or flood with new intelligence and power. She didn’t even feel the warmth that the screwdriver had produced. This was just booze and ice in a glass.

  She dumped out the drink, rinsed the glass, and set it down on the bar. “Third time’s the charm,” she muttered as she started to drizzle water over a sugar cube to dissolve it. Once again she went through each step precisely as written in The Devil’s Water Dictionary. And once again she found herself with a very pretty glass of whiskey, citrus, and frozen water. It tasted nice, and she couldn’t think of a more devastating compliment for her work. Nice was just another way of saying useless.

  Number four was normal. So was number five. Six looked for a moment as if she’d finally cracked the spell, but then she realized the glowing effect was just light glinting off a piece of ice that had chipped when she dropped it in the glass.

  What did you think, Bailey? she mused. That you’d nail mixing old fashioneds, then stir up the perfect Long Island iced tea while Zane was taking out the trash?

  She glanced at the clock while taking her now customary sip of number six. It was well past midnight. The bar closed at two, but chances were likely they might cut out early, depending on whether they could get Sleepy Ernie out the door in a timely fashion. She’d be able to put her disastrous attempts at magic behind her for the night, get some rest, and start all over again in the morning.

  Yeah, Bailey admitted. And then Zane and I would make out or something.

  The neon CHICAGO CUBS sign buzzed at her from across the room, illuminating one letter at a time. C-H-I-C-A-G-O. C-H-I-C-A-G-O. As she cleaned her glass yet again, her brain, slightly tickled by whiskey, had an amusing, irrelevant thought: Chicago has seven letters in it. And I’ve just made six old fashioneds.

  Bailey, another part of her brain thought, those two facts have no correl—

  Shut up, self.

  Before she’d been precise, but now she was slapping the drink together like an essay an hour before it was due. By the time the ice splashed into the whiskey, she wasn’t even thinking about getting the recipe right anymore. She was just looking forward to drinking. She was screwing up, but as long as Zane couldn’t see those screw-ups, they were less real.

  She took the final ingredient—the orange peel, cut as jagged as a cartoon lightning bolt—and nestled it between the ice cube and the glass. The peel pushed the cube, which struck the glass with a soft clink.

  And just like that, the old fashioned glowed a soft red-brown.

  Her jaw dropped. “You’ve gotta be shitting me.”

  But no, this one appeared to be on the level, appeared being the key word, because Bailey was suddenly having trouble finding her footing. Of the six failed experiments, five had been sampled within the past hour, and even if she’d spaced them out with some water (which she had intended to do but then forgot), the fact was she was a tiny Asian girl with a minimal amount of body fat. Her resistance to alcohol was about as effective
as cardboard armor.

  Well, she reasoned, she wasn’t drunk. Hell, she wasn’t even tipsy. She was just feeling a little more loosely wound than usual. Zane had said that too much alcohol in the system would dampen magical effects, but she was already metabolizing the old drinks. She’d drink this one now, then surprise him with her sudden aptitude. I can’t believe it, he would say, after a sip. You’re amazing. Then he’d push the glass out of the way, whip off his glasses, and sweep her up against the bar—

  “Bailey?”

  The door shut with a click as Zane headed into the bar.

  “Eep,” Bailey said. “I mean, um, yes. Present. How was the bank?”

  “No bueno,” Zane said. “I’ll try calling in the morning. Hey, what’s that?”

  She’d tried to scoot the evidence of her unsanctioned cocktail experimentation behind the forest of beer taps, but apparently he’d already noticed.

  “Oh, you finally cracked it?” Zane rushed to her side and stooped to inspect the drink. When he saw the glow in full effect, he nodded slowly in approval. “Niiiiice.”

  He picked up the glass, held it to the light, and took a big gulp, complete with a little ahhh at the end. As Bailey looked on in quiet despair, he took another sip, then another, and then beamed at her. “Tastes great.” He raised the glass in a toast. And then he let go of the glass and dropped his hand.

  Bailey lunged for it, but the drink didn’t drop. The glass was suspended midair, without even a wobble.

  “Whoa.” Bailey’s despair turned to wonder. “What?”

  “Come on, Bailey, you studied. You know what.”

  She closed her eyes and thought of the old fashioned’s Dictionary entry. “ ‘A potable to lend physicality to the will of the mind,’ ” she whispered.

  “It’s kind of a long way to say telekinesis,” Zane said. “But then again, telekinesis is kind of a long way to say telekinesis.”

  She suddenly remembered they weren’t alone. “Wait. There are witnesses—”

  He waved her off. “Ernie,” he called, “you don’t see anything, right?”

  Ernie, now spread across three chairs, rolled over and scratched himself.

  “See?” said Zane. “We’re fine. Now grab your coat. Or hell”—he gestured toward the back room—“I’ll get it for you.”

  Her coat reeled into the room as if on an invisible fishing line, depositing itself neatly over her shoulders.

  “Trina!” Zane called.

  “Scrubbing,” Trina said from the bathroom.

  “You said it was a pretty quiet night, right?”

  Trina poked out her head. “Yup.”

  “Congratulations,” Zane said. “You’re promoted back to bartender!”

  “Thank God,” Trina said.

  “You’re welcome.” Zane gave her a thumbs-up. “Can you handle the post-closing-time patrol? I’ll do one final sweep now, but—”

  “We will,” Bailey said firmly. “I’m ready.”

  The old fashioned glass floated away from Zane’s lips, and he frowned.

  “What?”

  “Put me in, boss,” she said with more bravado than she felt. “Let me take my first smoke break.”

  THE DEVIL’S WATER DICTIONARY.

  The Old Fashioned

  A potable to lend physicality to the will of the mind

  1. Drop a sugar cube into an old fashioned glass and let dissolve in a little water.

  2. Add four dashes of Angostura bitters.

  3. Pour in two ounces of rye.

  4. Stir well with a bar spoon.

  5. Add an orange twist and one very large piece of ice. Serve.

  The old fashioned is the premier whiskey cocktail. Its telekinetic properties make it incomparably versatile; a creative bartender can make use of its effects in offensive or defensive contexts and even beyond patrols, particularly in situations concerning high shelves.

  The modern old fashioned was codified at the first National Symposium of the Cupbearers Court in 1852. Although this status has previously invited a cultural pushback, young generations of bartenders quickly found principles to be far less practical than moving things with one’s mind.

  RYE WHISKEY.

  American whiskey, which is made with a mash of at least 51 percent rye, was rediscovered in 1790, toward the beginning of the Great Hangover. Credit goes to Joshua Cromley, a Virginia distiller who, while drunkenly attempting to drive off a census taker, accidentally made his own horse explode. Rye whiskey soon became the preeminent weapon of the fledgling country’s defense against the unnatural. Subsequent rediscoveries gradually taught modern man how to temper the liquor’s raw power and, in doing so, saved the lives of countless horses.

  ANGOSTURA BITTERS.

  Special preparations of botanically infused alcohol and water, bitters act as a lens to “refract” energy. Angostura bitters in particular were rediscovered in the 1820s by Johann Gottlieb Benjamin Siegert, a German doctor in Venezuela. Working from fragments of an old text, the doctor thought he had merely invented a new kind of medicine that tasted extremely good. It wasn’t until ten years later, when the concoction was displayed in England, that a bartender properly attributed Siegert’s discovery to the mixological arts.

  ORANGE TWIST.

  Fruit garnishes are inherently the freshest part of a finished cocktail. The matter of the old fashioned’s garnish was settled at the first National Symposium in 1852. The legendary Hortense LaRue, then merely an amateur bartender who had bluffed her way inside, bested all comers by presenting an old fashioned garnished with an orange peel. When the proponents of the lemon and the cherry protested that she must have cheated, and that as a woman she had no place at the court anyway, LaRue responded by mentally seizing the two objectors and juggling them for nearly a quarter of an hour.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The mean streets of Ravenswood were hardly mean, but Bailey had never felt more wary of them. Damen was quiet, the lights of the Hibachi restaurant and the insurance company and even the place that sold Italian beef sandwiches all dark for the night. Cars passed, but not many, and when they got to the broad intersection of Lawrence, they crossed under the glare of a red light.

  “Are you sure you want to do this, Bailey?” Zane walked purposefully, but he still seemed a little nervous when his gaze fell on her.

  “I’m sure,” Bailey said, imitating his patrol-swagger walk as best she could. “Why? Are you scared?”

  Zane hesitated for only a half second. “No.”

  “Okay.” Bailey nodded crisply. “So teach me.”

  Zane blew out a breath. “Right. So a bar’s typical patrol radius is six blocks in every direction. It’s big, but the zones overlap. Better to have too many bartenders prowling than not enough. So Nightshade territory goes—”

  “North to Foster, west to Clark, south to Montrose, and west to … Western.”

  Zane blinked. “Right. I forgot you have the home turf advantage here.”

  Bailey shrugged. “I can find my way around just fine. What I don’t know how to do is hunt.”

  “It’s not hunting,” he said. “But okay. Uh, look for busted lights.” He pointed to a neon nail salon sign that flickered between dead and near dead. “Tremens love shadows.”

  “I thought tremens were sensitive only to sunlight,” she said.

  “They are,” said Zane. “But they also take advantage of darkness. They know how bad our night vision is. Dark helps them get behind you.”

  “So why don’t we all just carry flashlights?” Bailey said, hugging herself. Not that she was scared, because she wasn’t. Home turf advantage, after all. “We could send them out with census forms or something.”

  “The Court tries to keep on top of writing to the city to get more lights installed,” Zane said. “All under the guise of concerned citizens, of course. But—”

  “But at the end of the day,” Bailey finished for him, “we’re still in Chicago.”

  “You’re goddamn right we a
re. Inefficient, recalcitrant, and glorious.”

  Zane kept walking, but Bailey had stopped on the corner of Ainslie, then she took a sharp right down the side street.

  “Uh, Bailey? Where are you going?”

  “If tremens hate light, we’re not doing any good staying out here,” she said, gesturing toward the streetlight bathing them in an unflattering industrial orange. “So let’s go where it’s dark.”

  Zane hesitated but followed.

  “What else should I be looking for?” Now Bailey was the one walking with purpose. Maybe it was the alcohol pumping in her veins, but she was itching to fight something. Learn the ropes. Kick ass. Although she wished she had something to take notes with.

  “Well,” Zane said, “hedges with loose branches. Alleyways with debris they could use as shelters. Ectoplasm.”

  “Really?”

  “No,” Zane admitted. “Here, look.”

  They cut up Winchester, checking under cars and in the alcoves of apartment buildings. But nothing was there. They didn’t see a single living thing—if tremens counted as living—until they hit Winona, where a cab casually rolled through the stop sign.

  “Those are important, too.” Zane nodded at the taillights.

  “The cabbies?”

  “The people,” he said. “Don’t get so focused on hunting prey that you leave innocents unprotected.”

  The wind whistled down Winona, and again Bailey shivered. “Is it always this boring?” she said. Thank you, whiskey. “I mean, sorry.”

  But Zane seemed unmiffed. “No, I get you. The grind can get dull: making a drink, getting magic powers, using them to punch tremens until they explode …”

  “But that’s not dull at all.”

  “No,” Zane said with a grin. “It totally isn’t. But it’s still a routine.”

  “Ugh.” She puffed out a pouty sigh. “I guess I thought this whole patrol business would be more, I don’t know, superhero-y.”