by Helena Shaw
As the afternoon trailed on, most of the few diners who sat around paid their tabs and left. People hadn’t quite adjusted to the cold of winter yet, and while the town was starting to relax some, most people were still cautious about being out after dark.
As they should be, Dawn thought to herself as she watched the sun set through the windows at the front of the bar. The only people who filled the place the last couple weeks had been people who’d come to join the search for the animal, and they were rapidly thinning. Jim’s saw less and less of them every night, and Dawn was starting to prepare for another famine.
Most of the place had emptied by time the sun had fully set, and only a few stragglers remained as the clock on the wall chimed eight. Jim shook his head and retreated to his office then, probably to mope in the dark like he’d been doing a lot of lately, but Dawn kept her quiet perch, watching over the bar.
It was as the last table was settling up their bill that the door opened once more and a familiar face entered. Gavin Mosley stepped in as he brushed a bit of snow off his shoulders, and then shook off his boots. When he saw Dawn, he flashed her a smile, his teeth white and perfect as he hung up the light jacket he’d been wearing.
“Hey,” he said to her as he took a seat at the bar. “Busy night?”
“Hardly,” Dawn laughed. “Snowing pretty bad out there?”
“Nah,” he said. “Just a light dusting. It’ll pass soon enough. I walked, so I got myself a little covered.”
“You walked?” Dawn asked. “Really? Seems a little cold for that.”
“I grew up in this,” Gavin said as his smile grew. “I love it, though I can’t wait ‘til we get a real blizzard. Then the fun really gets going.”
“If you say so,” Dawn replied. “How about a nice, toasty beer to warm up with, though?”
“Now you’re speaking my language,” Gavin laughed. “God, I was really thinking more people would be here tonight.”
“I think they’re still a little scared of the dark,” she said as she handed over his pint.
“They’re being ridiculous,” Gavin said. It was the first judgemental thing she’d ever heard come out of his mouth, and it surprised her.
“I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “People just want to be safe.”
“Yeah,” he agreed, “but you can’t let something change your life like that. I mean, you seem fine. You’re here working, and I assume you’ll be walking home in the dark.”
“So?” Dawn said, a little put off by his assumption. “I don’t have much choice in it. Besides, Gabe and I usually walk together. He’s just up the street from me.”
“Okay, okay,” Gavin said as he put up his hands in faux defense. “Sorry I said anything.”
“It’s fine,” Dawn said. “I can just understand why people would be scared, is all.”
“You’re totally right,” he said with a smile. “Man, did your boss turn up the heat in here?”
“No,” Dawn said. “It’s pretty much normal.”
“Maybe it’s the beer,” Gavin said as he pulled off his jacket. “It’s pretty toasty all right,” he said with a wink.
“Hey, your arm looks better,” Dawn said as she noticed he was no longer wearing the tension bandage.
“This?” he said as he rotated his right arm for effect. “Yeah, it had me laid out for a couple days. I almost called my old sports doc to ask him what to do, but I just stayed off it and rested, and now I’m fit as a fiddle. Won’t be sliding into home plate any time soon, of course, but I’m not out of commission.”
“Well, that’s good,” Dawn said. “Feel like anything to eat to go with that beer?”
“Oh yeah,” Gavin said. “Can you get your cook to do me up one of those burgers? I’ve been itchin’ for one, and I can’t cook for squat, so I’m starving.”
“Want me to make it a double patty?” Dawn asked with a playful wink.
“Do it up,” Gavin said. “And fries with gravy. I am so hungry, I could eat the whole cow.”
“Coming right up,” she said before she moved to the kitchen to put in his order. “Hey, Gabe,” she called to the cook. “Double burger and fries.”
“Shit,” he said. “I was just about to shut down the grill.”
“Just one more,” Dawn said. “I don’t think anyone else is coming in.”
“Fine,” Gabe grumbled as he threw two patties on the flat-top.
“Any chance we have some gravy?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he told her. “Tons, actually. Figured we’d need it for Thanksgiving.”
“Throw some on the fries,” she said. “Smother them.”
Gavin hadn’t asked for them to be drowning in gravy, but she had a feeling he’d appreciate the thought. If he was that hungry, he probably would be glad of it.
“So, how’s business been?” Gavin asked when Dawn returned. “Or is that a sore subject?”
“It can be,” she said with a shrug. “Up until recently, we were booming, but the last few days, it has really slowed. I think folks are heading home.”
“They shoot whatever it was they came here to shoot?” Gavin asked her as he took another drink from his beer.
“I doubt it,” she said. If someone had shot a werewolf, well, anyone but Jase, she was sure everyone would be talking about it, and not just the folks in Goosemont. “You ever go hunting?” she asked him.
“Me?” he said as he pointed at his own muscular chest. “Nah, not really my thing. Couldn’t imagine pulling the trigger on some helpless bunny rabbit. Besides, where’s the sport in sitting in some tree, covered in piss, and shooting some poor critter that’s just doing what he does best?”
“You have a point,” she said. “I mean, that kind of hunting, at least.”
“There are more kinds?” he asked, seemingly clueless.
“Well, of course,” she said. “My dad took me a few times when I was a kid. We didn’t do the sitting in trees thing. We actually stalked the deer.”
“You ever shoot one?” Gavin asked, his brown eyes intently watching hers.
She shook her head. “No. My dad did, and I watched him do it. He did teach me how to shoot, though. And I shot a duck, once.”
“You know,” Gavin said as he took another swig of beer. “When I first saw you, you never struck me as the tomboy type.”
“It’s hit or miss,” she said. “I guess it depends on the activity.”
“Fair enough,” Gavin said.
Gabe appeared from the kitchen, Gavin’s platter of food in hand. There was so much gravy on the fries that it had soaked through the bottom of the hamburger bun, but Gavin didn’t seem to notice as he scooped it up and took a bite.
“I’m shutting down the kitchen,” he said. “If anyone orders, let them know it’s appetizers only, ‘kay?”
“Will do,” Dawn said as she watched him retreat.
“So, what about you?” she asked Gavin once the cook had left. “Beyond baseball, what do you do?”
“Well, that’s the pickle,” Gavin said between bites. “Baseball was all I ever did. In high school, my parents didn’t care how my grades were, as long as I was playing ball. God, especially when college scouts showed up and said I had a future. The only club I was in was baseball, the only sport I played was baseball. Even in the winter, I was at the batting range every weekend. So, uh, I guess I’d have to say baseball.”
“But you have a degree, right?” she asked. “You went to college.”
“You been checking up on me?” Gavin asked before he tore out another big bite of his burger.
“Guilty,” Dawn confessed, smiling at him. “What did you study?”
“English,” he laughed. “I thought it would be a bird major and I could just skip everything. But as it turns out, some of those English professors have integrity and expected me to actually show up. Looking back, I really should have done that, but three years in, I got scouted to the minors and I’ve played ball ever since. Never got the degree.”
“What will you do now, though?” Dawn asked, genuinely curious.
“I’m not really sure,” Gavin said with a casual chuckle. “I’ve got some money, but it won’t last forever if I’m not careful. I’ve got no skills beyond playing ball, so that’s out. Maybe I’ll get a job at the local hardware store, or something. At least it’d give me something to do. I’m going stir-crazy up at my cabin.”
“Really?” Dawn asked.
“Hell yeah,” Gavin said before he scooped up a fry and popped it in his mouth. “I only get about three channels on the TV. There’s nothing to do. I mostly go for walks in the woods, but even that doesn’t kill much time. Maybe I’ll take up yoga.”
“Hey,” Jim said as he poked his head out of the kitchen. “I think I’m going to close up… Oh!” he said when he spotted Gavin. “Or maybe I won’t.”
Dawn waved him off. “It’s fine. Gabe is shutting down the kitchen. If you two want to go, I can close up on my own once Gavin’s done.”
“You sure, Dawnie?” Jim asked as he glanced at Gavin.
“Very,” she affirmed. “It’s fine.”
“All righty,” he said, shrugging before he slipped back into the kitchen.
“You don’t have to do that,” Gavin said. “I can hurry up.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she told him. “You’ve got a lot of food there to finish. Don’t rush.”
“Well,” he said as he picked up a fry that was more gravy than potato. “I think I made a tactical error. My eyes might have been too big for my stomach. You want some of this?”
“I wouldn’t say no,” Dawn said as she reached for one of the fries that had somehow escaped the gravy bath.
While they ate, Gabe and Jim finished up and left through the front door. Dawn turned off the neon “open” sign and locked the door behind them before she returned to her familiar place behind the bar.
“So,” he began as she poured herself a beer and then another for him, “you plan on being a waitress here forever?”
“No,” Dawn said. “I mean, probably not. I don’t know. My life hasn’t really involved sitting still for too long, I guess.”
“And why’s that?” Gavin asked as he drank some of the heady beer.
“Oh, no reason,” Dawn said, though it was a lie. “Maybe a bit of wanderlust. Once I got going, I realized I liked it.” That part was true. She liked Goosemont, sure, but she’d been thinking more and more about leaving, and the reasons she was staying were getting thinner and thinner. Courtney was gone, she had accepted that much, and it had been a week since she’d seen Jase.
Just thinking about him made her heart clench in her chest. She worried about him. She wanted him to be okay, but she couldn’t wait around in Goosemont forever. The time for her to leave was drawing near, and she was really starting to realize that.
“Everything okay?” Gavin asked, noticing the grimace that shadowed her face.
“Yeah,” she said as she forced a smile. “Just… Sometimes I think about Courtney, and think I should stay until I know for sure what happened to her.” And Jase, she mentally added.
“You can’t let that hold you back,” he said. “If it’s the right time for you to move on, people would understand. Although, I don’t know how happy I’d be about it.”
“Sorry?” Dawn said as she drew her hands back off the bar.
He smiled at her, his innocent puppy dog eyes meeting hers. “Nothing. I just… I like talking to you, and I hope that’s okay.”
A weird touch of anxiety caressed Dawn’s stomach, but she couldn’t explain why. Gavin had been nothing but nice to her, sweet and maybe even a bit naïve. Yet the idea of him missing her didn’t make her heart flutter. Instead, it left her uneasy and uncertain.
“Well,” she said, trying to be polite. “I haven’t decided yet. And I don’t know if I could just leave Jim. Poor guy, it would break his heart, with Courtney and all.”
“I can understand that,” Gavin said. “But while I know I can’t change your mind, I love it here. Sure, I’ve been a little bored, but the open air, the small town atmosphere, it’s pretty much exactly what I was looking for.”
“Yeah,” Dawn said. “Me too.”
There would be other small towns, though she knew that. Goosemont was nice, but it wasn’t entirely unique. She just needed to make up her mind and decide what was best. The only thing holding her back now was finding out what had happened to Jase, and even that couldn’t hold her for long.
“Well, it’s getting late,” Gavin said as he polished off the last of his burger. “I think I’m going to call it a night. Thanks for letting me stay.”
“It’s no problem,” Dawn said as she ran his bill. She left off the last beer, though part of her thought better of it.
“I owe you one,” he said as he pulled out his wallet and handed her a couple twenties. “Keep the change, by the way.”
“I can’t,” Dawn said as she tried to get his change. “It’s too much.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he said, smiling as he took her hand in his and folded the money into her palm. His touch was hot, hotter than she expected, and she was filled with a sudden urge to pull away from him. Somehow, something inside her said that reacting would be a bad choice, and she suffered through his scalding touch until he let her go.
“Well, thanks,” she said, forcing a smile.
“Want me to walk you home?” he offered. “Just in case.”
“It’s fine,” Dawn said. “I still have some cleaning to do here. Can’t leave dirty dishes, and all.”
“I don’t mind waiting,” Gavin said, his insistence startling her.
“Nah, don’t worry about it,” she said, putting on a casual, nonchalant mask that she prayed he couldn’t see through. “I don’t have a computer at home, and I was planning on using the office one for a bit after I closed up. Figured I’d Skype my mom. She’s on the west coast, and it won’t be too late for her.”
It was all a lie, but Dawn couldn’t stop herself. She knew that Gavin was a sweet guy who seemed genuinely concerned about her getting home safe, yet she couldn’t help but make excuses. Something inside her told her to stay put in the bar and stay there alone.
“That’s sweet of you,” Gavin said as he pushed himself up from his seat and grabbed his jacket. “Well, if you change your mind, call my cell,” he added as he scribbled his number on a napkin. “I’ll come right back and give you an escort. No funny business, I promise.”
“Thanks,” Dawn said with her forced smile. “Here, I’ll let you out.”
Time seemed to crawl as Gavin strolled to the door and Dawn followed. Her mind was screaming at her to get him out of the bar, to lock the door and stay put where it was safe, but she forced herself to move slowly, casually, and smile as she let him out.
“I’ll call if I change my mind,” she said as her fingers found the bolt and slide it open. “And thanks for chatting with me.”
“Well, thanks for staying late,” he said as he brushed a lock of blonde hair away from her face. The heat of his hand radiated off him, and she did her best to hide her desire to flinch and back away from him.
“Get home safe,” she told him, her friendliness never faltering.
“You too,” he said, stalling at the door. “Are you sure I can’t walk you home?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “Mom and I need some girl talk.”
“Okay. Have a good one,” he said as he finally stepped outside.
“You too,” she called after him. Even once he was gone, she needed to resist the temptation to slam the door in his face. Politely, she waved goodbye and watched him walk the first ten or so feet away from the front door before she finally closed the door and double-bolted it.
What the hell? her mind asked as she finally let the anxiety flow over her. Dawn’s body trembled, and she let out a nervous laugh once she was finally alone.
She couldn’t tell if it was her paranoia, or if it was something else
, but she was glad she’d listened to her instincts. Despite how nice Gavin was, there was still a seed of doubt in her mind.
Even after he was gone, Dawn didn’t just clean up and leave. It was getting late, but she stayed behind and did some extra cleaning. Something told her that staying put was in her best interest, and when she finally did leave, it wasn’t out the front door.
As the clock struck one in the morning, Dawn slipped out the back door in the kitchen. The door locked on its own behind her, and she made her way through the alley. It wasn’t a long walk home, but her fingers trailed over the boning knife she’d slipped into her pocket. She had the feeling that a little extra defense wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
Chapter Sixteen
Jim’s had been deserted the last couple of days. The hunters had left town, and even the FBI agents hadn’t been seen since just after Jase disappeared into the forest on his hunt for the beast. Word was there wasn’t enough evidence that it was anything but a wild animal and they were called back to their field office for a higher priority case.
Really, there had been no evidence of anything since the night the one hunter was bitten. His shooting had been declared an accident by the local cops, and they were trying to get anyone who might know something to come back to Goosemont, but since the victim had been from out of town and had no family, most people stopped caring after a day or two.
Still, most of the town was still opposed to going out at night. Jim’s was slow at the best of times, but now it was downright empty, and Dawn had been told to stay home the last two days.
Most of her time was spent looking at an AAA road map she’d taken out of a long haul truck about a year ago. Without a computer to use online maps, she knew it was a little outdated, but she couldn’t risk someone knowing where she was going next.
Dawn wasn’t quite sure where she was headed herself, but she knew she was leaving soon. She’d already started to pack up her necessities, but she knew she was going to have to leave a lot behind. A life on the road wasn’t meant for multiple suitcases and furniture. At most, she needed some clothes, her toothbrush, and some cash.