by J. D. Glass
The pre-dinner crowd was light as we entered past the sign that announced dancing after dinner, and the smell of old wood, varnish, and spirits over the unmistakable scent of something roasted filled my lungs as a young man—I stopped half a heartbeat—greeted us.
It was automatic, the reach beyond the skin to the aethyric double. Him. The sandy blond hair that curved over the delicate face that perched over a slender neck and slight shoulders said one thing, but the energy signature, the soul the skin wore… I tried not to stare, but I was certain I knew him, recognized him on some fundamental level. He led us to a table and handed us our menus, letting us know he’d be back in a moment with the pints Uncle Cort had requested.
“Yet another thing to get used to,” I told him with a small grin. The biggest thing had been one of the simplest: crossing the street. A lifetime of checking left, then right had to be reversed and I compensated by truly paying attention to and using the crosswalks. Food-wise, the first thing had been the whiskey in the ketchup. That had been an unpleasant surprise. The next had been the unexpected tang of vinegar on my potato chips. Actually, I rather enjoyed that and had gotten into the habit of eating my fries or chips like that, vinegar and salt. But this, the last… “Warm beer,” I said and saluted him with it before I took a sip.
“Don’t be a heathen,” he returned with a smile, “it’s not beer, it’s ale, and it’s good for your blood this way.”
“Sure. Yeah. Right. When did they first get steady current and electrical refrigeration over here?”
He laughed outright. “Logan, your father, said almost the same exact thing to me once.”
“Really?” I asked, pleased for some reason. It was the first time anyone had mentioned my father that I didn’t automatically want to weep, but instead felt a warm sort of comfort, almost as if he were there and had put invisible arms around me.
“Truly. He insisted the virtues of warm beer were extolled because the people extolling it had no refrigeration.” He took a deep pull and smacked his lips. “He may have had a point, but it’s still pretty good this way. And besides,” he added, “it’s warm relative to refrigerated—it’s not as if it’s heated up like tea.”
The waiter came back, introduced himself as Graham, and after he took our order, Uncle Cort took me through the finer points of drinking ale, including a theory about the marketing of cold beer as a plot to destroy the ale industry, since cold beer could be stored for months, and ale for barely a week.
When a woman came up to the table and asked for a dance, I glanced up from my plate toward Uncle Cort and waved him away with my fork. “Go right ahead,” I told him, returning my attention to my plate. “I’ll be here with my well-done cow and my warm beer.”
“Actually, I was asking you,” she said, her voice friendly and low and I glanced up, first to see my uncle trying not to laugh at me, then to look over into a sparkling pair of light blue eyes, partially obscured by short dark brown hair that fell over in one long lock.
“Well, go on,” he said and this time he did laugh. “I’ll watch your well-done cow for you.”
Flustered, I stood anyway. “And my bass too,” I reminded him and pointed to where I’d tucked it under the chair and table, “don’t forget.”
“It’ll all be here,” he promised.
Her name was Hannah and as one dance became another and we fell into a real conversation, I learned that not only was I in what was considered to be the oldest bar in London, but also the oldest gay bar. I also learned that she was “taking a bit of a break” from gigging, since she was a studio and session drummer and had just come back from a six-week tour as a drum tech with a semipopular band.
It was a good conversation, and suddenly I realized I’d spent more time chatting with her than with Uncle Cort, who’d invited me.
“Hannah, I don’t want to be rude, but my uncle did invite me for dinner.”
“Of course,” she said and smiled, “and I’ve kept you. Maybe you’ll join me for dinner sometime?” she asked as we approached the table.
I thought about it and grinned. She was all right, but I wasn’t up for dating anyone yet, not with all the new…stuff…kicking around my head. Friends, though. Well, Elizabeth and Uncle Cort would certainly encourage that.
“How about…we could meet here sometime during the week and figure it out from there?”
“Sure, then. Here’s my number,” and she pulled a business card out from her wallet and handed it to me. Hannah Meyer, Kit and Percussion, Drum Tech and Repair it read, with her number beneath. Own Equipment and Transport it said across the bottom.
“Is that important?” I asked.
“Which?”
I pointed out the last line.
“Well,” she said with a little drawl, “it can be.” The accompanying gleam in her eye let me know I’d stepped into something I hadn’t meant to and I felt a rush of heat crawl up my neck.
She let me off the hook. “I’ll be here Wednesday, about five-ish—what say I stand you a drink and we can talk about bands, since you’re a bass player?”
“All right,” I agreed, “I’ll see you Wednesday,” and I sat back down to dinner with my uncle.
“So,” he said brightly, unable to hide his mirth completely in the lift of his brows, “did you have a nice chat? Oh, I think your cow’s cold, by the by,” he said, indicating my plate with his knife.
*
The place had begun to fill up by the time we were done, and Hannah waved to me and yelled, “Wednesday, right?” across the room as we made our way through the other patrons and to the door.
“So, the oldest pub, and the oldest gay bar in London,” I commented as the cool autumn air blew against our backs and we rounded the corner on Dean. “Any particular reason you picked that, or…” I let that hang in the breeze.
“Simply figured you’d never been, and this one’s so very nearby.” He shrugged in his thick, brown workman’s jacket. “That and you may want to do a bit of socializing there, so you might as well get comfortable with the place, right?”
We walked in companionable silence as I thought on that. I was confused. He was right, I’d never been to a bar before, and especially not a gay bar, but was he trying to help me out, was he trying to tell me something about himself…or both?
“Do you go there a lot?”
He gave me a sidelong glance as we neared the door next to the shop, the door that led directly to the steps into the flat. “No, but often enough. That bother you?”
“No,” I shrugged, “but it’s, well, it’s unexpected, I guess.”
He unlocked the door and swung it open, then waved me past him again. I rested my hard shell case on the floor and waited for him at the bottom of the landing. I watched his shoulders work as he took a deep breath and locked the door.
Tiger eyes met mine, deep amber flames in their depths.
“Samantha,” he said, the first time he’d called me that since I’d asked him not to, and that, combined with his tone, made something clench in my chest.
“You’re making two assumptions, the first one being that I’m straight, and the other being that if I were, I wouldn’t be comfortable around people that aren’t.”
I had assumed exactly that and attributed his comfort level with me to two things: first, he was my guardian, and the second—well, I wasn’t exactly a “girly” girl, by most standards. Other than biology and appearance, there was nothing I said or did that I could think of that marked me as a girl, and Cort didn’t treat me like one either. I guess I’d assumed that he was comfortable with me because he could treat me like, well, a guy.
“I know, I mean, I’m not like regular girls,” I said, “you know, like besides the gay thing.” I stared down a moment at the case that rested against my thigh and took a breath. “I’ve always sorta hung out with the guys at home and I guess maybe I’m more like them than a girl.” I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. “I figure that’s why we’re, you know, cool.�
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Uncle Cort laid a gentle hand on my shoulder and gave me an even gentler smile. “First, no one, absolutely no one, is completely straight or gay, not me, not you, not anyone, and we’ll leave that there for now. As for the rest…” He motioned me up the stairs before him. “I’m not looking at you as a boy, or a girl, as a man, or a woman,” he said, his voice firm, an underlying fire behind the words as we trooped up the stairs. “You’re here to be a Wielder, and I? I’m the forger, the teacher. There’s no room for that nonsense about boys and girls and the inanities about supposed differences. People live, love, bleed, then die. It’s that simple, and that short.”
He caught my eyes with his when we reached the landing. “Your strengths—and your weaknesses—are completely unique to you. That’s what I look for, what we have to work with, that’s what I help you develop and guard against. So I don’t care,” he said as we stood on the landing, “who, or how, you love, so long as the law of Light is guarded. Nothing else matters.” The flame in his eyes was ablaze as I opened the door at the top of the steps. “Nothing.”
My amp had already arrived and sat there in the hallway. “Well, Ann, go ahead and put that where you’d like it,” he said in his usual tone, “and no studies tonight—you need to spend time with your new love.”
He grinned at me then volunteered to carry the amp upstairs to my room when I said that’s where I’d practice. It was a matter of five minutes to discover the perfect floor position for it, and I mulled over our discussion as I experimented.
“No one’s completely straight or gay,” he’d said. Huh. What did that mean, anyway? And that bit about unique strengths and weaknesses… Did he mean regardless of being a boy or a girl or because of it? And where did that leave me, with my definitely female body and my decidedly nonfemale mindset?
But within seconds, none of that mattered: I found the sweet spot that I was pretty certain would give me back the tone I wanted to hear, and my heart thrumming with anticipation, I tuned up, strapped on, and plugged in. I let the vibrations from the bass flow through me as I plumbed the mysteries of the low end.
*
I did go to the pub Wednesday and since I was early I sat at the bar, where I met the bartender, Kenny Black.
“So, you’re new ’round here, yeah?” he asked as he handed me a pint.
“New to almost everything ’round here,” I answered with a grin.
His eyes lit up and he smiled. “Hey, you’re an American—I saw you carrying an instrument last night. What’re you playin’? You here with a band?”
“Nah.” I smiled. “I don’t know anyone yet.”
His blond and rather curly mohawked hair fell in soft curves over to one side and his eyes, dark and vibrant, were also honest and warm.
“Well, ya know me now, and I sing, play guitar,” he said and he held out his hand. “I’m not in a band at the mo’, but I’ve got an eye out, you know?” he told me as we shook.
“Well, I’ve finally got myself a Fender Precision,” I said, “it’s what you saw me with last night.”
“How long you been playing bass for?” he asked, curiosity sharpening his question.
“Well, if you count the time at the store plus last night,” I joked, and glanced at my watch, “about twenty-four hours—but I’ve been playing guitar for about ten years or so.”
A surprised expression crossed his face. “Hey, then you’re gonna be good at it. So many of the better bassists played guitar first.”
“You think?” I asked, genuinely intrigued.
“Oh sure,” he said airily, “you’ve got all that melody and theory down. You know, there’s a couple of all right studios around. Find us a good drummer, and maybe we can rent a few hours, make a little noise sometime, see what we can do?”
“Sounds good,” I nodded, warming to the idea. It not only sounded like fun, but I’d never been in a band before and then I could honestly tell Uncle Cort and Elizabeth that I was, in fact, making friends. “Where do you go to find studios around here, anyway?”
As Kenny and I chatted and debated the merits of different guitars, I felt the approach of a familiar energy: our waiter from last night.
“This fellow talking your ear off ’bout his eternal band search?”
I turned to find the same sandy brown hair, now slicked back except for the forelock that fell over bright eyes, and a delicate mouth smiling at me while Kenny laughed. “Ah, Graham, just chatting before you steal yet another bassist for your outfit. He,” and Kenny jerked his thumb in Graham’s direction, “is a ska-band man, and quite the Rude Boy about town.”
I raised my eyebrow at him as I reached for his hand. “Ann,” I told him as his palm met mine. That sense of recognition swelled, and I thought perhaps he felt it too from the way he examined my face. “What’s ska?” I asked with a grin.
Kenny laughed as he pulled another pint and Graham goggled as if he’d been told that yes, this really was a gag and it was all being filmed for television.
“Not know what ska is?” he spluttered. “And you’re a musician? God—where have you been? Kenny and I’ll have to take you ’round to some of the shows, then.” He smiled, perhaps a bit too charmingly for me, and I raised an eyebrow as I looked him over, his black sweater and its turquoise and white diamond blocks, the thin black tie over a narrow-collared shirt, his perfectly creased black pants over thick-soled creepers. I don’t know why I thought I knew him, I’d never met him before my first visit to the pub, and certainly never seen anyone that dressed like he did, except, perhaps, in old movies.
“Not that you look like the kind of girl that can be taken, I mean, uh—”
“Graham can’t speak to anyone about anything before he’s had breakfast, right?” Kenny saved him by handing him his mug.
“Why don’t you tell me a bit more about it, then?” I asked as Graham buried his face in the foam.
“Sure, sure,” he agreed after a hasty swallow. “Kenny, queue something up, hey?” he asked, pointing to the receiver that sat on a shelf on the wall behind the bar.
Kenny laughed as he moved to comply. “We’ll start it easy, then, shall we?” he asked over his shoulder as he flipped and selected through a pile of discs and tapes.
I’d been thoroughly introduced to some of “the best of what’s around, I tell you, not that new, Victorian, dark wave stuff,” as Graham put it by the time Hannah stepped in to join us.
There was certainly a lot of strong musicianship involved in ska, I mused as I listened to the interplay between the bass and the drum, and the speeding trumpet and horn melodies that danced in my ears. So far, ska sounded quite a bit like super-fast reggae with amazing horn sections arranged not as accompaniment, but as main melody instruments.
I kept listening to the music as a friendly argument ensued between Hannah and Graham about music and genre, the value of the message and whether or not it was diluted by the medium, and by the time I realized that I’d better get back to the shop so I wouldn’t miss dinner, we’d all agreed to meet there Sunday morning, then go together to the studio Hannah preferred, see if we could have a bit of fun.
“Well, consider me filler, because you know I’m looking to build a ska band, but we’ll give it a shot,” Graham said, and just like that, we were set.
*
With our first rehearsal set for Sunday morning and a second set for the following Tuesday afternoon, I practiced obsessively between lectures and training sessions. My shoulders, with the help of the weights I no longer noticed, had grown immune not only to the weight of the sword, but also to the weight of the bass, and as the calluses on my fingers thickened then smoothed from fretwork, so did the ones on the pads of my hand from the workouts Uncle Cort put me through, first with a practice weapon made of rattan and wrapped in duct tape to give it sufficient heft, and then with live, naked steel.
Somehow I managed to help Elizabeth and Uncle Cort ready one of the two spare rooms for Fran’s visit. We chose the one near mine beca
use it received more daylight.
I hadn’t seen her since our graduation, and when she emerged from the gate at Heathrow the very first thing I noticed as I moved through the press to greet her was her eyes. They were overlarge and overbright in a face that had thinned since early June, and she’d let her hair, the wavy honey and wheat mane, grow longer. Grief had changed her, I thought as we embraced, the fierce wrap of competitors, the close touch of friends, and if for a few moments I was startled by the familiarity and the strength of the arms around me, the surprise disappeared when I happily returned the hug.
“You made it!” I said finally over the din as we parted slightly to examine each other.
Fran smiled, the beautiful smile that I knew so well, the one that had caught my eye and heart so long ago and, I knew without a doubt, quite a few others as well.
“One piece, no less,” she agreed.
Once we released each other, I reintroduced her to Uncle Cort whom she’d met before graduation, and to Elizabeth, which was slightly awkward since she was neither relative nor friend but a bit of each. I finally decided on “close family friend,” which worked well enough. I took Fran’s hand in mine as we struggled through the crowd to find her luggage at the proper carousel.
It was non-stop chat on the ride back and through lunch. Cort and Elizabeth shooed us out to wander around a bit so Fran could get her bearings, which was funny to me, since I still needed a map. We wandered over to Wardour Street, the London version of Chinatown, and got a neat kick out of hearing the mix of languages and accents, so different from the heavy Staten Island voicing, the Italian lilt, or the occasional Irish accent we’d grown up with. And despite all the familiar enticing smells, it was very different than Chinatown in New York, because it was so sparkling clean.
After, we walked ’round and about back to Soho Green in the middle of Soho Square before calling it a night—even though Fran wanted to go to the famous Ronnie Scott’s jazz club.
I laughed and promised we’d go the next day, or maybe the one after—she’d only just arrived—and I laughed again when she yawned during her protest.