3. Chapter 3
three
Jamie
I f heaven had an address on earth, it would be in this city, in this repurposed warehouse, at my bar.
I push the brim of my hat up and wipe the sweat off of my forehead, grinning like an idiot.
Happy hour ended over an hour ago and the crowd hasn’t let up.
I’m in the back room, switching the hoses on a keg of Pale Ale as the cover band launches into a Rolling Stones song.
I can’t help but bang out a little drum solo on the keg.
A year ago, when I opened the doors to Fortune Brewery, I was lucky to sell twenty pints a day. Tonight, I’ve tapped a keg in the middle of a rush and I’m ecstatic over the inconvenience.
I wipe my hands on my jeans and push back out into the main bar, scoping out the line four deep with hipsters and college kids starting the weekend early.
There was a longer-than-I-care-to- admit stretch of years when I spent Thursday through Sunday partying on this same strip of bars.
But this bar, and the beer we serve, belongs to me. It’s still a little surreal.
I’m working so hard, my T-shirt is stuck to my back when I notice a couple of guys elbowing their way to the front.
I recognize one of them from school and have to bite back a groan.
I prefer the nights when none of my customers remember me as a sixteen-year-old fuck-up with a barely passing GPA and a first name familiarity with the local cops, but Portland’s not big enough to hide from your past.
“Jameson Bishop,” he shouts, giving the kid in front of him an I know the owner wink as he cuts the line. He’s drunk, but since he got that buzz buying my beer, I can’t really complain. The two of them sidle up to the bar.
“Call me Jamie,” I say to his friend. I pour a pint for a guy with a buzz cut and a styled mustache, then reach over the bar for a quick handshake.
“Man’s named after a whiskey and finds himself brewing beer,” he says.
“And I find myself doing quite well, thanks.” I know he doesn’t mean anything by it, but having dodged a few jabs about my profession from my family, I never let a comment like that slide. Plus, I’m feeling cocky tonight.
I gesture to the line of eight taps—five more than when I opened—and lift my chin to him. “What can I get you?”
“Gimme that orange one.”
I turn to his friend.
“What do you suggest?”
I shrug like I’m not chomping at the bit to show off my newest recipe. “We’re launching the autumn ale tomorrow night. Dark. Spicy. I could let you have an early taste.”
He gives me finger guns, and I pop open a bottle from the reserve fridge and pour it into a glass so I can keep the label under wraps until the party.
The guy takes a sip and his mouth curves upward. “Boy knows his stuff.”
I bristle a little at “boy.” I can’t help but hear one of my former stepfathers who always referred to me as “Laura’s boy” instead of using my name. As if I were a piece of furniture she brought along to the marriage, one that he had to concede to but would’ve preferred I’d been lost in the move.
I turn another glass under the tap, drawing the perfect amount of head, and slide “that orange one” across the bar.
“This is fantastic, Jamie. Really.”
My face pulls into one of those goofy smiles I get when people like my beer.
I have a small team of brewers on staff and most of my beers are collaborations, but this one in particular is all my creation.
It’s nutmeg he’s tasting and to say I took a chance combining it with the other flavors would be an understatement.
Clearly it worked, and the praise is like a shot of endorphins.
“Jamie!” Em bursts through the door from the back room, her forehead damp beneath the plastic snapback of a backwards Bruins hat. She’s been busting ass beside me all night. “Get the hell out of here.”
I look at the digital clock on the register and, shit , I need to be across town and suited up in thirty minutes.
The hockey league I play in on Thursday nights is my one night away from this place.
I think it’s Em’s favorite night because in the two years she’s worked for me, first on the brewery floor, now at the taproom, she never lets me leave late.
She also never lets an order get missed or a shift go uncovered.
That she doesn’t have the official manager title is solely due to the fact that I keep forgetting to order her new business cards.
I glance at the line again. “You sure you can handle it?”
“You sure you meant to say that out loud?”
I laugh, tossing my towel on the bar, and quickly cash myself out. “Give the band a refill when they break.”
Em salutes me, then in case I thought she was going to take an order, flips her hand around to give me the finger.
The rink we play at is over the bridge and into the suburbs. It’s half an hour from downtown but most of the guys are married now with huge houses and manicured lawns out here, so I’m the only one who has a commute.
I drop my bag on the bench and lace up my skates, watching Trev and Derek do a few laps around the rink to warm up.
Greg falls into the seat beside me, stretching his tricep across his chest. “You bring your A game tonight, Bishop? I’m not losing to a goddamn accountant and a high school music teacher again. ”
I laugh at the trash talk. Most of us have known each other since we played pee-wee so it’s all in good fun. We’re competitive, but no one is under the illusion that we’re not a handful of years out from being an official old man league.
“If I remember correctly, it was your boneheaded penalty that gave us the power play.”
He pretends to scratch the side of his face with his middle finger. “Kelsey coming to watch?”
I squint at him, surprised Greg even knows about her. Even if he got the details wrong. “It’s Kelly, and no.”
“Because she’s busy or because you didn’t invite her?”
“Both,” I say, snapping my helmet on. “It’s not like that.”
Yesterday I sent Kelly a text to see if she’s planning to show up for the launch tomorrow—a pretty big night for my career—and she has yet to reply. That’s what it’s like.
“Where’s this coming from?”
“The guys were chatting about you and her the other day at the pool.”
I tilt my head. “You were talking about me at your kids’ swim lessons?”
“I said the new instructor seemed nice and maybe we should slip her your number.”
“Oh, so you were trying to set me up at your kids’ swim lessons. That’s so much less weird.”
Greg shrugs, showing zero remorse for the overstep. When we all hit thirty, they started doing shit like this—dropping random comments about their wives’ friends and how single they were. Asking pointed questions to draw attention to some flaw in whoever I’m casually seeing at the time.
I’m aware that Kelly could be a little more supportive, but she’s a good time and a great distraction—exactly what I’m looking for while I’m building my empire.
Basically, it’s hockey on Thursdays and Kelly on Saturdays that keeps me from burning out with the number of hours I’m putting in.
But, fuck it, I’m young and healthy. I can work myself to death now and reap the rewards later.
Besides, I tried the whole Love me forever ? thing with Becca, and the answer was Kinda busy sleeping with someone else, thanks . I may not have been the best student in school, but that’s the kind of lesson you learn hard and you learn once.
“Don’t get your hopes up.” I shift on the bench, my stomach suddenly tight. “And send me a picture of the swim instructor.”
Greg slaps me on the shoulder with a chuckle, like he’s giving up. “You never change, Jamie.”
We hit the ice five minutes late because of all the bullshitting, and after a solid hour of play, Derek calls a water break. Chase is breathing heavily as he slumps against the glass and squeezes water through his goalie mask.
“You guys coming tomorrow night?” I ask, panting just as hard.
Greg’s face pulls into a smile. “Course we are. We’re fucking proud of you, bro.”
I accept the compliment even as a little voice reminds me that, though I work damn hard, not all the credit for my success is mine to take.
Do I go around telling people that my biggest business break came from a psychic at a party?
No. But anyone who knows me knows I’m not exactly a business mastermind, and the name says it all: Fortune. Luck.
Derek slaps me on the back. “Looking forward to it. Hoping it will be a little classier than the parties you used to throw.”
I shake my head because I know where this is going.
Trev leans on his stick, making a face. “You don’t think he’s planning on celebrating this business milestone by drinking a bottle of Fireball and sleeping in his car?”
Derek points his water bottle at Trev. “That’s the after party.”
Maybe it’s the you never change comment from Greg, but an age-old insecurity tightens my jaw. We all know I stayed in my dumbass phase a lot longer than these guys, but sometimes I wonder if they’ve even noticed that I’m out of it now. Or trying like hell to be.
I pretend to fix the snap on my helmet. “You three reminisce like a bunch of old men.”
Derek makes a show of stretching his quads. “I take a hundred-fifty milligrams of ginkgo biloba every day to be able to remember all of that shit, so I’m gonna bring it up when the moment calls.”
I laugh. “You can remember it all because you finally stopped getting high every weekend.” He also traded cans of Natty Ice for a vintage wine cellar in his basement and his beater Altima for the latest Audi A6.
He shoves me with his gloved hand. “Can still drink you under the table.”
“It’s sad how badly you wish that were true.”
Chase taps his stick on the ice. “Are we playing or you guys wanna grab a box of wine and make a scrapbook?”
I shake my head and take off to center ice. I’m keyed up for tomorrow and I need at least one more period of crushing cardio if I’m going to get a decent amount of sleep tonight.