7. Brendan
Brendan
Sunday morning arrived with Puck on my face. He apparently exited his sleeping hammock sometime before six, conducted what sounded like a thorough audit of the bathroom, and arrived at my pillow with an energy that said he required my immediate participation.
“Off,” I groaned.
He dook’d directly into my nose.
“Puck, for the love of God, please.”
I lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling with a ferret’s asshole now positioned on my head. For no apparent reason, my mind immediately drifted to a text conversation I’d had at one in the morning that I had definitely not read three more times before going to sleep.
Me: Save my booth for me, please. Tell Jacks I’ll take a whiskey neat.
I moved Puck to the pillow beside me, where he immediately began investigating the pillowcase with great suspicion, as though it would somehow become animated and try to capture him.
Knowing my furry friend wouldn’t let me get another moment’s sleep, I got up, made coffee, and stood at the counter looking at Gerald on the windowsill.
Gerald looked back.
Or rather, Gerald existed on the windowsill, which I interpreted as a returned gaze.
“He’s coming back Saturday.”
Gerald said nothing. He wasn’t much of a talker.
“He texted first.” I picked up my coffee. “That’s a big deal, isn’t it?”
Still nothing.
“You’re right, I don’t know if it’s significant. It might just be how he is.” I glanced at my phone on the counter. I had thus far resisted opening the conversation again this morning. “He’s very warm. He might text everyone like that.”
Puck emerged from his pillowcase audit, skidding to a halt at my feet and looking up.
“Good morning.”
He dook’d.
“I know I’m talking to the plant. I’m aware. Plants need love, too, you know.”
He dook’d again, longer this time.
“Unlike some in this household, Gerald is a good listener.”
He made the sound that meant he disagreed and found my position embarrassing, then went to investigate the cabinet under the sink, which he did every morning despite the fact that nothing in the cabinet ever changed.
I fed him, watered Gerald, drank my coffee, and finally opened the conversation.
Me: Save my booth for me, please. Tell Jacks I’ll take a whiskey neat.
I put my phone face down.
Then I picked it up.
Then I put it back down.
Puck returned from his cabinet audit carrying a dish sponge he had no business having.
“Where did you get that?”
He blinked at me as though I was an idiot, then his eyes squinted down at the sponge in his mouth, then he made a sound I assumed was a muffled dook of defiance and left with the sponge.
I let him go because I was choosing my battles—and also because my phone was buzzing.
Tasha Goldmire had been my best friend since our days at USF.
In truth, she’s more of a sister than a friend.
There’s nothing we don’t share, and for better or worse, she might be even more mischievous than Puck.
Her quiet, reserved personality and dental lab coat often made people think she was an introvert’s introvert, but plant the idea of a prank in her head and she was as insane as those guys smashing melons on their heads on YouTube.
“Hey.”
“You texted someone last night,” Tasha said.
I frowned and stared down at my phone, then remembered Tasha had nothing to do with my phone, because she was a dentist in Westchase and not, as far as I knew, a law enforcement agency monitoring my messages. “How do you know that?”
“You have the voice.”
“I answered the phone and said exactly one word.”
“I’ve known you since before you were born. I was there. You weren’t. I know your tones. Your ‘hey’ has registers.” A pause. “Also, Alan texted me.”
“Alan doesn’t have your number.”
“Alan got my number four days after you and I became friends because Alan said, and I’m quoting, ‘Someone needs to be able to reach me when Brendan does something emotionally significant and refuses to report it.’ I thought it was funny, so I gave it to him.
” Another pause. “He’s very charming for someone so annoying. ”
I dropped onto a stool at the kitchen island and ran a hand through my bedhead. “There’s nothing to report.”
“You went back to the bar, didn’t you?”
“It’s a good bar. They have good fried thingies.”
“Fried thingies?” Her snort practically spat through the receiver. “You went back to the bar where the dancer is, didn’t you? You went to get your go-go on.”
“I don’t even know what that means. Besides, there are a number of people who work at Barbacks, Tasha, not just the dancer.”
“The dancer with the Speedo and the puppy who came to your clinic, that’s who you went to see. I bet you want to examine his python, didn’t you?”
I blinked rapidly at Gerald, hoping he would send help.
He didn’t even turn my way.
Bastard succulent.
“Brendan.”
“I may have left my number on the bill,” I said.
Tasha went quiet for a moment, which was her version of containing a reaction.
It was the deliberate pause of a medical professional who had powerful feelings and had long ago use thislearned to introduce a gap between her feelings and the expression of them in order to seduce her prey into a state of vulnerability before pouncing with fangs bared.
I’d heard her talk about this approach with difficult dental patients for years.
“You left your number?” she asked, as though she hadn’t heard me the first time . . . and examined my answer . . . and catalogued it for future use.
“On the back of the bill . . . with a note.”
“What did the note say?”
I looked at the ceiling, let out a long breath, and recited (because, yes, I’d memorized it), “For personal use only. Not for puppy emergencies.”
The sound Tasha made was small and high and extremely un-dentist-like. “Oh, that’s good.”
“It’s a note, Tasha. It’s barely even a note. It’s just a few words on a bill.”
“That’s a very good note, Brendan. That’s a note from a man who thought about what he was going to write. You put effort into it, and I’m not talking about the hip-thrust effort he puts into his act.”
“Tash!” I held the phone away for a second and tried to wipe the image of Adrian thrusting from my mind.
“He’s a go-go dancer.” She snorted. “His feet think faster than most people’s brains. Did he use said number?” I heard her moving around her kitchen, the familiar background sounds of a Sunday morning at Tasha’s, which always involved NPR and something being chopped.
"Yeah, he did."
She let out an unladylike squeal. "And? What did he say? How did you respond. Spill it before I drive over there."
“He said he wasn’t texting about a puppy emergency.”
“And?”
“We talked about how I left before I could speak with him in person.”
A longer pause this time.
“I love him already,” she said.
“You’ve never met him.”
“I love him anyway. A man who will debate the ethics of ferret kleptomania with a person he’s interested in through a barback during a go-go performance is a man worth knowing.” She resumed chopping. “When are you going back?”
“Wait. Rewind. None of that was in the note. How did you know—?”
“Brendan, baby doll, how could you doubt the power of my information network? I’m like the Spider in Game of Thrones. I don’t ask questions because I want answers. I ask so you can confirm what I already know.”
“Dear God, you are the CIA.”
“More like the FBI. CIA isn’t allowed to operate on domestic soil.”
I let my head fall to the counter.
“So, out with it. When are you seeing him again? I already know you have a plan. You plan your trips to the bathroom.”
“I do not—” I actually did. Shit. Fine. “Maybe Saturday.”
“Of course Saturday. Are you going to actually talk to him this time, or are you going to leave another third grade note and flee into the night?”
“I didn’t flee.”
“You left before he got off the bar.”
“I had an early morning.”
“It’s the weekend, you lovable idiot. The only early activity you had this morning was making coffee and probably getting sat on by that throw pillow of a pet you keep.”
“Hey! Show Puck a little respect. Besides, how did you know—”
“You complain about him sitting on your face first thing in the morning every time we talk. Literally, every time. I’m observant. You know this.”
“Like a surveillance camera.”
“Don’t forget it.”
Puck reappeared in the kitchen without the sponge, which was now somewhere in the apartment doing whatever sponges did when ferrets cached them. He climbed onto my shoulder and settled—my shoulder, where he could nuzzle my neck, was his favorite nesting spot.
“I asked him to save my booth.”
Tasha put down whatever she was chopping. “Your booth?”
“It’s where I sit.”
A pause. “And he knew what you meant?”
“Apparently.”
“Brendan.” The chopping didn’t resume. I was in serious trouble. “That man paid attention to where you put your perky little ass in a crowded bar.”
“It’s just a few text messages, Tasha, not the key to the Mayan calendar.”
“It’s thoughtful text messages from a man who was paying attention.” I heard her make a few aggressive chops. I quietly sent sympathies to the poor vegetable family of her current victim. “You’re allowed to let that mean something. People can mean something to you, B.”
“I’m not saying it doesn’t mean something.”
“You’re saying, ‘It’s just a text message,’ in the voice you use when you’re telling yourself something doesn’t mean anything. I’m going to scold you for this until you relent. It will go easier on you if you simply admit I’m right.”
CHOP!
I craned my neck and looked at Puck.
“I have a voice for that?” I asked.
“You have a specific voice for most things. Eight years, Brendan. I’ve known you longer than most inmates serve time.”
“What a flattering description of our friendship.”
CHOP! CHOP!
She didn’t so much as chuckle.
“Go Saturday. Sit in your booth. Let him find you there.”
“That’s the plan.”
“And when he comes down between sets—”
“He doesn’t usually, but if he does, I’ll talk to him.”
“Actually talk to him, B. Not about the dog.”
“The dog is a legitimate topic.”
“The dog is a safe topic. There’s a difference.” She let that sit for a moment. Damn it, I hated when she was right—and she was, honestly, always right. “You know the difference.”
And I did.
That was another thing about Tasha—she never told me anything I didn’t already know. She just said it out loud so I couldn’t keep pretending.
“Saturday,” I said.
“Saturday,” she confirmed. “Text me after.”
“I’m not going to text you after.”
“Alan will text me after. Same result.” She hung up before I could point out that this was a privacy violation, which it was, and neither of them would lose a moment’s sleep over it.
I put my phone down and looked at Gerald on the windowsill.
“She’s right.”
Gerald said nothing, which I chose to interpret as agreement.
Puck climbed from my shoulder and dook’d once, short and certain.
“I’m going, all right? Jesus. You, too? I’m surrounded by traitors.”