The jukebox keeps stuttering. It loops on the same last word until the meaning drains and becomes monotonous enough to register as white noise.
Maz shifts on her stool. Her knee knocks against Eli’s, and a cold line cracks between them.
Stop shivering. Or whatever this is. Maybe someone’s left the door open? No, you’re not cold. It’s your… heart beating? Or is that his? That’s a bit too fast.
A nearby glass rings against another.
Maz jumps a little on her stool.
That clinked almost inside your head.
Eli’s hand wraps around his drink. His finger reaches to the rim to start tapping in time with two off-beat pulses. He looks down at their knees touching under the counter and up at Maz.
She’s doing this to me. But she looks as confused as I feel. So, am I doing the same to her? It’s just hearts beating. Isn’t this supposed to be a normal thing?
The pub’s noise turns flat and muffled in their ears, as if it all comes from somewhere too far away.
Maz sips her wine. She only notices her trembling hand when putting the glass down. The shadows stretch taller in her periphery, her own doubled.
Not this again.
She drinks a mouthful.
If the second one moves, you’re leaving. Of all the things you should actually remember– “…You will forget…”
Her gasp sounds too close to a yelp.
What the…? Are you hearing Mr. H’s voice in your head now?
The colours of the pub melt away at the edges, where the centre is too bright and the walls are uncertain.
Eli’s grip loosens on his glass.
Oh, lucky me. My brain decided to save a seat for Mr. H. I could still be remembering his argument with the woman outside.
He taps a different rhythm, more for order than comfort.
She said ‘counting helps’, right? Okay… Three clinks of glasses. Five skips from the jukebox per minute. Seven second gaps between my breaths. Is this helping? Obviously– “…Half for you–”
Eli sits upright.
Now I’m thinking in Ari’s voice. Great. Is it the drink?
Maz’s hand slips on her glass while her fingers are rigid around nothing in the shape of holding a pen.
Was that Ari?
She looks up and spots Ari.
He’s all the way across the pub. You’re not drunk. “–Half for you…”
Her brow creases when Ari’s voice continues in her mind.
Again? Stop it.
A smell reaches her so close that she can almost see the rotting rind of a pomegranate.
Eli’s shoulders sink. The pub feels as if it shrinks; the walls tilt and creep closer, making it seem like an office in the corners of his vision.
Yeah. And all I’m missing is a stack of paperwork? Right. Completely normal evening.
The condensation on his glass creeps upwards.
What? Gravity still would work even if I was drun– “…Are you still queuing for Oblivion? The Waiting Room’s got everyone in the wrong order…” That. Was me. But… What was I talking about?
His gaze locks onto Maz’s hand, which pretends to hold a pen.
“…Sign here…” Am I still imagining voices, or did Maz say that just now?
He turns to her.
“What?”
Maz jolts at his voice. The back of her hand slaps her glass and makes it wobble from side to side. She catches it before it topples over. Her eyes snap to him.
“What?”
Val’s laugh arrives behind Maz. Dogs bark from beside Eli. A desk bell rings above them. The pub’s warmth drains out.
They turn, looking around with panicked eyes. Val is still by the dartboard, chatting to Meg. There are no dogs in sight. No bell. Doors are shut.
The sound returns from its muffled state when a glass shatters nearby.
Maz’s hand jumps towards Eli and clamps on his wrist. His knee jitters with his heel kicking air down over the bar’s footrail.
A woman curses from a distance.
The pub snaps back around them. With all its glory of laughter being too loud and bodies pressed in too close. The corners haven’t yet decided how sharp they need to be.
Maz’s fingers find the bar and give a single knock before going to her pocket.
Eli catches her gaze as she pulls out the mint tin. She tips it towards him from under the bar. He gives a slow blink as if to nod. She works the lid as the branding on top dishes inwards and out in clicks and clacks. She balances it between her fingers before–
Thump.
Someone barrels into her shoulder from behind, and the dense weight of it jars through her arm.
The mint tin claps shut before it slips out of her grip.
“Sorry, love. That corner wasn’t there last night.” A man’s rasping laugh floats back.
Eli lunges for the mint tin, where his fingers skim the side of it only to catch air as he bites out a curse.
Maz scrabbles after it as it hits the floorboards.
She tracks the thin gleam of metal across the floor. It bounces around a small puddle of spilt drinks, hits the leg of a stool beside her, and skitters through a gap beneath the bar to disappear out of her line of sight.
Hands braced against the counter, she leans and stretches herself forward for a glimpse. Her eyes find the tip of a polished shoe halting the mint tin’s flight.
Sequins catch at the edge of her vision when Deon melts into a crouch to collect the tin without ever taking their eyes off her. As they rise, they take a cocktail napkin from beneath the bar and dab the tin dry. They turn it in their hand. Their thumb reads the shapes embossed along the top.
Deon clicks their tongue.
“Darlings…” They flip the lid and peek inside.
“You do know what this is for.” Their voice drops a pitch.
“Don’t you?”
Eli’s chair scrapes. He gets halfway up and stops.
What’s the point if I make a scene now?
His hand reaches towards his pocket and covers the thin outline of the metal still there.
One last scale. One more day of pretending this is a choice.
Maz slaps her hand on the bar.
“Deon.” The name comes out not like a name at all, too close to need.
“Give it back.”
Their gaze moves from Maz’s stiff stare to Eli’s hand and back again. Deon’s smile changes, bright at the edges and cruel in the centre.
“No.” A slow wink follows, more an invitation to a bad idea.
Maz winces with her chin dipped to one side.
Don’t beg. Don’t reach over and bite them.
Deon’s voice deepens into a grim rumble.
“I’m saving you from yourselves. Try to look grateful.”
Eli puts his hands on his arms.
“You’re enjoying this.”
Deon’s grin flashes. They give a nod towards the shelves before tucking the tin into their waistcoat pocket as they turn.
“I contain multitudes.”
Over their shoulder, they add, almost gentle,
“If you take it tonight, you’ll lose another day that’s already running short.” They’re already moving.
“And I’m bored of watching you fade away.”
They leave the bar and disappear into the crowd.
Maz looks away. Her eyes land on the sticker-plastered mirror on the pillar at the centre of the bar. Her eyeliner’s smudged, face a touch too pale under the engraved ‘The Archive’.
The sound of a screech and a clang pricks up Eli’s ears, dragging his attention upwards. Another clang follows another screech. All sixteen hour hands on the clock above the mirror move forward with a grind that suggests dragging metal on marble.
It looks like weird metal on cheap plastic to me. Oh, well. As long as I’m not hearing Mr. H again, I can take a party trick.
Maz watches the clock hands crawl ahead five more times before they fall silent. Nobody else looks at it. Nothing happens. Her gaze drops back to the mirror.
‘The Archive’ of bad jokes and lost scales.
One flake of ink fades off a sticker on the mirror, leaving a blank that takes a moment to resolve, like a vision readjusting when entering a dark room. An ‘L’ scores itself into the glass, just as slowly, after ‘The’.
Her elbow nudges Eli, instinctively, but he’s already staring at the mirror.
The longer they look, the more the letters bleed and rearrange. The pub’s name slides about either side, smoothing and re-etching itself, making room for the new arrivals. When it stops, it reads, clear as a dare:
‘The Lower Archive.’
Maz blinks.
Lower what now?
Neither of them can look away. Maz’s last sip sits unswallowed in her mouth. Eli’s finger rubs on the bar’s surface, not finding the groove this time.
A series of clanks, loud enough to turn heads, cuts through the noise. Metal rattles as its glass hums.
They twist towards the sound to see a bearded customer repeatedly driving their fist, stained in black, into the jukebox. He seems built like a wedge of a man designed for breaking things back into shape. The machine wheezes as the song reels backward, rolls forward, and stops. It rewinds and breaks free of its hiccup at last.
‘You’re never ever really home, are you?
The dead know your name, but the living forgot.
You walked out a door that was never quite yours.
The way back was always the thing that you lost.’
Laughter bursts from the pub. A few applaud the man for abusing the machine back to life. The rest cheer for finally hearing the tune or for the brief storm of noise. He retreats with a hitch in his step as he limps back. After a clumsy mock bow, he heaves his uneven frame to his table.
Maz and Eli turn their gazes back to the bar. They avoid the clock and the mirror along the way, only to stare at the surface.
Every reflection in the mirror tilts towards them.
Maz is already sitting at the edge of her seat.
Eli’s hand closes over hers.
“Let’s go home.”
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