The jukebox keeps stuttering, looping on the same last word until the meaning runs out 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 that you’re doing. Maybe someone’s left the door open? No, you’re not cold, it’s just your… heart beating, or is that his? Either way, that’s a bit too fast.
A nearby glass rings against another, and she jumps a little on her stool.
That might as well have clinked inside your head.
Eli’s hand wraps around his drink, his finger reaching to the rim and tapping in time with both pulses, on and off. He looks down at their knees touching under the counter and up at her.
She’s doing this to me, right? But she looks as confused as I feel. So, am I doing the same to her? It’s 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 drifts in from a place too far away.
Maz sips her wine and only notices her trembling hand when putting the glass down. At the edge of her vision, she watches the shadows stretching taller, 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?
She tries to shake it off, but the colours of the pub seem to sharpen and brighten at the centre, everything else melting away at the edges, as if the walls take the people and blur them into uncertainty.
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.
His fingers tap 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. Gaps, I’ve got this… seven seconds, to be precise, between my breaths. Is this helping? Obviously– “…Half for you–”
He sits upright.
Oh, great, now I’m thinking in Ari’s voice. Is it the drink?
Maz’s hand slips off her glass and stiffens, her fingers curled tight, pinching at something invisible on the bar.
Was that Ari?
She looks up and spots Ari.
He’s way over there across the pub. You’re not drunk.
Her brow creases when Ari’s voice continues in her mind.
“–Half for you…” Again? Stop it.
A smell reaches her from so close by 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; tables appear to have taken the form of desks, everything resembling an office for a moment.
Yeah, so 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 strained mime of holding a pen.
“…Sign here…” Am I still imagining voices, or did she say that just now?
He turns to her.
“What?”
She jolts at his voice, the back of her hand slapping her glass and making it wobble from side to side. Her fingers hook it straight before it topples over.
“What?”
Val’s laugh arrives behind Maz. Dogs bark from beside Eli. A desk bell rings from somewhere above them. The warmth inside the pub drains out. They turn, looking around with panic in their eyes, only to find that Val still stands by the dartboard in a chat with Meg, no dogs, no bells, and no open doors to bring in any cold.
When a woman shouts curses from a distance, the lively sounds of the pub return from their muffled state, in all their glory and thunderous laughter. The colours snap back around them, bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder, though the corners remain undecided on how sharp they need to be.
Maz’s hand shoots towards Eli’s wrist, but veers away before slipping into her pocket.
His knee jitters, heel kicking air down over the bar’s footrail. He catches her gaze as she retrieves 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, the dense weight of it jarring through her arm as the mint tin claps shut and 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, but his fingers skim the side of it and catch only air as he mumbles stifled curses.
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 vanish 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.
Sparkling sequins catch her eye when Deon melts into a crouch to collect the tin without ever looking away from her. As they rise, they reach beneath the bar for a cocktail napkin and dab the tin dry. They turn it over and back, letting their thumb read the deformed serpent embossing 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 in pitch.
“Don’t you?”
Eli’s chair scrapes as he gets halfway up and stops.
What’s the point if I make a scene now?
His hand goes 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 the bar.
“Deon.” The name comes out not like a name at all, too close to a need.
“Give it back.”
Their gaze moves from Maz’s tense face to Eli’s pocket and returns to Maz. Deon’s smile changes, curling bright at the edges and puckering cruel in the centre.
“No.” A slow wink follows, more of 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 lifts his hands, abandons the attempt to cross his arms and grips his own elbows instead.
“You’re enjoying this.”
Deon’s grin flashes.
“I contain multitudes.” They give a nod towards the shelves before tucking the tin into their waistcoat pocket as they turn.
Over their shoulder, they add, gently enough, “If you take it tonight, you’ll lose another day that’s already running short.” A flick of their hand unlatches the bar flap and flings it up towards the lights.
“And I’m bored of watching you fade away.” They step through and let the hatch take its time to descend back into place as they disappear amongst the crowd.
Maz looks away, eyes landing on the mirror on the pillar at the centre of the bar. Amid the assortment of stickers, beneath the engraved words ‘The Archive’, she spots her reflection, eyeliner smudged and face a touch too pale.
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 put up with a party trick.
Maz watches the clock hands crawl ahead five more times before they fall silent. Nobody else looks at it. Nothing happens. She glances at the mirror again.
‘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, as if entering a darker room. An ‘L’ scores itself into the glass, just as slowly, after ‘The’.
She nudges Eli with her elbow, without noticing he has already fixed his eyes on the mirror.
The longer they look, the more the letters bleed and rearrange, the pub name sliding to one side, smoothing and etching itself over, making room for the new arrivals. When it stops, it reads, clear as a dare:
‘The Lower Archive.’
She blinks on repeat, as if reality hides between the frames.
Lower what now?
Neither of them looks away. Maz’s last sip sits unswallowed in her mouth as Eli runs his finger over the bar’s surface, not finding the groove this time.
A series of loud clanks cuts through the noise.
They twist towards the sound to see the metal of the jukebox rattle beneath its humming glass, and a bearded customer standing in front of it. He seems built like a wedge of a man designed for breaking things to fix them. As if he has made it his task, he repeatedly drives his fist, stained black, into it. The machine wheezes as the song reels backwards, scrubs forwards, stops, and breaks free of its hiccup at last.
‘You’re never ever really home.
Named by the dead, by the cold crowns crossed.
You walked a threshold not your own,
And the way back became the thing you lost.
Forever exiled. Forever gone.’
Laughter bursts from the pub. A few applaud the man for abusing the machine to life. The rest cheer at finally hearing the tune or at the brief storm of noise. After a clumsy mock bow, he retreats with a hitch in his limping step, heaving his uneven frame to his table.
Every reflection in the mirror tilts towards Maz and Eli as they turn back. They avoid the clock and the mirror, leaving themselves only the bar top to stare at.
His hand closes over hers as she sits at the edge of her seat.
“Let’s go home.”
Advance chapters available on Patreon now! https://www.patreon.com/TolaLone