Martini, Dirty, On the Rocks

Teghan settled herself onto the bar stool, leaning forward on her folded arms. The bar was called the Black Dog, and it was her usual after-work drinking haunt. It was a popular drinking bar for bikers who came through from British Columbia, on their way to Toronto or the northern States--Montana, the Dakotas. It

had cheap drinks that were good for the price, and bartenders willing to throw out anybody who bothered her. That was why Teghan came here. A couple bottles of Jägermeister sat behind white-lit glass in a small box on the other side of the bar. The rest of the bar was washed with a warm, orange glow from the fairy lights around the ceiling. She turned her phone over on the bar top, checking the time-- 1:13am. She had gotten off work an hour ago; she was a bartender at [redacted], and her shifts tended to go late. She came here most nights, as an escape from having to speak to bar patrons. She was one of the few people in the establishment without tattoos.

"What can I get you love?"

Brynn, the mountain of a man who worked as a bartender most late-nights of the week--besides Saturday and Sunday--gave her a friendly smile as he walked up. He tossed the bar towel over his shoulder, folding his arms across his broad chest. His head had been shaved, which only played into what most people thought of the man--ex-military, likely special ops. He wore a white t-shirt tight enough that it seemed stretched around the enormous muscles of his chest and biceps. Dark tattoos stood out along his neck and forearms. Long Live, was spelled in black cursive along one side of his bald head, in large letters just above his left ear. Only Teghan knew that the man was a retired mine-inspector from Yellowknife. They had shared many drinks together, over the years. Despite his fearsome appearance, Brynn was one of the kindest men she had ever met--he also knew exactly how she took her drinks. He only asked for the pleasure of hearing her say it.

"Martini," she spoke clearly, "dirty, on the rocks."

"You got it, gorgeous."

Anybody else would have met the sharp side of her tongue, for that nickname. Brynn was... well, he was Brynn. He was different. There was a little bit too much sexual chemistry between them for Teghan to be entirely comfortable thinking of him as a father figure, or a protective older brother--but it was something like that. She didn't have many friends, but she had Brynn. The man would step in front of a train if she asked him to, and she would do the same for him. They spoke only in the bar; she had only added his number to her phone last week, but somehow it had just happened that way. She watched as the bald man turned away, grabbing a round glass off the shelf and placing it down on the counter. He filled the cup with ice with one hand as he worked with the other. As a bartender herself, she admired the swift efficiency of the man's movement. He poured two shots of gin into a tumbler, then turned to her with a wink, and poured in another two shots. He added a splash of vermouth, a smaller splash of olive juice, and shook the tumbler one-handed as he took orders from a pair of men down the bar. Returning, he poured the slightly cloudy liquid over the previously placed ice and popped an olive into it. She traded the man a ten-dollar bill as he slid it over the bar to her.

"Keep the change," she said.

"Aw--you do treat us well," Brynn grinned at her, "By the way, leathers' wants your number. Should I give it to him?"

She glanced down the bar. Leathers' was Brynn's familiar way of telling her that the man was wearing a biker jacket. She glanced down the bar to where the two men were chatting; they were both in their middle age, and probably had twenty years on her. Both men wore thick beards and open-fronted leather jackets decorated with patches. On the back of the closest man's jacket, she could make out Hell's Angels MC and below it in a curved white bar British Columbia. The further man wore a heavy mustache, with a small amount of beer foam clinging to the bottom of it.

"Which one--wait, no." She sipped her drink and shook her head as she turned back to Brynn, "I just realized I don't care which one. No."

Something had caught her eye, though. She watched from the corner of her eye as a young man came through the doors of the bar and took a seat between two wooden walls, tucked into a booth. He didn't seem to be hiding; he sat too casually for that, and he signaled for Brynn as he sat. She saw a swath of blonde hair, pulled back from a broad forehead. Every inch of the boy was tattooed, from the flats of his fingers and the back of his knuckles to the bottom of his throat. Two small daggers, points down, were etched into the skin beside his eye in blue ink. He was wearing a biker jacket, but it wasn't the scratchy black cut-off of the Hell's Angels; it was faded green, and the long sleeves were pushed up to his elbows.

"Whose that one?" She asked Brynn, tilting her head slightly in the young man's direction.

Brynn looked up, and cursed quietly when he saw the boy. He raised a large hand, indicating that he had seen his gesture and would be with him shortly. Leaning in toward Tegahn slightly, he shook his head.

"Not that one, gorgeous. He's bad fuckin' news."

"Whose he ride with?"

"Iron Teeth," Brynn grimaced, "fuckin' nasty gang out of the pineys. North Ontario boys. Haven't seen him out here since he was riding the back of his daddies chopper, but he was a nasty kid even then. Don't look like he changed much with the years."

"How do you know if he's bad news," Teghan gave the man a hidden smile, "if you haven't seen him since he was a kid?"

"'Cause I know his old man," Brynn shook his head, "If he got his skin with the Iron Teeth, he's got his daddies' mouth, and probably his temper. More fights when those bikes pulled up than any other time of the year."

As if on cue, Teghan watched the two older men realize who was sitting behind them. The wooden legs of their stools scraped on the bar floor as they pushed them backward, moving to stand. Behind the bar, Brynn watched carefully as the two men approached the young man's table. One of them slid into the booth across from him, the other folding his arms and leaning against the wooden wall of the booth. Either of the men alone were almost twice as large as the young man. Teghan also watched, though she pretended not to. Under the din of the bar patrons in the back of the establishment, none of whom had noticed the confrontation taking place beside the door, she could make out their voices. The young man's eyes looked almost lazy as he stared at the man in the opposite booth.

"You're riding out of territory," the mustached man leaned against the table as he spoke, "that's a bad call."

The boy didn't reply. Teghan saw a hint of dark eyes as he blinked in response to the man's words--he barely seemed to register them.

"I think maybe you should offer to buy us some drinks and take off," the other man offered.

The boy smiled. For a moment, Teghan forgot she was pretending not to watch. She started slightly. His top canine teeth, on either side of his mouth, were covered in metal caps--at least, she thought they were caps. The teeth themselves might have been removed. As he smiled, it revealed the white teeth around them, and she saw two pointed tips pressed against the bottom of his lower incisors. It truly did give the boy's already lean face the distinct impression of a snake. A snake which was ready to strike, should a hand unknowingly wander too close. Even sitting and relaxed, he appeared coiled rather than lounging.

"Whatever you're thinking--" the standing man took a half-step forward, "don't."

"I wasn't thinking anything." Hearing the boy's voice for the first time was a strange experience for Teghan. She's expected anything--except neutral. It was a completely normal voice, "I'm just here for a drink."

"Maybe we--" the mustached man began, but cut off as Brynn appeared beside the table. Teghan had barely registered that the enormous man had left the bar behind. Now he stood at the side of the table, his body placed firmly between the young man and the older men. He slipped a menu onto the table.

"Any issue here, gentlemen?" He turned his eyes on the bikers, who met his stare evenly, "It would be a shame to have to throw people out of here."

"No issues," the young man leaned back slightly, showing his strange teeth in another almost-fearsome smile, "I was just going to buy my friends' here a beer. Two of whatever they're having."

Brynn eyed the young man, "And for you?"

"Whatever 3am over there's been drinking," the boy's brown eyes flashed up to touch Teghan's for a moment--making her realize that she had turned slightly to study him, and that he had noticed. 3am?

"Careful, boy--" Brynn's voice held a slight edge, "Gin martini?"

"Two," he nodded in her direction. Pulling a red fifty-dollar bill from the upper pocket of his leather jacket and handed it to Brynn between two fingers, "keep the change."

Brynn stared at the bill for a moment, obviously surprised. He slipped it into his back pocket and gave the young man a considering nod. He jerked his head at the two bikers, indicating that they'd be best to reseat themselves at the bar. They complied slowly, studying the young man with hard eyes. As they retook their seats, Teghan picked her glass up from the bar and approached him. She slid into the booth opposite him.

"I think I preferred my previous company," he shifted slightly so that he was sitting with his back propped up where the booth met the wall, "I felt safer."

"What the hell's 3am mean?"

"Nothing open past 3am but legs," the boy replied easily; it was the ease of the insult that caught her off guard, feeling as if she had been rocked with a slap.

A flare of anger went through Teghan's body. She breathed out deeply through her nose--for a moment she considered flinging her drink in the boy's face, but she decided that was a waste of perfectly good gin. She thought about standing up and simply leaving him sitting there, but something stopped her. It was a quality to the boy's eyes; despite his words, they were not cruel eyes. They were careful and watchful; she had the sudden sense that he was weighing her.

"You think you're brave," she dropped her voice so that the conversation was only between them, "but you're just a prick."

"Probably," he shrugged his shoulders under his jacket, "but you're wrong about the first part. I don't think I'm brave. I'm just fearless."

"They're the same thing, dipshit."

He smile was infuriating; it was so cocky that for a moment she completely forgot about his metal teeth. She saw the smile of a young man who was exactly as he described himself--fearless. Beneath her anger, she thought grudgingly that he was actually handsome. She studied the tattoos on his skin carefully in the space of silence; most were obviously old, which she thought was strange. The young man was a couple of years younger than her, she guessed--maybe twenty-five on a good day. For his tattoos to look like that, he would have had to start getting them at... twelve? Maybe thirteen. Unlike many of the other gang-bikers' she had met, none of them were hate symbols. A ring of pine trees wrapped his right arm from the wrist to just below the elbow. The tattoos on his fingers were NORTH and SOUTH respectively, and she recognized the symbols on the back of his hands as a compass and a sextant. Most people didn't go around rocking swastikas and iron eagles--though a few still did; Teghan was pretty well versed in the designs that gangs used to hide hate-speech, and she didn't see any of them on the boy's skin. There were no numbers, lightning bolts, laced boots, hammers or knotwork. He had quite a bit of lettering, but none of it was Norse or Germanic. The only thing that she thought might hold an alternate connotation was the stylized wolf-head that peaked out from his left breast beneath the collar of his mussed, bleach-stained grey t-shirt. One of the animals' faded blue eyes stared out at her from the drooping V of his neckline.

"They're not," her eyes snapped back to his as he spoke. Had he read her fucking thoughts? "Brave and fearless--they're not the same." Teghan realized what he was talking about. He wasn't answering the question she had asked in her head, but continuing the conversation from before, "Bravery is doing what's right, independent of the outcome for yourself. Fearless just means you're not afraid of something happening to you. I'm not brave. You can be afraid and brave. They're different."

"Alright Shakespeare," she nearly spit the words over the table at him.

To her surprise, the boy only sat back with a comfortable smile. This time, it didn't part his lips. There was nothing to distract her from the bright, grainy brown of his eyes--a strange, but admittedly not unattractive combination with his dirty blonde hair. His features were so precise that they seemed almost delicate. A pair of metal rings stood out in his bottom lip, and he wore a single silver earring in the shape of a leaping trout, as if the fish were biting the bottom of his right ear.

"What do you want from me--" 3am? He didn't actually say the final words, but his eyes did.

"Nothing," she pushed herself up from the table, "forget it--fuck you."

Before she could step away, the young man reached out a hand and placed it on hers. The sudden contact of his skin sent a shock up Teghan's arm, and she turned back to meet his brown eyes. His expression almost managed to be apologetic--almost, but not quite. His eyes were slightly too sharp, the corners of his lips turned up just a fraction too high.

"I'm sorry," he said. Strangely, the words seemed genuine, "I'm unused to polite company. Please," he nodded his head to indicate Brynn, who was approaching from behind and holding two round glasses. He took Teghan's nearly-empty one from the table, replacing it before sliding the second in front of the boy.

Not quite knowing why, Teghan found herself sitting again. She slid back into the booth, wrapping her hands around the glass in front of her. The young man raised his own glass and sipped appreciatively. Setting the glass back down on the table, he offered one tattooed hand in her direction.

"Let's start again. I'm Peter." Peter--the name was so completely ordinary that for a moment Teghan thought he must be mocking her. She extended her own hand carefully, taking his.

"Teghan."

"That's a pretty name." Again, she studied his face for any hint that she was being made fun of--interestingly, she saw only honesty.

"You can't just drop a compliment after insulting me and expect me to sleep with you, but--thanks."

"Who says I'm trying to get you to sleep with me?" Again, blank honesty, "You came up to my table, remember?"

She thought about this for a moment, raising her glass and taking a sip from it. Brynn had obviously toned down the amount of gin in these ones, and she almost smiled--she knew that he'd be watching her like a hawk, tonight. She could feel his eyes on her from behind the bar.

"That's fair," she nodded slightly, lowering her glass back to the table, "Maybe I do--did--want to sleep with you. Doesn't change the fact."

"No, I suppose it doesn't." The corner of his lips tugged up, "Maybe I'm gay."

"Are you?" she asked, with genuine interest.

"No," he shook his head, "and yes--I'm trying to sleep with you." He raised his voice slightly, catching her off guard, "I'm staying at Chateau Motel, room 117." He lowered his voice again, "Want to come back with me?"

"Go to a secondary location?" Teghan raised an eyebrow, "With you? That you chose? No chance. I've got a room around the corner." She raised her own voice, "Hey Brynn--" the bald man looked in her direction from where he was busy pouring a pint from the taps, "if I don't call you by... 3am, come on by."

Peter laughed at the time, checking his wrist for a watch that was not actually there.

"I'd make it four." He worried the left lip-ring with his top teeth, giving his mouth an off-kilter kind of mischief.

"Confident," Teghan rolled her eyes.

"You got it," Brynn pulled a thumb up from behind the bar. His eyes touched Peter's for a moment, as if trying to bore into the young man's skull, "I'll be sure to watch the time carefully."

Downing the rest of his drink in a single go, Peter pushed himself to his feet with the flats of his hands and offered a hand to her. Teghan ignored it, swallowing her own drink and climbing out from behind the booth without his help. She heard him chuckling under his breath as she did so, and felt a small flush of heat in her cheeks--it was petty, she knew. She shoved him toward the door, getting a slightly louder laugh.

"Stay safe T," Brynn called from behind the bar. She waved a hand over her shoulder as she followed Peter out of the bar and into the cool Albertan night. She tucked her hands into her pockets and let out a low breath--it wasn't cold, but was cool enough that small goosebumps formed on her shoulders and the tops of her arms after the relative warmth of the bar. In front of her, Peter stripped off his jacket. She started slightly as he turned and draped it around her shoulders.

Now that was something that she had never seen before--not even with bikers' and their wives. A jacket was a second skin; it was like giving away a part of themselves. Peter didn't seem to notice how intimate the gesture was. She stared at him, slightly taken aback. If he saw her expression, he didn't comment on it. They began to walk down the street, but he paused after a few steps.

"Oh--there's a folder in the breast pocket, you mind?" He held his hand open in front of her. She didn't know what a folder was, but figured it out pretty quickly. Reaching into the inner pocket, she closed her fingers around what could only be a folding knife. She hesitated, holding the knife in her hand. Then, watching him very carefully, she handed the knife to the young man.

"Thanks."

The knife clicked quietly as he flicked it open with a quick jerk of his wrist. The gesture would have been alarming, except that he was already turning away from Teghan. She watched him with confusion as he made his way toward the side of the street. When it dawned on her, her eyes widened. He was walking toward a pair of motorcycles; one was a proper long-handled low-rider, and the other was a black sport bike that had obviously been custom-built with an extended fairing and a clear engine cover. White flames had been painted across the side of the second bike. Obviously, he had left his own bike somewhere else, because it was nowhere to be seen. At the motel, maybe. As Teghan watched, Peter flipped the knife over in his hand and drove it straight down into the front wheel of the first bike. He repeated the same motion with the second, and the otherwise quiet night filled with the low hiss of escaping air.

Suddenly, she remembered--he had raised his voice as he gave her his address. Because it hadn't been for her. It had been for the men at the bar. She let out a low breath, shaking her head as the young man wandered back in her direction. The knife folded closed in his hand, and he offered it to her.

"Keep it--" he grinned, "souvenir. Plus you can use it if you decide I'm getting a bit too handsy."

"I'll keep that in mind," she took a final glance at the bikes as they continued 82nd Avenue. He kept pace with her, his hands tucked casually into the pockets of his pants--sitting in the bar, she hadn't even realized that he was wearing sweatpants. Now she became acutely aware of the fact, as well as how they hugged his backside. She leaned back, not bothering to hide what she was doing as she studied his ass.

"Like what you see?" He turned over his shoulder as they walked, giving her a grin. Streetlights caught the metal studs of his teeth, making them flash--it gave his smile a sharp, polished quality.