The inside of The Armory usually exuded a red glow from every surface. Tonight, this was technically the truth—the recessed ceiling lights certainly strained to emit their various shades of crimson into the atmosphere. But as for surfaces, Chris could find none when he scanned the room. He’d bumped his way through three rows of wobbly shoulders to order the Jack and ginger in his hand, making him the first of the crew to succeed at grabbing a drink and therefore, the one responsible for finding everyone else a place to sit.
“It looks like those people are about to leave.” Traci appeared right next to Chris, yelling to be heard over the din (about half-successfully). She gestured—open hand, so as not to appear rude by pointing—at a couple in the corner, taking up a whole booth just to sit on the same side. Chris rolled his eyes.
“Okay, word,” he called back to Traci, who was in the process of being squeezed even closer to him by a jostle of the crowd. The two lingered, anticipation in their eyes, while everyone else slowly elbowed their way to the bartop. The room was usually hot on a Saturday night, but tonight, it swayed back and forth as vigorously as the Cocteau Twins wafting out of the jukebox. It was, as Aaron was often saying, electric. He’d seemed like a bit of a bro when he was first hired, but Aaron had come to grow on Chris, so much so that he’d picked up a few of his mannerisms.
Jason was the next to emerge from the throng of bar patrons, nearly spilling his beer and chaser shot as he broke through the wall of people. By then, the couple in the booth had slowly started to get up and put their coats on.
“Where the fuck are we gonna sit?” Jason panted. Chris gestured gently—open hand, still—to the booth. “Oh.”
Vanessa and Amy joined the group together, each drinking a Malibu and pineapple. Even though new bartender Amy was a senior and Vanessa a freshman, they’d bonded fast over being students at the nearby, teeny-tiny art college, so much so that Vanessa had started going out with the group. At first she skated by on her coworkers knowing the doorman, but when that didn’t work, she presented a Florida ID, despite hailing from one neighborhood over.
“She’s my other half,” she’d told Chris the first time he watched her shove it back into her wallet behind her actual ID. “Victoria.”
Couple now gone, Traci staked her claim by tossing her purse the distance between the bench seat and where the group was standing. It bounced twice but remained on the seat’s leather surface.
“Yeah!” Traci cheered as she brushed and elbowed her way to the booth. Jason followed suit, leading the rest of the crew through the writhing crowd. The eight of them filled into both sides of the booth, Chris landing on the aisle next to Traci, then Eliot, then Aaron.
“Here’s to restaurant week finally being over!” Eliot toasted.
“And here’s to Little Joe finally getting the fuck out of my bar!” Traci followed up as the glasses were clinking. Amy let out a guffaw. Indeed, the crew’s last guest of the night had been none other than half-owner Giuseppe “Little Joe” Esposito himself, date nearly half his age in tow. They’d grown used to the ways Little Joe treated the world like his own personal playground, but tonight had been a new low even for him—after Little Joe walked in the door with Caroline or Carolyn or maybe Catherine at ten minutes to ten, cold side had unwrapped all of their freshly-packed stuff to make him a cheese board, and Traci mixed negroni after negroni while the rest of the crew stood at attention, terrified to start their closing procedures in front of him lest he learn that they regularly hurried lingering customers out by stacking chairs. By the time they’d gotten out of there, it was after midnight.
“Hear, fucking, hear,” Renee said, clinking glasses with just Amy a second time. Renee had started as a server after Simone put in their two weeks. She claimed to be an asexual lesbian, but it was hard to ignore the way she hung on Amy’s every word, and even if she didn’t, Chris had been there the night a few folks went back to Traci’s and Renee drunkenly said her staff crush was Amy. He made knowing eye contact with her across the table and smiled.
“Oh, shut up,” Renee whispered. Chris chuckled and held out his glass; Renee reached across to clink.
“Thank god we’re here!” Vanessa yelled like she was on a reality show. Renee shot Chris a knowing look—that same night she’d admitted to crushing on Amy, someone had asked her about Vanessa and she burst out laughing. She’s just so….eighteen, Renee had finally conceded when asked. She’ll grow out of it.
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“Adam Sandler,” Eliot said, then took a sip of his PBR.
“Sheryl Crow,” Traci followed.
“Christina Hendricks.” Aaron couldn’t see who was speaking without craning his neck, but it sounded like Chris. Hilary Clinton. Harry Houdini. Helen Mirren, Aaron thought, anticipating the next name in the sequence. It didn’t come.
“Oh, wait, is it me?” Vanessa asked, giggling. Traci started to laugh, too; Renee rolled her eyes and started furiously typing on her phone. “I forgot the rules.” Traci started laughing even harder as a scowl affixed itself tighter to Renee’s face. The decorum quickly left the building after that, with Traci collapsed into Chris’ shoulder and Vanessa giggling with Amy, all while Renee’s thumbs assaulted her keyboard.
Despite having worked at La Fratellanza for the better part of six months, Aaron barely knew any of his front-of-house counterparts. He’d played Smash Ultimate with Jason and Eliot one time, but Jason had Irish-goodbyed after the first round, and Eliot loved to be at the center of everything—a desire Aaron didn’t share.
“Now, now, ladies and gents,” Eliot joked. “The game is Famous. One person starts by saying the name of a celebrity. Then the next person has to say a celebrity whose first name begins with the same letter as the previous celebrity’s last name.” Vanessa was still giggling a little, but Amy’s gaze was fixed on Eliot as he spoke.
“So like, say I say Jason Bateman,” he continued. “Then Traci would say…Bob Barker? Except that’s a double letter, so it would stay the same for the next person, and the order would switch, so I’d have to go again. And maybe then I’d say Betty White.”
“Didn’t she just die?” Chris interjected. The group laughed again, even Renee—then realized what they were laughing at and let out a chorus of awwws.
“You get the point,” Eliot replied with a laugh. “So…Britney Spears.”
“Sarah McLachlan,” Traci continued.
“Macy Gray.”
“Grace Jones.”
“Jhené Aiko.”
“Ariana Grande.” Everyone looked at Aaron.
“Gary Payton,” he offered.
“She’s not a songstress!” Traci cried out in jest. That time, it seemed like the group’s laughter was actually enough to penetrate the million layers of noise in the tiny bar, surrounding the seven of them with each other’s joy. Aaron scanned the circle, landing on Chris for just a second longer. They’d only ever talked across the window, and for seconds at a time. Aaron watched as Chris took off his glasses, polishing the lenses with his fisherman sweater as he chatted idly with Traci about something.
The next thing Aaron knew, Chris was looking straight at him, and Aaron snapped his eyes down to his beer in seconds. He let out an imperceptible sigh, went back to the well of his Tecate tall boy, and drank deep, stopping the spike of his heartbeat.
“Okay, okay.” Eliot summoned the group’s collective attention. “So that’s my turn. Paul Walker.” He pretended to pour out the empty PBR can in front of him, earning an enthusiastic laugh from Amy.
“Winona Ryder.”
“Ryan Gosling.”
“Giuseppe Esposito.” The last one came from Vanessa, and Chris and Traci burst out laughing.
“Oh my gooooooood,” Traci trilled. “Not Little Joe. He’s not even famous!”
“He’s kind of locally famous,” Vanessa justified. “Everyone knows La Fratellanza—it’s been open forever.”
“Okay, but the name of the game is Famous,” Eliot said. “Not Kind of Locally Famous.”
“Okay, fine.” Vanessa crossed her arms. “George Takei.”
“Tom Selleck.”
“Susan Sarandon.”
“Suzanne Somers.”
“Sammy Sosa.” Amy and Renee passed it back and forth a few times before devolving into more laughter. Eliot tried to restore order, but they had Traci giggling along with them now, and it wasn't long before even he relented and dropped the pretense of the game. Aaron found his gaze drawn to Chris even more as Vanessa stood up to leave and the seating order shuffled; rather than at the end of a sardine-tight line of people, Chris now sat catty-corner from Aaron, groping for his straw with his tongue before finding it. He looked over right as Aaron smiled—completely busted. But instead of making it awkward, Chris flashed a quick grin back before turning his attention back to Traci and Eliot. Aaron smiled to himself again.
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Traci dug through her cavernous coat pockets like she’d lost something precious, depositing handfuls of lint, receipts, and balled-up hair on the wooden table each time she dipped her hand back into their fleece-lined crevices.
“What are you looking for?” Eliot slurred.
“Quarters,” Traci replied, a newly-found BIC pen between her teeth. “For the jukebox.”
“I thought it took dollars.”
“For the millionth time, that’s the one at 30th Street.” Traci upended her glittery purple purse onto the tabletop, change and keys and makeup clattering a cacophonous soundscape each time she shook the bag. Now emptied, she flipped it back into her lap and started to put things away again—a travel pack of tissues. Hand sanitizer. Wine key. Chris was the kind of drunk where he was starting to notice things, and the contents of Traci’s bottomless bag mesmerized him. Everything was a different shade of purple, a shiny, deep aubergine under The Armory’s vermillion lighting concept.
“Do you have any quarters?” Eliot asked him while Traci used her pointer fingers to sort through the loose change she’d dumped on the table.
“I might?” Chris patted his own pockets—jeans were a bust, but his flannel pocket produced two twenty-five-cent pieces. He was reaching for his coat when Aaron, Renee, and Amy came back with their drinks.
“What are you doing?” Amy asked Traci.
“Jukebox,” Eliot replied. Traci was too focused.
“How much is one play?” Renee asked.
“Fifty for one, dollar for three.”
“What have we got?”
“You have a lot of questions,” Amy cut in, slurring her words gently.
“...three seventy-five, four, four twenty-five…” Traci counted to herself. “Like, $4.50?”
“Ooooooh, you should put on ‘Go Your Own Way,’” Renee suggested.
“No, if we’re gonna do Fleetwood Mac, put on ‘Songbird,’” Amy countered.
“What is the weakest track on Rumours and why is it ‘Songbird?’” Chris replied.
“Stoooooooooooooop.” Amy was almost melancholy in her sincerity. “Christine McVie deserved a moment!”
“Whatever you say.” Chris held up his hands.
“If you little shitbirds think I’m going to spend my money on your music, you’ve got another thing coming,” Traci warned.
“Hey, fifty of those cents came out of my frocket!” Chris protested, patting his left chest.
“Okay, so you get one,” Traci conceded.
“Not ‘Songbird.’” The whole table erupted in laughter as Traci got up to feed the jukebox.
“Nah, Fleetwood Mac is crazy, though,” Chris continued. “Rumours is crazy. You ever see that tweet that’s like, Stevie Nicks goes okay this one is called eat shit and die you fucking fuck and Lindsey Buckingham is like ok let’s call it Silver Springs and leave it off the album?”
“YES!” Renee yelled. “Which is crazy! Because every other song on that album is like eat shit and die you fucking fuck!”
“Except for ‘Songbird!’” Amy insisted. Eliot hadn’t really stopped laughing, but Renee and Chris started back up again. Chris looked over at Aaron, who looked nonplussed.
“Are you a ‘Songbird’ fan too, Aaron?” Chris asked.
“Oh, no,” Aaron replied. “I mean, not oh no, I don’t like it. Oh no, I haven’t heard the album. I don’t really know Fleetwood Mac.”
“Oh, word!” Chris was surprised, but took it in stride. Right, he thought. He’s straight.
Traci strode back over as the opening chords of “You Make Loving Fun” thrummed their way through the bar. Chris couldn’t help but tap his feet and drum along on the table. It didn’t take the group long to catch up, with even Aaron bopping his head to the bass.
“I couldn’t abide by ‘Songbird,’ sorry, Amy,” Traci said. “But I had to give you your Christine McVie moment.” Warmth snaked through Chris’ torso as the vocals came in and his coworkers started to sing along in their deepest, most dramatic Christine McVie impersonation. It wasn’t much sometimes as far as work went, but he always told himself he could be surrounded by worse people.
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Eliot was making his way towards the door when Aaron stood up to get his next beer, an act that surprised him in and of itself. Aaron didn’t customarily socialize with coworkers, the occasional hangout with Eliot being the main exception. Now that he was gone, what did Aaron really have to stay out for?
Chris stood next to the only empty patch of bartop Aaron could find. He leaned his elbows on the linoleum countertop and glanced Aaron’s way, smiling once he recognized the familiar face.
“Whatcha drinking?” Chris asked.
“Tecate tall boy. With a lime.” Dean, the joint’s mainstay weekend bartender, slid Chris his drink and opened the cooler to dig for Aaron’s beer. As Dean reached into his pocket for his churchkey, Chris tried to grab his attention.
“Hey, Dean, can you put that tall boy on my tab?” he asked. Dean looked up and nodded as he cracked the can, fished a lime out of his garnish tray, and handed it to Aaron.
“Thanks, bro,” Aaron said. “You didn't have to do that.”
“Eh, I wanted to,” Chris mused. He pinched the two black cocktail straws in his drink together and took a big sip.
“What are you drinking?” Aaron asked after a beat of silence.
“Jack and ginger.” Chris sucked the straws again, quickly draining the drink to half-full. “I mean, I will broadly drink a whiskey ginger if a spot doesn't have Jack,” he clarified. “But my dad drank Jack. And I like it.”
“You and your dad close?”
“We were. He passed last winter.” Chris was nonchalant, but hung his head a little.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Aaron meant it, despite barely knowing him.
“Eh. You know,” Chris started. “It’s not like it was sudden or anything. I mean, we all saw that happening.” Aaron wondered what that was, but it felt far from his place to ask.
“And you?” Chris asked. Aaron gestured to himself; Chris nodded.
“Like, do I have a dad?” Aaron asked.
“No, like, why do you drink Tecate?” Chris chuckled.
“Oh, oh. Word.” The truth was, Aaron had been drinking Tecate since he was a teenager and started sneaking into 21+ shows at The Jewel Room. “I dunno. Always have, I guess.”
“Ha, yeah,” Chris playfully nudged him on the shoulder with no real force, but Aaron felt its impact through his entire body. “I know how that is.” The two laughed for a minute before Chris reached for his pocket.
“Ah, shit. Hang on.” He pulled out his phone and answered it. “Yo. Oh, shit, it’s been that long?” Chris pulled the phone away from his mouth, held a hand over the speaker, and mouthed Traci; Aaron nodded.
“Yes, I can order you a High Life pony and a shot of Fernet. JEE-sus Christ.” Chris emphasized the first syllable of the Lord’s name in his hyperbole, laughing as he hung up the phone. He leaned back over the bartop to try and get Dean to look his way.
“It’s for Traci,” he said after ordering. “She doesn’t feel like getting up.”
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Amy signed her credit card slip and waved goodbye to Chris as the bartender slid him another Jack and ginger, this time a double. The Armory served their doubles in a pint glass, and all their this-and-that drinks packed more liquor than mixer. As far as Chris was usually concerned, you only ordered a double at The Armory if you were in the mood to get roaring drunk. He may not have been feeling quite that fancy, but the last round had certainly angled his gaze toward Aaron, and he needed the liquid courage to see that through.
“No, because oh my GOD, what the fuck was that tonight?” Renee was in the middle of a passionate rant when Chris returned to the table. “I’ve worked for plenty of small business owners in this city and none of them—none of them—treat their employees the way Little Joe treats us here.”
“I had my entire station broken down when they ordered that cheese plate,” Aaron piped up.
“Oof,” Traci said with a laugh. “I didn’t want to tell you this, but they only ate the gouda. I threw the rest in a box for myself.” She pulled a takeaway container out of her giant purse and opened the lid to reveal, in fact, an entire cheese board minus the gouda.
“If I don’t laugh, I’m going to cry,” Aaron replied between sips of Tecate. Chris reached for a chunk of Humboldt fog.
“No but really, what is Little Joe’s deal?” Renee continued. “It’s not like Big Joe is even remotely that rude, so it can’t be a family thing.” The elder of the two Esposito brothers, Giovanni, was almost a foil to his younger brother. It wasn’t just in age that they were Big Joe and Little Joe.
“Yeah, Christ, Kristen loved Big Joe so much, she married him,” Traci joked, giving Chris a playful nudge with her elbow. The two had both been working at La Fratellanza back when their former GM, Kristen, had started to date Big Joe, with Traci and Chris even helping him keep their impending engagement a secret from her.
“Besides, I say we’ll see what happens with Little Joe,” Traci went on.
“Wait, what does that mean?” Chris asked.
“Ah, fuck. I shouldn’t have said anything.” Traci was sheepish.
“You can’t just drop that and then leave us hanging,” Aaron insisted.
“Yeah, for real. We’re among friends,” Renee chimed in.
“Okay, well, you didn’t hear it from me. No, really, you did not.” Traci looked each person at the table in the eye. “But Simone quit because Little Joe is lowkey so fucking ableist and he basically pushed them out of here, and they’re now thinking about suing him personally.” Renee’s jaw dropped across the table.
“So like, they may not do anything, but if that goes anywhere, I feel like Big Joe has no choice but to buy him out of the business to save the restaurant’s reputation.”
“Simone told you that?” Aaron asked. Traci nodded.
“How poetic would it be if our Little Joe problem solved itself?” Renee slurred.
“I’ll drink to that,” Traci said, and the foursome raised their glasses again.
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Outside the bar, Aaron pulled a second cigarette from the pack out of habit—when he was drinking like this, he was usually at home and able to chain smoke on the back porch. Now, as the alcohol sank deeper into his bloodstream, he was fiending for a smoke or seven.
“Damn, a second already?” Chris asked, hovering closer to him and then further away in an instant. Aaron still couldn’t tell if Chris was drunk or if he really did keep finding excuses to be close to him. In the dim, cramped bar, it was easy to blame it on spatial constraints, but now that they had migrated outside, it was harder to ignore, and even harder for Aaron to stop himself from looking at Chris.
“I’m gonna take off, I think. It’s late.” Renee stood up from the curb and shoved her Camels into her quilted pink handbag, then dug her hand deeper to fish around for her keys. Traci raised her eyebrows.
“Relax, I’m gonna walk.”
“Be safe. Text me when you get home.” The trio was silent as Renee grew smaller and smaller down the block, then turned the corner. Chris looked around.
“Aaron, you smoke?” Aaron knit his brow in confusion; he looked down at his cigarette.
“Like, weed,” Chris clarified. It wasn’t often that Aaron smoked weed, in all honesty—maybe the last time had been his ex-girlfriend’s birthday over a year ago. But for some reason, he nodded, and Chris pulled out a joint, holding it between his lips as he flicked the lighter with one hand, then threw the other up for a wind shield. It was impossible for Aaron not to stare at him as he sucked the smoke deep into his lungs, curling it around his lips for just a second before tilting his head up and blowing it into the sky. This time, it was Traci who made eye contact with Aaron, knowing grin on her face as Chris passed him the joint.
“Man, I fuckin’ love The Armory,” Chris said as Aaron took his first puff. “You know I got kicked out of 30th Street for smoking a spliff across the street?”
“Whatever, dude,” Traci shot back. Aaron wasn’t sure how long to inhale for, so he kept holding his breath. “You know that place is owned by Trumpers.” Chris shrugged as Aaron finally exhaled, bringing a cough from the darkest recesses of his lungs with his breath. Chris and Traci giggled for a few seconds until they realized Aaron was still coughing.
“You good, dude?” Traci asked. Aaron managed to slow his coughing and hawked a loogie into the street.
“Yeah.” His eyes were pinkeye red. “Yeah, I’m good.” He let out one more gentle cough, then cleared his throat. “Just haven’t smoked in a little while.”
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“I’ve never really looked at it like this before,” Chris admitted.
“I’m not gonna lie, I did not know this ceiling looked like this,” Aaron added.
“Shhhhhhhhhhh,” Traci shushed softly, audible as the room emptied out.
The trio had made their way back inside and were all leaning back in their seats, looking at the ceiling. It was hard to pinpoint just one central quirk of The Armory, but perhaps one of the core facets of its existence was the ceiling, which was painted from edge to edge to look like The Creation of Adam. They’d all heard of more famous dive bars with the full Sistine ceiling, but The Armory was the size of a postage stamp, so the famous finger-touch was all that fit.
“See that part right there?” Traci gestured to something Chris could barely even see. “I know one of the artists who worked on this. He said that part of the ceiling fell out when they were painting it, and they had to re-plaster and then paint that part again. You can kind of see where the plaster is if you look hard enough.” Chris wasn’t looking anywhere near hard enough, instead acutely aware of Aaron’s proximity to him on the bench seat.
“I’m not really into art, but this is so beautiful,” Aaron continued. His pupils were dime-sized, his body fully relaxed into the cheap leather banquette. Chris didn’t look down from the ceiling, but he heard Traci gather her coat and slide out of the booth.
“I’m gonna go to the bathroom,” she lied. Both boys mmmmed, eyes on the ceiling and legs touching under the table. By the time she was out the door, Chris’ courage had extended to reaching a hand out for Aaron’s thigh. The pair stayed enveloped in the beauty of the ceiling, even as The Armory staff flipped every light switch in the joint and shouted “LAST CALL” at the top of their lungs. At some point, the beauty of the ceiling became fused with the beauty of each other, and Chris pulled Aaron’s face towards him, consequences be damned. It wasn’t often Chris got really, truly lucky—so shock and delight flooded him when Aaron kissed him back, the boys an oasis in the clank and clatter of the bar’s closing rituals.
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Aaron was the type of hookup veteran for whom any casual game of Never Have I Ever was a certain loss. As a point of fact, the last time someone took one of his firsts was the year he dropped out of high school, barely sixteen. But here he lay, stark naked in Chris’ bed and stripped of a series of firsts. The first time he had kissed anyone other than a woman was back at The Armory under the last call lights, and it hadn’t taken him long to connect the dots between the kiss and its inevitable, subsequent acts of affection—Chris called a car and they spent all twenty minutes of the ride tangled in each other, far more desperate for touch than air. When they arrived at his apartment, it was straight to bed. It wasn't as if Aaron ever imagined this happening, but he previously considered himself straight enough that it surprised him how little he hesitated, how easy it was to fall into a moment and tumble back out of it completely upended for the better. In the light of the morning, maybe there would be some sort of disbelief, but for now, he gazed over at Chris’ sleeping form through sinking eyelids, content. No fallout could ruin this.
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