Chapter 1: The Bartender's Warning
The air in the bar was the same temperature as blood. Jess felt it cling to her skin the moment she pushed through the door, leaving the cool evening street behind. A familiar blanket of sound wrapped around her—the thump of a bassline from the jukebox, the clatter of ice, the low murmur of people trying to connect or forget. Neon, a washed-out pink and corrosive green, bled across the sticky floorboards.
Her eyes found Cat before she’d taken three steps in.
Cat was behind the bar, polishing a glass with a white cloth. She wasn’t looking at the glass. She was looking at Jess, her whiskey-colored eyes tracking Jess’s path from the door to the empty stool like a predator sighting prey. A slow, knowing smile touched Cat’s lips. She placed the glass down with a quiet thunk.
Jess slid onto the stool, the vinyl sighing under her. The wood of the bar was scarred with initials and water rings. She traced one with her fingertip.
“You’re late,” Cat said. Her voice was a low rasp, always sounding like she’d just woken up or had smoked one cigarette too many.
“Am I?” Jess’s own voice was softer, muffled by the music.
“By twenty minutes.” Cat leaned her elbows on the bar, bringing her face close. The scent of her—clean soap, juniper gin, and the underlying sharpness of lemon—was a territory Jess knew by heart. “I was starting to think you’d stood me up.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“No?” Cat’s gaze dropped to Jess’s mouth, then back up. “He’s not coming tonight.”
The words landed between them, a fact dropped like a stone. Jess felt her stomach tighten. She hadn’t asked. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t. “Who?”
“Don’t.” Cat’s smile vanished. The word wasn’t angry, just weary and final. She reached across the bar, her fingers brushing a stray strand of honey-colored hair from Jess’s temple. The touch lingered, then her hand slid down, tracing a deliberate, possessive line from Jess’s shoulder to her wrist. Her skin was cool from handling ice, but the path she left felt branded. “He’s not here. I am.”
The air thickened. Jess could feel the weight of Cat’s want, a physical pressure in the space between their bodies. It was a language they’d both learned, composed of glances and charged silence and the simple, devastating geometry of proximity. Cat’s eyes held a question Jess had been avoiding for months.
“Get you a drink?” Cat asked, her fingers still circling Jess’s wrist.
“Gin. Tonic.”
“Coming up.” Cat turned away, but the absence of her focus felt like a minor abandonment. Jess watched her move—the efficient grace, the tight line of her shoulders under her black tank top, the way she tucked a piece of dark, chin-length hair behind one ear. Every motion was familiar and agonizing.
The drink appeared. Condensation already beaded on the glass. Jess took a long pull, the bitterness a welcome shock.
“He’s wrong for you, you know,” Cat said, her back to Jess as she rearranged bottles. “All that… performance. The easy charm. It’s just glitter. It gets everywhere and then it’s gone, and you’re left with the mess.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I know the type.” Cat turned back, her eyes narrow. “He takes. He takes your time, your energy, your good faith. He’ll take until you’re hollow, and then he’ll be surprised when you break. People like him always are.”
Jess’s phone buzzed in her pocket. A single, violent vibration against her thigh. She didn’t move.
Cat’s gaze dipped to Jess’s jacket pocket. “See? Even when he’s not here, he’s here. It’s exhausting.”
“It’s not him,” Jess lied. The lie was thin and transparent.
A laugh, short and humorless, escaped Cat. “You’re a terrible liar. It’s your only innocent quality.” She reached out again, this time to tilt Jess’s chin up with a knuckle. Her touch was less gentle now. “Look at me. Just for one night, be here. With me. Where you’re actually wanted. Not as some… option. Not as someone’s second choice when they’re bored.”
The words hit their mark. Jess felt them sink in, sharp and true. Cat saw it—the flinch in her deep-set eyes, the slight part of her lips. Cat’s own expression softened, regret flashing through the frustration. She let her hand drop.
“I’m sorry,” Cat muttered, wiping the bar where no spill existed. “That was shitty.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not.” Cat sighed, a sound of profound tiredness. “I just… I look at you, and I see you halfway out the door already, heading somewhere I can’t follow. Somewhere he is. And it kills me.”
Jess’s phone buzzed again. Twice in quick succession.
The spell shattered. Cat’s face closed off, shuttering behind that cool, effortless demeanor like a slammed window. She picked up her cloth and started wiping down the already-clean taps. “You should probably get that,” she said, her voice flat and distant. “Might be important.”
“Cat—”
“Don’t.” She didn’t look up. “Just go. Or answer it. Or do whatever you’re going to do. But stop sitting in my bar breaking my heart in slow motion. It’s bad for business.”
Jess slid off the stool. The moment was gone, evaporated like the gin on her tongue. The magnetic pull was still there, a terrible ache to reach across the wood and fix it, to fall into the certainty of Cat’s hunger. But the buzzing in her pocket was a tide pulling her the other way.
She left the drink half-finished, a pool of melted ice and regret. She didn’t look back as she pushed out into the night, the bar door swinging shut behind her with a soft, final sigh.
The street air was a cold slap. She fumbled the phone from her pocket. The screen glowed in the dark, casting her face in a pale blue light.
Two messages. Both from Harry.
Missed you tonight.
Where are you?
She stared at the words until they blurred. Behind her, through the smudged window, she could see Cat’s silhouette moving behind the bar, already pouring a drink for someone else, her expression smooth and unreadable. A continent away.
Jess leaned against the brick wall, the rough surface snagging her jacket. She was nowhere. Stuck in the narrow, impossible space between two stars, feeling the gravity of both, tearing herself apart in the silent, dark expanse between.
Her thumb hovered over the screen. The city hummed around her, full of other people’s destinations. She took a breath that did nothing to fill the hollow feeling in her chest, and began to type.