Lovely Hues | Fillie AU

Chapter Three

After introducing Gaten to his precious bike, Finn was reminded that it would take a bit for his new mechanic friend to properly diagnose the hunk of metal on wheels. In the meantime, he decided to take a stroll through town. Gaten's shop was on 3rd street which met up with main street a block down. Main street was far more bustling than 3rd and as he passed the town's main pub which was creatively named, Town Pub and Grill—someone sure strained a few brain cells on that one—his stomach gently informed him, and everyone around him, that all he'd had to eat today was a piece of toast and a black coffee. Following his gut, he turned into the restaurant and took a seat at the bar on a high leather bar stool.

The ambience of the bar was the same as every other small-town bar he'd been in. It was somewhat dim with a thin veil of cigarette smoke serving to make it dimmer. Wood panelling all around made the space feel small, yet more secure somehow, and black and white pictures of important members of the community in thin gold frames were on all the walls. There were a few frames of soldiers as well, from the two previous wars still on everyone's minds and a large American flag was centered behind the wooden bar that had a seemingly inherent tackiness on its whole piney surface that made Finn's bare arm feel sticky when he lifted it.

The lone bartender came to him right away and took his order. A burger, some fries and an ice cold root beer. It was a little after one in the afternoon so the lunch rush had come and gone, leaving Finn one of about five total patrons. A decent amount, Finn thought, for a town this small.

The radio played softly in the background. Frank Sinatra's melodies ebbed into Finn's mind and paved a road that led straight to his God forsaken ex. They say that falling in love is wonderful, sang the famous lips through the staticky box on the bar shelf, It's so wonderful, they say.

Sure, Finn thought sarcastically, love is so damned wonderful. . .so damned fucking wonderful that I'd be perfectly happy to never experience it again in my life. 

He let out a disdainful laugh that sounded more like a harsh cough and asked the bartender if he could change the station which he did, no questions asked. Finn thought a bar of this type called for some more hoppy music anyway, to go with the hoppy beers on tap.

On came the more foot tapping and mood raising sounds of brass accompanied by some light woodwinds and a quartet of chipper voices, making it easier for Finn to leave behind his hate of love and what it did to him.

"Thanks." He said with a gratuitous nod to the bar-keep.

"You got a problem with Sinatra? Or a problem with love." came an unknown male voice from a few seats down.

Finn hadn't noticed the man sitting just feet from him. In Finn's defense, the guy was in the corner of the bar which had a darker shadow cast over it than the rest and this guy had been sitting so still that, if he hadn't spoken, Finn probably would never have noticed him at all. He'd have come, eaten and left, never having this gentleman make a mark on his consciousness or his life.

He was wearing a cream tinged, mud splattered long sleeve cotton shirt under a ragged pair of dark jean overalls. He wore cowboy boots. The kind Finn had really only seen in movies before trekking into America where he noticed ranchers and people who actually worked with cows, typically wore them daily. What really surprised Finn though, was that he was African-American. With all of America's backwards laws surrounding the treatment of its darker complexioned citizens, he'd have thought that this guy would be somewhere with a higher density of people that looked like him. Not here in this lily white town of just under a thousand people. Maybe this town is more forward thinking than most? he considered. But he knew that was wishful thinking. Even back in Canada, black people were treated terribly. It was a sad reality of the times he lived in and it was actually a large part of the reason that he was on a sort of pilgrimage to the east coast and America's capitol city.