SomeWhere On... (BXB)

CHAPTER 1: ...Frith Street, UK - January

"People say things like "it wasn't supposed to go this way" and "this isn't what I wanted." They're just making noise. There's no such thing as "supposed to," and what you want doesn't matter. All that matters is what happened."
~ Mira Grant

~ ~ ~

"You 'lright, mate?" I ask. I don't know his name. I don't care. He's cute. I want to fuck him.

He doesn't hear me. He's doodling on a napkin.

The music isn't that loud, though, so I'm not totally sure how he didn't hear me. "Mate?"

He looks at me.

"You all right?" I look him over real fast. He's got rings under his eyes and everything. He's got this wavy black hair and is slouched over drinking something I can't figure out. His glasses are slipping down his nose and he looks like a knackered librarian. Nerdish appearance aside, he's got this real cute face.

The bartender gets me my beer. I don't know what he's drinking. It looks like rum and coke. Or a whiskey? I don't know. I don't care.

I turn to lean against the bar. "Nice place, yeah?" I ask. Seems like the right thing to do right now.

The bar's cool. It's like a really big airplane cabin. Like, long. Or even a wider-than-normal private train car. Bar's on one side, seating along the walls, and light wells punch through the sloping ceiling.

Except I'm not that into the bar. I'm interested in stripping him down and seeing if he screams when I slam it into him.

He turns to me for a second, looks away, and then leans forward a little. "What?" And then he takes off his glasses to rub his eyes.

"You all right?"

He nods his head hard and then looks back at the three still-full drinks by him. "I'm just waiting for my friends to come back."His voice is distinctively American, except it has some weird English inflections mixed in. Like he's trying to blend in.

He puts back on his glasses and glances around, scratching the top of his head. His face is really round and you can tell it's a face that can express shit like nobody's fucking business, clearly not a British face. But his breath is heavy as he looks around the long room more than once. "They've been gone for half an hour,"he says finally, after three minutes of checking the place.

"Mate?"

"What?"

I don't think he heard me. "I think they ditched you." He leans in, and I repeat myself.

"Why would they abandon me at the Bugle?"

I scoff. This poor kid. "Luv, this is the Bulge."

His eyes widen. In the blue light behind the bar, I can't tell what colour they are. "No...no. This is the Bugle. My friends told me so."

"Mate, this is the Bulge." I lean forward. "Though I can understand if you want to ditch them, too."

He turns back to the bar and sighs, putting his face in his hands. "I knew the sign wasn't a typo," he whispers, and then downs whatever is in his glass. "They insisted it was a typo, but I thought it was a little ridiculous that a brass instrument like that would be hanging that many rainbow flags on the front." He throws back whatever he's drinking and taps the glass with his fingers. "Though it also might be because it's Soho, but still..."He trails off.

Thank God.

I signal for the bartender for another of whatever he was drinking.

The bartender fucking pours him a Diet Coke.