Blood Bourbon

Whiskey Lullabies

Daryl 

Daryl should probably have been sleeping off the bruises, strains and aches from the rodeo earlier that day, but he needed a beer and several glasses of good whiskey.

No. No he didn't need whiskey. He was trying to forget whiskey.

He'd shoot tequila with his beer and maybe find a cute girl to dance with. He had lost track of which city he was in today, the rodeo circuit running him mercilessly throughout the long hard season. Not that he was a Bull rider. No. Any idiot could climb onto an angry asshole of a cow and hold on for eight seconds. He had the buckles to prove it.

He was a bullfighter. One of those idiots that wrangled the bulls out of the ring and away from the riders. And no, not a clown. He didn't sit in barrels or wear garish costumes to entertain the crowd. He did his job, kept the competitors safe and took a few bumps and bruises along the way.

The bar he stepped into was dimly lit, and the crowd wasn't his usual scene. He had avoided cowboy bars since that night a couple weeks ago, still trying to come to terms with what it all had meant. From women he swore he had met before to others who were dangerously alluring. And then the redhead that had knocked him for a loop, and the blonde that had followed along for the ride.

It wasn't the fact that he couldn't remember who he had gone home with that night. What man would complain about the choice between a redhead and a brunette? He had woken up alone in his bed with the tastes of whiskey and sugardust on his lips, more satiated than he had been in a while.

It was a fact that the redhead had been a tall, impossibly attractive man with dark eyes Daryl had drowned in. And the brunette had been a dark skinned warrior god who had breathed life back into him with merely a smile on his lips.

Daryl wasn't closed minded or a bigot, but he had never considered himself attracted to men before that night. So, despite being in a new city every second night, and despite the fact that the chances of running into either of those two again were slim to nil, he avoided the cowboy bars, just in case. Because he didn't know what that meant, or what to do with the fact that it wasn't just women he was considering these days.

All that left him, in the neat, chic sort of bar that had a good selection of blues and rock on the sound system, well dressed clientele and a well-stocked bar with ten beers on tap.

Daryl had left his hat at home, though the only spare shoes he had were his nice boots, leaving him to wear a t-shirt that he desperately wanted to tuck in, a plain belt with no buckle and his nicest pair of jeans, hoping it would pass for a casual sort of look. After a quick glance around he slid onto a lone barstool and ordered a beer.

"You a thrill seeker, honey?" The bartender, a young woman with a short haircut and an array of tattoos watched him as she slid the beer across the bar.

"I'm just looking for a couple beers." He offered her his best charming grin and was rewarded with a small smile.

She inclined her head and winked at him. "I can tell you're not from around here. This probably isn't your kind of place, honey. But you won't find any trouble here unless you make it. Some... people... come here looking for trouble."

Daryl chuckled and took a drink of his beer. "No, ma'am. Not looking for trouble. I swear. I get beat up enough at work."

She gave him another smile and turned to continue serving another customer, leaving him to drink his beer in peace. He found himself watching the rest of the bar through the mirror in front of him, seeing the distorted images of people shifting back and forth, dancing and engaging in a little more physical displays of affection than he expected.