O'Shea's

He carried a leather shoulder bag, distinguished looking but worn. It was overstuffed with papers. A day-planner stuck out of the top. He wore shiny leather shoes and baggy wool dress slacks and a white shirt, crisp even at the end of the day. A tweed sport coat was slung over his arm, and his other hand was in his pocket. He had thin wire frame glasses that amplified his lawyer aura. He stood at the corner of the bar with his left foot propped up on the brass foot rail in front of the stool on which his leather satchel sat.

She was working behind the bar, pouring drinks, checking IDs, selling packs of cigarettes to addicted suicidal customers who nervously tapped them against their hands as they prepared to light up and share their habit with everyone around them. She rung up orders on the cash register one after another, tapping on the glowing computer touch screen that sat perched on the counter between the mirrors on the wall, under the neatly arrayed bottles with expensive looking labels, beneath the shining brass bell that hung silent while the rolling hubbub of the place filled in the brief moments of silence between the music of an Irish folk band coming from the back.

He stood patiently there keeping an eye on her while she walked up and back, up and back, never stopping to catch a breath, filling glasses, tossing out empty bottles of beer, making change, sliding food across the bar. After a long while, she stopped briefly and saw him standing there waiting for that moment. She returned his gaze with flashes of light and a hint of a grin.

Did you get my message? she asked.

I did, he answered with a satisfied smile on his face. But in the time it took to speak those words she had gone back to the other end of the bar to deal with something that needed dealing with down there.

So he reassumed his patient stance, waiting for the next snippet of time she could share with him. But it never came, and after half an hour of waiting, he picked up his bag and sat at a table where some other people were gathering and talking and drinking and eating and winding down the end of their day. They greeted him loudly when he walked up.

His work day was done. Hers was just beginning.

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