Page 52 of Last Call at the Local

I drum my fingers against the doorframe. Raine’s got her hands on her hips and this look on her face that Ishouldn’tlike but definitely do.

“Have you ever heard of Grumpy Cat?” I ask.

She narrows her eyes. “Yes. Why?”

“You look like Grumpy Cat right now. It’s very charming.”

She stares back at me, unamused. “It’s your pub. If you hate it, I’ll change it. You can tell me the truth.”

“I don’t hate it,” I say. She raises an eyebrow, and I add, “I... don’t know what I think about it.”

She searches my face. She’s got her bottom lip between her teeth again, and for Christ’s sake, why am I always looking at her mouth?

“You look like you don’t feel great,” she finally says.

“I don’t feel great,” I say. I don’t know if we’re talking about the same thing. I don’t know if she understands this is an OCD thing.Part of me hopes she does. The other part hopes she thinks I have a headache or something. What would she think if she knew what my intrusive thoughts were really about? I’ve only been vague with her about it. Would it scare her? Or would there be a part of her thatwonders if I’m really capable of the things my brain tells me I want to do?

I look away from Raine, unsure what to say. I feel wound up and weighed down at the same time, as if the fear is sitting right there on my chest. And of course, there are the thoughts. Circling and circling and circling.

After a few moments, Raine says, “Would you like to go out there and sit at a table with me for a while? I could use some help brainstorming ideas for the pub quiz next week.”

No. Not really, I think. It’s actually the very last thing I want to do right now. But sitting with the discomfort is what I’msupposedto do, which Raine must know. I’m thankful she’s not making a big deal out of it. It makes it easier.

“Okay,” I say. “Yeah, sure.”

“Great.”

When she starts walking, I follow. I avoid looking in the direction of any knives as we make our way through the kitchen and behind the bar. Raine grabs a pen and pad of Post-its from beside the cash register. The thoughts keep coming, but I tell myself they’re just thoughts. They’re not true. They don’t mean anything.

Raine stops at a small, somewhat hidden table in a corner of the main room. I sit opposite her, and she sets the Post-its and pen in front of me.

“What’s this for?” I ask.

“I want a Jack Dunne original sketch, of course. I’m thinking of getting a tattoo, you know.”

“Oh, really?” I pick up the pen and twirl it between my fingers, ignoring my OCD when it suggests a variety of ways I could hurt myself with it. “What are you going to do? Walk into a tattoo shop, hand some poor tattoo artist a Post-it, and say,I’ll have exactly this, please.”

“No,” she says. “I’m going to handyouthe Post-it, and say,I’ll have exactly this, please.”

“I don’t think so,” I say, but I’ve already started doodling a beetle.

We fall quiet then. I doodle on the note, and Raine taps away at her phone, asking my opinion about pub quiz topics every now and then. I glance up every few minutes and make myself look at the walls, at the people around us. When the thoughts come, I try not to argue with them.Yes, you’re right, I’m a violent murderer, I tell them. I keep my hands busy drawing so I can resist tapping my fingers against the table. Whenever I want to think the wordundo, I ask Raine a question instead.The anxiety doesn’t lessen, but after about half an hour, I get used to it. I decide I don’t hate the changes Raine has made. In fact, I really like them. It’s cluttered, but not chaotic. It’s colorful, and interesting, and the opposite of lifeless.

When I finish the beetle drawing, I stick it between us on the table. She picks it up and examines it. “It’s perfect.”

She sticks it on the table beside her phone, and we fall quiet again. On the Post-it pad I draw a picture of Sebastian with his toy baguette. Once I finish the top Post-it, I flip to the next, and then the next. I glance at Raine. She’s looking at the beetle I drew for her. I keep doodling, but I watch from the corner of my eye as she looks around the pub and then back at the drawing in her hands.

“Your work is really beautiful, Jack. It makes people stop and look,” she says.

I laugh. “Who says they’re stopping because it’s beautiful? Maybe they’re shocked by how bad it is.”

“You don’t really think that.”

She’s right. I don’t. I like my work. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have tattooed it onto a person to carry around for the rest of their life. But it is easier to pretend my work sucks than to think about how it was taken away from me.

“Beauty’s subjective anyway,” I say.

“Yes. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t real.”

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