The early evening moved into the late evening and the night drinkers came and all the time I thought about what had happened with Jenny earlier. Myself and Andy discussed it while we worked and it seemed to me that the possibilities of what could develop between Jenny and me were endless and I felt almost euphoric as last orders were taken and last orders were drunk, and the place became quiet once more.

There was a knock on the glass door and Andy answered it. Jenny came in and I hugged her and told her that we were almost ready. Andy offered her a drink while she waited on us cleaning up the last of the empties. I arranged the bottles of spirits that were lying on the bar. There was a particular way of aligning each bottle so that things wouldn’t get away with us on any given busy night. Andy insisted that there was a place for everything. I kept to the rules. I was good like that. It was decent of Andy to give Jenny the red wine on the house and he made an attempt at chatting to her. She seemed incredibly shy in front of Andy, but I supposed that she was probably in shock after leaving Jerome. I moved quickly around the lounge putting on the finishing touches. I checked that the Open sign was flipped to Closed. I made little neat piles of beer mats on the bar beside the Guinness on draught. I remembered that it was Guinness that I had brought over to Jerome that night when he had been in with Jenny.

We went back to my flat and I cursed myself for not having a bottle of wine to offer her, and me working in a bar. Jenny said that she wasn’t a big drinker generally, which I found surprising, considering our first meeting. She said that she had other methods of coping with stress. I did wonder what stress she was referring to. Was it what had happened with Jerome or was it her art? But I decided not to pursue it. She had been through enough for one day. Instead I sat beside her, my arm loose around her shoulder. We watched a late show about music and it felt great when she placed her head in the crook of my neck.

We took things slow that night, it was nothing like the first night we met. I was gentle, almost tentative with Jenny and it wasn’t purely raw physical sex, it was more like an emotional connection was being made.

This was exactly what I wanted.

6. My Family

February 2017