A Round of Drinks - 3

Chapter 3

“Joseph, man, are you ok?” Travis asked, giving the man a beer. “You are here everyday,” he pointed out. It was just fortunate that he’d caught the man at his bar alone for once, if only because apparently his friends were coming later. As he said, Joseph seemed to have gone into his bar one day and not one afterwards had he been absent. Even his friends usually rotated or something, but he was always there.

Still, even with that, the guy didn’t drink too much except for the one time a few days back that had caught his attention. That was the main reason why he’d been kind of casual with the question. He didn’t want to pry too much or be too serious without a better reason than that, after all.

“I am, Travis, relax,” the man answered with a laugh before bringing his drink to his lips and taking a gulp. Apparently, he’d very much been seen through, considering that answer. Then again, he hadn’t been very subtle, despite his tone. He’d never been one for that kind of thing, not unless the situation really called for it. “I just liked this place and it’s conveniently on my way back home after work, you know?”

“If you say so. I won’t complain about more business, I can tell you that,” he replied with a grin. Still, even as he said that, he made a mental note to make sure that Joseph didn’t get too drunk too often. The last thing he wanted was to feed someone’s alcoholism. Drinking was all well and good. Addictions were not.

Not at all.

“That’s more the mindset you should have, man,” Joseph told him, shaking his head. “You gotta make a profit before some crazy bastard decides it’d be fun to blow up your place. I’d know.”

“You’re not wrong about that,” he acknowledged wryly. He was kind of surprised that nothing had happened so far. Not even a shady-looking guy dropping by and standing there menacingly. “I’m not new here. I expected to get robbed and-or held at gunpoint about two days after opening,” he added, looking around and then taking a seat across from Joseph when he saw that nobody needed him for the moment.

“That’s not what you should worry about. I wouldn’t walk out much if I were you though, lots of muggers everywhere in this God forsaken place,” Joseph explained, making him grow confused.

“But you said-”

“This is Alleytown, Travis,” the man told him, as if he didn’t know that. Although, thinking about it, maybe he didn’t know what it meant. Not anymore, at least. Apparently, the fact that he didn’t understand seemed to amuse Joseph though. “Man, are you sure you’re not new?”

“I inherited this place,” he answered with a shrug. He did his best to push rising thoughts in his mind back down where they wouldn’t bother him… as much. “Didn’t have much of a choice,” he added, not really lying. “It’s been years since I’ve been around.”

“Not sure if you are lucky or not then. Hopefully the former,” Joseph told him with a chuckle, taking another gulp from his beer. “Anyway, this is Alleytown, not The Bowery, let alone Crime Alley, Travis, this place is run by the Mafia. If you don’t step out of the line, you should be fine. There’s always someone crazy enough not to care about the families though, but those are everywhere, hence the warning.”

He’d known that already, but maybe things had stabilized as of late? Back before he left, things had been… chaotic. Gangs popped up everywhere and the Mafias had been scrambling to keep things under control without letting any of the others get ahead. He’d seen that chaos first hand and it was somewhat similar to how people saw the Joker. Except that was a lot of bad chaos contained in a single person, a focus. What he’d seen, it had been everywhere, in every person and around every building. There had been nowhere to hide, nowhere that was safe.

“What does not stepping out of the line even mean?” he asked, shaking his head to try and get memories out of his head. Better to focus on the needed information, to know what the rules were, because apparently the game had changed in his absence.

“You don’t have to worry about that, I can tell you that,” Joseph waved off. “They stay out of everyone’s way unless you get involved in their business. The good thing with them is that they’ll keep most everyone else out. You only have to worry about the psycho freaks that roam this shithole. The Joker and the rest of the lunatics don’t care about the Bat and certainly don’t care about the gangs, the mafias or any of the rules,” the man explained and the matter of fact and casual way he spoke did more to get the reassurance across than his words did, really.

The fact that he didn’t even mention the police was kind of sad though.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

“With any luck, my bar will be too boring for that kind of attention, eh?” he commented, drawing a snort from the man. “Maybe I shouldn’t get that TV up.”

“Come on, Travis, we’ll help you protect this place. God knows nobody prepares drinks half as good as you do around here,” Joseph protested vehemently, with someone close by giving his own agreeing “Yeah, you tell him!” from off to the side.

“My bartending skills suck. No need to lie,” he commented dryly, giving them both an unimpressed look.

“We ain’t disagreeing,” said one of Joseph's friends after they came through the door and started making their way towards them. Travis got up from his seat then, to leave it to them. Besides, he’d have work to do now with them there. “But you are still the best around.”

“Man, that’s just sad.”

“Ain’t that the truth, Travis,” Joseph told him, toasting to him with his already almost empty beer mug. “Ain’t that the fucking truth.”

“So, what do you guys want?” he asked, leaving casual conversation seamlessly to go back to working. At least the place was relaxed enough to allow him that kind of little break. That was very much appreciated. Especially when it would be the busiest hour in a bit.

Still, now there was a thought roaming around in his mind… but at least it wasn’t as unwelcome as the others.

[}-o-{]

A busy day was already bad enough – even if it meant more profits – and that was without someone deciding that they wanted to be an asshole.

Furthermore, it was one thing for someone to be an asshole in a bar, but to be one without even having drunk? That was some next level bullshit that Travis hoped wouldn’t happen often. The only thing the guy needed was to be a woman named Karen and that’d be that. Alas, Travis wasn’t in a position where he could turn people away or anything like that, so he just nodded and did his best to appease the guy.

It wasn’t worth the trouble to not do that, at least not yet.

Besides, why was the guy even making so big an issue out of a tiny difference in his sandwich compared to his friend’s anyway?

Honestly.

“Give me a minute and I’ll be right over!” he called when he heard the door open and he saw, out of the corner of his eye, some people coming in. Normally, he wouldn’t have said anything, but he might have been left a little agitated after the whole ordeal with Mr. Karen. That was also why it was so relieving to hear a friendly voice reply.

“Take your time, Travis.” It was Joseph again, apparently. “But you better bring your A game, because my boss is here,” the man added and he raised an eyebrow to himself. Maybe he could do the guy a favor and offer a discount or open a bottle of something a little more fancy for them. He’d seen his father do that a lot for good clients. It paid to make “friends” with the clientele. Especially in Gotham.

One never knew when someone might come in handy on a bind.

“Of course, Joseph!”

“You’re doing well for yourself,” a somewhat raspy voice commented and Travis blinked. That sounded familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it at that moment. So, he finished what he was doing – washing some dishes because he was about to run out – and turned to look at the new arrival. He was greeted by an old man in a suit, pulling off a vibe that was somewhere in between lawyer and office worker. “Been a while, hasn’t it, Fool?”

That, more than anything, gave him pause. Nobody had called him that in forever, it felt like. Furthermore, that was the last puzzle piece that his mind seemed to need. After another blink, he grinned widely.

“Angelo?” he asked, chuckling as he walked around the counter. “How are you still alive? Aren’t you like, two hundred already?” he asked and he was surprised by how happy he was to see that old man.

“And here I was excited to see you,” Angelo replied flatly, but there was no hiding the glint in his eye. Nor the way he opened his arms and welcomed Travis in with a hug that always made him think of the man as an uncle of sorts. Although, maybe that’d just been kid Travis thinking too hard, hoping too hard. “It’s been too long, Fool,” he said softly.

He’d admit, in the privacy of his mind, that it was almost like being a kid again.

“It has,” Travis said, pulling away with a grin that felt so odd on his face, like he wasn’t used to it. Maybe he wasn't. “Had my reasons though,” he added and the smile became a whole lot more brittle almost immediately, with memories of said reasons flashing through his mind. Angelo himself smiled sadly at him. “You got promoted then?” he added, forcing himself to remain calm and casual, happy, and pointing at his outfit. “I guess I missed a celebration…”

“That I did,” the man confirmed, very obviously proud of that. “And you missed more than one,” he added, his expression falling into a somewhat sad smile.

“Wait, you are Joseph’s boss?” Travis asked then, noticing the shocked look on the aforementioned man. “Oh, now I definitely have to break out something good. Hold up, I gotta rob my old man’s stash,” he said, turning away and going to do just that.

“No mercy even for the dead, Travis? That’s heartless.”

“Oh, shut up. You know he’d have wanted me to,” he called with a laugh. A part of him was hurting, deep inside, but he wouldn’t let that ruin a good moment. “Actually, I’m sure he did just that when you got promoted, didn’t he?”

“He did, which is why you shouldn’t.”

“I wasn’t here for that, so it doesn’t count,” Travis replied cheekily, making Angelo chuckle. If anything, Joseph seemed to grow even more baffled than before. “What? I told you I was from here,” he pointed out to who had turned out to be a regular at his bar, which was funny because… “Angelo was a regular back when my dad owned this dump.”

“And that’s not crazy,” Angelo commented and Travis was sure the man was as amused as he was. He was better at appearing he was not though, or maybe he was just trying. Travis definitely wasn’t, admittedly. “You come here because it’s close to work and so did I. Things have been busy for a while on my end, sadly. It was funny that you invited me for a drink here though, I have to admit.”

“Back in the day, eh, old man?” Travis asked with a grin and he almost rolled his eyes at Joseph's pale face. Did he think he was screwing him over with his boss or something? Angelo was nice. He’d be fine. “Back when you were still young and had color on your head.”

“Your father is not around to cover for you anymore, kid. You know that, right?” the old man asked, raising an eyebrow and Travis just grinned wider.

“Please, everyone knows you covered for me with my dad,” he replied, getting a smile back from Angelo. “How’s the rest of the old guard doing, by the way? I thought you all moved or something when I didn’t see any of you all around here.”

He knew, immediately, that there was a story behind that and not all of it was good. It was evident in the way Angelo’s expression fell the smallest bit, turning complicated. It wasn’t necessarily a surprise, but it still caught Travis the smallest bit off guard. No matter how shitty Gotham was, a part of one would always be hopeful all the same.

Funny how that worked… in a very not funny way.

“Lorenzo got shot about… two years ago,” Angelo said and that was that. His expression and tone told the rest of the story. Travis’ hand clenched into a fist immediately. “Johnny left town. He found a good girl for himself and decided that Gotham wasn’t for him anymore, wasn’t for them.”

“Lucky,” he commented, happy to have some good news.

“I know, right?” the man agreed, taking the empty glass Travis set in front of him and looking at it like it was a relic. It kind of was, he supposed, since those glasses had been in the bar all the way back when Travis was still around. There were new ones by then, both that his father had gotten and that Travis himself did, but he’d chosen those in particular on purpose. “The rest are still around, just not quite close enough to drop by like we used to. We also didn’t know you’d opened the place back up. I’ll tell them to drop by to say hi.”

“Please do,” he agreed easily. It’d be nice to see some friendly, familiar faces. “Anyway, you were always talking about wanting that promotion. We… I got excited for you to get it after hearing so much about that,” he said, all the while moving to get a good bottle to offer them. He was kind of ignoring the rest of the bar, but he wasn’t too concerned about that. The slight fondness already present in the old man’s face when he came back with the bottle was worth it all by itself. “Congratulations, Angelo, even if I’m late.”

“I appreciate that,” was the response he got and Travis opened the bottle he’d gotten. “It’s very good to see you, Travis, truly. Gotham is Gotham, but things are not as bad as they were back before you left. Maybe things will be better now,” he told him and that was incredibly reassuring. Travis would have opened one of his old man’s treasures just for that piece of news.

That was one less worry for him, at least.

He ignored the other half of that statement though, because he wasn’t too sure about that. He still had time to screw it all over, but he was riding the high of success for as long as he could manage. Life had taught him to do that and it was one lesson that he’d always held close to his chest… for better or worse.

“Ok, that’s nice, but let’s not bring the mood down, yeah?” Travis asked, nodding as he served a glass for everyone at the table. His attention was firmly on Angelo though, even if everyone else was staring at him like they were seeing him for the first time. “How are things with Caterina? Her father already started beating boys off with a stick?”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Angelo lamented, although he also seemed a little amused. Travis thought that, for once, coming back almost seemed like a good thing- “You’re not getting a glass for yourself?”-so of course life decided to kick him in the balls for good measure.

“I’m around drinks all day every day, Angelo. I don’t know how dad did it,” he said, but he knew instantly that the old man knew there was more to that. It was a small mercy that he seemed to decide to let the matter go and Travis was incredibly grateful for that. He almost let out a relieved sigh when the man went back to talking about his granddaughter.

Long after that though, when everyone left, when the bar was closed and he was alone inside it, he found himself staring into a glass of water. In the silence though, Travis could almost hear the old music, the laughs and the clinking of glasses. He was suddenly smaller, dumber… happier. Funnily enough, as he took a gulp from the glass, he wondered if he was feeling nostalgic, or regretful, or something else entirely.

He just knew he felt shitty and yet… it was nice to remember those times.

He felt like he was more often than not remembering bad things. All the fights, all the screwups, they lived rent free in his head, they tortured him late at night in bed and they followed him through his day. Yet, there were good things in his past too. Family friends like Angelo, and actual friends he didn’t even know how to begin looking for, didn’t even know if they were alive…

There were good memories, even of his father, but… for some reason, his brain refused to look at those, to acknowledge them.

Because maybe he was just that much of a mess, he supposed.

[}-o-{]

‘Hm, this is good, if I do say so myself,’ Travis mused, sitting at his own counter with a sandwich and a soda. He might eat sandwiches every other meal, but at least he tried to mix up what he put inside of them. A lesser version of his experimentation with cocktails and such, he supposed.

He’d even gotten himself a small cake to celebrate the passing of the first month after his bar opened. The place was doing well, he was making money and upgrades to the place would be easy to get done soon if things continued the way they were going up to that point. It’d been a month of wins, as far as he was concerned.

Sure, such thoughts inevitably led to him feeling even more nervous. After all, he was in Gotham City. There was no way he could go very long without something happening. The place was cursed to never let someone have a good time. Good things were few and far between in bad old Gotham.

So, having a good luck streak made him feel like he was running out of time. Every good and/or calm day he went through felt like a step towards a robbery or a villain attack or something. It was kind of the reason why Travis didn’t leave his bar much. Why give fate more chances of messing with him? The last thing he needed was adding muggins to the list of stuff that could happen to him and that was a valid concern, if Joseph was to be believed.

There was also the fact that he hadn’t been one to get out much for a while, but it was mainly because of the mugging thing.

‘If things go well, I’ll be able to get a nice TV set up here in no time,’ he thought to himself. Sure, he could get one right then and there, but he’d rather not have to dig into his savings too much. If anything, he’d like to make his nest egg even better.

After all, when shit inevitably happened to him, Travis would have enough to get his feet under him again… hopefully, at least. That was the plan he was working on at the moment. However, it would be a bit of a balancing act, he supposed. He needed to improve the bar so it would do better, but for that he needed to spend money that he would rather save.

Investment was difficult to do when there was no certainty that things wouldn’t go up in flames in a moment’s notice.

On the other hand, if his bar was shitty, it wouldn’t matter if he could recover from a disaster, he supposed.

‘Stuck between a rock and a hard place, I guess,’ Travis mused with a sigh as he took another gulp of his drink. For a moment, he let his mind focus on the sweet taste of it before replacing that with a bite of his sandwich to change things up. It was as nice a way to get his mind to calm down as any, he supposed. ‘One step at a time. I’ll save for the TV and then probably can leave the bar alone for some time. No need to turn this into a pub, I never liked those anyway,’ he decided, letting out a long breath.

Music too loud wasn’t his cup of tea, as it were. It made it so that he couldn’t talk with someone without shouting and that was annoying. Besides, he liked the current atmosphere of the bar. People came, drank something and maybe got something to snack on and talked. It was cozy, in a way, relaxed and friendly. That was the impression he got and he’d like to keep it.

A TV would give the place some background noise without bothering and maybe he could get it set up so that they could see sports matches. Travis hadn’t watched much of that in a while, but he knew others were very into that and he could entertain himself well enough with those. All in all, it looked like the better option for improving the place, so maybe he should start looking, even if he would probably-

He turned towards the door when he heard someone push it open.

“We are closed,” he said almost in reflex, his tone not even annoyed. Wouldn’t be the first time someone tried to get in even when the sign read closed. He’d gotten used to people like that after the first week. “Jason?” he asked then, blinking as he saw the kid enter through the door with a woman by his side.

Uncharacteristically, the boy looked nervous, unsure, as he shifted on his feet and glanced between Travis and the woman. Confused and a little caught off guard, he straightened his back and went to stand up, pushing his meal and drink to the side. His mind was already conjuring scenarios to what could be happening and they got increasingly worse with every passing second. ‘Please, kid, I like you. Don’t bring trouble to me,’ he thought, fighting not to scowl or purse his lips.

“Hey, old man,” the boy said, sounding like he was having to force the words out of his mouth. “This… this is my mom.”

“I’m Catherine Todd,” the woman introduced herself, shifting her stance to stand straight too. The new position didn’t really help her look any less uncertain, however. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Larson.”

“Travis Larson, although it seems you already knew that,” he replied with a smile, if a little confused. He hadn’t expected to see Jason on his day off and least of all in such a situation. ‘So, he’s not an orphan rat, huh?’ he thought, considering the new information. Not all rats were on their own, he knew, but that didn’t really change much for them.

He wondered how this might change things though, if at all.

“So, what can I do for you?” he asked, running his fingers through his sandy hair as he tried to gather his thoughts. ‘And on my day off, of all times. Why did you do this to me, Jason?’ he lamented to himself. Although, thinking about it, it’d probably have been worse if it were a normal day.

Still though.

“Yes, I do believe there’s something you could do for me… for us, Mr. Larson,” Catherine told him, shoulders dropping as she slouched again, whatever semblance of confidence she might have been showing before disappearing. He saw her hand move to grip strongly at her other arm and she visibly gulped before opening her mouth again. “I… I need a job.”

 [} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

Some slice of life, Travis getting settled still and some glimpses at his life before this story. Some more characters have been added and… Well, characters already doing character things at chapter 3. I’m not even surprised anymore.

I should have known it’d be Jason, the little shit, the one that’d kick my poor plans before they could even get started.

Ruthless guy, that one. No wonder he turns out like he does.

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord .gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: If you look away from the screen, what’s the first piece of text that you find or catches your eye? There’s “Witnesses of good moments” in Spanish (Testigos de buenos momentos, for those that know) written on the wall in front of me in the cafe I had to go to in order to get some work done today. It was a hectic day.

See you.