Page 10 of Fish Out of Water

“I met him at Sandway earlier this week. Real asshole, huh?”

“Well, I shouldn’t comment on that, but—wait, did you say you saw him at Sandway?”

“Yeah. He helped me find something—rudely, obviously. He justhadto point out that I was new here.”

“No, that couldn’t have been Robert Jr. You must have gotten him confused with someone else.”

“He told me that was his name. Brown hair, blue eyes, pretty tall, kind of a stuck-up face?”

“Oh, you mean Robbie?”

“Yeah, I guess that’s what he called himself when we met. Yeah, Robbie. Is he not a junior?”

“You’re talking about Robert Alan Eaton the 3rd,” Isabel corrected him. “He’s Robert Jr.’s son. Nice kid.”

“He’s hardly a kid, and he’s sure as hell not nice.”

“Well, he’s always been nice to me. Maybe you just caught him on an off day.”

“Maybe,” Jake said, still skeptical. “Anyway, that’s all I wanted to know. Hopefully you don’t need me to go to that fucking bookstore anytime soon. I don’t wanna run into him again if I can help it.”

“Watch your language, please,” Isabel said.

Jake set his cup in the sink. “Sorry, Aunt Isabel.”

“You’ll see Robbie again. It’s only a matter of time. His family practically runs this town, and he’s a big part of it.”

Jake groaned. “I was afraid of that. Well, hopefully he doesn’t like hanging out in bars and… old theaters.”

“He likes the beach.”

“I know. Especially long walks on the beach, right?”

Isabel glanced back, her brow furrowed. “That’s oddly specific. How do you knowthat?”

“Never mind, Aunt Isabel. Never mind.”

Jake foundhimself wandering around town that evening for much longer than he had anticipated, just looking for something to do. At his aunt’s suggestion, he’d looked into driving to Grayland, but it hardly seemed worth it for another townmaybedouble the size of Eventide. It had a bigger gay scene, but when Eventide had none at all, that wasn’t saying much.

On any given Sunday night back home, Jake knew exactly what he’d be doing right now—grinding up against a guy at the club, the music and lights deafening every unnecessary sense. It was too early for him to be home yet, balls-deep in some hot twink’s throat, but that would’ve been the end goal. And it would’ve been fun.

Instead, he meandered down the quiet street, hands in his pockets, the sun setting behind him. It was peaceful. Too peaceful. He couldn’t stand it for much longer.

With nowhere else to go, Jake finally gritted his teeth and slipped intoThe Cove, the dingy bar across from the movie theater. The outside was not promising, with salt-damaged concrete along the stretch of sidewalk, dull red paint flaking off far worse than the paint Isabel’s house, and a door whose glass had been broken one time too many, and now had cardboard taped up in its place.

Inside the lighting was dim, but not in a sexy way. It felt like half the bulbs in the building had burned out, and no one bothered to replace them, instead leaving the remaining flickering incandescents to do all the work.

Some generic 80s pop rock blasted from a radio behind the counter. It suffocated the room, yet still couldn’t even manage to numb Jake’s brain enough for him to get used to it.

He took as deep a breath of the stale air as he could and approached the bar, sitting down on one of the stools—the only one that didn’t have a rip in its vinyl cushion. He waited for the bartender to notice him as he drummed his fingers on the countertop.

A sign directly in front of him advertising some beer he’d never heard of suddenly came to life. One of the neon tubes stayed dark, leaving a blank space on the edge of the sign, but therest remained lit, only flashing once the entire time Jake stared at it.

“How can I help you?” The bartender, a middle-aged man with a bald head and a short beard peppered with gray hairs, asked as he walked up to the counter.

“Vodka soda,” Jake said, eyeing the bottles of alcohol behind the man. “With your most expensive vodka,” he added.

“It’s cash only here, you know.”