Page 85 of Keep

The customers were cheering. Actually cheering—drinks raised, whooping at each new cut like they were watching a comeback in the fourth quarter. A couple near the window had their phones out, filming the screens, adding another layer to the recursion. Two men at a corner table were holding each other and laughing so hard that one of them had mascara running down his face.

“Blake.” Chad’s voice came out strangled. “What did you do?”

“Someone posted this edit like two hours ago. It’s already past five million views.” Blake didn’t look remotely apologetic. “I just put it on our screens. Seemed like a public service.”

Chad watched a man who cooked breakfast for him, a man who said excuse me when he bumped into furniture, a man who still couldn’t say fuck without looking slightly startled—Chad watched this man become a folk hero in a three-minute loop set to pop music and spliced stock footage.

The front door opened, and Tim stepped inside, shaking water off his umbrella. He stopped dead.

“What in the hell⁠—”

“Blake did it,” Chad said.

Tim crossed to the bar, eyes on the nearest screen. The gospel choir hit its chord. The teeth flew. The elderly woman fanned herself.

“Do you know how many people have called tonight asking if you’re working?” Tim said.

“What?”

“Best publicity this place has ever had.” Tim clapped him on the shoulder, leaving his hand there a beat longer than usual. “Are you holding up?”

“Getting there.”

Tim nodded once. Went to his office. Didn’t push.

The bar settled slowly after that. Blake switched most of the screens back to their usual rotation, though he left the edit running silently on the corner monitor—and every now and then, by coincidence, the beat of whatever song was playing synced with the punch, which got a laugh from whoever noticed.

A regular near the end of the bar—a heavyset guy in his fifties, years of nothing but drink orders between them—caught Chad’s eye. He raised his glass and nodded. No comment, just a silent, affirming grin.

Chad grinned back.

He started closing early—wiping surfaces, restocking bottles, keeping his hands busy. It didn’t work. Every few minutes he caught himself reaching for his phone, composing messages he couldn’t finish.

I’m sorry.

I saw what you did.

I—

Reel it in, Chad.

Love? Was that what this was? It had been a month. A month of stolen hours, whispered conversations, and a connection that felt too big for the container he’d tried to put it in. A month, and now this man had thrown a punch in the United States Capitol, and the whole country was watching, and Chad was behind a bar trying not to fall apart over a text he couldn’t compose.

One month. You’ve known him for one month. People don’t⁠—

But his hands were shaking, and that was its own answer.

“I’m gonna take the trash out,” he called to Blake. “You good?”

Blake gestured at the near-empty room. “I think I can manage.”

The rain had tapered to a fine mist, the alley glistening under the single security light. Orange glow on wet grime. Chad heaved the bag into the dumpster and was heading back inside when a voice stopped him.

“Chad.”

He spun, shoulders tensing. A figure near the back wall—thin, hunched, but moving with more purpose than last time.

“Mac?”