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January
One
Raine
When I step inside the pub, the first thing I notice is the music. It’s punchy, with layered vocals and a thrumming bass that makes me want to hum along, even though I don’t know the words. The Local is emptier than I’d expect for a pub on a Friday night in Ireland, but maybe this is normal. The only thing I know about Cobh is that it was the last port of call for theTitanicbefore it sank. That and, according to a woman I met in Dublin who makes her living hula-hooping, the cruise ship terminal is an excellent spot for busking.
I cross the pub, take a seat at the bar, and after ordering a Guinness from a polite but grumpy-looking bartender, pull my phone from the pocket of my coat to use my song-finder app. When the screen doesn’t illuminate, I instinctively reach for the giant backpack I always keep by my side, only to remember that I no longer have my backpack. Or my guitar. Or the travel case I use to carry my gear. Or any of my gear, for that matter. No street amp. No microphone stand. No phone charger.
I am usually calm in a crisis, probably because I’m so good at getting into one. But my face is numb after searching for my stolenthings in the January cold, and I am one wrong turn from snapping like a too-tight guitar string.
The problem: I am stuck in this town I know nothing about, with nothing to my name but the contents of my pockets. Lip balm. My train ticket to Cobh from Dublin. A Ziploc bag with some cash from my guitar case. A foot tambourine. Old napkins with scribbled lyrics. Old receipts with scribbled lyrics. A piece of chewed gum inside of a crumpled receipt. (A lot of receipts, really.) My passport and phone, thank God.
The solution? Yet to be determined.
When the song ends, I’m resigned to the fact that I will never know the name of it. Just as I am resigned to the fact that after a year abroad, I will likely be moving back to Boston sooner than I planned.
The bartender fills my pint glass halfway, then sets it aside and disappears through a door to the kitchen. While I wait, I peer around the pub. It’s clean and well-lit but sparsely decorated. Other than two Irish flags on the ceiling, a chalkboard menu, and some black-and-white photos of boats and buildings, it’s not decorated at all. And speaking of sparse, there’s hardly anyone else here. I wish I’d stumbled upon somewhere livelier to take my mind off of things, but now that I’m seated, I simply don’t have the will to get up.
The bartender returns a few minutes later and sets my Guinness before me. “There you are, love,” he says.
I thank him, but he only grunts and disappears to the kitchen again.
As I drink my pint, I prod my dead phone with a finger. I don’twantto call my parents, but I need to. There’s only so long I can put it off. I try to focus on the music playing overhead, but I’m stuck in a loop of negative thoughts. The humiliation of calling my parents and asking for help. The humiliation of returning home and movingin with them until I can get back on my feet. The humiliation ofI told you so.
I’ve just finished my beer and am working up the motivation to hunt down a store that sells phone chargers when I’m startled by a blur of movement to my right. When I turn, I find the largest black cat I’ve ever seen perched on the barstool beside me.
“Oh, hello,” I say. The cat swishes its tail lazily behind it, staring at me with its large green eyes.
It might just be the beer, but I’m already in love with this cat. I dangle my hand in front of it and say, “Aren’t you incredibly floofy? You’re a little late though. I’ve already had all my bad luck for the day. At least, I hope I have.”
The cat blinks at me, then makes a trilling sound, almost like a bird.
“I bet you get the bad-luck thing all the time, don’t you? I’m sure it’s not true. You’re probably a very lucky cat.”
The cat chirps again. It rubs its face against my hand, so I give it a scratch beneath its chin. “Speaking of luck, you don’t happen to have a phone charger, do you, floofy boy? Or girl. I don’t want to assume.”
I nearly fall off my stool when a voice answers me. “He doesn’t, but there’s usually one behind the bar.”
When I look up, a man is lowering himself onto the stool on the other side of the cat. He swipes the beanie from his head and stuffs it into the pocket of his coat, then runs a hand through his dark hair. When he faces me, I decide that I was right, this cat is lucky, because with clear blue eyes and an easy expression, this man is...hot.
He props an elbow on the bar, posture confident and casual, like he owns the place. He’s sex on a stool, and I bet he knows it. I take in the swoop of hair that falls into his eyes, the black peacoat and blackjeans and black wingtip boots, and decide that this sophisticated-bad-boy look really does it for me.
“I like your...”Everything, I think.“Boots,” I say, and immediately want to punch myself in the face. Of all the things that shoot out of my mouth, I couldn’t find something more charming thanI like your boots? Seems I haven’t become any more worldly since leaving home.
“Thank you,” the man says.
He gives me a bemused smile, and I soon realize the cat has pulled away from me and I’ve been scratching at nothing but air for the last few seconds. I grab my pint glass and take a sip, but it’s empty except for a few drops of liquid. Any game I had (minuscule, tiny, almost nonexistent) has abandoned me in my time of need.
The man pushes the hair from his eyes and looks at my dingy brown hiking boots with faded red laces. “I like your boots too,” he says.
I can’t tell if he’s serious or not. These boots have taken a beating. I really need a new pair, though I probably won’t need hiking boots much back home. My parents will use their connections to get me an office job at a clinic or something, and instead of hiking boots, I’ll be buyingsomething sensible, though I don’t see how heels and pointy-toed flats are more sensible than traction and arch support.
The man nods to the cat. “He’s a boy, but you can call him whatever you like. He doesn’t care. Isn’t that right, Princess Ugly?”
I wiggle my toes in my perfectly sensible, if dingy, hiking boots. “That’s quite the name.”
He shoots me a playful smile. “His real name is Sebastian, but floofy boy works too.”
