“Hey…you smell good.”
Lilith and Mags are on their way to the local billiards bar and Mags just caught a whiff of Lilith’s perfume. Mags also notices a softness to Lilith they hadn’t noticed before…like her shoulders have dropped and a cool river pools at her chest. Maybe it’s a friendship softness.
I wonder if I look softer, too. I’ll ask Jeje later.
“Thanks. I had it made for me by some scent queen,” Lilith says and winks as she opens the door to the bar, releasing a puff of stale beer air mixed with frigid A.C.
“A scent queen? Wow. Please say this in front of Jeje next time we are with them. They would probably take issue with another queen in Edentown…” Mags’s words trail off as they take in their surroundings.
A few dudes, heads drooping into pints at the bar. A buzzing neon beer sign, halfheartedly illuminated red, as if it, too, has been sipping pints all day. A T.V., set to murmuring volume, displaying some sport situation.
“So, this is it! This is my happy place!”
Mags does a double take at Lilith’s genuineness. She seriously looks even more soft and serene now that they’re in the bar.
“But? You don’t drink…do you? And this place is full of dudes…it’s all–kinda sad? No offense,” she says to a nearby patron, who looked over in disgruntlement at Mags’s comment.
“Ah yes, but they serve cherry coke here. And the billiard tables are almost always empty. And pool? It’s my game–hey, Mo! Can we get two of my usual?”
Behind the bar, an older person with long grey hair and a matching beard nods and uses a soda gun to fill up two pints with fizzy, dark liquid.
It’s been years since Mags has sipped a cherry coke and now she wonders why…she forgot the divinity of this sticky, rich cola.
The femmes take their cokes to a pool table, which features a large yellow stain across the middle–like a dry grass patch in the middle of a lush green yard.
“This is my lucky table.”
Mags continues to reel at all of this new Lilith information…dive bar frequent, cherry coke lover, pool shark; at the same time, she feels a deep warmth of honor settle along her shoulders. They obviously adore Jeje, and they have enjoyed getting to know Luc…but Lilith has felt so familiar–like, bone familiar–in such a short amount of time. Like a friend she didn’t know she wanted so bad. Like a friend she didn’t know was possible at this stage in her life, or ever.
The two spend a couple hours at the dive, Lilith guiding Mags into proper pool stance, Mags scratching balls left and right, Lilith laughing with her head thrown back, the two taking turns sliding quarters into the juke box (Big Joanie, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Hendrix, Shania). Their mouths coated with cola. Their fingers dusty with blue chalk. Their chests humming, cool with connected river.
The next morning, Mags wakes up to a sore arm and shoulder.
She rubs into the soreness, smiles, and picks up her phone to text Lilith.
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