I kicked the stand down on the motorcycle just a few blocks west of central Mission District, in the street outside my old best friend Quintin’s newly opened Station to Station Pub.

San Francisco sunlight cut through the gray fog, glinting off the sunglasses of the girls sitting on the bar terrace. I eyed them and tossed my head back. In my leather jacket and black jeans, I was formidable, dominant. I pushed my sunglasses off and raised my eyebrow toward them—young twenty-somethings with short jean skirts and overzealous laughs. There they sat, sipping bright margaritas and gabbing.

I’d been across the United States of America on this motorbike more times than I could count, and I’d seen girls like this nonstop. They were a dime a dozen. They always wanted me.

“Hey bad boy,” one of them called, sliding her painted fingernails through her curls. “Where you comin’ from?”

I strutted past them, unzipping my leather jacket to reveal a V-neck T-shirt. I smiled and shook my head. I almost wanted to toy with them, to say, “I think you might be looking for something you can’t handle.” But I held back. I knew it wasn’t worth it. It never really was.

One of the girls, stick-thin, perky, and blonde, jumped to her feet as I walked past. Her nostrils flared. She was definitely one of those new-money rich-girls, her daddy’s bank stuffed with tech-world cash. I would have laid down a half-a-mil on a bet that her nose was a fake one.

As she searched for something to say, some way to reel me in, the door to the bar opened. The open door silhouetted the familiar form of my childhood best friend—a dark and brooding asshole, with a leather jacket similar to mine and dark black curls rounding over his ears. An old tattoo under his shirt leaked out onto his neck. He tilted his head toward Little Blondie and asked, “So, Wesley, just got back into town and you’re already messing with my customers?”

“Q, my man,” I said and strutted toward him. We had a brief hug—a smack on the back, more like—and then drew back to eye each other with a strange mix of complete trust and apprehension. What the fuck would we get up to this time? Our encounters always stirred up some kind of ancient, dormant chaos, ever since we were twelve years old, sneaking into old Mrs. Conner’s house off Penn Street, just to prove we weren’t scared of a witch.

“All right, man. Let me get you a drink,” Quintin said. He slung an arm around my shoulders and walked me inside. “You ain’t been to the bar yet, right? Where were you last? Florida?”

“Naw, man. I was in Chicago,” I told him. “Good few months. Can’t really beat Midwestern summers.”

I sauntered in beside him, eyeing his new bar. Station to Station Pub was a lifelong dream for Quintin, something he’d talked on and on about when we were teenagers. “Just a fucking place where locals can come in, sit down, have a place to drink in peace,” he said. “None of these overdone bullshit places playing pop music. I want grit. I want the old San Francisco, pre-tech boom”

“You did it, man,” I said. “It’s fucking cool.”

It was. The place was mostly dark wood, a mahogany bar, with little booths that gave it an Irish-pub feel. Alt-rock sizzled in from the speakers, and old San Francisco locals sipped brews at the bar. It was only five o’clock on a Wednesday, but fuck, they looked comfortable, like they’d been there all day. It felt like a living room—at least, a living room where you could talk to a stranger for hours. Or keep to yourself for days.

“Yeah. It’s actually been pretty spectacular, business-wise,” Quintin said, stepping behind the bar. He poured a frothy pint and tapped the glass on the counter, then wiped his palms on the front of his pants. He watched me sip, and I knew he was looking for my approval. This was a rarity in Quintin, a man who did whatever the hell he pleased, much like me.

“It’s good, man. Real good,” I said.

“Why are you back this time?” he asked, his voice lowering. His eyes darted toward a room in the back, which must have been where they kept the kegs. A figure stood at the keg, tossing her brunette curls behind her back. Her waist was slim, her legs long. Even from where I was, I could see her tits rounding out her dark shirt, and the way the lights cast shadows across her cleavage. It wouldn’t have been hard to guess why I was staring, but I usually wasn’t one to stare at a woman.

“My old man wants to see me,” I offered. “Who the fuck knows why. I haven’t said a single word to him since Christmas, maybe. Not like he’s on my calling rotation.”

“Not like I am, either,” Quintin scoffed.

“Man. You know what it’s like on the road,” I said. I nodded toward the woman still yanking at the keg opener, straining. Her thin arms were no match. “Who the fuck you got bartending with you? She’s gorgeous.” I almost caught myself and lowered my voice, but still, the comment slipped out. I hoped Quintin hadn’t heard. If this was his lady, I didn’t want to be disrespectful by ogling her. Quintin was one of the best guys I knew.

Quintin’s face turned a strange grayish color, almost cloud-like behind his black beard. He sniffed, bringing his hand into a fist. “Man, if I’d known you were coming in today…”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I asked him, tossing up from the barstool. “You don’t want me to meet your girl? Think I’ll steal her?” I teased him.

“Man, it’s not like that,” Quintin said, quietly. “I just wouldn't have had you come in today is all.”

Curiosity made me do all kinds of things, and I had at least as many lives as a cat. I strutted toward the open side door where the woman was thrusting the pipe over the keg with a final push. She smacked her hands against her thighs, which shook just slightly. From behind, she was a perfect hourglass shape, her curls easing toward the top of her ass. She was as good or better than any of the gorgeous, all-American women I’d spotted on the road. How had Quintin nabbed her? Had he finally dumped that ragamuffin girl, Evie, he’d met when he “tried out college”?

Satisfied with her work, the woman spun on her heel, but then she stopped short, her eyes turning to bright orbs when she spotted me. She inhaled sharply. I couldn’t help but notice the quiver in her breasts. A wave of recognition came over me, warming me: my brain lit up, my muscles strained inside my leather jacket. Those familiar, supple lips, that curious little wrinkle between her eyebrows, the way her cheeks turned to apples when she was surprised.

This girl. This woman. She had been mine. Maybe a million years ago.

“Remy,” I said, my voice low. I brought my arms over my chest, crossing them. I took up the space in the doorway, forming a blockade between her and her brother, Quintin.

“Wesley,” she said, stiffly. My name sounded so delicious in her mouth. Like a sweet candy she rolled around, twirling along her tongue. “What the hell?”

Quintin yanked me back slightly, giving me a dark look. I understood now why he’d rather have had me on a different day. Remy had been my high-school lover, the girl I’d first thrust my cock into on a particularly foggy September day after skipping science class. I still dreamed about the way she whimpered into me mid-first-fuck, her eyes daydreamy and wet.

Remy remained near the keg. Her fingers flickered against her thighs, and her bottom lip trembled, though she’d put up a frown.

“My sister’s working here now,” Quintin said, clearly trying to take control of the situation. “Just for a while. Right, Rem?”

Remy’s eyes remained on mine. The energy between us sizzled with a strange mix of nostalgia and desire. God, I hadn’t seen her in ten years, maybe more. Her body looked better, tighter. Her hair curled in a grand, alluring way. Something behind her eyes spoke of sadness, of longing, but after fucking my way across the states, I knew that kind of look just came with age. What were we now? Thirty-one goddamn years old. Of course she’d had a broken heart or two. Hadn’t we all?

“You’re looking fucking great, Rem,” I told her. I gave her my best smile.

Remy remained feet away. “As if I’m looking good for you,” she said, her eyes sparkling. “But you were always the kind to think that the world only existed for you, weren’t you?”

“What was it you always said during our fights, Rem?” I asked, my smile becoming crooked. “That it’s Wesley’s world and you’re all just living in it?”

“Hey. As much as I love this little reunion between you two,” Quintin began, slapping a palm against the bar top. “It’s really not cool to come back here, Wesley. Customers up front. Fucking please.”

I stepped back from Remy, clearing a path. Despite her apparent sass about seeing me, we still shared a small, private joke: that no matter what, Quintin still hated that we’d ever been together. That we’d ever “loved” one another—or whatever the hell that meant when you were sixteen, seventeen years old and pumping with hormones. God, he’d put up such a fit when he’d discovered Rem and I with our lips locked in the back of my shoddy Chevrolet. He tossed his science book at my head, glaring from beneath dark eyebrows low over his eyes. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing, man? I know you. I know what you do.”

He hadn’t been wrong. But at the time, I’d felt nothing but the love pumping through my heart. I hadn’t been able to resist her. Until it all fell apart, just as he’d expected it to. I was no good. I don’t know why I’d ever thought I could be enough for her.

Remy slid out from the keg room, whipping her hair behind her back. One of the local drinkers, a white-haired overweight man with thick glasses, smacked his fist on the bar top. Remy turned her attention to him. “What can I grab you, Marshall?” she asked.

“Just your love, Remy,” he sighed. “That’s all any of us want. Even this asshole.” He gestured toward me with a drunken, thick thumb, chortling. “Ain’t that right, man?”

I rolled my eyes at him, lifted my beer, and chugged almost half of it. When I set it back down, the old man, Quintin, and Remy’s eyes were all on me, like they were waiting for me to say something. Finally, I did.

“Don’t be fucking ridiculous—Marshall, was it?” I kept my eyes on Remy. “I’ve had her love. But neither of us wants that anymore, do we, Rem? We know to keep our distance.”

“So glad you came in here to make my day brighter, Wes,” she said. “It’s always a pleasure. Every ten years.”

I thrust myself from the stool and into the glinting light outside the pub, still grinning. I felt almost gleeful, sizzling with energy from her anger. She still burned with memories of me. And I was surprised at how swiftly memories of her rushed to the surface.

Hadn’t seen that perfect ass in more than ten years. But it was as if not a single day had gone by.

I heard Quintin’s boots behind me. I whirled around at my bike. He shook his head, showing a strange mix of anger and humor. “Leave my sister alone, asshole,” he said.

I slipped my leg over the side of the motorcycle and revved the engine with a squeeze. Over the roar, I said, “You know I’ve already traveled that road, Quintin. I wouldn’t do that to you twice.”

“Ha. You fucking better keep your word this time,” Quintin said. He took a few steps toward me as I turned the bike toward the road. “And man, hit me up more often before you get back on the road. It’s been, what? Six months? Seven?”

Quintin was a guy I’d left behind, a friend I felt shit about abandoning. He’d had to make his way in the city alone in the years after I’d cut out on the road. “Why don’t you just come with me?” I’d spewed at him, knowing he wouldn’t. His mother was sick then, and so he stayed back, giving Remy the chance to get out.

“Will do, man,” I said, before slipping back onto the streets. “Will do.”