Five Years Ago

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She wasn’t entirely sure what drew her to the place.

It certainly wasn’t the atmosphere.

She paused, looked left, then right.

The view was the same from both sides. The street was paved, barely. The asphalt was cracked and broken, the lines that had been painted on it long faded from view.

There were abandoned buildings, some that looked like a stiff breeze would take them down. Others boarded up or burned-out. One or two of the lots seemed well-cared-for, but the others had fallen into disrepair, the grass infested with weeds, trash threatening to overrun it all.

The neighborhood had clearly seen better days, but she got the feeling it wasn’t completely gone yet.

It was clear to her that the place was teetering, balancing between good and bad.

If she believed what the world had taught her so far, she’d had no doubt bad would win out.

But the eventual fate of this place wasn’t her concern, so she focused on the one lot in particular that had caught her eye. It was one of the more well-maintained ones, no trash littering it. The building was stark, almost desolate-looking with no adornment, nothing that gave any hint of what it had been or what it was becoming, but it didn’t look run-down.

She found herself mysteriously drawn to the place. Perhaps it was the moving truck parked out front. The truck’s door was open, and from her brief glimpse, she could see what looked to be valuable equipment inside.

Even though she hadn’t let her gaze linger, she thought she had spotted chairs, nice heavy-looking wooden ones. The fittings of a kitchen. A couple of boxes of glassware.

Not so unusual, she supposed. But whoever owned the truck didn’t seem concerned about its well-being. Expensive gear was packed in it, but she didn’t see another soul, and that made her curious.

Curiosity had led her down many a bad road, but that didn’t make the impulse any easier to ignore. So, after a brief internal debate that was really no debate at all, she gave in and walked toward the building.

She peered inside and could immediately see that the doorway led to a steep staircase, one that went down, down, down into darkness.

Another thing that should have warned her away.

But she wasn’t.

She heard sounds inside, assumed it was whoever was responsible for unloading the truck.

Before she could stop it, a little spring of hope had started to develop.

She had been looking for…

In truth, she had been looking for a lot of things, some she wasn’t even brave enough to acknowledge to herself. But, on a more practical note, she had been looking for work.

She’d sworn she wouldn’t touch that money, and so far she hadn’t, but things were beyond tight, and she worried she would have to eventually.

She’d picked up odd jobs here and there, but she was tired of that, and for some irrational reason, she couldn’t shake the thought that this place might be for her.

Not long term, of course; she was done putting down roots. But if, as she suspected, the place was just opening, it might be a good time to get in. Maybe she could stay for a month or two, just take a little while to rest and be still.

“What the heck?” she whispered under her breath.

She walked across the threshold and then down the steep but sturdy steps.

About halfway down, it again occurred to her that this might be foolhardy.

She had no idea what was in the basement, and logically, she knew she should leave. But, for whatever reason, she wasn’t afraid. And despite all of her other failings, she’d learned to trust her instincts.

Even after all that had happened, she could still say that they had never steered her wrong. No, the errors in her past had not been her instincts, but rather her unwillingness to listen to them.

She vowed she would never make that mistake again, and now, her instincts told her this was the place she needed to be. So she continued down, debating whether or not she should call out.

“Hello?” she finally said when she reached the bottom of the stairs.

Her voice was quiet enough that most people would call it a whisper. It wasn’t that, at least not to her. Instead, that soft, wispy sound was the residue of who she had been, what she had been taught, what she had endured.

She hated speaking that way, but it was an old habit, one she didn’t yet know how to break.

One she didn’t know if she would ever be able to.

Some part of her feared that quiet voice, the one that was so low that sometimes she didn’t even hear it, was to be hers forever.

The thought terrified her.

“Who are you?”

The man’s voice was warm and didn’t startle her, so she looked toward him. She’d stayed in the doorway, and he appeared to be about ten feet away.

He was tall, probably a foot taller than her own barely above five feet. Broad, muscular.

Physically intimidating, but when she met his eyes, she saw amusement in them, warmth.

He had what looked to be blond hair slicked back, something like a smile on his face.

“I was just…” She trailed off, looked past him to the man who was behind him.

Taller than the first, dark hair to the other’s blond. An even more intimidating figure, one that she couldn’t help but shiver when she looked at.

And unlike the other man, he didn’t seem friendly. His eyes weren’t smiling. Instead he looked at her with naked suspicion, didn’t even attempt to hide his perusal.

Ordinarily, she wouldn’t have liked that. Had always hated that in fact. But now…

She wasn’t comfortable, not exactly, anyway, but whereas the man who watched her was undeniably intimidating, his gaze didn’t make her uncomfortable, didn’t spark that instinct that told her to run.

No, this man’s look sparked just the opposite, made her want to get closer. Instinctually she knew that would be a mistake, and the depth of her desire to get closer to him scared her, scared her enough that she considered leaving this place. But she couldn’t do that either, so she stayed put.

She shifted, still keeping her body in the doorway, but moving so that the other man was in her periphery. Then she looked back at the blond with the welcoming face.

“Who are you?” he asked again.

The question was frank, but not aggressive. It was mostly curious, and she found herself relaxing.

“I just wandered by. I saw the truck out front,” she said.

She felt like a stammering idiot, a feeling that went away when the blond smiled even brighter.

“Yeah. We aren’t open yet but soon,” he said.

“What’s opening?” she asked.

The blond lifted his arms and spread them wide. “The best Irish pub this city has ever seen,” he said.

She found herself biting back the desire to laugh. That was another habit that she hadn’t quite been able to kick. It had been drilled into her mind that laughter, a human but totally unseemly emotion, wasn’t something to be shared freely.

Few things were.

“Ahh, that face. It tells me that you doubt it.”

She looked at the blond again, noticed that he was still smiling.

“I—”

The man looked at her, tilted his head.

“Have you ever tended bar?” he asked.

“No,” she said. She decided it might be overkill if she told him she’d never had a drink.

“That could be problematic. Do you know how to pour a drink?” the blond asked.

“Well—” She trailed off, considering the question. “No.”

“That could be problematic too,” the blond said.

At his words, she felt herself deflating. Perhaps she should’ve lied.

She dismissed the thought out of hand. Despite what her past would suggest, what others had said about her, lying wasn’t something that came easily to her, and it certainly wasn’t something she wanted to make a habit.

Not when she’d worked so hard to get away from all that.

“Can you waitress?” he asked.

“Umm…”

Again she considered what to say, and again the only option was the truth. “No. I never have.”

“What can you do?” the blond said.

This question left her at a complete loss.

What could she do? That she didn’t have an obvious answer was something that left her feeling even more deflated.

Her life had never been one of doing. It had always been about being.

Being silent.

Being wholesome.

Being perfect.

And utterly replaceable.

Forcing herself back to the present, she noted that her skills likely weren’t the qualifications he was looking for. Still, she felt a sense of urgency, a deep unwillingness to walk out of this place.

Something about this moment felt monumental and she wouldn’t let it slip through her fingers.

So she stayed, her mind racing, her body starting to tremble as she tried to think of something.

And then, it came to her.

“I can bake,” she said.

The instant the words were out of her mouth she felt stupid. No pub needed a baker, and it was clear she was simply wasting this man’s time.

She shook her head, feeling as useless as she ever had before. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to barge in. I’ll leave—”

She went to turn but was stopped by the blond’s voice. “Hold on. Why are you going?” he asked.

“I-I’m not what you’re looking for,” she said.

She kept her back to him, but risked looking at the blond, saw that his green eyes were sparkling, his face lifted with a smile.

She didn’t dare hazard a glance at the other man, certain that he would not be smiling.

“You’re exactly what I’m looking for,” the blond said.

“What?” she replied, her brows furrowing, her heart again starting to lift, despite the disappointment she knew was coming.

“Yeah. You’re the one,” he said, nodding.

“I don’t know how to bartend,” she said.

He shrugged. “Between you and me, I don’t either. We’ll figure it out together,” he said.

“I—”

“Besides, you can bake. Everybody needs a baker.”

She looked at him, wondering what was behind this.

“Why?” she asked.

She wanted to take the word back as quickly as she had said it, but she swallowed, studied his reaction.

That was so foreign to her, asking questions, expecting answers.

But, to her surprise, the man smiled.

“Don’t know other than to say I think you’re exactly what this place needs.”

“Okay,” she said, quiet, confused, but still unwilling to walk away.

“So you’ll take the job?” he asked.

She stared at him for a moment, and, very resolutely, did not study the man next to him.

“I’ll take the job,” she finally said.

The blond smiled and then crossed the room. He extended his hand, and she reached out, shook it. “What’s your name?” he asked.

She stared at him for a moment, and then, finally, the words emerged. “I’m Grace,” she said.

The blond smiled. “I’m Sean. Sean Murphy. And the silent one over there is my brother Declan.”