Beautiful Mistake(2)

Behind the bar, Charlie—who had been listening to us for most of the night—was pouring a beer. “That’s it. From now on I want names.” He slammed the full mug on the wooden bar, causing beer to slosh all over. “I’m runnin’ any assholes either of you go out with.” Charlie O’Leary owned the Brooklyn pub where Ava and I worked. He was also a retired cop.

I smiled. “Okay. But you know that makes me want to give you the names of suspected serial killers—just to watch your ears turn that lovely shade of purple they turn when you’re pissed off.” I leaned over the bar and kissed him on the cheek. “’Night, Charlie-o.”

He grumbled something about being grateful he didn’t have daughters and waved me off.

“Can we go out the back door?” Ava asked. “I don’t want to pass him on the way out.”

“Sure. Of course.”

I hooked my arm with hers to make sure she stayed steady as we walked. After a few steps, I looked up and saw Married Guy standing next to the back door.

“Ummm, Ava, we should go out the front. He’s standing at the back door now.”

She looked around the room. “No, he’s at the front door talking to Sal, the new waiter.”

She was more wasted than I thought. I lifted my chin toward the rear exit, a straight line to Owen. “That’s the back door, Ava.”

“I know. Owen’s at the front door.”

I furrowed my brow. “Isn’t that Owen? With the blue button-up shirt?”

She drunk-snorted. “I said he was the good-looking guy in the blue shirt, not the Greek god modeling one.”

My head whipped to the front of the bar. There was only one guy near the front door who I didn’t know, and he was talking to Sal. “Owen is talking to the new waiter right now?”

She looked again and then sighed and nodded. “I should tell Sal to punch him.”

“Ava—the guy talking to Sal right now, right at this moment, is Owen?”

“Yes.”

“His shirt is brown, Ava. Not blue.”

She turned again toward the front door, squinted, and shrugged. “Maybe. I can’t see so good. My contacts are all smudgy from my makeup and crying.”

When she’d said her ex had just walked into the bar and pointed in the general direction of the front door, there’d been only one guy with a blue button-up on.

Shit.

I’d told off the wrong guy.

Since I couldn’t very well make Ava leave through the front door where the real Owen was standing, I sucked it up. Of course, Not Owen had his eye on me, with a smirk, the entire way to the back door.

He nodded at my friend as we passed. “Have a good night, Ava. ’Night, Feisty.”

I took the cowardly way out and kept my head straight, not making eye contact with the guy, until we were out the door.

Ava wasn’t so strong willed. Her head turned as she kept her eyes fixed on Not Owen, even as we made our way into the alley. She might have been drunk with smudgy contacts, but she wasn’t blind.

“Holy shit. Did you see that guy? And did he just say my name?”

I glanced back just as the bar door was closing. Not Owen waved with a cheeky grin.

“You’re hearing things.”





God, I was going to be late.

As if Monday classes weren’t bad enough after working a double shift on Sunday, I had a stain on my blouse from spilling my coffee when I had to jam on the brakes for an old man driving an enormous Cadillac. He’d decided he needed to make a left…from the right lane.

The first day of school was always a nightmare. People wandered around campus, standing in the middle of the road while giving fellow classmates directions to various buildings. I honked my horn at two underclassmen doing just that. They looked at me like I was the annoying one.

Come on. Move it, people.

After circling the parking lot three times, I parked in a reserved spot in front of Nordic Hall. Leaning over, I rummaged through the glove compartment, half of the contents falling to the floor as I searched for what I needed.

Got it.

I tucked an old ticket under my windshield wiper and took off for lecture hall 208. I really needed to pee, but was going to have to hold it until after class. I knew three things about Professor West, other than that he was in the music composition department. One: He’d gotten rid of his last TA because she refused to grade as hard as he wanted her to. Two: For the last week, whenever I told anyone I’d been reassigned to Professor West, they made a face—not an encouraging one—and said he was an asshole who almost got fired a few years back. And, three: He hated when students were late. He was known to lock the door as class started so latecomers couldn’t interrupt his lecture.

None of those boded well for me. But what choice did I have? My TA position with Professor Clarence had been eliminated when he died suddenly three weeks ago from an aneurysm. I was lucky to secure anything, at this point. And without a teaching assistant position, there was no way I’d be able to afford the tuition at the Music Conservatory. I was already waitressing full time at O’Leary’s just to pay my rent and partially reduced tuition.

Beads of sweat trickled into my cleavage as I arrived at the classroom. The door was closed, so I took a minute in an attempt to make myself presentable, smoothing down my dark, wild curls as best I could, considering the humidity. It was hopeless to try to fix the stain that pretty much covered my right breast, so instead I switched hands and hid it with the leather portfolio I was carrying. Taking a deep breath, I reached for the door handle.