“Okay, so we need to poll our customers and find out what other kinds of events they’d be interested in. Karaoke is always a winner, and trivia nights are super fun. I always loved a good poetry slam night back when I was in college.”

Paul scoffs.

I cross my arms. “What? Poetry slams are fun.”

Paul cocks a brow. “I’m sure for you they are.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“You look like a cross between a librarian and a fifties pinup girl. The fact that poetry slams excite you isn’t even a remote surprise.”

“Whatever. You just wait, my poetry slam nights are going to make axe throwing seem like a trip on a snooze cruise.”

“Gettin’ your rhyme on already?” Daphne smirks.

“It must be the booze.”

They chuckle and groan.

“But seriously, when it comes to poetry slams, I never lose.”

chapter five

Poke the Agitated Alice

Ronan

The books look good so far.” My grandfather pushes his glasses up his nose, bushy white eyebrows furrowed, shoulders hunched as he leans in close and leafs through the printed reports. Being in his eighties means everything gets lost in translation when he’s looking at a computer screen with the exact same numbers, so I print things out for him, even though it makes forests cry.

He rolls his shoulders back, sitting up straighter as he looks around the bar. His eyes crinkle in the corners, the lines in his face deepening with his wistful smile. “The renovations look good, too.”

I lean on the bar, pride choking me up, so my reply comes out a little gruff. “Thanks Gramps.” It was hard for him when I started changing things, so he hadn’t come in much for a while, but he’s back to popping in almost every other day.

He pats my arm with his big, knobby fingers. Gramps and I are about the same height, although he’s lost a couple of inches with age. His white shock of hair is slicked back and styled neatly, and as usual he’s wearing a white button-down and a pair of black dress pants. “Back in my day the only guys who decorated their skin were the ones who were in the Navy or spent some time behind bars.” He tells me this pretty much every single time he sees me, which is often, especially now that I’m helping run his bar. Mostly it’s a joke. Although the first time he saw my sleeves he asked me why I couldn’t hang my art on my walls like regular people.

“I can make you an appointment, get you set up with your own art if you’re jealous of mine. We could get matching ones.”

Gramps snorts a laugh. “I don’t even like it when a pretty nurse takes my blood. Not gonna have some guy coming at me with a bunch o’ buzzing needles.”

I rap on the bar and point a finger at him. “Just remember that when you tell a nurse she’s pretty nowadays it’s called sexual harassment.”

“It’s really a woman’s world, isn’t it? Can’t say we didn’t have it comin’ or that Dottie didn’t tell me it would happen. God rest her soul.” He makes the sign of the cross, and I do the same.

Grams passed away a little over a year ago, and for a while there I was worried Gramps was going to follow in her footsteps. They’d been together for more than sixty years and had been working side by side every single day since they met. In all the time they’d been married, they’d never spent a night apart. Sure, Gramps would go out with his friends and play poker, and Grams would have “knitting” nights with her friends—which were really gin martini socials with a few balls of wool and sets of knitting needles lying around for decoration—but there wasn’t a single night in over sixty years that they didn’t sleep beside each other.

I’m not sure if I’d consider that romantic, clingy, or an extreme case of codependency. Regardless, they loved and bickered fiercely. So when Gramps woke one morning to find that she’d passed in her sleep, I wasn’t so sure he was going to be able to manage the world without her. And more selfishly, I worried about how I would handle it if Gramps couldn’t deal with the loss.

My dad—his oldest son—and my mom were killed in a car accident when I was twenty. I was old enough to survive on my own, but it still shook the foundation of my life. I’d always been close to my grandparents, so they stepped into the role of surrogate parents. Which is how I ended up back here, running the show instead of just bussing tables and tending bar—although I still do those things, too.

I’d been working my way up the ladder in finance, because that’s where the money is, but it isn’t my passion. Not even close. It was a nine-to-five grind that lined my pockets but gave me zero in the way of job satisfaction.

For the past several years I’ve wanted to open my own brewery, but to do that I need cash. So I went to Gramps for a loan, hoping to circumvent the bank’s high interest rates.

Having immigrated from Scotland to America as a kid and growing up in a middle-class family that sometimes struggled to make ends meet when they first came to America, he’s a big fan of working for what you get. Which means he didn’t just hand over the money. Not a big surprise.

However, he offered me an opportunity. The Knight Cap has been in our family for three generations, and he can no longer handle the responsibility of managing the place on his own. Plus, it was in serious need of an overhaul. He would fund the renovations and if I could breathe some life back into the pub, he would loan me the start-up money for the brewery—no interest. It would give me the experience I needed running a business and hopefully keep his pride and joy from going belly up.

So far, I’m keeping up my end of the bargain.

“I have to admit, I wasn’t real keen on the axe-throwing business, but it looks like once the renovations are paid off, you’ll be turning a real profit there, as long as no one hacks off an arm, anyway.” He winks. “It’s a real good start, son.”

“Thanks. And there are some pretty strict rules around the axe throwing, so everyone’s limbs should stay safely attached to their bodies.”

“That’s generally where ya want them, eh?” He drums his fingers on the bar top, his grin wry. “And I appreciate that ya kept the wall o’ photographs. Means a lot to this old man.”

“Well, I might not have been there for all of them, but they mean a lot to me, too.” I know it’s been hard for Gramps to have to step down from running the bar. It’s been his second home for most of his life, and all the memories in it contain Grams.

My phone lights up with new social media alerts. We both glance at the screen.

“What’s that all about? You get yourself a new girlfriend? You started dating one of the ladies you hired?” His expression brightens and I laugh.

“Once again, asking my employees out is on the list of no-no’s these days. Too many potential complications.”

Gramps throws his hands in the air. “Dottie and I would n’er ’ave gotten married if we’d worried about complications, now would we?”

“This is true. However, my employees are college students.”

“Ah well, you’re bound to meet a lass eventually, especially working ’ere.”