“What then?” Melissa asks curiously.

“What then what?”

“What are you doing at the end of the month?”

“Moving.”

“Moving!?”

“Yeah.”

“Where!?”

“‘Cross town,” Travis waves his hand in the general direction of Karen’s house.

“Oh.” Melissa breathes a sigh of relief. “I thought you meant you were moving away.” “No.” Travis says simply. After a moment of rolling the words around in his head, wondering if he should say it, he says, “Would it matter?”

Melissa stops in her tracks. She gives Travis a look that means he should know better than to have asked. She keeps walking and says, “Yes. It matters.”

They coast on small talk the rest of the way downtown, and when they get to the corner of College and Broad, Travis doesn’t know how to say goodbye, standing in front of his bike. She’s made up her mind to walk home instead, asking for a rain check on the bike ride, though. Travis jams his hands in his hip pockets and says, “There’s this party tonight…”

Melissa shakes her head lightly. Travis feels like she’s already walking down the street. “Not for a while, Travis, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I just need to get back to things, um, settle some things…”

“I guess I’ll see you around then.”

She gives in against her better judgment and steps close to him. She leans in and kisses him on the corner of his lip. After she does they look at each other. “I know where to find you. And I will” Then, she turns and walks away, leaving Travis standing next to Mary Jane with his hands still jammed in his pockets.

“I’m not telling you.”

“What’s it matter? I’m gonna’ see it in an hour. You’re not suddenly going to be embarassed in an hour are you?”

“That’s the point,” Melissa replies.

“Well, is it something you said or was it somebody famous.”

She smiles. “Somebody who will be famous.”

“I hope you didn’t quote me.”

“Why?”

“That would be a bit pretentious, don’t you think? My own words on my bedroom wall?”

“No. It’s in my handwriting. That makes it okay.”

“It does?”

“Yes.”

“What standards board declared this?”

Melissa thinks about it. “The Graffiti and Scrawled Quote Board of Etiquette.” Duh.

“Okay.”

“I thought you’d be touched.”

“Depends on what I said. I’m the one who’s gonna’ have to look at it for the rest of the month.”

“You’ll like it. Shut up.”

“No sweat.”

“You know your room is much more… interesting in the daylight.”

Travis peers over his shoulder. “The wall?”

She walks down the length of the mural, “This is impressive.”

Travis is still standing with a plate of eggs and a glass of orange juice, “You have to split it with me.”

She hesitates and then steps over to him and looks at the plate. “You’re very sweet.” Then she says, “But I’m not hungry.”

Travis set the glass down, picks his fork up, cuts a bite and holds it out to her. He feels like he’s offering food to a wild animal in a strange place, clearly unsure of the situation now that it’s morning. She takes the fork out of his hand and eats the bite. After chewing for a moment, self-consciously, she swallows and remarks, “Not bad.” Then she takes the plate out of his hands and sets it on the dresser. Turning to him, she leads him to the bed and half pushes, half tackles him on to it. They lay together for a while. She kisses him, lightly, on the lips, and settles back on her pillow and says, “This is a nice t-shirt.”

“I’m glad you like it. That’s all I got.”

Wrinkling her nose, Melissa asks, “You mean you only own one t-shirt?”

“No, no, no. I meant I don’t own any other kinds of shirts. Sorry.”

“Oh.”

Travis looks back to his closet. “I don’t have much use for anything but t-shirts, I guess.”

She wraps her arms under him, and her embrace is hot. After a moment of laying still, she rubs his head and says, “You’re cuddly.”

“Thanks.” Travis shuts his eyes and lapses into a thoughtless state after a few minutes—he smiles when he thinks cosmoblatarific meditation. He wants to just absorb the feeling of being held and hang onto it because he can tell it’s passing. She needs time and space to be alone with what she had finally gotten out last night.

He does not notice as he drifts off into sleep. His dreams are waking ones, vivid. All the colors in the dream are saturated and stark, grainy shades of nothing but yellows and browns. There is a field and shapes lean at odd angles; fence posts. The feeling of his own feet on the ground is imperceptible. He can here a concert playing faintly in the distance. But as soon as he begins to try to go to it, to grasp where and who he is, he awakens with a start.

“You all right?” Melissa asks.

“Yeah. Sorry. Drifted off there.”

She rubs his back with her hand. “Fall down some stairs?”

Travis rolls over and smiles—looks at her sincerely, and says, “Fell off a merry-go-round.”

“That’s odd.”

“Tell me about it.”

There is a pause for a few minutes, and then Travis says, “I need to get downtown pretty soon.” After having woken from the dream, he feels anxious.

“That’s fine.”

“You can stay here if you want. I’ll go get my bike, and then I can take you to your car.”

“You’re gonna’ take me on your bicycle?”

“No, motorcycle.”

“Oh!”

Travis laughs at the vision of trying to balance her on his handlbars. For some reason, the vision involves him wearing thick glasses, talking with a nasel voice, wearing a bow tie.

“You have a motorcycle?”

“You knew that,” Travis says.

“No I didn’t.” She is visibly excited.

“Welp. I do.”

“That’s so cool!” Melissa’s voice rises in pitch. “I get to ride on a motorcycle!”

Travis loves the excitement, loves the vicarious joy he gets from new riders.

“That so figures.”

“What?”

“That you would have a motorcycle.”

“What? I’m a stereotype?” Travis replies indignantly. “That’s insulting.”

“Yeah, but it’s true.” Melissa lists the following items on her fingertips, “Guitar, musician, only wears t-shirts—and probably leather when its cool out—motorcycle.” She raises her eyebrows, having presented her airtight case.

“You forgot boots.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. Black boots.”

“Okay, okay. Whatever. I give.”

Melissa is smiling at a private joke practically breaking out from between her pearly teeth.

“What?” Travis asks, waiting for a punch line.

“No… nothing.”

“What?”

She sighs and puts her hand out, lightly touching his nose with her index finger. He tries to look at it as she speaks. “You’re a cowboy.” She smiles, brilliantly, having said it. “Happy now?”

He says, “Good morning.”

“Nooo.” She snuggles down into the covers and pulls them over her head. “Go away.”

Travis puts his arm under the pillow and lays his head back down.

Peeking out from beneath the covers, Melissa giggles. “I woke up at about four this morning and was halfway tempted to leave, but I didn’t know where the hell I was.”

Travis makes a face. “You were gonna’ ditch me?”

Melissa nods fecitiously, the comforter wrapped around her like a shawl. Then she smiles more sweetly and says, “I’m not used to just going home with complete strangers.”

“Oh, I see. I’m, like, totally used to that.”

“Oh really?”

“Oh yeah. I’m a slut.”

Melissa bats her hand out for a moment, long enough to make contact with Travis’s shoulder, and then slides back underneath the covers.

“What? I said I’m a slut. How can you possibly take offense?”

“You were implying that I was one.”

“I was not.”

“I was kidding anyway.” Melissa giggles again, and then brings her head up out from under the covers for a moment to listen more closely to a very strange sound emanating from the living room. Travis hears it too, and before Melissa can ask, he replies, “No, no. Hide, hide.” He slides underneath the comforter, and without really thinking about it, Melissa does the same.

“What are we hiding from?” she asks the darkness between their noses.

Travis can feel her breath, and replies in the general direction of the question, the Screamewling Fuzzfart. He can feel Absynthe leap up on the bed, make his way across the mattress, little bastard, walking up Travis’s leg. After a moment, Absynthe crosses the bed and tests his weight on Melissa’s thighs.

“Oh my god!” Melissa hollers and squiggles around in the bed, shifting up against Travis. She had thought Travis was kidding about something coming for them.

With all the sudden movement, Absynthe takes his cue to jump off the bed. He sits on the floor, and starts screaming his lungs out.

“Relax,” says Travis. “I was just kidding around. It’s just my roomate’s cat.”

Melissa looks around the bed for the cat, and hears it screaming from the floor. She pulls herself over the side to look at it. “I thought it was a rat or something.” As soon as she looks at the kitten though, the cat screams at her. “Aw…” Melissa replies, “I think we hurt it.”

“No, you don’t understand,” Travis says. “He does that every morning.”

Melissa looks perplexed as Absynthe screams again. She sits up in the bed and looks at Travis. “Are you serious?”

“For ten minutes, you watch. It’s a God damn ritual or something.”

By the time Absynthe screams a third time, Melissa catches on. “Oh my God. That’s awful.” She looks at the kitten as it claws its way back up to the top of the bed, sits down and lets out a disheartening, “Eeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyaaaa-aaahhhhhhhhh!”

“Aw…” Melissa’s sympathy’s are renewed. “It just wants attention.” Travis just rolls his eyes as she reaches out to pick the kitten up. It promptly falls on its back and claws vigrously at the approaching hand with all four paws. Melissa pulls her hand back quickly. “Good Lord.”

“Told ya’.”

Absynthe rolls on his side and stretches lazily, using all of his relaxed muscles to push forth yet another scream, followed by two more quiet ones, a little unsure of something, directed at the opposite end of the bed. Travis sits up, bows his legs out underneath the comforter, picks Absynthe up despite protest, and folds his legs and comforter around the kitten. Absynthe screams from inside the soft bear trap, but the noise is pleasantly muffled.

“I only do this when I have guests or a hangover,” Travis reassures Melissa, who is already laughing. “What?” Travis asks.

“I’ve never heard anything like that.”

Travis rolls his eyes. “I’ve only been having to put up with it lately because Nick’s gone. He usually gets up before I do.”

“What did you do to it?”

“Nothing! I swear! It just started doing it one morning, and now it always does it.”

“Probably because you fed it, and now it thinks it has to do that to get fed.”

“No. Even when you give him food he won’t stop.”

“Really?”

“Really. As soon as he hears that someone’s awake, he starts, and then about ten minutes later, he stops.”

Melissa laughs again.

“It’s not funny,” Travis says desperately.

“It’s hysterical.”

“It’s punishment.”

“For what?”

“I wish I knew. I would fix it. I swear I would.”

Melissa shrugs.

“Watch this,” Travis says. He puts his hands on either side of the clam shell trap that he’s made with the comforter, and waits for Absynthe to scream again. As soon as the cat does, Travis pushes it back and forth, making the scream vibrate like an engine.

“Stop. Stop it.”

“He doesn’t mind,” Travis replies.

“That’s terrible. Quit it.” The request sounds genuine the second time, and so Travis stops in mid-shake.

“He really doesn’t mind,” he says, and opens his legs, revealing a much enthused Absynthe on his back, trying to claw his way out of the cave. Picking the cat up underneath the forearms, Travis lifts Absynthe whose body stretches down lazily beneath him, long and sleek. Absynthe blankly looks around the room with wide eyes and then screams at the wall near the bed. “See?” Travis offers. Melissa looks at the cat distastefully at first, but then, it’s a kitten and she pets him. Absynthe lets her this time.

Travis puts the kitten down and after accepting a few more friendly scratches, Absynthe walks out of the room without a sound.

“Is he done?” Melissa asks.

“Yup. That’s it. Next show’s tomorrow morning.” For a moment, he wants to ask her if she’ll be there, but then they both sit upright, facing the doorway, confused. Neither has any idea of what they are supposed to now. “You want some breakfast?” Travis asks.

Melissa hesitates, feeling that maybe she should just leave.

Seeing her reaction, Travis says simply, “It was just sleeping. It’s just breakfast.”

“All right,” Melissa replies and she starts to get up.

“No, no. My treat. Stay in bed and sleep some more. I’ll just be ten minutes.”

“Is that what’s been bothering you, then?” Melissa asks.

Travis shrugs. It seems too easy. “I guess.”

She has relief in telling him this: “You’re not alone.” She wants to lean on him, but, leaning toward him, holds off.

He waits a long time to respond, sure she’s finished. “I think that a lot of things have been bothering me—a lot of them over and over again. I’m not sure I’m gonna’ put it together for a long while. But, a good start would be what happened to you when I met you at the Engine Room that night.”

“Oh that? That was nothing—my Dad and I got into a fight.”

Travis nods.

She waits a while before she says, “He’s actually still not speaking to me.” Then, she rolls her eyes.

“He’s not speaking to you?”

Melissa nods.

“Well, that’s a quick way to resolve a dispute.”

“Yeah. Tell me about it,” and it’s her turn to look a long time into the mirror.

She looks like she’s going to spill. She jostles, trying to keep her balance, keep it from all coming out. Taking a drag off her cigarette, slowly, she says, swallowing hard, getting over shame, hoping she can trust him, “I got pregnant.”

There’s another long moment between them of sipping, smoking, looking around. Travis is thankful for the bluesy jazz, even though it’s probably not helping things. She starts up again, “I had been dating this guy for a year and a half, and I got pregnant.”

The jazz plays on as Travis smokes his cigarette and scenes of Melissa and her father screaming at one another over the phone abracadabra in his head. He sees vague images of her boyfriend, frightened, scared, probably too young to take responsibility—probably too stupid. He sees Melissa in a white, dirty room in a white gown, by herself, waiting. He thinks about how there was no relationship, no support, after reality set in—and it dawns on him how she feels more alone than he can biologically understand. He listens to a muted trumpet transcribe all of this into something sensible for himself—he wishes he had some way to show her, but music solves only so much—humans do the rest. He gathers himself and takes a breath and focuses on her, her waiting porcelain face, staring at the table. Leaning in and taking her hand he says simply, “I’m sorry.”

“I just… what you said about enjoying the sadness…”

“I only meant—”

“No, no, no—that’s the thing, though—tonight. I had it for a moment—I didn’t care, Travis—listening to you. It was gone. I knew it before—before all of this—before we met. That pledge song. I knew it, Travis—” she tears up “—before everyone I loved went away—” She looks at him haplessly, “Everyone! What did I do?” She tries to hold it in, but can’t. The tears come out. She’s sniffing and taking a drink napkin off the table. The arc of her small, tight lips break and the corners collapse toward her chin as tears poor down her face. “I didn’t do anything!”

Travis holds on to her hand tightly. If he can absorb every ounce of pain, her sorrow, her shame, he will. He can’t. He holds her hand.

Melissa tries hard to straighten up for this or that, public or private, friend or stranger, but as she stoically, bravely, tries to hold back tears, she is falling apart at the seams. “I… uh…” She wipes her eyes and blinks. She’s too tired of crying to cry anymore. Months—months have gone by. She has cried and cried and cried. She wants it to end. She looks at Travis in complete indecision. She squeezes his hand until his knuckles turn white, and the corners of her mouth are forced down again. Another tide of sadness—of relief this time—comes over her. She rolls her eyes up and tears make paths down her cheeks like the last trickles on the dam of a dried up river, reflecting the candlelight on the table. “I… just…” “It’s okay.”

She wipes her face, holds his arm a little closer, looks out to the bar, and then back to him in the mirror, pleading for him to let her out. “I just don’t want to be alone right now. I-I thought you would understand somehow.”

He leans over, pulls her in. “I do—I understand—sort of—but…” Without urgency, he pulls her black locks, her head, to his shoulder, his hand pressed against the back of her head. Pride resists, but after a moment, Travis can feel her shudders and warm saline dripping down his neck. Mostly he thinks, God damn her father, God damn her man. And then, Melissa brings her head up, almost head butting him, her tears still shimmering gems on her face. Travis wipes away a few from her magnolia colored cheeks with his thumb, and says, “Listen, we can go somewhere safe. We’ve been drinking and we shouldn’t drive, but you’ll be okay with me. I’ll get you to a bed and get you to sleep and I promise it’ll look better in the morning. You don’t have to be alone.”

A little after that, for one mile and a half, three thousand, four hundred and forty-seven hand-held steps, mostly through quiet, dark tree groves and sidewalks of the University, neither of them say a word.

Finally, Travis decides he has talk to her. And of course, right when he decides this, a handsome young man walks up and greets her. At first Travis just shakes his head, unsurprised by his luck. Then, it becomes apparent that the two know each other. Travis sits back in the booth, overhearing Nick for a moment—“Absolutely nothing happened in the Baroque period,”—and watches the girl and her friend exchange pleasantries. After a moment, the young man turns and walks away down the bar past Travis to the bathroom. When Travis looks back from the bathroom to the girl, he catches her glance. There’s a moment, and then she looks back to her drink. Still, Travis caught the curiosity and decides that if the young man comes back out and doesn’t rejoin her, he will.

Looking back to the table, Travis hears Nick saying, “No, I’m sure Kandinsky was the first.”

Karen shrugs and replies, “I guess you’re right. I don’t really remember.”

Sitting next to Travis, Chris speaks up, “Out in space there, champ?”

Travis smiles sheepishly. “Nah. I’m just watchin’ that girl down there.” He points with his head, letting his eyes wander nowhere in her direction when he is speaking. She probably can’t read lips, but anybody can read eyes.

Chris turns around completely in the booth and looks over his shoulder. Luckily she isn’t looking, and Travis just puts his head in his hand. “The one in the black dress?” Chris asks, facing Travis again.

“How ’bout I just ask her to come over here so you can get a good look?”

“Huh?” Chris asks.

“Yeah. The girl in the black dress.”

“That sounds like a song,” Chris muses.

“A bad one.”

“Well, you should go talk to her,” Chris says encouragingly.

A little impatient, Travis says, “I’m workin’ on it. In a second.”

Chris looks confused. “Wha’da ya’ mean: working on it?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Travis says, not wanting to be rude, but unwilling to explain his strategy.

Chris just nods, as Travis watches the young man returning from the bathroom. He walks up to the girl and stops for a moment again. Just as Travis suspects he is out of luck, the young man walks out the front door. Travis sits up a little, pleasantly surprised. He starts to stand,

“All right, ya’ll,” he says, “I’ll be right back.”

“Go get’em tiger,” Nick says. Travis’ nerves bubble up as he makes the long walk down the bar, stomach performing heroic floor exercise gymnastics—flips, cartwheels. Something in him won’t accept that walking up to talk to an attractive girl at a bar is something he has done before. This is not just any girl. There is something about this girl. And it would not have seemed such a long distance except that she had noticed him stand, and is watching him approach, maybe curious, maybe wary.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

“Is this seat taken?”

“No,” she replies, her tone implying that she doesn’t necessarily want it occupied. Travis does not sit at first. He figures he’s gotten this far; he can have some patience. He sets his drink on the bar. “It’s just that my friends down there are talking about art history, and I really don’t know anything about it. I’m kinda’ in the mood to talk about somethin’ though.” Travis laughs inside. It certainly is an honest approach. She smiles at him and he thinks, maybe it’s the right approach to boot.

“Well, what exactly interests you?” she asks politely. Travis already likes her—she’s coy. She’s letting him dig his own hole, giving nothing away.

He thinks about his answer. Everything is the real answer, but that’s too heavy. His mind is racing through possible topics now, but he finally admits, “It’s not so much what interests me, so much as what I can yammer on at length about.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Yammer?”

Travis isn’t sure whether she doesn’t know the word or is just being facetious. “Yeah, ya’ know—yammer. Talkin’ without getting anywhere.”

Smiling, she replies, “No, I know what you mean. I just don’t recall anyone using it besides my grandfather.”

Travis shrugs innocently. Sincerity always trumps facetiousness.

“Well, by all means,” she says, “yammer away.” She turns her hand out and offers the barstool with a wave. Travis relaxes a little and sits down.

He holds out his hand. “My name’s Travis.”

Shaking his hand, she replies, “Melissa.”

“I haven’t met too many Melissas.”

“That’s all right, I’ve never met a Travis.”

“Well, you don’t have to meet any more then,” Travis says, “we’re all exactly the same.”

“So, after you and I have talked, I won’t need to speak to any other Travis’s to know anything about them?”

“Travisi,” Travis corrects.

“Is that right?”

“Yeah, like octopus/octopi.”

She chuckles, she takes a sip of her drink to let Travis lead. It strikes him as funny, that he feels like leading. He is feeling suddenly punchy, a bit funny. “What’re you sippin’ on there?” he asks.

“Gin and tonic.”

“He hold up his own glass. “Here’s to good taste.”

“You too?”

“Oh yeah.”

They clink their glasses and take drinks. She searches his eyes. “Do you know how gin got its name?” he asks, attempting to distract her.

“No. Do tell.”

But he just feigns surprise instead of answering the question and then says, “No, I don’t know—I thought maybe you did.”

Laughing lightly, Melissa says, “And here I thought we were going to talk about something interesting.”

Travis looks around to see if she is mistaking him for someone else. “I’m sorry,” he says sincerely, “did I say interesting? I meant I just liked to talk.” He shakes his head and looks at the bar sheepishly.

She laughs again and it seems apparent that she is coming out of a funk of some kind. Travis hopes he is partly responsible for that.

“Actually, I have to admit,” Melissa says into the straw she’s twirling in her drink. “You never actually said you were interesting. I guess I just deduced that.” Now it’s Travis’s turn to be caught off guard by the subtle compliment. Melissa looks sly—she too could be disarming.

“Still though,” she continues, “as cliché as it sounds, you do look familiar to me.”

“Really? I can’t believe you said that. You were lookin’ familiar to me, too. But… I’m really sure I wouldn’t forget your face if I knew who you were. Where do you hang out at usually?” Melissa thinks about it, “Here sometimes—not often—the Manhattan Club, City Bar, DT’s.”

Travis decides to give a possibility a whirl: “I’ve played DT’s a few times.”

She looks down at the bar trying to recall and then realizes, looking up at Travis and scrutinizing his face. “I can not believe I didn’t recognize you.”

“Really?”

“Yeah! I know who you are. You used to have longer hair though, right?”

Travis rubs his peach fuzz and agrees, “‘Bout six months ago.”

“Oh, that’s so funny.”

“Is that why you were looking at me?”

“Well, uh… no.” She hadn’t realized she’d been caught and seems embarrassed.

Travis just smiles in reply though—nothing to be embarrassed about.

“You used to play a song about… an… oath or something.”

“Pledge?”

“Yes. Pledge. That’s it. I don’t really remember it, but I remember thinking it was really beautiful. And it kind of… means… something to me right now.” She lets her eyes light up with the feeling and Travis notices for the first time how steely they are.

“That’s nice. Thanks.”

“When are you playing next? I just have to hear it again.”

Travis is taken aback by her enthusiasm. “Next weekend actually—not this coming one, but the next.”

“Oh,” she looks disappointed. “I won’t be here.”

Travis shrugs. “Honestly, I think the owner’s are pretty satisfied with me. They’ll probably be retaining me for a while.”

“Well, I’ll have to see you play again. Especially now,” she says. “Do you have an album out or anything?”

“No,” Travis says simply. He thinks about it for a moment. He should have made an album at this point, and he really doesn’t have an excuse for not just going into a studio and doing it. Everyone in John’s band had offered to back him for such a venture. “I, uh… I haven’t really—” he always feels stupid explaining why he doesn’t have an album. Everyone had albums in Athens. It makes him feel small. “No,” he says finally.

Melissa nods, not sure why Travis is so unclear on the matter. “I guess Athens must be nice that way. You can make enough money just playing around here.”

“If you know people,” Travis agrees. “I guess I’d like to get out and play some other towns…

I’d probably really need a band to back me up.”

Frowning slightly, Melissa offers, “I thought you were good. It’s nice just hearing someone play guitar—someone good.”

“Thanks. I think so too,” Travis agrees.

“No.”

“There are these two races horses sitting in a bar.” Melissa shifts her posture to appear inattentive, but Travis can see through the gesture and continues undaunted. “The one race horse, Mama’ Good Gravy, turns to the other, Old Magic Hat, and says, ‘You know, the strangest thing happened to me the other day. I was racing and was dead last coming around the last turn, when I suddenly gets this really sharp pain in my ass!” Travis says it loudly, and a few of the bar’s occupants looks in his direction—more out of curiosity than anything. Melissa indicates that she would listen to the joke, but only if he quieted down. He leans in toward her. “So the other horse says, ‘You know, that is strange ’cause the same thing happened to me. I was in a race, and not doin’ so hot, when all of a sudden, right down the last stretch, I get a shooting pain in my ass. Felt like fire or somethin’ and I just bolted ahead of the pack on the outside and won the race.” Raising his eyesborws, Travis around the bar and back to Melissa in conspiracy, as if they are sharing a secret. “So this dog comes up to the two race horses. He says, ‘Say, fella’s, I didn’t mean to be eavesdropping, but I couldn’t help but hear ya’ talkin’. Thing is, same thing happened to me. I was in a race, and I was chasing the little bunny, you know, and fallin’ behind. But just like you’re sayin’ I get this sharp hot pain in my ass, ran like hell, and I couldn’t believe it! I won the race! I even beat the little bunny!’ Well, the dog nods and walks off, and Mama’a Good Gravy turns to Old Magic Hat and says, ‘What the hell was that? A talkin’ dog!’”

Melissa laughs.

“I love that joke,” says Travis, “’cause it just doesn’t go where you’re thinking it’s going to.”

“I was waiting for something about hot dogs.” Melissa chuckles and nods a little embarassed by her admission for some reason. “That is pretty good.” She takes a sip of her drink, and Travis settles down to the table and his own drink again. Looking around the bar for a moment, Melissa looks to the mirror on the other side of the room and catches an instant of emptiness in Travis’s expression as he looks down toward the table. “And you even managed to succesfully change the subject.”