Free Fog City: A Short Story (Voices of the Apocalypse Book 5) by Simone Pond

Fog City
    On that foggy afternoon, I wasn’t supposed to be sitting in a dive bar with a guy from the office, not during work hours anyway. But that’s where I was on that dreary summer day––the day everything changed.
    Crow and I were playing a heated game of dominoes on one of the sticky bar tables in the back of the dank hole. Crow only went by his last name. I say the game was heated not because of the competition, but for the sexual tension that had been building between us for the last eight months. Every time I was around him, a fire ignited in my groin, and it was burning hot by the second game. The two pints of Guinness I had already guzzled down couldn’t contain the flames. How
badly
I wanted to kiss him––so much that concentrating on the game was nearly impossible. I’d been able to hold my own at dominoes, but that day I was a colossal mess. He was up by at least fifty points. I kept my mouth shut and feigned coolness with regards to the “sexual tension” thing. Crow wasn’t dating material and I was up for a promotion, so I figured it’d be best to keep it professional between us. I understood hanging out in a dive bar with a fellow co-worker during work hours wasn’t very professional, but I blamed it on the pheromones.
    Our pint glasses were half empty, or full, depending on your perspective, and I debated whether or not to order another drink. I didn’t need any more booze to fuel the uncontrollable yearning, and I worried that another drink would loosen the chastity belt around my lips, spilling out my secret crush on the unavailable Crow. But I wanted to spend another few minutes silently pining over him before going back to the office up on California Street. And we had a game of dominoes to finish, of course. I decided against getting another pint to stay clearheaded. I wasn’t yet prepared to proclaim my affections to Crow, at least not in some crappy bar that smelled like stale beer. I had
some
principles. Plus, I wanted to wait until I was absolutely sure he wouldn’t brush me off like a lap full of crumbs. I looked at my tiles––all high numbers. I was about to throw down a double five to garner twenty-five points and redeem myself when I thought I saw someone from the office walk by.
    “I think I just saw Jenny,” I whispered to Crow, as though she could hear me through the seedy bar’s brick wall.
    “So what?” he said. “Not like she can see us in here.”
    “Probably wasn’t even her.” I drank down the last few gulps of beer and tried to downplay my obvious paranoia.
    Even if it were Jenny, she wouldn’t have wasted a second of eyesight looking into the Summer Place. It wasn’t the type of establishment you’d notice, unless you were thirsty for a cocktail at 6 a.m. The crappy bar was situated between some nondescript shops on Bush Street, near Union Square. Most San Franciscans were in too much of a hurry to notice anything, unless it sparkled. This place did not.
    “Want another?” Crow asked, lighting a cigarette.
    Besides offering privacy, the Summer Place was one of the last few bars in the city where you could smoke. That is, if you could score an actual cigarette. They were hard to come by since e-cigs had taken over the marketplace. During the early phases of the Repatterning, finding real cigarettes was costly but possible––as long as you had some serious black market connections, which I’m sure Crow had plenty of. He was that kind of guy.
    I glanced down at my tablet poking up from my bag and noticed forty-two red notifications waiting to be answered. Looking up at Crow, my heart did that flip floppy thing it does whenever our eyes met, and I started sinking into a whirlpool of lust. I grabbed the edge of the sticky table to keep myself straight.
    “I need to get back to the office. I have a bunch of messages,” I said.
    “Come on, just one more.”
    “Nah, no more for me.”
    “At least finish out the game,” he said.
    “Fine.” I