This week, I will share the other side of a big event. In our Red Letters series, this goes smoothly for the mains in book one, and we see some of this mood later when these characters come up in their own rights and the more current timeline in later books. I don’t want to give too much away, just that this is a before anything really starts to happen…

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Soulful, Fall 2009

“I can’t believe you just made a deal like that on a handshake…” 

The seventeen year old man in plaid’s voice dripped with disbelief. He lifted one end of a table, waiting for the older man in his sixties to lift the other end. 

“You are my grandson, not my boss.” They carried the table across the room and went for the next one together. “I know you worry about me, but I still can make decisions, and the deal is different. It lets us keep this bar in the family though. It won’t be torn down.”

Gus elbowed his grandson, Greg. “Besides, the new partners are paying for all these renovations. I don’t have the business to do it myself, but they do. That Tweety reminds me of your grandma so much. I bet she can do what she clams, and fill this place like it was in its hayday.”

“But at what cost?” Greg moved on to chairs as Gus took a break.

“Listen, sometimes people need a place more than the place needs them. They needed a home. I needed a way to stay open long enough for you to graduate and inherit the third I kept for you.”

“Shouldn’t it be half and half if it’s a partnership?”

“They come as a pair. I get a front of house, and a back of house. My third let’s me retire and relax to talk to whoever I want, and I still have that one percent controlling interest.” Gus shrugged and pointed where a beat up chair should go for trash not repairs. “She isn’t scheming anything. Tweety just wants a home for her friends, and Nira showed me their numbers. We would be in the black in about six months if the projections are right.”

“You are trusting strangers though. Do you know them at all?” Greg grabbed another chair and tested the wobbly leg. He decided he could fix it, and set it aside.

“I know them enough to see what kind of people they are. You’d be surprised if you met her. I think you should, but I know school started again, so you might not be here as much.” Gus smiled, getting lost in some memories. “I think your grandma sent her to me. And it’s not like I signed my life away, I have some time to decide if this is the right move. But Greg?” He waited until the boy stopped fussing with that chair leg. “So far, this has been the only move I have that lets me keep what I built with your grandma. Everyone else wants to knock it down. Tweety wants to restore it. Weigh your options. This will always be your bar too. Someday it will be you and them. It’s worth at least keeping tabs on until you get your degree finished. Let them do the leg work, you be ready when it needs guidance.”

“Why her though?” Greg continued to use the loose leg as an anxiety lightening rod, playing with it while processing.

“Tweety?” When Greg nodded, Gus started punching the air like it was a combo KO move as he spoke. “Besides being pretty, Tweety is confident and determined. She’s picked people around her that are good at their roles, and support her.” 

“I’ll think about it. But I don’t trust it.” Greg spoke as if it was a matter of fact, slipping into the kitchen with his bar stool project for the tools.

The front door opened, and in strode the woman they had been discussing, along with the trench coat body guard, Remmy. She wore a long sleeved green top, a bare midriff, and brown jeans with boots. Her sure stride carried her into the bar, unaware of anyone other than Gus, still sitting and shadow punching.

“Hey Gus, working out your arms? Or did you hurt yourself moving things?” The happy note in her voice edged with concern. “I said I’d find a way to come help you, didn’t I?”

Greg peeked through the kitchen window, with the door slightly ajar. This Tweety woman rolled up her sleeves and had her helper grab the other end of a table. It was marked for tossing, and Gus said as much, but she ran her hand over the gouges in the tabletop. 

It was history. Plain and simple. To Greg, it was legacy and letting it go was hard. 

“I think we can save this one. Round it out and it fits the napkin holder. Striped stain or maybe a sticker coaster something for these other cuts…” Her hands ran over the surface over and over. “Let’s see what we can do to save this one ok? I don’t think we have to get rid of everything, just make sure it’ll last another decade at a time.”

Greg stayed in the kitchen, listening and learning. Stunning, not pretty. He’d add honest and sincere to the list Gus made. She wasn’t prissy about jumping in and doing the work, or saving this history. Greg conceded there were some things that could do with replacing to last another decade, as she said. As he fixed the stool, he heard everything. Gus never called out for him, and Greg was grateful. 

He wasn’t ready for this meeting. Tweety wasn’t someone Greg understood yet, and if that was his future business partner, they would have to meet when they were on the same level or else the balance would be off. He would be a co owner, not the grandson, not the stand in. Greg needed to make sure he was as prepared to take over as Tweety was to reinvent this dying bar. 

If Gus was right and the intent was to keep it in the family, Greg had a bar to run forever, so getting all the experience needed to do that mattered more now. He’d come fix anything Gus mentioned at the drop of a hat though. Any chance to be here without being here, to keep an eye on the place.

On her.

The thought slipped around the edge of his mind.