Rudy did not realize his head had dropped until the bartender told him to perk up. He paused, hoping that she spoke to someone else, another guy slumped over on his stool with a Recently Dumped Male Takes His Pity to Local Bar banner on his shirt. The bartender, who looked to be twenty-something, wore her hair shaved down on one side with thick, excited curls that spiraled at the top. Rudy looked up to face her and pointed to himself, but she was definitely talking to him. She stared back, leaned over, and placed a pitcher of ice beside her. Nineties rock music simmered in the background, but no one was there to bang their head to the drum solos. Her breasts were breasts that said, “Hey buddy, we’re breasts!” whereas his ex’s breasts didn’t seem to say much at all. When he noticed where his gaze landed, Rudy’s eyes shot back up to meet hers and she grinned. He felt ashamed to compare the two women like that, prayed that everything would soon stop reminding him of his ex.
“Are you going to tell me what your problem is?” the bartender asked.
Her name tag read “Kay.” Rudy lowered his head and stared at the glass of whiskey in his hands. He couldn’t imagine spilling his heartbreak to this stranger, but before long, he had confessed all of his recent misfortunes to Kay: the planned dinner, the inevitable fighting, his girlfriend Ellie leaving him at a Thai restaurant with his mouth full of curry. They were together for three years, and for the last year of their relationship, she had been sleeping with a barista—a fucking barista. Ellie, what he now thought to be a stupid name, had already made arrangements to move in with the java-making girlfriend-thief. He left this part out. The barista was waiting outside in the car for Ellie when she finished her “explanation” to Rudy in the restaurant. Rudy wanted to get up and punch him in the throat, but he knew he couldn’t fight.
When he finally came up for air, he said, “I mean, I’m a good guy, right?”
Kay returned a smile that displayed most of her teeth. He expected her to carelessly agree.
“Who knows,” she replied, “You look like an okay guy for sure.”
Rudy put his whiskey down.
“Don’t get me wrong,” she continued, “But girls nowadays don’t just want a good guy. They want entertainment.”
What did she know, he thought. Rudy pushed himself back in his barstool. He put one foot on the ground, ready to walk out.
Kay snapped and pointed at Rudy.
“That’s it,” she said. “I got it. You…you remind me of my Uncle Blaze. Like before he was my uncle. I saw high school pictures of him once, and I swear it could be you, you know?”
Rudy didn’t know. By then he was utterly annoyed—though not by Kay, but by his own life, which, in recounting to her, he realized was a terrible cliché. He did like Kay’s honesty. Maybe he’d take her home—whisper sweet things in her ear as she clung to the warmth of his body, lying in the bed Ellie had purchased. He nodded his head, looking to his right as a confirmation from the man with the purple fedora and gray handlebar mustache, but he only gawked and snarled. Rudy whipped back to Kay.
“I tell you what,” she said, “I’m technically off right now. But because you remind me of my uncle, I’ll do you a favor. You’re coming out tonight to Ice-T Lake with my friends and I. Honestly, you need this.”
“My friends and me,” he corrected her.
“No, they’re my friends,” she said, “not yours.”
He shrugged, drunk enough for a night around faces he didn’t have to remember.
Kay went toward the kitchen door, but turned back around to face Rudy.
“This isn’t a sex thing, heartbreak guy,” she said. “There will be no sex. Alright?”
He nodded his head. She vanished into the back and returned minutes later into the main bar wearing a green hoodie. She stood by the exit and motioned for him to follow her through the windowless, wooden door. He left his glass on the counter. Outside, Kay held up her hand and called for Rudy’s keys.
“Why can’t we take your car?” he asked.
“Because there’s no gas in her,” she responded.
“So you made it all the way to work without breaking down on the side of the road?”
“Hey,” she said, throwing her hands up. “I’m just that good.”
Rudy raised an eyebrow—maybe she was crazy. This was his chance to call it off, to go find Ellie, or better yet, drive his car while still inebriated enough to roll off the highway and into some mystic lake where he could allow himself to slowly sink. Not die, simply sink. But he handed her the keys anyway, and they hopped into his Toyota. The only other person he let drive his car was Ellie. He wondered what she was doing then. Kay started the engine and placed her hands on the wheel.
“Where do you live?” she asked.
Rudy tilted his head in confusion.
“We need blankets,” she continued, “and you need some Advil.”
He laughed a little—of all the nights to be tipsy and heartbroken. After he told her the way, Kay put the car in reverse and pulled out onto the main road. She turned on the radio and did a shoulder dance Rudy had never seen before.
Rudy’s apartment complex—a succession of identical brown and white buildings—was lit by the faint glow of street lamps. Kay parked the car and turned off the engine as Rudy got out.
“I’ll be quick” he told her, accidentally slamming the door. He brought his hand to the side of his mouth and shouted, “Sorry,” as if Kay could hear him through the glass.
Upstairs, he hesitated to open the door to his apartment, his keys resting in the knob, afraid his ex would be behind it. He eventually pushed through to reveal tan, empty walls, the single blue couch in the living room, and the sheets of his bed on the floor, stretched all the way to his dresser. Several drawers were open with no clothes inside, recently picked over. His clothes were scattered on the carpet. Rudy knew this meant Ellie had no intention of returning. It was actually over. Who could be cheated on for an entire year and not know? he kept asking himself. Just like that, and she’s gone. He took out his phone and decided to text her. Are you sure? he typed and hit send. Rudy took a breath, and then another, then went to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom, remembering what he had come for. He placed a bottle of ibuprofen in his jean pocket and went to the closet to grab a blanket.
“It’s good this isn’t a sex thing, huh?” Kay said from the doorway.
Rudy, too embarrassed to look her in the face, dropped the blanket and began shoving clothes back into drawers.
“It was my ex,” he said. “I told her to grab her things and leave, that if she wanted to fuck the barista she could go live with him.”
The lie shot from his mouth before he could think it through. Kay moved into the room, took a seat on the blue couch, and crossed her legs.
“You know,” she started, “I used to own a cleaning business. It was called Aunt Pat’s Cleaning Service, after my Aunt Pat who used to train pigeons, but now she sticks with four-legged animals. Anyway, we’d drive around in these big green trucks. Our slogan was on the back, in big red letters. It said, ‘The people improving your life.’ I kind of think that’s what you need right now.”
Rudy pushed the drawers back into the dresser. He found her words hard to believe. Own a business? he thought. Not the same girl who couldn’t even remember to put gas in the tank of her car. A car he didn’t even remember seeing in the bar lot.
“It’s fine. I’m fine,” he told her.
Kay jumped off the couch and made her way to a photo of Rudy and Ellie on the windowsill. She picked up the frame, along with another photo of them on a small stand. He realized just how many photos there were of them around the apartment.
“Let’s make a pile,” Kay told him. “Get rid of all of these pictures. Better yet, round up anything that reminds you of that girl. Ellen has to go.”
“Ellie,” he corrected.
Kay paid him no attention. She started picking up the rest of the frames and dropping them in the middle of the floor. She found tubes of lip gloss and earrings too. She threw in tiny knick-knacks, a silver Buddha head, a Batman Forever poster. To Rudy, it looked like she was throwing in anything she didn’t like. He didn’t stop her. Rudy looked around the room, but couldn’t find one thing that didn’t remind him of Ellie. He decided on the stack of National Geographic magazines in the corner. After they were done, they stood side by side and looked down at the heap of things.
“Now what?” he asked.
“You leave it there,” Kay told him. “And whenever you come back to the apartment, kick it.”
They burst into laughter, and for a few seconds, Rudy felt a little better. Kay turned toward the door and motioned for them to leave. He picked up the blanket off the floor, and closed the door behind them.
Neither bothered to check the time. Rudy, a bit more sober, drove with one hand on the wheel as they headed to the lake. When there weren’t any words to fill silent spaces, they counted fast food joints. He stared blankly at the nonexistent traffic while Kay sat with her legs propped up on the dashboard. From time to time, she’d scrunch her nose in his direction or make popping noises by patting her cheeks. He smiled over his shoulder and thought how weird this girl was, how weird the night had already been. Rudy checked his phone. Nothing. Then, Kay let out a startling moan as they drove past their town’s famous diner Stir & Shake.
“I can honestly taste their banana bread sundae,” she said. “The one they put in those fancy plastic cups that look like glass with the cherry on top.”
She let out another moan.
“My ex taught me how to tie a cherry stem with my tongue,” he said. He shouldn’t have.
“That’s a real thing?” she asked.
He shrugged.
“The trick is to get a long stem. Then it’s just blindly messing around until you actually get it, and that’s with luck. But once you catch on the first time, it will always come back naturally.”
“I’m allergic to cherries,” said Kay.
“What about the sundae?”
“Who would want a sundae without cherries? Then it’s just a cup of milk.”
Her sense of humor comforted him, though he couldn’t figure her out.
“Let me guess—you and Ellen met in college?” Kay said.
“Ellie,” Rudy corrected.
She continued, “You fell in ‘college love’ and thought it was the best thing to ever happen to you. I mean, I’m sure it was, but you got boring, and then she got bored and found a chai latte making barista.”
He couldn’t find the lie. They did meet in college. Ellie did grow bored, but most likely months before the barista. Rudy couldn’t recall a moment within that year where they actually enjoyed each other’s company the way they used to. Not like back in their final semester of school when they took a road trip to Nashville just to sing at all the open mics they could find. Or going to animal shelters to play with cats. Or helping Ellie with her nature photography. But he thought it was normal to get bored, that all couples ended up this way.
“So, how long have you been working at the bar?” he asked.
“Going on a year,” she responded. “I used to be a celebrity hair stylist.”
“After the cleaning service,” Rudy added.
“Exactly,” Kay said. “Now I’m not talking Rihanna or Meryl Streep, but I did do Miley Cyrus’ sister’s hair.”
“Noah Cyrus?”
“No, the other one.”
Rudy forgot how it felt to meet someone new, to be constantly surprised by what they said and did. He was willing to play along. There was pleasure in believing whatever words came out of her mouth.
***
At the lake, it took Rudy a drunk second to unknot the laces of his sneakers. Kay, giddy, held the blanket on top of her head with one hand and her boots with the other. The light was illusory, only coming from two light poles by the main building. Trekking through the sand, her hips followed the purr of the water and moved to a beat Rory imagined was as curious and indefinable as her. Then, he realized he and Kay were the only ones there.
“Are your friends on their way?” he asked.
Kay shrugged. She splayed out the golden blanket and rolled her body to smooth out the clumps of sand like a dog begging for a belly rub. Rudy lay on his back parallel to Kay and wondered what weird statement she might come out with next. She looked toward the stars and started to trace the dots with her finger.
“When I was a kid, my dad used to tell me these stories about my mother,” Kay told him in a soft voice. “He said she was an astronaut.”
Rudy turned his head to face her and watched her finger go back and forth.
“I remember him telling me how she left to go on a mission to explore the depths of space, making sure it was safe for people to visit. Before that she had training all around the world—diving in the pits of the Arctic, climbing K2, repeatedly leaping out of airplanes. Every week he told these stories.”
Kay explained it all in a sort of murmur, easing her way to the ends of her sentences like she wanted to hold on to them. Rudy sat up.
“You didn’t believe these things, did you?” he asked.
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Rudy swung his legs over to hold them to his chest.
“When you love someone, you believe them,” she said. “You should know this, Rudy.”
“What does that mean?” he quickly asked.
“It means no matter what Ellie did, she knew you would always see her as the Ellie you first met. And when she eventually grew bored enough, she broke up with you in a crowded Thai restaurant because she knew you’d let her. You probably don’t even like Thai food.”
Rudy began to clinch his jaw to the point where it hurt. His eyes were locked on Kay’s face. He wanted to scream at her. He wanted to lie and proclaim that Ellie meant nothing to him anymore. He was grateful that Kay didn’t look him in the eyes when she spoke then because he knew he couldn’t bear it. Why would she bring me all this way just to shit on me? he thought. The day was filled with enough of that already. Why would she choose this moment to tell the truth? He knew himself to be a person that allowed things to happen to him. He’d always known.
“Why do you get to have it all figured out?” he whispered, his gaze fixed on the moon’s reflection in the dark, rippling water.
“Because you let me,” she answered, her eyes now trying to meet his. “You’re not weak for allowing yourself to love someone, Rudy.”
“Can we just swim?” he asked.
“Okay.”
They rose to their feet. Kay unzipped her hoodie, and Rudy pulled off his t-shirt. Whatever guard he’d maintained was now dismantled. They undressed in front of each other naturally, as if there was nothing left to hide. As they stood in their underwear, Kay grabbed Rudy’s hand, and they ran to the edge of the lake. She screamed when her toes met the water. Rudy followed behind her and splashed Kay’s backside. Before long, they were splashing each other back and forth. The freezing water hit their bodies in wild clashes. They roared with laughter. Then, simultaneously, they fell in.
“I swam with elephants once,” he lied.
“Well, I beat Michael Phelps’s cousin in a swimming race.”
“I can hold my breath for five minutes.”
“Bet I can swim to the end of that buoy in under one minute.”
“Do it.”
Kay didn’t hesitate. She stood up straight and dove forward, splashing water onto Rudy as she went. Maybe she was telling the truth. Nevertheless, he counted in his head as her arms stroked across the water. He knew she would make it there before he got to sixty. And she did. She sprang up from the surface and threw herself onto the buoy, her hair straight and longer than Rudy expected. He clapped and hollered. His voice echoed in the silence of the night.
Kay, victorious and panting, began to swim back toward Rudy. He looked on while her faint arms held her up for a second, but suddenly her body dropped under the surface. Rudy stepped forward. Again, her head flung back above the water, but went under as her left arm came crashing down. The silhouette of her frame faded into black ripples. Rudy stood paralyzed. Could she be pretending? Then, coming to his senses, he sprung in after her. Truthfully, he was a clumsy swimmer, his height his only advantage against submersion. He cut through the water. His heart pounded wildly in his chest. When Rudy finally reached her, his trembling hands extended for her head, but she leapt out of the water and onto him, yelling viciously into his ear. She broke into laughter. Rudy, still struck with fear, released a deep breath. She pulled his arms forward to hug him.
“Is this your version of fun?” he muttered.
“That’s exactly right,” she responded. “You’re having fun.”
Their bodies clung together for a moment.
“I’ve always wanted to be a damsel in distress,” she sang, her voice now hoarse and raspy, sounding like a kitchen sink disposal. Rudy smiled. He playfully carried Kay to the shore.
They lay flat on the cold sand. Rudy tried to piece together how he’d gotten to that moment, there with the bartender on the night of his heartbreak. Kay crouched to her side and rested her cheek on her knuckles.
“How much of what you said tonight was the truth?” Rudy asked.
Kay took a long breath.
“Does it matter if you feel better? Everyone wants a story told to them or about them, but they’re just words. What matters is what you experience when you say them.”
Rudy rolled over to see her face. Her brown eyes looked pitch-black.
“Be honest with me,” he said. “Why do you think Ellie broke up with me?”
“You already know that. You just have your own version of the truth.”
Rudy drove them back to the bar, where he discovered that Kay did have a car, an older looking four-door with a cheap paint job.
“Don’t you need gas?”
“No, no, no. She’s good to go.”
Rudy didn’t question it. He asked her if she fixed it up herself, and she chuckled. As Kay walked to her car, hoodie hanging over her arm, Rudy called out to her.
“What was Uncle Blaze like?” he asked.
Kay stopped. She turned back around to lean over the edge of his window.
“When my mother left,” she said, “Uncle Blaze helped my father look after me. He was such a badass. You have his face.”
Kay glided her hand across Rudy’s cheek, then she got into her car and drove off. He looked down in his cup holder to see the light from a notification on his phone. He unlocked it to reveal a message from Ellie. I’m sure, she had texted back. But what did it matter now? He didn’t care. He’d heard enough of the truth.
The next day, Rudy entered the empty bar and its lonely rock music. He sat at the same seat he’d taken hours before. This time, an older ponytailed man was working the counter.
“Is Kay working tonight?” Rudy asked.
The man threw a towel over his shoulder.
“Who’s Kay?”