“For the opening we’ll be featuring the barbecue bourbon sliders, the loaded potato skins, the cheddar-mozzarella sticks, and the blooming onion pieces.” Macaria tucked a strand of chestnut colored hair behind her ear as she read off the list of foods Jack had picked out, standing on a barstool so that the kitchen and bar staff alike could see and hear her. “JAck also wants us to try the bruschetta bites, but if they don’t go within the first hour we’re going to nix them from the menu all together.”

The eight kitchen staff members were taking notes in small legal pad resembling notebooks in shorthand while the four bartenders nodded absently and the six membered waitstaff looked at each other anxiously.JB’s Ale House, the bar and restaurant Jack had sunk his heart and soul in to three years ago when All Time Low broke up, had been an endeavor in patience and kindness from both himself and for Macaria, and now that opening day was upon them she couldn’t help but look at each and every member of their staff with pride. Mixed with a bitter sweetness.

“We won’t be opening the dining room until Sunday night, where we will go full menu but we are going to treat tomorrow like a dry run okay? Which means smiles everyone.” She clapped her hands twice, dismissing everyone to the small tasks left before they wrapped up for the night, before allowing Jack to help her down. She brushed a chunk of blonde hair, he was forever coloring his bangs bizarre colors, out of his tired eyes with an affectionate smile and grabbed her clipboard off the bar top.

“How are they looking?” Jack asked as he surveyed the room. He had given his entire life for the past three years to the place; money, blood, sweat, tears, and endless hours spent in the two main rooms, the spacious kitchen, the store rooms in the basement. He had spent so much time putting the decaying industrial building back together that he had no idea what he was going to do if the opening didn’t go well.

Macaria smiled at him reassuringly and shouldered her jacket. “We’re ready to go boss.” The cheeky smile hid the concern behind her blue eyes - she didn’t know the last time he had slept and the lack of rest was evident in his face.

“Please, do not call me that.” Jack laughed so hard he snorted and draped his arm over her narrow shoulders. The Lebanese man towered over her 5’3 frame, as he had since they first met over a decade prior, his dark eyes winking at her under bushy eyebrows and thick lashes, belonging to eyes that looked like they needed to sleep for a year. “You make me feel like I’m thirty or something when you say that shit.”

“You are thirty.” Macaria ducked out from under his arm. “Have you heard back from Zack and Ri?” The thought of her boys all under the same roof for the first time in three years, since Zack’s wedding, illeviated some of the stress and the concern in her chest. Since the band broke up...since the break up...she, Jack, Rian, and Zack had only been all together a handful of times. Zack met Noelle and moved to New York City, Rian and Cass broke up and he decided he wanted to go back to school - which apparently meant moving to Portland - and Jack and Macaria had stayed in Baltimore. Jack because he had just bought the bar when things went to hell and Macaria because of Alex’s parents (but that was an entirely different story). Now they would all be together, celebrating the culmination of the last three and a half years of Macaria and Jack’s lives. She was excited.

“Everyone has confirmed that they will be here at six on Friday.” Jack led the way, the two leaving the busting staff to finish packing up for the night. It was the first time they were leaving the building before midnight in weeks and the crisp, early fall evening greeted them as they slipped out the heavy front door.

“I have the champagne in the back freezer,” Macaria informed her companion as they strode through the back parking lot. “I figure the bouncer’s will start letting people in around seven, so knowing Ri, six is going to be six thirty at the earliest. We’ll do the toasts and then I can get the kitchen motivated.” She was thumbing through the schedule of events on her phone, her heels clacking in the rush of wind and the crunch of tires on the street. “I have the restaurant booked through New Years thanks to the review Sinclair did when we hired Mark, so you should be turning a profit by December if all goes well. Marginal but still.” The cost of the renovations, the liquor license, the multiple inspections, had burned a hole in Jack’s pocket that had him cringing whenever he looked too closely at his checkbook but with the aggressive advertising campaign Macaria had been the head of, things looked like they were going to get brighter soon.

Jack opened her driver’s side door for her, a wave of something she couldn’t read flashing across his face. “Yeah. It’s going to go great.”

Macaria stood on her toes, kissed Jack’s cheek, and offered a concerned smile. “You okay?”

“Yeah...just tired.”

“Just think...tomorrow we’ll get to see Zack and Rian. And Matt. And Noelle. And Derek, and everybody else. And we’ll get to see these lots full. And it’ll all be worth it.” Her smile, innocent but grating, had Jack ducking his head in guilt. “I’ll text you when I get home?”

Jack nodded and stepped back as she slid behind the wheel of her black Camaro. As she pulled out of the lot he hung his head, running his hands through his hair in frustration with himself.
———
Macaria let herself in to her small two bedroom bungalow a half an hour later, balancing a grocery bag containing mint chip ice cream and a small bag of M&M’s and the accountant ledgers for the bar in one hand and her keys, sunglasses, and a six pack of Sam Adams in the other, when she felt her cell phone vibrating. Her cat, Leo, met her in the kitchen as she dropped the bag, unceremoniously plunked the glass bottles on the island, and fished her phone out of her back pocket. Isobel Gaskarth’s beaming face was staring her down from the lock screen, the name “Mom” lighting up the shoulders of the gray sweater she was wearing. It was almost eight at night, late enough for the woman to be in bed - she and Peter were habitually asleep before the end of the nightly news.

Anxiety caused Macaria’s mouth to twitch as she hit ‘answer’ and pressed the screen to her ear. “Who died?”

“No one died,” Isobel’s laughter eased the knot forming in her chest. “I just wanted to see if you were still at the bar with Jack.” The matron’s voice, warm and affectionate as she spoke, softened when she mentioned her son’s oldest, and most distant, friend. “I wanted to wish him good luck.”

“I’ll pass on the message,” Macaria filled Leo’s food bowl and popped the top on a beer before passing through the small house to the stairs leading up to her loft bedroom. “I just got home from the bar, it looks amazing.”

“Tell me about it?” They spoke on the phone three times a week, at least, the bond between women stronger than the failed engagement - or the bitterness that still crept into Macaria’s throat whenever she dwelled too long on where things had gone wrong. But the late call, mixed with the need to ask about her and Jack’s project, had suspicion spurring the younger woman on.

“What’s up, Ma?” She flipped on the bedroom light, engulfed in the soft sandalwood smell of her wax melter and the plushness of her carpet.

On the other end of the phone call she could hear the elderly woman sigh. “I haven’t heard from Alex in a few days...I was hoping…”

Macaria rubbed her face as she sank onto the edge of her bed. “I haven’t spoken to him in four years, Ma.” Four years, eight months, and four days; not that she was counting, because in reality she really was not. It had popped into her mind a week prior as she was sorting through her vinyl collection, of course she owned every All Time Low vinyl, that the last time she had spoken to Alex had been only a few months after she had her Don’t Panic vinyl framed. The back of the black frame was dated in Alex’s messy scrawl, and read “to my Wendy, I can’t wait for the rest of our reality, March 2014.” She had almost smashed the frame when she read it; instead she had moved it to the storage unit, with the rest of her paraphernalia from that period of her life, memories she would have rather kept under lock and key rather than destroy or lose.
“I’m sure he’s just on another bender. But I’ll see if the guys have heard from him,” she said in defeat as she took a swig from her bottle.

“Thank you. Now. The bar?” Isobel navigated the conversation away, her motherly love wrapping around Macaria even though they were on opposite ends of the city.

Notes

Hey guys!

Since I’m reworking this, I keep forgetting to add little tidbits of background information (sorry <3). The first is that this is all happening in the fall, which will become important soon. Second, I will be uploading my characters later - for those of you who remember the original, Barbara Palvin is still my ideal for my female protagonist.

This chapter’s song is “Somewhere in Neverland” by All Time Low! Another personal favorite.

What do you guys think about her relationship with Alex’s mom?

Thank you for reading!

-x.o.x.o. M.T.