Two Men Walk Into a Bar (At Christmastime) Read Free

table to check it for messages. He’d been drinking bourbon with a veteran when he last texted her. Now . . .
    Her face fell.
    All flights canceled until morning. Baby, I love you so much. Don’t give up on me. I’ll find a way home.
    But when she turned on the news and saw that over three hundred flights to the Eastern Seaboard had been canceled and delays ranged from one to three days, all she could do was whisper, “I don’t think so, Zach. I don’t see how.”
    She swallowed over the lump in her throat, blinking her eyes against the burn of tears. He wasn’t going to make it home. She—and her news—were going to spend Christmas all alone.
    Ring, ring. Ring, ring.
    She sniffled and wiped her nose, reaching for the landline.
    “Hello? Zach?” she said, her voice breaking.
    “Hi. Is this Violet Aubrey?” asked a woman with a slight Southern accent.
    “Uh, yes. Who’s calling?”
    “You don’t know me,” said the woman. “My name is Savannah Lee.”
    ***
    “Any luck finding a hotel room?” Zach asked Asher, whom he found staring dejectedly at a bank of courtesy phones on the lower level.
    Asher turned around and sighed. “The Best Western over in Van Nuys thought they had a room, but just as the clerk was about to take my credit card number, someone walked in and took it.”
    “What time did United rebook you?”
    “Nine o’clock tomorrow night. You?”
    “Ten.”
    “At least we’ll make it home for part of Christmas,” said Asher glumly.
    For the first time, with the stark airport lighting over their heads instead of the dimmer, softer light at the bar, Zach realized that the scarring on the right side of Asher’s face was really quite extensive. He guessed that they were about the same age, or Asher could have been a few years older, maybe. He admired Asher, giving up so much for his country. He hated the thought of a veteran spending tonight and most of tomorrow in an airport chair.
    “Hey, I know we don’t know each other that well, but my wife and I have an apartment out here. We keep it for when we need to be out here for a few weeks at a time to work on a show or an album. Anyway, you’re welcome to come home with me if you want.”
    “You’re sure?” asked Asher, looking relieved. “I wouldn’t be imposin’?”
    “Nah. As long as you don’t mind the couch. It’s just a one-bedroom.”
    “I’d sure appreciate that,” said Asher.
    “Not the Christmas Eve either of us had in mind, huh?”
    “Just bad luck,” said Asher, hefting his bag on his shoulder and following Zach out to the long line at the taxi stand.
    “Tell that to my wife.”
    “She’s pissed?”
    “Oh, yeah,” said Zach. “She asked me not to take this gig. Didn’t want to risk spending Christmas alone. And now she’ll wake up on Christmas morning without me there. I fucking hate it.”
    “I’m sure she’ll understand.”
    “Will yours?” he asked doubtfully.
    Asher looked slightly less confident. “I hope so.”
    “What were you doing out here? I never asked.”
    “In LA?”
    Zach nodded.
    “I work in the office of media relations at Walter Reed in Maryland.”
    “The military hospital?”
    “Yep. And occasionally we work in tandem with other hospitals like the UCLA Medical Center. They have a great program called Operation Mend that offers assistance to veterans with catastrophic physical injuries—extensive burns, amputated limbs. I flew in for the holiday gala two nights ago and spent yesterday with a few of the guys in the program.” He held up his prosthetic hand. “I did some i-Limb demonstrations.”
    “It looks bionic.”
    “Someday, when we have kids, that’s what I’ll tell them: Daddy’s a bionic man,” Asher said, grinning.
    “Is your wife . . .”
    “Bionic? No, just me.”
    “No.” Zach chuckled. “Is she pregnant?”
    “Expectin’? Lord, no!” said Asher, shaking his head. “No. We’re still newlyweds. Only been married a few months. You? You have