“Mornin’, Grimes,” I say as I pass.
Grimes doesn’t look up, his matted gray hair a dangling mess of moisture and grease, but mumbles something that sounds a lot like, “Icin’ neverendin’ colder’n chill night storms…” I think there’s more but I stop listening when he starts swearing. I’ve had enough of that for one day. And yet, I push through the door of the obscenity capital of ice country.
“Dazz! I was wondering when you’d freezin’ show up,” my best friend says when I enter. Following protocol, I stamp the snow off my boots on the mat that says Stamp Here, and tromp across the liquid-ice-stained floorboards. Buff kicks out a stool at the bar as I approach. He’s grinning like an icin’ fool.
For a moment the place goes silent, as half the patrons stare at me, but as soon as they recognize me as one of the regulars, the dull drone of conversation continues, mixing with the clink of tin jugs and gulps of amber liquid ice.
“Get a ’quiddy for Dazz,” Buff shouts to Yo above the din. The grizzled pub owner and bartender sloshes the contents of a dirty, old pitcher into a tinny and slides it along the bar. Well-practiced bar sitters dodge the frothing jug as it skates to a stop directly in front of me. As always, Yo’s aim is perfect.
“Thanks,” I shout. Yo nods his pockmarked forehead in my direction and strokes his gray-streaked brown beard thoughtfully, as if I’ve just said something filled with wisdom, before heading off to refill another customer’s jug. He doesn’t get many thanks around this place.
“Out with it,” Buff says, slapping me on the shoulder. His sharp green eyes reflect even the miniscule shreds of daylight that manage to sneak through the dirt-smudged windows.
“Out with what?”
Shaking his head, he runs a hand through his dirty-blonde hair. “Uh, the big breakup with her highness, Queen Witch-Bitch herself. It’s all anyone’s been talking about all morning. Where’ve you been? I’ve been dying to get all the details.”
Elbows on the bar, I lean my head against my fist. “It just happened! How the chill do you know already?”
Buff laughs. “You know as well as anyone that word travels scary fast in this town.”
I do. Normally, though, the gossip’s about me getting broken up with after having done something freeze-brained, not the other way around. “What are they saying?” I ask, taking a sip of ’quiddy and relishing the warmth in my throat and chest.
Buff’s excitement seems to wane. He stares at his half-empty mug. “You don’t wanna know,” he says, and then finishes off the last half of his tinny in a series of throat-bobbing gulps.
“Tell me,” I push.
“Look, Dazz…” Buff lowers his voice, a deep rumble that only I can hear. “…the thing about girls is, when you want ’em they’re scarcer than a ray of sunshine in ice country, and when you don’t, they’re on you like a double-wide fleece blanket.” Now I’m the one looking at my unfinished drink, because, for once, one of Buff’s snowballs of wisdom is spot on. I thought I wanted the witch—because of her looks—but as soon as I got to know her I wanted to toss her out with the mud on my boots.
Using my knuckles, I knock myself in the head three times, exactly like I rapped on the witch’s door this morning before it all went down. Don’t ask, don’t ask, don’t ask, I mentally command myself. “What are they saying?” I ask, repeating myself. Having not listened to my own internal advice, I feel like knocking my skull against the heavy, wooden bar a few dozen more times, but I manage to restrain myself as I wait for Buff’s response.
“Well…some of them are saying good sticks for you, she got what she deserved, Brown District pride and all that bullshiver. You know the shiv I mean, right?”
All too well. I nod. “And the others?”
Buff chews on his lip, as if deciding how to break something to me lightly.
“Give it to me straight,” I say.
He sighs. “You know tomorrow they’ll move onto the next freezin’ bit of juicy gossip, right?”
“Buff,” I say, a warning in my voice. I know what’s coming, so I tilt my tinny back, draining every last drop in a single burning gulp.
“If I tell you, promise me you won’t start anything—I’m not in the mood.”
Looking directly into his black pupils, I say, “I promise.”
He rolls his eyes, knowing full well I just lied to him. Then he tells me anyway. “Coker’s been saying the witch was too good for you, that she shoulda dumped your Mountain-fearin’ arse a long time ag—”