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🛑 TW : mentions of alcohol, slight anxiety.
🚦 Y/F/F : your favorite flavor
🚦 DEFINITIONS / definitions within reading are marked by an asterisk ( * )
* The Boxer Rebellion - an uprising against foreigners that occurred in China about 1900, begun by peasants but eventually supported by the government. A Chinese secret society known as the Boxers embarked on a violent campaign to drive all foreigners from China. Several countries sent troops to halt the attacks. (real event in history btw. i remember learning about. pretty interesting stuff)
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ON Y/N'S WAY HOME, they began feeling a slight drizzle drop on their head, causing them to ruffle their hair and gaze up at the sky. they sighed to themselves, deciding to just keep walking and hope there will be somewhere to take shelter under temporarily in case it rains harder.
while walking along the sidewalks, passing by the city's buildings, you turned to look down the alleyway. you had to do a double take though, walking backwards to stand where you previously passed by, gazing into the alleyway once more. what caught your eye was an unfamiliar, half-rusted, neon green sign of a lone cactus, its lights flickering and showing off a grayish-black residue plastered on the brick wall of the building due to the longevity of it being there.
you still stood there, taking a couple steps forward into the alleyway to crane your head up at the sign, staring at it with furrowed eyebrows like it was a code to decipher. as if on cue, the sound of thunder rumbling in the dark skies made you jolt back to reality, your instincts promoting you to drag your feet into the alleyway, taking a turn to find the doors of the building with the cactus sign.
to your luck, you ended up not getting soaked as the rain began pouring down heavily, creating much noise on every buildings' roofs. you hurriedly ran up a couple steps and pulled open the silver doors of the brick building, feeling the atmosphere switch from moderately humid weather to an extremely cold, air conditioned environment, making you shiver and clutch your arms close to you, attempting to pull your light jacket closer to your body. it felt like you were in the middle of the fucking arctic. you were surprised you didn't see icebergs yet.
you took the time to collect yourself, examining around the building that you realized you just entered out of impulse. wait.. where am i? you asked yourself. your eyes trailed around, spotting a somewhat short wall with blurred glass to your left, and a short hallway that seems to open up to a bigger space. the walls were painted with half white on the top—decorated with clean cut lines of green led lights that hugged the crevice of wall and ceiling—half grey on the bottom. the floors had black carpet, and overall the lights and simplistic design of the decor that you could see reminded you of minimalistic architecture that was becoming trendy these days, and the entire spot you were in just gave off movie theatre x 80s diner vibes.
you closed your fists and dug your fingernails into the skin of your palms out of anxiety, knowing it would create temporary crescent moons on your hands. nevertheless, you breathed out, cautiously stepping forward and following the small hallway that had a lit up, neon yellow arrow pointing left towards the only turn that you were able to walk through anyways. that's when you discovered that your logic was correct: your hearing gave way to soft, class rock n roll music buzzing quietly in the background, your eyes looking around to see that you were at a bar. there was clean tables and booths that had a nostalgic, 80s feel to them, and a huge bar counter that ran almost the entire length of the room towards the back.
you spotted two people: a person with an extremely fit physique complementing a broad stature with bubblegum pink hair and impeccably pointed ears cleaning a cocktail mixer behind the bar, and someone sitting at the bar with their back turned towards you. however, you noticed that they were wearing a reindeer onesie, the attire's brown antlers sticking up on its hood, making you curious. you quietly made your way over, your feet finally making a shuffling sound against the carpet when you were literally standing just mere feet away from the bar.
your presence wasn't felt already until your shoes made that noise, prompting the two people to stare at you with doe eyes, processing that there was another person that they didn't recognize in the bar right here right now. "um.. hello." the pink-haired fellow spoke out first, surprising you as you heard their unique, monotone voice project from their mouth. holy shit that voice- you thought to yourself, shifting your feet and looking away briefly as you realized you were staring with your mouth slightly parted out of shock.
"o-oh um- hey." you stammered out awkwardly, putting your hand up in a way to say hi. "you new around this city?" the same monotone voice talked back to you again, speaking slowly and calmly. "no um.. i was just looking around and saw this place. plus it's kind of like-" before you could even get another word in, the sound of a loud lightning strike sliced through the air, creating a rough silence for a moment. "raining. outside." you finished. the person behind the bar nodded, putting their cocktail mixer down for a brief moment to signal that you had their full attention.
"yeah i get it now. please have a seat. make yourself at home." they offered, gesturing to the seat right across from them that was next to the reindeer person who was still staring at you in slight awe. "thank you." you nodded, a small smile spreading on your face. you took the seat, putting your purse to the side on the bar counter while sighing in exasperation. you leaned your chin on your hand, drumming your fingers on the counter. the pink-haired person seemed to be searching for something, deciding to walk into the room in the back and briefly disappear from your vision.
you felt someone staring at you to your left, turning over to see the second person's face with clarity. they seemed to be wearing a captain america mask—definitely a slight contrast to a reindeer—making you crack a smile. "captain america?" you asked. they seemed to snap out of their trance, looking away in embarrassment. they silently nodded at you, taking out a notepad and pen from their pocket and writing down on it. "he's the best superhero :)" the notepad said in neat handwriting. you chuckled. "i beg to differ." you admitted, making them silently gasp with a shock and offended expression.
the two of you ended up talking, having a mini debate and getting to know each other. you ended up doing sign language since you caught onto the memo that he couldn't speak. you also got to find out his name is callahan, and he was the owner of a costume store, hense the reindeer attire. the entire time, you didn't really acknowledge the bartender's presence, having a deep conversation with callahan. eventually when the sounds of the rain haling on the roof became silent, callahan decided to head off, bidding farewell to you and the bartender.
now you were left alone with the pink-haired man. you turned to him, feeling more social. "hey i didn't get your name." you said. he looked up at you, still cleaning down the area behind the counter carefully. "i'm techno the bartender. how about you?" his monotone voice rang out. "i'm y/n. you know this is a very fine place you got here." you said, admiring the green lighting and perfectly cleaned space. "thank you. it's my pride after all." techno said, chuckling a bit. "do you have a lot of customers?" you asked. "used to. this place was founded during *the boxer rebellion. all types of personalities used to hang out around here. now that they're gone, it's been empty. i just stay here because i have nothing else to do." techno explained, making you intrigued.
"damn. you're telling me this place is over centuries old?" you asked in surprise. "yeah. doesn't look like it with the obvious modernization." he stifled, pointing out the architecture. "i'm pretty sure it didn't look like this in the 1900s." he joked. "wellll.. maybe the 80s." you responded back, making him chuckle. you two continued to converse about world history, techno's monotone voice and calm way of speaking making him sound like a relaxing teacher.
"i know this might be a dumb question for a bar buuut... do you by any chance know how to make root beer? non-alcoholic if you don't mind?" you asked as the historical topics of conversation were coming to a close. techno cracked a pleasant smile. "that's my specialty, y/n. i could also get you a slice of cake if you'd like." your eyes lit up, nodding your head profusely. while you watched techno reach over at something behind the bar counter, the sleeve of his shirt ran up slightly, revealing a black tattoo on the side of his wrist that you recognized, making you perk up.
[deees tattoo :)]
"is that a tattoo of theseus?" you asked, making him whip his head at you in surprise, eyes flickering between his tattoo and your face. he showed his arm off, pulling his sleeve up some more to get a better view of it. "yeah. how'd you know?" techno said, trying to hold back a smile. "i didn't tell you the history that i'm actually interested in. greek mythology." you said happily, making his smile widen until his cheeks hurt. techno just gave you a nod and then walked away to retrieve some ingredients for root beer and some slices of cake, wanting an excuse to go to the back room [haha. techno in the back rooms what he gonna do].
when he came back, he quickly made the root beer and then slid it over to you, along with a plate that had a slice of y/f/f cake. "thank you." you thanked him, clapping excitedly and digging into the cake. techno chuckled at you, fixing up a plate with a slice of cake on it for himself, and then taking a tall stool, sitting across from you from behind the bar. "so you said you were interested in greek mythology?" techno asked with a hint of surprise and curiosity. you nodded while sipping your root beer. "yep! also have i told you how good this is?" you complimented, sipping the root beer again and making techno smile at you.
the two of you began talking about greek mythology for a long while. you didn't know how late it was getting but you didn't care. you enjoyed techno's company in the empty bar and so did he. he just couldn't fathom how someone else had the same interest as him in this city. you even showed him a phone charm that bad gave to you as a gift. it was a single wing that represented icarus. you eventually checked your phone, seeing it was past 1 am.
"oh my gosh. it's already 1 am?" you exclaimed a bit questioningly, turning your screen over towards techno. his eyebrows raised. "do you have to go?" he asked, seeing that you were about to move from your seat. you nodded. "yeah. i have to go home." you said sadly, standing up and grabbing your purse. "i'll definitely come back here to visit, tech." you affirmed, making him smile at you. "please do. you're a pleasure to talk to, y/n/n."
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w.c.: 1.9k+