Intro

The midnight air in New Orleans lay on the skin like grease in a hot kitchen, thick and close and without mercy. In the shallow pools that gathered in the broken places of the street where old stone had long since given way - there flickered the ruin of the night, neon burning in the water and simmering there, each electric light bent and trembling, calling the drunk and the damned alike toward some narrow door or shadowed corridor. And in those darkened mirrors, a man might not see his face but the shape of what he'd done in his life, the tally of it, each sin set down and waiting.

Hell didn't lure people under anymore. It had emptied itself into the streets and taken up residence there among the noise and the laughter and the reek of things gone bad. It did not trick men to folly down but instead cast them back out to wander a while in the heat and the press of it, to steep in their own making beneath the southern Louisiana summer sky. It was much easier fishing that way.

A man could get through it if he knew the way. There were paths between the worst of it, narrow and shifting, and you might step around the sickness in the gutters and turn aside from the hands that beckoned and the drinks that promised more than they gave. The happiness borrowed from tomorrow. William Still moved among it all with care, the noise of it no burden to him - only the smell. Which rose up rank and sour from the street and refused to grant him reprieve. He sought only a place to drink where the air was clean enough to breathe and the night did not cling so close.

The main bloodline artery of the French Quarter was Bourbon Street. And that was the path he had to take to get where he was going, treading thoughtfully and light-footed through a field of landmines conjured from bad decisions. He thought this felt familiar. And that's why he'd rather avoid it. Whatever devil assigned to William Still from birth, he shaped the world around him to feel like just like this everywhere.

William made it past the shot girls. He made it past the bickering lovers who swore at one another for the last time. He made it through the proud Bible thumpers who cast their judgements from on high. And by the time the air smelled a little sweeter, he found himself in an area of the French Quarter where rainbow flags hung on the doorway of every bar. This was what he was looking for.

Inside the first bar was electric but close and the air held the weight of bodies. Music thumped from another room out of sight perhaps with a dance floor. And perfectly dainty men frolicked around in glitter, feathered boas, illuminated cowboy hats. This is the place he had his business.

The bar top shone dull beneath the sticky film of spilled drink and the slow drag of rags passed over it. William took a seat near the end. He set his hands flat on the bar a moment like he was testing it. And then he asked for Jameson. Pours were 3-for-1 on special and so the kind bartender obliged him with 6 fingers in a rocks glass and left the bottle close by.

Men came and went from the place over the course of the next three triples but one in particular stood out. He did not belong to the place. That was plain. He shuffled his shoulders with the music, but it was all wrong. His face half wore judgment like a coat that didn't really fit anymore. And he carried it with him between the tables, booths, and the bar looking from face to face as if to take inventory or like he was carefully selecting something.

He found an empty barstool beside William.

How's it going? You come here often? He kept his charade going with the little jerking twitches in his shoulders.

I don't come here often, but I've been here a million times.

William drank. Set the glass down. He reached over to the bottle of Jameson, poured himself another as he motioned to the bartender that he was helping himself. Again the bartender obliged and added it to his tab.

So you know what this place is then.

New Orleans? Or you mean this fine establishment? William grinned a charming smirk.

The man relaxed his shoulders.

Well, I can tell you're no stranger to making friends.

Friends, I have a few. But I'm a whole lot better at making enemies than friends, if I'm being completely honest. William drank.

Well how about you let me buy your next round there, friend.

How about you state your purpose. Business or pleasure?

Well what do you mean? The man took it for flirting.

Oh don't be so shy now. This was flirting. I saw you out there… I passed right by you. Didn't you see me? You seen me now. I didn't catch your eye out there?

I don't think I saw you tonight… I'm just getting out for the night…

Well maybe that was your business and this is your pleasure. You were out there standing on a milk crate. Going on and on about how God will punish the gays. All sinners burn in hell. Repent now or blah blah blah. I didn't listen long. It was dreadfully boring. I had to get to the gay district to find some decent human beings. Now are you sure you didn't see me? He smirked again.

Now look, friend…

Are you sure about that? I told you I make more enemies than friends…

William casually rose from his barstool and turned to face the man. Not to threaten him, though it probably felt threatening. William learned before his training that posture was everything.

The man smiled, but there was no humor in it.

You don't fear for your soul?

No.

You ought to.

Why, you don't fear for yours.

Look, I come here trying to save people… I think of myself as a messenger… I…

You're a bully. I heard tell of a man 3 nights back and once a week for the past month that leaves this area with a drunk queer in tow, and somehow that poor soul ends up in the hospital, beaten ragged. So is this your business?

The man's hand came quick then. Not to strike but to seize. He caught William by the front of the shirt and pulled him close.

You think this a game?

William rode with him jerking around. Easy. But the man was not in control. He looked down at the hand knotted in his shirt.

You picked the wrong man, he said.

The first blow came quick and without ceremony. The rocks glass cracked dull like splitting wood and the man folded against the bar and took bottles with him tipped over spilling their contents in the low light.

Some laughed. Some didn't. Everyone in the room orbited away from them like ferrofluid repelled from a magnet. A murmuring murmuration.

The man slipped a knife from his boot that he'd had hidden all along, all eyes caught in the glint of his blade. A woman cried once and then no more.

They moved in close quarters, breathing each other's breath. The knife flashing and gone and back again. The blade was oily black and dripping in the neon light. And the thumping from the other room matched the heartbeats of every spectator.

The man caught William's wrist and drove him back into shelves and glass came down in sheets around them like rain. It was William's blood on the knife. He'd been slashed several times. William quickly grabbed a seven inch or so shard and stuck it in the man's left thigh and broke off the rest of it that was exposed. He dropped the knife.

William struck the man's midsection quick and hard and it took the breath from him. His gasping air smelled of Grizzly wintergreen, William noticed. He staggered back but did not fall. He came again with a curse and a wild, heavy swing that William ducked beneath with grace and caught him with a quick combination body shot and uppercut to his jaw. He felt it let some teeth loose as the man bit through the tip of his tongue.

The man did not relent. His will impressed William. He clawed for him, struck at him blind his vision gone to rage, and William hit him again and again until the fight went out of him and left him folded up beneath the ledge of the bar with his breath gone raspy and thin.

The room had gone quiet.

I don't like bullies. But I hate pretenders.

He reached down into the man's front pocket and pulled out a wad of bills and set them on the bar though no one had asked him for it.

He pulled the bottle of Jameson from the bar and then he went out into the night.

The door shut behind him and the noise rose again as if it was holding its breath for it to be over.

And it was. The night waited still.