Cigarette smoke swirled out the door, delivering a rancid teaser of what awaited inside: the smoke laced with the odor of stale beer and other noxious alcohols and the gestalt of perfumes and colognes of humans who did have a sense of hygiene and the noxious musks of several who didn't. Country music strummed from a jukebox in the corner, thus completing the average small-town-bar setting.

Sammy balked at the entrance, and not just because he had to duck his head to get through. "Do we really hafta do this?" he asked.

"Yes," answered a voice behind him. Sammy felt his companion push against his back, shoving him through the threshold. Gerry was a wiry, lean man who moved as if he could just barely contain the energy in his body. "It's high time you got over her."

"I'm not gonna meet my soulmate in a bar," Sammy grumbled. "You know how I know? Because [i]I [/i]don't go to bars." Not willingly, at least.

"You won't know for sure if you don't try," Gerry insisted, further propelling Sammy towards an empty booth. "You said it yourself: You're not going to meet any girls staying home."

Sammy snorted. "Clara and I were together for three and a half years," he lamented for the hundredth time, but acquiesced so far as to sit down in a booth with worn green vinyl and padding so worn it may as well have been nonexistent. The wooden table was so old and used that the grain of the wood had separated into small peaks and valleys that acted as traps for particles of old food and salt.

"Correction. She strung you along for three and a half years," Gerry said with an exasperated sigh as he sat down opposite Sammy and casually pulled out a pair of napkins to brush the debris off the table, an endeavor that only proved half-successful.

The duo could not have been more mismatched. Wearing a crisp-clean white shirt and a black sports jacket, and brandishing well-trimmed mustache that everyone agreed worked for him, Gerry was a man ready to have a good time. Sammy, by contrast, could boast that he had put on a clean flannel shirt. He wore his favorite jeans, which had started to fray around the knees, and workboots that put the "use" into "abuse." His braid, at least, looked like something he had brushed and re-woven before leaving home.

Sammy just grumbled. He knew Gerry was technically correct, but he vacillated on which version of the story made him feel less like a chump.

"And for the record, this wasn't my idea. It was the boss's. [i]Last[/i] thing I need is you crimping my style."

Sammy's eyes flickered with a twinge of intimidation. "Odys- uh, [i]Nicholas[/i] asked you to take me out?"

"What, you didn't think he'd get tired of your bad attitude eventually?"

"I'm doing all my chores."

"Yeah, but your moping is bringing everyone [i]else[/i] down. I believe Nicholas's exact words were 'take him out and show him a good time before he becomes a hollow shell of the man he used to be.'"

"Nice of him to think I'm not already a hollow shell," Sammy said, though he visibly shrank in his clothes and his dark complexion paled despite the dark humor of his words.

A waitress with more makeup applied to her sagging face than most Hollywood monsters appeared by their table. Gerry ordered a Mexican beer and Sammy, knowing he would need something to smooth his frayed nerves, requested something fruity. As for food, Gerry got the chicken wings and Sammy a steak on the rare side. He always felt more confident on a full stomach.

Once the waitress shambled off, their conversation resumed. Gerry leveled his gaze at him. "So look, just relax and try to enjoy yourse… oh right. Look who I'm talking to.."

"I can enjoy myself," Sammy objected.

"You're the most wound-up person I know." Gerry flashed him a toothy grin. "It's a good time to be us right now, Sammy-boy. We're gainfully employed, you're covered in muscles, and that mysterious little scar above your eyebrow doesn't hurt either. And best of all--thanks to literary trends, women [i]love[/i] supernatural people. We're probably the most eligible bachelors in this place!"

Of course, Sammy ignored all the praise heaped on him to focus on minutiae. "Gerry, you don't tell women what you are just to get laid, do you?"

Gerry growled in frustration and ran his hand over his face. The edge of sarcasm in his voice was no less sharp for its whispered volume as he said, "Of course, Sammy. Tonight I'm going to jump up on the table, rip off my shirt and change in front of everyone here just so some lonely lady who reads too much supernatural romance fiction will take me home tonight. And that's how our species is going to come out of hiding."

"Okay, I get your point." Sammy glanced back to the front door, and considered fleeing, Odysseus' orders be damned. "As for what you said about us being the most eligible bachelors here, that bar ain't high here."

Gerry made a coughing noise somewhere between a scoff and laugh. "Self-flagellate all you want, just don't do it while you're talking to women, okay? Tonight is singles' night. The ladies here came [i]looking[/i] to meet men. Just give it a shot."

"I'll try," he said with a sigh of surrender. Best to stop resisting and just get this night of inevitable awkwardness over with. He had to remind himself that he had been through worse. He could survive a night of being rejected by women.

The two sat in silence until their drinks came. After a few sips, Gerry began scoping out their prospects and analyzing the women with a voice just above a whisper that made him sound like a David Attenborough but for women. Sammy listened to his packmate's observations with mild interest. The older woman hanging around the counter was a notorious cougar--avoid at all costs. The trio of women in the far corner was off-limits; they traveled in a pack like that to keep each other out of trouble and there was always one overly-cynical member. The giddy pair of girls barely suppressing their smiles were obviously using fake IDs and most likely too young, and even if they were over twenty-one, they'd be too rowdy for Sammy.

Their food arrived. Being in a public setting, Sammy put a little effort into minding his table manners and didn't just inhale his meat. Or perhaps he was just stalling for time. He knew he wasn't going to impress any ladies here, but there was absolutely no need to repulse the other patrons here. Once his plate was polished clean, he had to admit he felt better. Gerry grinned at him before snatching up his drink. "I'm going to go talk to the redhead who's been giving me looks since we got here," he said. "She's got a friend. I'll see how it goes and when I give you the signal, you come on over."

"Signal? What are you gonna do, caw at me?" Sammy folded his arms.

"Don't be obtuse. I'll wave you over."

Sammy sighed in resignation. If only to appease his alpha, he would comply. "Alright."

But with Gerry gone and his food finished, Sammy realized he had nothing to do beyond sit there and look pathetic. He tapped his foot idly, but that was about as entertaining as it sounds. After five minutes of sighing and surreptitiously glancing around, Sammy decided he was sick of the country music. If he could just hear one song from a different genre to break the twanging monotony, he wouldn't have to rip his own heart out. Leaving his still-half-full bottle on the table, he moseyed over to the juke box and began flipping through the selection. THe only name he recognized was Bruce Hornsby. Close enough. A few quarters was a decent bargain to preserve his sanity. Now he just had to wait for the saddest highlight of any night ever. Someone had fed a few dollars into this machine before him.

He spun around to return to his table, but whatever higher powers were watching him had other plans. With the grace one would typically imagine from a giant, he found himself knocking into someone and pushing their drink into them.

"Nooo!" said the woman he tripped into as she looked down at the red stain on her pink blouse. He recognized her from the trio Gerry had declared off-limits.

"Oh geez! Oh geez I'm sorry!" Sammy repeated over and over like a mantra as he snatched fistfuls of napkins off a nearby table and started handing them to her. But inwardly he was thinking [i]Just what I need, a scene with a drunk lady. Perfect. Just perfect.[/i] From the corner of his vision he noticed Gerry cradling his face in his hands.

"No, no it's fine, I got in too close," the woman admitted without slurring a single word. She set the remains of her drink down--some kind of fruity mix, from the smell of it--and began dabbing the napkins over her chest. "This'll come out in the washer tomorrow, it's fine. I wanted to select a song and I couldn't help noticing you picked out the one I was going for. You, ah, like Hornsby?"

Sammy was flabbergasted. A woman was actually talking to him… an [i]attractive[/i] woman. She had a ponytail of blonde curls, and blue eyes, framed by a round face that had color in her skin that hinted at a life full of activity. He stared at her for a moment before her question sunk in. And then he silently cursed himself out before actually answering.

"Oh, uhm, he's okay, I only really know two or three songs of his," he admitted. Time was expanding and retracting randomly and he couldn't tell if he had stared too long. Likely he had come off as some sort of idiot. "It was just the only good thing I could find in the jukebox."

"Oh I know what you mean," she said. If he had stared for too long she didn't seem to mind. "I love Hornsby, myself."

"Can I… buy you another drink? It's the least I can do," he offered.

She smiled and answered, "Only if you sit with me while I drink it."

"Oh!" He hadn't considered that. "Sure, I guess so."

"Wow, you're new at this aren't you?" she asked teasingly.

Sammy felt his face warm. "Y-yeah," he admitted.

"Well don't worry, I'm not," she said. "My name's Sarah. I'll walk you through it."