Better Time

Two people walk into a bar.

It sounds like the start of a bad joke, and it sort of is one. Two people who used to be kids walk into a bar and sidle up next to the marble countertop and pull out each other’s stools with a familiarity so flawless it looks rehearsed. The boy wears a dark green blazer over a crisp white shirt and carries himself with the sort of confident flippancy that would get him into places he’s not meant to be. The girl wears all black. There are nondescript sunglasses on her face, even though the sun has long fallen below the horizon, and they make her look like a secret agent.

They settle into their seats. She pulls out a gun and points it at him under the countertop. Flicks off the safety with one decisive click.

He pauses and takes a good, long look at her. Her hand is sure and steady. Her face is expressionless. At this distance, it would take an idiot to miss, and she’s possibly the furthest thing from one.

It’s Friday night, for god’s sake. Can’t a man get a break? He fights the urge to lash out and loses.

“I know you’re capable of shooting your old friends.” He drawls. “No need to prove it. Again.”

Her knuckles tighten on the gun. He turns away before she could fire something back and calls the bartender over with a lazy wave of his hand. One Bloody Mary and one lemon drop, no ice, closed tab, cheers mate, keep the change. Then he turns back to her, takes a deep breath, and attempts a charming smile. Business is business. “So, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

She says nothing. Her jaw is set.

He sighs exaggeratedly. “Let me put it in your language. What do the goddamn cops want this time?”

She takes off her sunglasses. Her right eye is covered by an eyepatch. A jagged scar runs through and underneath it, beginning at her eyebrow and coming to a stop just above her cheekbone. It’s raised and intimidating and takes up a third of her face, and it gives her what one could call character.

Her left eye stares at him. A steady gaze to match her steadier gun, sharp and cold and icy blue.

He whistles. “Oh, very serious conversation time. Let me guess, you want me to give you a list of who I’m inviting to my birthday party? Spoiler alert, you’re not on it.”

No response. He gives up and pulls out a pocket knife to fiddle with, flicking it open and closed and open again in an idle rhythm. It’s plain and silver, and she looks away at the sight of it.

They sit in silence until the bartender comes back with the drinks. He keeps the Bloody Mary and slides the lemon cocktail over to her, and lifts his glass, a little sardonically, in a silent offer.

She hesitates only briefly before raising her own. Their glasses clink together—

 

—but the sound was drowned out in the rambunctious rock music that was almost literally shaking the ground. Heavy bass, upbeat guitar, some guy rasping through cheap speakers about love and liquor and being young. They were both smiling, a little beyond tipsy, enough that it took them three tries to match up their glasses for the toast. When she threw her head back to down her entire drink, half of it spilled down her shirt and made him fall off his stool from laughter.

Just kids having fun.

He caught his breath and her attention to mouth watch this. She did, still smiling, her gaze soft under lowered lashes as he pushed himself up from his high stool and half-climbed, half-crawled onto the bar top.

Around him, heads turned. Whoops and cheers rose from the crowd. He paid them no mind. His eyes were on her. He crouched down and held out his hand, grinning, waiting.

She rolled her eyes and took it. He pulled her up, knocking over more than a few cups and patrons in the process. The bartender— who went by Fee— hollered at them to get off, but his eyes were exasperatedly fond behind his spectacles as he did so, and they pretended they couldn’t hear him over the noise.

The bar was quite an intimidating height. Neither of them was particularly tall, but from up there they were standing well above everyone else’s heads. It was dizzying to behold, and they paused for a brief moment to savour it. This is what it’s like to be on top of the world.

Or maybe they’ve just had one too many drinks. She pulled him into a spin and he whooped with glee. The music was still rocking the entire room and destroying eardrums, but for the moment, between their eyes, it’s tranquil and still.

By the time they sat down again, the crowd had quartered. He was more than halfway on the road to drunk and had lost memory of half the alphabet. She was slightly more coherent, though not by much. Fee had chased them off the bartop and herded them into a corner booth so he could clean up the mess they’d made, and now they were draped crookedly over each other’s shoulders while reality trickled back to them in small streams.

“So.” He said. Or tried to say. It sounded more like show. “What are you gonna be when you grow up?”

No hesitation. “A spy.”

“Why?”

“They wear cool glasses.”

He grinned. “Liar. It’s ‘cos they fight the bad guys, right? So righteous.”

She rolled her eyes. “No, it’s because I’m a good shot, and that’s the only profession where you’re legally allowed to shoot people.”

“You’re not a good shot. You’re a fantastic shot.”

“Whatever.” She said, but he caught her smile and instantly felt ten times drunker. “What about you?”

“Maybe I’ll be a bartender. Like Fee. I’ll wear a suit jacket everywhere and act like an old man.”

“Hey.” Fee called, from where he was wiping down the countertop.

“It’s true!” He called back. “You wear old man glasses—”

Fee rolled his eyes behind his gold-rimmed spectacles. “You only think that because you can’t afford them, kid.”

“—and you carry around an army knife.”

“It’s a pocket knife.”

He raised an eyebrow. Or, tried to. “Prove it.”

Fee sighed. “You know you can just ask if you want to see it again.”

He crossed his arms defensively. “Who said I wanted to see it again?”

Fee muttered something about stupid children but walked over and indulged him anyway. The pocket knife appeared in his hand, plain and silver, and he flicked it open with a deft twist of his fingers like he had so many times before.

He oohed and ahhed like it was his first time seeing it as he took it from Fee with all the care of a bomb disposer. She shared a faint smile with Fee from beside him.

“Can you leave it to me in your will?” He made his eyes wide and innocent. “Please?”

Fee rolled his eyes. “Take the glasses too, why don’t you?”

“I want the glasses.” She said.

“Fine, fine, whatever. I’m not even dead yet and you’re fighting over my inheritance. What’s next, the clothes off my back? Get upstairs, I’ll take you two back to school after I clean up.”

They slid out of the booth obediently and she—

 

—chases him up the stairs. He vaults onto the railing, taking advantage of the fact that she wouldn’t fire in such a small space or during such a quiet time to make his way up vertically. She’s right behind him, and they tumble into the second-floor hallway without any sound save for the soft thump of shoes on carpet.

He heads for the room at the very back, the one that drops down to a narrow alley. She sprints after him. They’re matched in speed, have been since forever, so he gets there only a split second before she does. Not enough time to shut the door.

She raises her gun again. Kicks the door shut behind her and locks it without looking, because even after all these years this is a familiar space. First a haven, then a nightmare. The position is hauntingly familiar. She blinks and sees bloody gold-rimmed glasses and a plain silver knife that doubles in her vision. The person holding it is different.

“Drop the knife.” She says.

He goes low and lunges for her legs, intending to knock her off balance. She sees it coming and springs neatly to the side, but he anticipates that, and sweeps his leg out to knock hers from underneath her. She catches herself with her hands but loses the gun. It skids across the wooden floor. They both dive for it.

He gets there first and turns immediately. The cold muzzle goes against her forehead.

“I’m going to offer you a chance for last words.” He says. “Unlike what you did to Fee.”

She drops her centre of weight and punches him in the gut with all the ferocity of a person in pain. Quick and brutal. Hard enough to hear his ribs crack. He doubles over, gasping, and his left hand comes up lightning quick with a flash of silver in its grasp. That too, was hauntingly familiar. For both of them.

She catches his wrist, twists it until he drops the knife, and wrenches the gun from his other hand in one smooth move. The safety is still off. She points it at him while they both heave for breath.

“I know you’re capable of cutting up my eye.” She says. “No need to prove it. Again.”

He closes his eyes and smiles begrudgingly. “You’ve made your point. Can we talk now?”

She backs him onto the balcony, against the metal railing, and presses the gun muzzle into his temple. They used to stand here with their hands weaved together and talk for hours under the moon until Fee finally came up with car keys and a knowing smile. The memory turns her away from him. She watches the distant city lights instead, little dots of yellow that flicker and waver and wink but never go out.

“You’re too quiet today.” He says. He doesn’t sound like he’s joking.

She fights the urge to step closer and loses. Her head comes to rest in the crook of his shoulder. Her left arm— the one that wasn’t holding the gun— wraps around him with enough devotion to hurt. He pauses briefly before his hands come up to rest gently on her back.

“I’ve figured it out.” He said. “It’s not about deals and cash flow and politics this time, is it? It’s them tired of doing business with criminals, of sharing a city that doesn’t belong to them in the first place. It’s me. The cops want me gone.”

She closes her eye briefly and considers punching him in the gut again.

“And who do they send to do their dirty work? The one who has never failed them. Their best assassin.” His voice is gently proud as he says, “The fantastic shot.”

She flinches hard. He pats her gently on the back.

“Time to finish me off, I guess.” He said. “His glasses are in my pocket. Take them. They were always supposed to be yours anyway.” He takes a deep breath. “I know it’s too much to ask of you to turn away from all of it now, but will you catch me at a better time? Maybe when we’re both a little less stubborn and power-hungry, yeah? I’m sorry about your eye. I wanted too many things and you fell out of sight.” He smiles, a faint shadow of what it used to be, but real and warm and beautiful. “Get it? Fell out of sight?”

She choked out a laugh. “That’s—

 

—terrible. The absolute worst.” She complained, leaning into his side. He grinned and thought success. The moonlight showered their silhouette with a kindness it could not offer to their older selves, but which it attempted to do anyway.

 

Back then, on the balcony, he kissed her temple and she smiled at him with both her blue eyes.

 

Now, she pulls the trigger.

Writer – Amy Zuo
Editor – Alvia Farooqui
Artist – Rufina Chan

–May 2025–