It’s an angel bar—the angel bar in downtown San Judas. It’s in the old Alhambra Theater building near Beeger Square, a former Masonic meeting hall. The Masons’ insignia, the Square and Compasses, still hangs over the door. A lot of the place was recently torn up by a Sumerian demon (it was chasing me, as it happens) but although there were still signs of ongoing construction, the bar was more or less back to normal.
The Compasses was predictably loud, with the usual suspects in residence—the Whole Sick Choir as we sometimes called ourselves. (We’d even put it on softball shirts once, but dropped out of the local league when we found out we were actually expected to show up and play softball.) Chico was behind the bar, looking his usual combination of Mexican biker and aloof Confucian scholar, fiddling with his mustache while deciding which of the guys singing off-key at the bar he was going to cut off first. The serenaders were led by Jimmy the Table, a portly fellow who liked to wear old-fashioned gangster suits and looked like he should be out helping Nathan Detroit find a place to hold his famous floating craps game. He waved to me when I went past, but he didn’t stop singing, being well into the middle verses of “Roll Me Over,” a song that’s always more fun to sing than to listen to. I didn’t intend to do either. I had Chico get me a Stoli, and then I crept off to one of the back booths. For about ten minutes nobody noticed me, and I just sat and watched God’s warriors at rest and play. Pretty horrifying sight, if I do say so myself, but good for some laughs.
Of course I couldn’t stay that lucky very long. Sweetheart, large, bald, and fabulously angelic, spotted me and rolled over to give me a frighteningly detailed account of all the cheap punks and overdressed poseurs in the club he’d visited the previous night, and to quiz me on my latest trip through the Pearly Gates. And of course, a few minutes later Young Elvis showed up, and I had to tell it all over again, or at least the abbreviated and sanitized version I’d cobbled up for public consumption. Most of the Choir didn’t even know that Sam was gone. The official word was that he was on some kind of administrative leave, and although the rumors had been flying in the Compasses ever since he disappeared, as far as I knew, nobody but Clarence and me knew what had really happened.
Later in the evening, Monica came in with Teddy Nebraska, an angel I didn’t know too well because he worked the other end of town and tended to hang out there, too. Monica was relatively sober, or at least sober enough to remember that I had been kind of a shit to her lately, so after she got the bare bones of what had gone down with me and the bigwig angels she floated off to find more entertaining company. This was an immense relief, even though it left Teddy Nebraska sitting in my booth making awkward chitchat until he thought of an excuse to follow her, or at least to get out of my morose vicinity.
Monica Naber and I have history. She’s a wonderful woman (or angel, or angel-woman) but I’ve hardly dared to talk to her since the thing with Caz started, not because it would be cheating on Monica—we’ve always been a lot more casual than that—but because she knows me well, and I’m scared to death she’d sort of metaphorically sniff the scent of another woman on me. Normally that wouldn’t bother me; many of my other relationships have twined in and out of my weird off-and-on thing with Monica. But if anyone in Heaven found out about Caz there would be nothing left of me but a scorched hole in the sidewalk and the whiff of dispersing ozone.
I decided I’d made a mistake showing up at the Compasses instead of just going to some ordinary bar. My fellow angels wanted to socialize, but what I really wanted to do was sit in stoic, self-pitying silence until I had enough of a buzz on to stagger home. I’d cursed my job for years, being roused at all hours of the day and night and sent skittering across Jude to take up the fight for somebody’s immortal soul, but now I was beginning to realize how much I missed it. Being on administrative leave, or whatever bureaucratic limbo I was inhabiting at the moment, was too much like being a prisoner of my own mind. I needed distractions, but not the other-people’s-problems kind. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not really that type of guy. I mean, I care about people, really I do, but to be honest I’d rather not have to hear too much about them.
I guess you’re beginning to understand why I’ve never been one of Heaven’s model angels.
I had just paid my tab and was heading for the door when Walter Sanders came in. Walter looked like he’d had a couple of drinks or more himself, which wasn’t all that common. I’d seen him nurse a single beer through a whole evening while others were downing them in wholesale quantities. He’s one of the angels I like, a reserved fellow with a sharp, slightly bittersweet sense of humor. I’d often wondered if he had been English in his pre-angelic life.
He recognized me and stopped in the doorway, swaying almost imperceptibly. “Bobby. Bobby D, I was hoping to find you here. Want to talk to you. Can I buy you a drink?”
“To be honest, I think I’ve had enough, Walter. I was just on my way out.”
“Okay, fine.” He shook his head and smiled crookedly. “I think I’ve probably had enough myself, and I don’t really want to talk in here anyway.” He looked around. “Too many ears. I’ll walk you out to your car. If you don’t mind, we can chat for a few minutes in the parking lot.”
“I don’t have a car,” I said. “I’m walking.”
“Then I’ll walk with you, at least for a block or two.” Again the semi-apologetic smile. “The air will do me good.”
We made our way out, ignoring Jimmy and the other guys up at the bar who were shocked to see anyone leaving before midnight. A few ordinary humans came out of the pizza place next door just as we passed and there was a little jostling, but they moved along to the parking lot and we turned onto Walnut Street, which was quiet and empty except for a homeless guy sitting huddled against the wall halfway down the block, asleep with his black hoodie pulled down over his head like a monk at prayer.
“So what’s up?” I asked.
“I’m just—” He stopped, thought about it for a few steps. “Sorry. I’m not even certain it’s anything, and you’ve probably got enough to worry about, but it just seemed really strange . . .” He trailed off again, this time to step over the homeless guy’s skinny legs, which stuck halfway out onto the sidewalk. The guy had bare feet, thin and white, and even though it was spring I didn’t envy him spending a night on the street without shoes.