Talk to Glynda’s mom

“I’d love to catch up with you, Blake, but right now I have to take care of something. Can we talk later?”

Blake smiles. “Sure thing. I’ll look you up, and we’ll chat.”

Xabar nods, and gets up to follow Glynda’s mother. He is surprised at how light-headed he is as he stands and looks at the empty glasses on the table. “That stuff is stronger than I thought,” he observes, and makes a mental note to ask about what it is. He’d definitely like to try some more.

He looks around for Glynda’s mother. Not seeing her, he goes to the bar. The bartender must be new, because Xabar doesn’t remember seeing him in his previous visits. Of course, he wasn’t exactly interested in the bartender when he was here before. In fact, the only time he was actually at the bar itself was one night when he brought Glynda home late. The tavern was closed, but Glynda was good enough to let Xabar get a bit of liquid refreshment before turning in for the night. He smiled as he remembered the lovely experience of leaning against the bar with a bottle of Scotch in one hand, while the other hand helpfully guided Glynda’s head as it bobbed up and down on his cock.

His reverie was broken as the bartender demanded, “You gonna order something or just stand there with a shit-eating grin?”

Suppressing his irritation, Xabar responses, “I’m looking for Mrs. Peterson.”

“What do I look like? The Information Desk? How do I know where she is. Either order up or fuck off.”

Xabar scowled and clentched his fists. “I’ll take a Scotch. Make it a double.”

“We’re outta Scotch,” he replied.

Xabar looked behind him to the shelf where he had grabbed the Scotch the other night. Sure enough, there was a conspicuous vacant spot. He wondered if he had remembered to replace the bottle after drinking from it and vaguely remembered still having it in his hand when he staggered back to his room in the early morning hours.

“Well, I’m that case, I’ll have —“ Xabar started to say, but when he looked, the bartender was gone, evidently too impatient to wait for Xabar to make up his mind. With a scowl of irritation, Xabar helped himself to the beer of the guy sitting on the stool next to him. He was so engrossed in his attempts to chat up the girl at his side, that he didn’t notice.

Draining the drink and replacing the empty glass, Xabar went into the kitchen. His head was buzzing nicely, and he thought again that he really must ask about that delightfully-strong ale. He was also dealing with the irritation of that annoying bartender. With the day he was having, he really had little patience for people like that. He remembered Hager’s observation that he was a mean drunk and took a few deep breaths to calm himself.

As he stepped into the kitchen, he nearly collided with Glynda’s mother. Mrs. Peterson looked up sharply at Xabar before smiling. “What a surprise, Xabar! What brings you here?”

Without pausing for an answer, she continues on her way out of the kitchen with plates full of food.