ARIA'S POV
The bar on Hawthorne has no memory of me.
After looking at it for a while, I go in.
I have walked past it a hundred times and never once stepped through the door and that is exactly the qualification it meets tonight. No version of myself I have to maintain inside it. No associations or corner booths where anyone knows me. Just dark wood, low lighting and the particular mercy of a room full of people who are all separately minding their own business.
I take a stool at the bar and order a whiskey sour.
The bartender makes it without asking anything. I appreciate this more than I can explain. I wrap both hands around the glass and take the first sip and let the taste of it sit on my tongue. My mother's drink. I don't know why I ordered it tonight except that I want to be ins
