Oh. He thinks. It's all he can manage, when he sees the space where the bartender's left arm should have been. Instead, from the shoulder down, there's a single milky-white wing. It doesn't take his physician's training to tell that this is real and bonafide. He's drawn to it as much as he is the rest of the bar, with all five of its stools and lack of a proper door. It's little more than a counter with a few seats attached, if Toshio is to be completely honest. There's something about it that seems somewhat familiar, even if the man himself, is not.
He picks the middle seat. "I'm sorry sir, that seat is already occupied by a patron."
The bartender points at a seat on the edge of his bar. And Toshio remembers a little too late that places like this usually only cater to regulars. "Sorry." He mutters.
"What'll it be?"
"Whiskey," Toshio says reflexively.
Swan-wing slides a glass to him with his right hand. "First one is on the house."
It's good and cold, but not quite the same as when he's alone in his apartment. Usually with an old record. Sometimes a show Kyouko taped but forgot to delete. And that now Toshio refuses to.) He nods to show appreciation. Swan-wing doesn't notice, and instead re-fills a dish of sake in front of the middle seat. (As if there is an invisible, intangible person drinking from it.)
He drums his fingers against the bar before asking something that he's curious about, but doesn't necessarily mean to. "Is that genetic?"
"What?"
"Your…" He licks his lips nervously. "… Your wing? Is it genetic?"
Swan-wing smiles. "Not really, no." And he says no more.
Toshio briefly wonders what making mix drinks is like. If a color has ever splashed out and stained the feathers. Or if, when shaking, feathers come loose and flutter into cocktails not carefully guarded by the hands of attentive patrons. Or maybe he just doesn't serve them. He thinks.
He gulps down the rest of the whiskey.
"Would you like anything else?"
"What do you recommend?" He finds himself asking.
"It depends." He pauses. "For heartbreak, a rosé. Hedonism, a brandy. I can't tell what you would like yet." Come back tomorrow.
The next night, he takes the same seat he did the previous night. He's slightly anxious about being told to move. Or rather, that he's occupying a spot where a patron from a different dimension might sit.
Swan-wing smiles at him. "Welcome back. What will you have?"
"Whiskey," Toshio says again.
"Is it because of your nerves?" Swan-wing asks him, sliding the glass across the bar.
"No." He sighs. "It's because of death." He adds, without quite meaning to.
"Yours?" He leans against the counter. "Or perhaps another's?"
"Someone who was close to me." Toshio says.
Swan-wing outstretches his winged left arm. (Much to Toshio's surprise, the feathers stay in place.) "It's a half-broken curse he says. Some people think it's pretty." He pauses and quirks his head. "But trying to get on public transit or into crowded art galleries is kind of a fucking mess." He laughs. "That's why I made this place. So people like us have somewhere to go."
"I didn't think…" There were more people like you.
"You're not looking in the right places."
Toshio finishes his glass of whiskey and sets it in front of Swan-wing. He lets a minute pass before asking for another recommendation.
"You know, the rum-and-cola is also called the Cuba Libre?" He asks. "Because it was made for a colonel after the war for Cuban independence." Swan-wing pauses. "I wonder what the name of the drink would be, if Cuba had lost."
"What does that have to do with me?"
"Maybe everything." He shrugs. "Or maybe nothing at all." Come back tomorrow.
"Seishin," the bartender says on the third night. "It's my name."
"Toshio." He says in response.
Their eyes meet, but they do not speak.
Come back tomorrow.
On the day before the fourth night, Toshio sees a patient that reminds him of his wife. "I'm sorry," he says, after writing down a prescription he knows is wrong. It isn't one that will hurt the patient; and it isn't as if he can stop himself from doing it. Anything that reminds him of Kyouko leads him back to her ineffective medication. (If only he had given her more.)
"Do you ever look at it," Toshio says, stumbling over his words "and regret things?" He takes a sip from his pitcher.
Seishin smiles. "It's a long story."
"I have time."
Seishin shrugs. "Probably not the right kind."
"She said that too."
He runs a hand through his feathers and takes a deep breath. (Although, Toshio almost wishes he hadn't asked): Once upon a time, in a kingdom that both rose and crumbled before you were born, there lived a king. He married young and could not conceive a child for a number of years. When he did, the child from their union was wayward and neither a daughter nor a son. His wife died shortly after, but before she did, she told her husband, the king to love their child as much as he had loved her. He did, long into his next marriage. And after the birth of his second child.
(Here, Seishin pauses to take a breath and wipe down the bar.)
In those days, stepmothers were much more jealous and vain than they are now. She cursed the child to wander, just like his soul. He was transformed into a swan, and could never stay in one place too long.
The first year was the worst, with the constant wandering and the adjustment. Eventually he began losing himself to The Swan. It was easier not to think, for a time. This, was of course, until the world closed in on itself like a flower blooming in reverse. The Swan came back to the kingdom that was once his inheritance. There, through the window of a tall tower, he saw his half-sibling. They had been friends in their youth.
When she saw him, she recognized him before he recognized her. It takes her an instant. He takes three years to find the human part that had been cast aside. In the intervening time, she cuts out her tongue and trades it to the queen of all faeries for a cure.
It's especially cruel because she had a sweet voice, and the only thing the queen could offer her was knowledge.
(If you ask me, he says, she shouldn't have done it. Knowledge is common, but a voice like that, is not. He leans away from the bar slightly and closes his eyes, as if remembering something from another life. It doesn't change the fact that you didn't ask.)
"The cure," the queen says "is an act of love." She takes the princess's hand in her own. "You must harvest the nettles that grow in the graveyard each morning. Do it without gloves on your hands. And then you must crush them under your bare feet. You must harvest the thread and weave it into a tunic. It will sting. But if you start this task, and you do not finish, your sibling will feel this pain ten-fold."
She does this diligently, never once complaining. Working until the collapse of empires and the birth of new, smaller kingdoms. In the sixth year, a particularly young monarch came for her hand in marriage. They say they love a woman dedicated to her craft, and promises to bring around a priest to help her decide, and to test to see whether the union would be good or not.
The following morning, the priest sees her in the graveyard and assumes she is a witch. He tells her this much. He schedules her to burn at an eight-o'-clock appointment on Monday morning, because the religious men take the Sabbath off. The monarch is disappointed, and chooses to seek romantic love elsewhere.
Knowing that her time is limited, she tries to finish the garment, but has one sleeve remaining.
"I put it on, knowing that the curse wouldn't ever fully be broken if I did." He scratches the back of his head. "Anyway, we ran like hell and got out of there." Seishin looks at Toshio and smiles. "Was that what you were looking for?"
Toshio frowns. "It's a great story, but how do I know it's true?"
"Does it matter?"
Toshio puts a handful of bills on the counter. "Whatever happened to your sister, anyways?"
"You've probably seen her wedding dresses somewhere. They're gorgeous." He shrugs. "We send each other Christmas cards." Sometimes things just don't work out.
On the fifth night, Toshio asks him two questions, and tells him a story in return:
"I googled your story. It was written in the 1800s, and there were eleven princes." Toshio takes a sip of his drink. "Why pick that one?"
"What makes you think the guy that wrote it is original?" Seishin laughs. "I've had my fair share of exes. And before chronic pain medication was invented, a lot less patience to finish the story the right way. Have you heard of Puss in Boots? That was mine too."
"Aren't you ever mad? Or upset?"
"How could I be?"
Toshio frowns. "I fell in love with Kyouko while she was sick. I mean, I met her when she was sick. I knew she wasn't going to get better." He fiddles with the silver ring on his left hand. "I think I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And what I felt for her wasn't pure. There might have been a part of me that thought that she could get better with love and care. And maybe another that pitied her."
(Seishin lets him bury himself in the wing. It's soft and downy, and they pretend not to hear the rhythmic beating of each other's hearts.) Come back tomorrow.
Seishin introduces Toshio another patron on the sixth night. He moves a dish of sake towards the doctor, and points at a small frog swimming around the bottom. "He's actually a prince. Sometimes he's on the Forbes 500." He says, grinning.
"So if I kiss him, will he…?" Toshio looks at Seishin. "You know?"
"Aromantic," a small voice from the bottom of the bowl says.
"And you know? I think he kind of prefers being a frog." Seishin folds his wing behind him and pours the prince more rice wine.
"I do too." Toshio says, without meaning to.
"Yeah? That's a really nice croak you have there," Seishin laughs.
"No, I meant. The aromantic thing."
Seishin nods. "That's fair. It's not like romance leads to anything good, anyways."
Come back tomorrow.
Toshio is later than he normally is on the seventh night. He sees someone with Kyouko's hair, and is dazed. There are many things that remind him of her, and he's almost always overwhelmed. He sees Seishin wiping down the bar, and possibly preparing to close for the night. His wing is extended over the bar, propped up on one of the stools.
"I haven't put the whiskey away yet."
Toshio seats himself. "Isn't there something else you'd rather be doing?"
"Not a lot of places for a guy with a swan wing instead of an arm to go on a Thursday night. Clubbing is impossible, and I'm not good enough at slam poetry to justify closing up early." Seishin slides him a glass.
Toshio takes a sip. "It's good."
"You know they call the part of whiskey that evaporates during aging the angel's portion?" He polishes off a glass. "The half you give up to the world, or something." Seishin looks at Toshio. "Kind of a poetic way to talk about the water cycle."
"I think I figured out the Cuba Libre thing."
He smiles. "Let's hear it."
"I don't think the drink would be the same with a different name. Or maybe, it wouldn't have been invented at all."
"You think so?"
Toshio frowns. "Well, what do you think?"
"The name doesn't matter at all. I think you can call it whatever the hell you want, and it's still the same thing." Seishin quirks his lips. "I mean, I didn't really expect you to have an answer."
"Your name means faithful, though."
Seishin grins and runs his hand through his hair. He carefully moves his wing so it's back at his side, and props his elbow up on the bar, close to Toshio. "I think I need some whiskey. It's been kind of a long day."
"Want to talk about it?"
"I mean. I don't really blame her. It kind of sucks when the name on your credit card is The Ugly Stepsister. And, here's the thing. She's not really ugly at all." A sigh. "And then there was the ogre. Have you met him yet? I can't remember." Seishin pulls a glass out from underneath the bar, and fills it half-way.
"Are you expecting anyone else?"
"Not really."