"She's only got one night," a voice said from the other side of the bar.
Flex shrugged and turned the glass filled with amber liquid on the bar top. A strand of braided hair fell in front of his eye and he picked another peanut from the wooden bowl. He threw it in the air and opened his mouth to catch it.
"Fuck." It fell onto the floor and split in two.
"Twenty fourth time you've done that." A dirty, white cloth flew over the beer tap. "That floor is dirty enough to eat off."
"Hey! Fuck you, I'm worried ok!"
A young, black woman lent against the bar and handed him a dustpan and brush. "Then occupy yourself and clean up your shit." She pointed a finger at the scattered pile of peanuts on the floor. He glanced up at her and grinned.
"Sorry, Kia, gotta finish my drink," he said as he shook the glass in front of her face. She grinned back, grabbed the glass from him and downed it in one swift gulp.
"You're finished."
He pulled out a knife from his boot and began to pick his nails and she picked up the cloth from the beer tap and threw it at him.
"Clean it up!" Flex slammed the knife into the bar top. "Flex! Bastard! I'll get into sit for that!"
"Aww, you'll actually miss working in this hole?" He stroked the side of the empty glass. "You're swimming in a bucket of piss, Kia, that's you're ticket out."
"There is not out," she muttered and grabbed the glass from his hand and dropped it into the sink. "This is it for me." She looked around. "A whore turned bar-maid." She sat down on the shelf behind the bar and turned her gaze to the floor pulling her top up to cover her chest. "This is about as far as I will go in this world."
At these words, Flex stood then crouched onto the floor and began sweeping the peanuts into the dustpan.
"Damn." Kia looked at him. "Damn, damn damn…"
"What?"
"This is as far as you go? Shame."
"Huh?"
"Well, there's this really good Chinese restaurant up town that I wanted to take you to." She picked up the cloth and threw it at him again. "Sorry I mentioned it," he laughed.
The front door slammed and Flex stood up straight sharply. The leather coat flew over the back of a chair. "One down Flex." Natasha rested the gun on the bar beside the knife still jammed firmly into the wood. She raised an eyebrow and glanced at Kia who smiled.
"He was showing off."
"Again?" Natasha pulled the knife out of the bar top and laid it down.
"Which one was it?" Flex knelt down again and continued to sweep.
"The dealer." He furrowed his brow and stood up, tipping the peanut half's into an ashtray.
"Could have been any dealer, Tash. Streets are full of them." She reached over the bar for a glass and filled it with Coke from the tap.
"Rum?" Kia lifted a bottle of white spirit. Natasha's head shook as she raised the glass to her lips and sighed as the liquid slipped down her throat, quenching her thirst.
"You could have just shot some poor bastard who didn't do shit." Flex sat down on the stool beside her and picked up her gun. She glanced at him.
"Bastard…yes. Poor, no." She shook her head. "Those scum don't deserve pity, prick shouldn't have been born if he was meant to sell that shit."
"So it wasn't him?"
"It was."
"How d'you know?"
"Don't know, being pumped full of heroin by that dick might have helped to jog my memory!" She slammed her fist down.
"I thought you wouldn't remember… it was a lot of heroin…"
"I wish I didn't…and…that's why I have to kill you." Flex looked up.
"What?"
"That five dollars you owed me," she said holding out a hand "Pay up!"
"Jesus, Tash, I thought you were…God! Don't do that!" He pressed a ten-dollar bill into her palm.
"Only five, Flex."
"Just to pay you off, incase I forget again."