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The ale's bitter aftertaste faded, replaced by the phantom sweetness of honeyed bread.
Jay closed his eyes, and the bar's raucous clamor dissolved into the crisp clang of a church bell tolling noon. Winter, 15 years ago.
He was twelve again, ribs pressing sharp against stolen rags, crouched in the snow-dusted alley behind the bakery. Steam curled from the chimney of a narrow brick house—Tom's house, though he didn't know the boy's name yet. Only the smells: rosemary, roast chicken, apple pie. A feast for ghosts.
Jay's stomach growled. He'd eaten nothing but gutter rats and regret for days.
The kitchen window was cracked open.
He climbed.
—
The warmth struck first, a balm against his frost-nipped skin. Then the scent of lavender soap, wool blankets, safety. He froze, one leg dangling over the sill, as a woman's voice hummed a lullaby.
"Mama! There's a thief in the window!"
Jay whipped around. A boy his age stood in the doorway, freckled and fierce, clutching a wooden sword.
"Thomas Boron, hush!" The woman—Mrs. Lea—turned from the stove, her flour-dusted hands raised not in anger, but weary amusement. "Look at him. He's half-starved, not a thief."
Jay bristled. "Am too a thief."
"Then steal this," she said, thrusting a loaf of bread into his arms. It burned his fingertips. "Eat. Then we'll discuss your career."
—
Later, after the bath that turned the washwater gray, after the borrowed clothes (too big, smelling of pine and paternal sweat), Mrs. Lea knelt before him. Her eyes were the same storm-gray as Tom's.
"Jay, was it? You'll stay with us tonight."
"Why?" he'd demanded, fists clenched. Charity always came with hooks, he had learnt that the hard way.
She smiled, thumbing a smudge of dirt from his cheek. "Because Thomas needs someone to keep him humble. And you… you need someone to keep you safe."
—
Safety was a foreign word, sharp on his tongue.
It became fights in the yard, Tom's laughter ringing as Jay face-planted into the mud. "You punch like a drunk goose!" Tom crowed, yanking him up. "C'mon, I'll show you."
It became shared bedsheets and stolen sweets, Mrs. Lea's exasperated sighs as she patched their split knuckles. "Brothers shouldn't bruise each other," she'd chide, but her eyes crinkled with pride.
It became a name. Jay Boron.
"Mama says you're family now," Tom said one night, tossing him a moth-eaten blanket. "So stop sneaking off. You're stuck with us."
Jay stared at the ceiling, throat tight. "What if I mess up? Steal again?"
Tom punched his shoulder, grinning. "Then I'll beat you twice as hard. And I'll always be here to pull you outta the mud. Promise."
—
The memory fractured.
Always.
Jay's eyes snapped open. The bar's noise crashed back—laughter, clinking glasses, the pocket watch's relentless tick, tick, tick in his palm.
Tom's voice lingered, bright as the day he'd died: "You're stuck with me."
But the watch was still. Silent.
Jay's reflection stared back from the ale's surface—a man drowning in borrowed time.
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