STILL | NH |

ONE

Niall
   
"Are you sure that it's alright if I head out?  I've got all the bar glasses sorted and put in their proper places and finished out the order that was left up in the office. Didn't want to leave a bunch of unfinished shit for you to have to deal with."

I wiped down the bar in front of me, ridding the surface of the condensation rings left behind from the glasses that were used from the couple of regulars that had just headed out into the night, saying they wanted to get out of here before the impending thunderstorm made its way into town. Throwing the towel over the shoulder of my navy collared shirt, I turned to look at my chestnut haired co-worker as he crossed his arms and leaned against the top of the bar, brushing the stray curl that always escaped out of his face.

Co-worker really isn't the most accurate term for what Harry is to me.  Harry and I own the place, The Bunk Off. Honestly, The Bunk Off is the entire reason both of us found ourselves moving from England about three years ago, after my uncle left me the bar in his will, a surprise to all of us.  Harry and I had been friends since we met in primary school when my family moved from Mullingar, Ireland to Holmes Chapel, located in the Manchester area of England.  I was the quiet new kid, Harry was the loud class clown who took me under his wing and we had managed to be inseparable ever since.

My uncle moved to Boston when I was around five, stating he wanted to try something new, that new endeavour being a pub.  The Bunk Off was about as authentic as you could get. Well, as authentic as you could get being outside of Ireland. Dark wood, low lights, and the endless amounts of vintage Guinness memorabilia crowded the place giving it the feel of a small local place you could go to grab a pint or two.  At maximum capacity she could hold maybe one hundred and fifty people, so not the largest place in the city, but definitely one that was rarely overlooked and stayed steady with business the majority of the time. 

Harry and I were both in our Junior year of university when my uncle, Eoghan, was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer. That same year, he paid for both Harry and I to come out to visit Boston, taking the time to sit with each one of us individually and explain that his plan was to leave it to me, since he never had any children and has always viewed me as his child anyways.  It was a lot to take in and think about, but at the same time it was also a no brainer type of question.  Making the decision to move across the Atlantic was the easy part, truly. What they don't tell you though, is that no matter how well you know someone, when you make big changes in your life they don't always want to join you on those adventures, something I wish i hadn't learned the hard way.

"Of course, mate.  It's been slow as fuck all night and the only person in here is Sam, who I'm pretty sure is going to be heading out in the next little while anyways." Jerking my chin toward one of our regular customers who was sat in his normal corner booth, nursing a cocktail and reading over a book, something he did quite often when he would come in.

Harry slowly leaned back, pushing his upper body off of the bar, the muscles underneath all of the black inked designs that littered his skin flexing in the process as he stood tall, placing both of his hands on his left hip and twisting his upper body to the right, attempting to stretch out in any way that he could before turning and facing me. "Alright, well then I'll go ahead and head out and get to my bed, I can hear it callin' my name all the way from here. Call me if you need me?"

"Haz, I don't know why you say that like you don't live, like, less than fifteen minutes from this place." I chuckled as he reached behind the bar and pulled out his keys. "It'll be fine, it's almost ten thirty, as you can tell we have been slammed all night.." motioning with my hands around the dead pub, "Especially with the storm coming in, I doubt anyone else will even grace us with their presence tonight. The kitchen's closed anyways, we decided that earlier on when we knew it was going to stay like this tonight."