Amelia had everything- family, friends, a promising future- the sky was the limit. But just like that everything was taken from her. One moment she's planning her high school graduation party the next she's laying on a therapist's couch. It was as i...
Elijah pulled the car into the lot of a local pub called O'Donovan's. A sign illuminated with green iridescent lights, along with a giant four leaf clover lit up the roof. It wasn't a place I would ever find myself in, but I knew damn well that Aralyn would've loved the atmosphere. She enjoyed the annual pub crawls in New York during October and March with her cousins. Her entire family was into drinking beer through the whole year, come to think of it.
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My parents, on the other hand, preferred wine. Uncle Chris had told me that Steven had owned a sizable red wine collection that he kept in the basement of our old house. My mother had a taste for white wine, chardonnay and pinot grigio, to be exact. Veronica, my sister, didn't start drinking till she was about nineteen and even then she only cared for Rose.
We got out of the car. Holding the door open, Elijah stepped inside behind me. The place was packed with people who were on their way home from a long day at work. When the bartender caught sight of who had just walked in, the corners of her mouth curved up. Her hair was a deep cherry red and her lips were painted a dark shade of coral. Her slender arms threw a bar rag over her shoulder with a cheerful smile. Her name tag read 'Darcy' in bold, white print.
"Well slap my arse." She planted a hand on her hip. "Long time no see, stranger."
"Hello, Darcy. How are you and the family?" Elijah asked.
"Oh, I'm fine. Yeah, Dads finally got me behind the bar after my twenty first- last week."
"That's right, your birthday was last Thursday..." Their conversation blended into the rest of the noise that flooded through the place. I felt small next to Elijah, but I took advantage of this time to really get a better look at the clientele.
A majority of the people that sat around at the bar and a few of the tables were mostly male. Middle aged, aside from the bus boys that looked all of sixteen. Some were wearing suits, others wore more casual attire that suggested they had come from a day of fishing at the lake. The room smelled of Guinness and, bread baking?
I didn't realize the place sold actual food here as well.
I eyed a young waitress carrying a large serving tray of dry stout, Irish nachos, and mini shepherd's pies to a table for a couple with their two children. At first I didn't depict this place to be family friendly, however they weren't the only group that had kids.
The walls were decorated with framed pictures of Virginia's most breathtaking sights. Such as the Luray caverns, Colonial Williamsburg's old cobblestone roads, and Smith Mountain's vase lake. I could tell that some of the photos were taken professionally while others were taken from someone's phone.
From what I could still remember, my sister taught me how to spot the difference between the two. According to her, a professional knows how to properly center and focus an object before snapping a shot of it. There were also a few pointers on proper lighting, but I stopped listening long before then. It was Veronica who held a true talent for photography, not me. Her favorite place to take photos was when we were at the shore. The waves crashing at our feet, the smell of the salt flying through the air as we shifted through the sand...
