Meet Me at Donovan's

Main Street in Branchton, New Jersey has remained relatively unchanged over the years. It is untouched by the version of capitalism, that is chain restaurants and department stores. Instead, the cute store fronts are still occupied by family-owned businesses, passed down from generation to generation. 

I walk the street now, sent by my mother to pick up a take out order from Donovan’s Pub. Rosie’s Attic, an antique store, still has a lavender facade. My grandmother likes to tell the story of Rosie painting the building herself decades ago. Back then purple brick was a huge scandal. 

Donovan’s Pub is across the street. An LED sign hangs down over the entryway. It glows a harsh red. One of the bulbs in the apostrophe is almost burnt out, it blinks slowly like someone clearing sleep from their eyes. 

The interior of Donovan’s is the epitome of a dive bar. It is dimly lit. The dark wood paneling covering the perimeter does nothing to brighten the place. Booth seats are made of dark green vinyl, most of which have been torn over the years. They are repaired with strips of silver duct tape. The entire place smells of stale beer and fried food. Despite smoking not being allowed inside since the 90s, the faint smell of cigarettes still hung in the air. 

For the holidays, they have added blinking string lights to the underside of the bar. A tilted Christmas tree stands in the corner. The star on top forces the branch to bend slightly under its weight. There are three stockings hanging above the bar, one for each member of the Donovan family. 

Austin, an older regular, has a permanent seat at the bar. Even when I was freshly twenty-one and nervously ordering Coors Light, he was present. A glass of his favorite Pinot Grigio in front of him, too. Similar to Main Street, years have not changed this fact either. Today, Austin sits at the corner of the bar with his wine. His gaze is held by the TV overhead. 

My eyes take in the familiar scene, but stop abruptly when they land on Luke Campo behind the bar. He tilts a pint glass beneath the tap and watches amber liquid fill the cup. I halt in my tracks, halfway between the far end of the bar and the front door. 

I stare at Luke’s profile. A layer of dark stubble covers his jaw. The sleeves of his green flannel are rolled up to reveal his forearms. The fabric is stretched tight over his shoulders. Luke had been the star quarterback of the Branchton High School football team, so he had always been a big guy, but there was now an extra layer of muscle that hadn’t been present at eighteen.

Luke passes the glass to a woman sitting beside Austin. She is older, probably closer to my parents’ age. I don’t recognize her. She must have a tab open because Luke does not wait for any form of payment before turning his attention to my side of the bar. 

His eyebrows shoot up when he sees me standing there, but he composes himself quickly. He always was a good poker player. 

“Sydney Gaines,” He says. His voice comes out as stunned as I feel. 

I realize that I am still standing awkwardly in the middle of the room. My feet shuffle forward of their own accord until I can rest my hands on the wood. Luke’s eyes never leave mine, except for the brief moment I catch them trailing up and down the length of my body. 

“I didn’t know you were in town,” Luke says. He scratches at the back of his neck. 

I think back to how odd my mother was acting when she insisted I be the one to pick up lunch from Donovan’s. Despite all of my siblings volunteering first. Mom had been adamant that I grab the sandwiches. It all makes sense now. 

“Just until the holiday is over,” I answer. “I didn’t know you were working here,” I add. 

Luke shrugs nonchalantly. He places a palm on the bar and leans into it, “I help out sometimes when the Donovans are out of town.” 

There was a point in time when I was certain I was going to marry Luke Campo. We used to lay in the bed of his dad’s truck and whisper about our shared future for hours. Under the stars we spun stories of kids and grown up jobs.

Our joint dreams died and here we are now; staring at one another across Donovan’s bar with a decade of silence between us. The sight of Luke still makes my heart flutter, even if just a little bit. 

“Aren’t you a saint,” I reply sarcastically. 

“Working for free booze and food doesn’t exactly canonize me,” Luke taps the bar with his fingers. He slides a coaster with the bar’s logo onto the wood. “What can I get you? Are you still drinking the cheapest thing on tap?” 

My cheeks flush at the memory of the two of us splitting a six pack of Keystone in the wooded area behind his parents’ house. At sixteen, the beer went right to my head and I was declaring my love for Luke loudly. Then we’d stumble home and pray our parents didn’t suspect anything. 

“Pinot Noir actually and definitely not the cheap kind,” I smile. “But I’m not here for a drink. I’m picking up my family’s lunch order.” 

Luke’s face falls for a split second. I swear I see traces of disappointment in his expression. He turns on his heel and heads to the window that separates the dining area from the kitchen. There are two brown paper bags sitting on the sill. 

“One order for Peggy Gaines,” Luke announces. He holds up the bags as he returns. Carefully, he slides the food in front of me. His eyes study my movements as I reach for both bags. I feel self conscious as I try to maneuver the food into my arms. 

“One drink,” Luke interrupts my concentration. “My treat.” 

My hands freeze. I peer up at Luke. His blue eyes are so intense it feels like being under a microscope.  I am fully aware that the food is getting cold by the minute and that Luke and I are twenty eight years old now, a far cry from the teenagers we had been. Images of my corner office and two-bedroom apartment in West Hollywood come to mind. I am so far removed from the life I left here in Branchton. 

“One drink,” I humor him and slide onto a barstool. Before my butt can fully settle onto the cushion, Luke has produced a wine glass from under the bar. He has a heavy pour, filling it nearly to the top. I watch the red liquid splash up the sides and then slowly crawl down to the bottom. 

I gently move the two bags of food a little further to my right. It will be easier to ignore the task I had been sent out to do if I can’t see it visibly chilling in front of me. 

“Tell me everything,” Luke leans on the bar. He rests his weight on his elbows. The woman he served before calls for him. Luke holds one finger up in my direction, letting me know to hold my thought. 

He makes quick work of closing her tab. In seconds, she has signed the bill and they are wishing one another a happy holiday as he slips into her coat. Then he is back in front of me, hunched over the bar once again. 

“Tell me everything,” He repeats.

The last time I saw Luke was at our high school graduation. Before the ceremony, the two of us stood on the metal bleachers while he broke my heart. We were wearing mustard yellow, polyester gowns. Bobby pins held my cap to my scalp, uncomfortably pulling at strands of my hair. My feet ached from the high heels I was not used to wearing. 

He told me that he did not want to go to USC with me at the end of the summer. He wanted to stay in Branchton and go to state school. I had a solution to that: he could come out to LA after we graduated college. Then Luke confessed that Los Angeles was never his dream, it was mine. 

Everything I have done since we broke up comes to mind like life flashing before my eyes. I graduated from USC with a public relations degree and landed my dream job. Last year, I was promoted and scored a coveted corner office. I rescued a dog named Piper and made friends in LA; Michaela, Veronica and Zoey. We had traditions and inside jokes. I had lived in multiple apartments and owned a few different used cars. So much life has happened since the last time I saw Luke Campo. 

I tell Luke about everything. He oohs and he ahhs. He asks for pictures of my office view and Piper. Then he laughs. 

“I’m surprised you have a dog,” He says. 

I lock my phone after showing him a photo and ask why. Piper is the cutest, most adorable thing ever. I am offended that he doesn’t think I am fit to take care of her.

“Remember our Family Life class?” He refills my glass without me asking. I don’t protest. 

The two of us had been paired to take care of a baby simulator junior year. It was a doll, but it cried to indicate that it needed to be fed or held or have its diaper changed. We spent the entire week arguing and at two a.m. on one of the nights I had ‘custody’ of the doll, I locked it in the bathroom to salvage a few hours of sleep. Luke and I failed the project. 

“Okay,” I concede. “Not my greatest work, but Piper is different and I am much more mature now,” I roll my eyes.

Luke studies my every movement. I feel heat creeping up my neck from the scrutiny. His tongue darts out ever so slightly to wet his bottom lip. “You’re definitely more mature now.” 

I swallow audibly. It is more of a gulp. My fingers nervously clutch the stem of the wineglass. It takes everything in me not to begin fanning myself in an attempt to counteract the heat warming my body. 

“Your turn,” I tip the glass slightly in his direction. “Tell me everything.” 

Luke sighs. He stands up straight and then leans back down over the bar again. I do my best not to focus on the way the muscles in his forearms ripple from the movements. 

He goes on to reveal that he went to Mountain University, the state school thirty minutes north of Branchton. He graduated with a degree in business with big plans to make it to Wall Street, but chose to take over his dad’s construction business instead. He bought a small house on Irwin Place, near the lake. No dog or cat or wife or girlfriend. 

“You should get a dog,” I tell him when he’s finished. “Piper is the best.” 

I am not sure why, but it makes me sad to think that Luke goes home at the end of every day to an empty house. Sure, his family lives close by, but there’s something slightly depressing about an empty house. 

“I’ll think about it,” He says in a way that means he most definitely is not going to think about it. 

There’s a pregnant pause between the two of us. I am staring down at the grains in the wood on the bar. Luke is fidgeting with the dingy-looking towel slung over his shoulder. He clears his throat. 

“Do you ever regret leaving?” He catches my eyes. 

“Sometimes I miss home,” I answer without hesitation. “But I never regret leaving. I love Los Angeles. I love my job. I love my friends.” 

Luke’s lips press together. I wonder if he was hoping for a different answer. Maybe he wants confirmation that he made the right decision all those years ago. Maybe he thought I would say that I had spent the last ten years wishing I never left. 

“Do you ever regret staying?” I turn the question to him. 

Luke considers it for a moment. He drops the towel onto the bar and absently pushes it in small circles. 

“I don’t know that I regret my decision,” He says. “Sometimes I do wonder how different my life would be if I had left.” 

I think of LA. My tiny apartment and the traffic-logged freeways. There are too many fad restaurants to count and everything seems so surface-level. I picture my life and cannot fit Luke into the frame.  

“If it makes you feel any better, you would hate living in California,” I tell him. 

This makes him chuckle. I catch sight of the food again. It must be ice cold by now, but I make no attempt to leave. 

“It does,” Luke starts. “Make me feel better.” 

I sip my wine. With no food in my stomach, it is going right to my head. Thankfully I walked here. 

“You would’ve been too restless if you stayed here,” Luke says. “You would’ve left eventually,” He pauses. “If it makes you feel any better.” 

Despite loving the current version of my life, there are still parts of me that wonder. At night, when I am alone with no one to keep me company, but my dog, I let my mind drift to the ‘what ifs.’ What if I never left? What if Luke and I never broke up? In another universe, I am still in Branchton, probably with a couple of kids and a split-level house near the park. 

I am not sure that this version of me Luke is portraying is as comforting as he means it to be. I would like to think that if I had chosen to stay, I would have stuck to my decision as wholeheartedly as the one I did end up making. I would like to think that in another life, I would still be here. Maybe I am helping Luke run the business or maybe I stay in PR, commuting to Manhattan every morning. 

Without responding, I tilt my head back and down the last drops of Pinot in one gulp. If the wine hadn’t gone to my head before, it was definitely about to. My fingers dab at the corners of my mouth, hopefully erasing any purple traces of wine. I push off the barstool and slide into my coat. After it is zipped up to my chin, I reach for the long abandoned bags of food. 

“It doesn’t,” I respond. “I think I could’ve been happy here, too.” 

Luke nods, but doesn’t say anything in return. I secure my grip on the food and begin my journey back to my parents’ house. Just as I am about to reach Donovan’s front door, Luke calls my name. I turn to look at him. He hasn’t moved from his place at the bar. 

“It was nice seeing you, Sydney,” He says with finality. 

It is final. Some part of me knows that I will never see Luke again. Even though I could have been just as happy here in Branchton as I am in Los Angeles, that’s not my reality. In two days I will catch the red eye home. So, I smile at him and cock my head to the right. 

“It was nice seeing you, too, Luke,” I turn on my heel and continue on my path to the door.