Brain Ships - Anne McCaffrey [129]
He felt the lump in his throat and knew one more drink would make it spill over into an outpouring of emotion. The bartender leaned over and said, confidingly, "Buddy, if I were you, I'd cut off about now."
Alex nodded, a little surprised, and swallowed back the lump. Had liability laws gotten to the point where bartenders were watching their customers for risky behavior? "Yeah. What I figured." He sniffed a bit and told himself to straighten up before he became an annoyance.
The bartender—a human, which was why Alex had chosen to drink away his troubles here, if such a thing was possible—did not leave. Instead, he polished the slick pseudo-wooden bar beside Alex with a spotless cloth, and said, casually, "If you don't mind my saying so, buddy, you look like a man with a problem or two."
Alex laughed, mirthlessly. The man had no idea. "Yeah. Guess so."
"You want to talk about it?" the bartender persisted. "That's what they hire me for. That's why you're paying so much for the drinks."
Alex squinted up at the man, who was perfectly ordinary in a way that seemed very familiar. Conservative haircut, conservative, casual clothing. Nothing about the face or the expression to mark him except a certain air of friendly concern. It was that "air" that tipped him off—it was very polished, very professional. "Counselor?" he asked, finally.
The bartender nodded to a framed certificate over the three shelves of antique and exotic bottles behind the bar. "Licensed. Confidential. Freelance. Been in the business for five years. You probably can't tell me anything I haven't heard a hundred times before."
Freelance and confidential meant that whatever Alex told him would stay with him, and would not be reported back to his superiors. Alex was both surprised and unsurprised—the Counselor-attended bars had been gaining in popularity when he had graduated. He just hadn't known they'd gotten that popular. He certainly hadn't expected to find one out here, at a refit station. People tended to pour out their problems when they'd been drinking; someone back on old Terra had figured out that it might be a good idea to give them someone to talk to who might be able to tender some reasonable advice. Now, so he'd heard, there were more Counselors behind bars than there were in offices, and a large number of bartenders were going back to school to get Counselor's licenses.
Suddenly the need to unburden himself to someone was too much to withstand. "Ever been in love?" he asked, staring back down at the empty glass and shoving it back and forth a little between his index fingers.
The bartender took the glass away and replaced it with a cup of coffee. "Not personally, but I've seen a lot of people who are—or think they are."
"Ah." Alex transferred his gaze to the cup, which steamed very nicely. "I wouldn't advise it."
"Yeah. A lot of them say that. Personal troubles with your significant?" the bartender-cum-Counselor prompted. "Maybe it's something I can help out with."
Alex sighed. "Only that I'm in love with someone that—isn't exactly reachable." He scratched his head for a moment, trying to think of a way to phrase it without giving too much away. "Our—uh—professions are going to keep us apart, no matter what, and there's some physical problems, too."
The habit of caution was ingrained too deeply. Freelance Counselor or no, he couldn't bring himself to tell the whole truth to this man. Not when telling it could lose him access to Tia altogether, if the wrong people heard all this.
"Can't you change jobs?" the Counselor asked, reasonably. "Surely a job isn't worth putting yourself through misery. From everything I've ever seen or heard, it's better to have a low-paying job that makes you happy than a high-paying one that's driving you into bars."
Alex shook his head,