T is for Tavern (short fiction) The thing about riding the same twenty miles every Saturday is that you know your route. You know it and you memorize what you see along the way. The faulty sprinkler that kicks off in your far neighbors yard which rockets water when it starts up. The elder beagle tied to an HOA sign who, while no longer pulls, howls as you ride past. The empty corner lot where the hardware store went under in 2020. The chain-link fence standing around it, weeds growing through the concrete. But wait, that isn’t right. Its not an empty lot and the fence has a hole in it. So that’s new. I got off my bike, and did my usual routine of locking my ride up to the fence. Leaving my helmet on the handlebars, and ducked through the hole. Walking toward the new building, I looked for signs of what this structure could be. Its timber, I think, actual timber, darkened with age with grain raised like veins. Its roof peaks sharper than the flat tar covering everything else on the…
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