‘That man has a lot of face on him.’

Shannon said pointing her half empty bottle of Hennessy towards the entrance of the bar we were seated in.

We were both bored and broke on the last week of our vacation and spent every single happy hour at The Glens , one of the cheapest bars two blocks from our apartment. The only place for ten blocks where we could get beers for two dollars at happy hour.

‘Who?’ I turned with effort towards the entrance to see who this person was, mostly to understand what ‘alot of face’ meant.

Shannon had a way of describing people that was hers alone, for example when we were in school she used to call me the ‘owl chick’ because when I get confused or embarrassed I bob my head like an owl . I honestly don’t know if I do , but she says so.

However Shannon doesn’t name everyone , unless she particularly finds them intriguing.

‘Him’ she pointed again with her bottle, ‘blue polo.’

There were four guys walking in, all about the same height , and definitely friends from the way they interacted with each other.

Then I saw ‘the a lot of face guy’ and choked almost immediately, in an effort to keep myself from laughing. He did have a lot of face.

His lips were thick and wide , his cheeks seemed to never have lost the baby flesh of his childhood, his nose crowded the center of his face, his eyelids were puffy and his forehead meaty. He looked a little like a caricature of Denzel Washington.

‘Dont laugh!’ Shannon scolded me , her eyes never leaving the group . They circled over to a pool table and started a game. One of the guys came to the bar and ordered beers.

‘Yeah alot of face’ I told her chuckling .

Shannon smiled and then said ,‘let’s go play pool.’

My eyes widened , ‘we can’t shoot pool for alms ! ‘

‘A lot of face will teach us.’ She winked.

I could not understand what intrigued her about this guy in particular . I could never understand it.

One day Shannon brought home a python she decided would be a pet. It had a birthmark in its underbelly which looked like an infinity symbol , she called the snake ‘Labyrinth’ because of the mark.

I hated Labyrinth mostly because we had to share our two roomed flat with it.

Labyrinth died three weeks later, fortunately for me.

Shannon was sad for a few weeks but then she brought home a boyfriend , she called him Curly Toes because the second toes next to his big toes were oddly protruding and sort of curved … slightly. She found that cute .

Like I said she named things.

We played pool and yes , James , the ‘a lot of face’ fellow did ‘teach’ us . Before the evening was done, he had taken her number. Two months later, he was sleeping over on weekends. Six months later they were engaged and married.

I moved out , got a job with a software company and soon after moved out of town all together but Shannon and I kept in touch. The babies came , they grew up . I visited on holidays and we recounted good old times over several bottles of Hennessy.

Then twenty five years later , I got the phone call. ‘He is dead. My alot of face man is dead.’ Shannon’s voice trembled into the phone.

I wasn’t much for settling, my career offered me remote opportunities so I traveled from place to place. This time I moved to Algiers with a Spaniard I met a couple of months back in Morocco. ‘Iam coming home!’ It was that simple .

I booked a flight after that call and told my lover, ‘there is death in the family.’

I needed to go .

He took me to the airport the next day and even as I held him, alot of my emotion was the grief I felt for Shannon.

I got to Virginia at noon the next day, took an Uber to Shannon’s and found her waiting at the front porch.

We held each other like we had not been in touch for years. We had spoken only six months before. Everything was fine then… until the news of James’s death.

When she told me what happened later that evening , I wept with her over our favorite beers.

Hennessy.

It was an unfortunate accident. Errant driver skidded into him on that icy 66 highway. His Ford focus overturned off the road – he was dead on spot.

The days to the burial were busy. I spent each waking moment on the phone with the insurance company , the funeral homes, the caretakers, the decorators, the food people and her children.

I wanted Shannon to rest.

She was afterall my best friend and the only family I had for over forty years.

Her two children , Mark and Melissa returned home for the funeral , insisting their mother needed to move out and have better care in an assisted living home where she would be surrounded with people.

I shook my head , ‘ I will take care of your mom. Just like always.’

A week after the burial , I convinced Shannon to get away . To shake off the doldrums. We took a cruise to the Caribbean , just us two and once again the light in her eyes returned .

She started to name people on the cruise ship and I cackled . Remembering older times when we people-watched in cafes or bars . Naming people and things.

I figured maybe it would be a good time to ask that question I had always wanted to ask her since the funeral .

‘Why James? Why did you choose him? I know he was kind and gentle and funny – but …’ I shrugged.

Shannon grinned, a far away look touched her eyes and there again I saw that look she had when we sat at the Glens, two broke bored girls two decades or so ago; she shook her head and the memories seemed to scatter and infuse the air with a good long ago scent . ‘Oh but you knew… because he had a lot of face on him.’