I deliberately bought my condo in a building just across the street from The Taverne, so it takes me only a few minutes to get out of office clothes and into casual attire and head for my meeting with Jason. I push through the swinging doors at the inner entrance and walk back towards The Confessional, which is unoccupied. I greet Lou the bartender, and his father Konstantinos – Lou is the fourth generation to work here. I say hello to the regulars present, and step into The Confessional.

Of course, it’s not really a Confessional – everybody just calls it that. It is a booth set diagonally into the furthest back corner of the room, raised up about two steps off the main floor, with a bench that can seat two comfortably, and wings on either side so that they can neither see nor hear anyone else, nor can anyone else hear them. In the Mob days, some pretty high-level people discussed who would kill or be killed at this table – at least, those are the local legends. The parish Priest at the church down the street has also been known to meet with certain people at that table, hence the name. And, of course, “What is said in The Taverne…”

The waitress brings me my first drink – they know what I like – and I’m about halfway through it when Jason shows up. He comes straight back to me with his quick, loping stride, and his megawatt smile. Jason is a piece of work – just over 30, from some God-forsaken small town in deepest Mississippi. He is a structural engineer by trade, who came north to get a combined Master’s in Urban Planning and Design and in Public Administration at our nationally-renowned school. Tall, lean, and well-built like the triathelete that he is, with straight dark hair and big dark eyes and that honeydrippin’ southrun accent that nobody can resist. And of course, those very courtly old-style southrun gennamun manners and that megawatt smile that just makes you feel glad to be alive, and to be with him, and to have made him smile…

He sits on the bench next to me in The Confessional and I buy him his first drink. He is unusually bouncy tonight, especially for a Monday, but I think I know why. After the first greetings and first clink of the glasses, he leans over and says “Frank, I’m in LOVE!” I look at him over the rim of my glass and say, “Yes, I know, in fact, I probably should remind you that you are officially engaged to be married to Lisa back in Jackson next spring – or did you put it off for another year?”

Jason colors a bit – which makes him even more handsome, if that’s possible – and he says “Well, I know that, but I mean in LOVE!”

To which I respond “You probably mean in Lust, or maybe in Heat, or both – and is the lucky person anyone I know?” Of course, I know full well who it is, since I introduced them here in The Taverne just last Friday night - and therein lies The Tale…