"Wait, what are IPAs?" Ted asked.

The sun was setting over the pine trees on the mountain in the horizon. Ted and his uncle were sitting on the roof of his house. They both had a brown bottle in their hand and were slowly drinking them as they talked. The cold breeze of Fall washed over the two of them and brought with it the smell of the pine trees mixed with the faint ash of a nearby campfire.

"Beer crammed full of hops." His uncle explained.

"And that's...bad?" Ted hazarded a guess.

His uncle nodded. "In a way. I'd say so."

Ted's uncle turned to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Look, at the end, beer is beer. It's not as much about the flavor as it is about the fellowship." He explained. "It's the act of drinking alcohol with other people."

"But?" Ted asked.

"But," his uncle nodded. "IPAs made sense when wooden ships carried them months across oceans. Hops help extend a beer's shelf life you see. But, the more you cram in, the more it obscures the flavor from the grain and whatever else you put in."

His uncle let out a sigh as he pulled his hand off of Ted's shoulder. He stared into the distance towards the sunset as he took a sip of the unlabeled beer in his hand.

"It's a balancing act. You want the flavors to lift each other up, and an IPA is more like they're all fighting. Like it's a war of who can overwhelm the tastebuds quicker. Plus, it's just so...bitter." his uncle continued.

Ted shrugged. "But aren't there different flavors with different hops? Like different strains and soil they're grown in?"

His uncle raised an eyebrow and looked over at Ted. Then he cracked a smile as he said, "Well, look at you kiddo. Smart and good looking. I bet you have to fend off the ladies with a stick!"

Ted rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "I uh...nope. Haven't really had much luck with girls," Ted said as his current loneliness threatened to come crashing down on him.

But, a light jab into his shoulder shook him out if his downward spiral before it could really start. His uncle chuckled. "Give it time, and keep your eyes open. It can be hard to miss the signs you know."

"Right..." Ted added nervously. "But uh, hops flavored in IPAs?"

"Huh? What are you..." Then realization flashed in Ted's uncle's eyes. "Right! The hops."

He cleared his throat. "Anyway, yeah hops can have subtle flavors in them. Same with how different yeast strains can add subtle flavors. But those are more supporting players to the bitterness at the core of the hop. And when you cram so many hops in, even a lot of those cam get drowned it." He explained.

His uncle waved his hands around towards the sky. He was so energetic, even a little beer splashed out of his bottle and landed next to them on the roof.

"They did it all those years ago for a function we don't use it for now. We have better ways to preserve it, and those ways don't drown out quieter flavors or punch a guy in the jaw with one loud note of bitterness when he takes a sip!" He scoffed.

"You're pretty passionate about this, huh?" Ted asked.

His uncle nodded as he took a big swig of his beer. "Aaah. Now that's a refreshing beer. A good mix of flavor all dancing around in harmony."

Ted took a drink. All he could really taste was the bitterness of it. He shuddered a bit.

His uncle caught his reaction and smiled. "You know, you don't have to drink it if you don't like it, right?"

Ted shook his head and then to prove his point, he tilted his head up and chugged half of the beer. It tasted awful, but he forced it down. Then he turned towards his uncle and smiled weakly. "It's good." He squeaked out.

Ted's uncle slapped his knee and started to laugh.

Ted was embarrassed, but he couldn't say he didn't like the beer. After all, he was old enough to drink it, but it wasn't just that. His uncle seemed to love all kinds of alcohol, even beer. If he liked it, then there had to be a goodreason, right?

Besides, it wasn't about the beer. It was about the act of drinking with his uncle. It made him feel that much closer to him, and Ted could endure drinking something he didn't like for that.

It was a bitter pill he was more than happy to swallow for what he got out of it.

Ted smiled at his uncle, and as his uncle wiped a tear from his eye, it seemed he was finally done laughing. He smiled back at Ted, and then patted him on the back.

"You're a good kid, you know that?" His uncle said softly. "Humoring an old man like me out in his booze cabin."

"Pfft," Ted scoffed. "You're not that old. Besides, I really enjoy coming here. You're fun to hang out with."

His uncle smiled even bigger. "Well, you certainly know how to butter an old brewer up. I'd figure life out here is too boring for someone used to the speed of the city."

"It's actually kinda nice," Ted admitted. "A lot of stuff keeps changing around me, but you're always kinda just there."

"Even as a kid," Ted continued, "it sorta felt like you were always here doing this same stuff, and there was always a place for me if things got too crazy."

His uncle nodded a little more seriously. His eyes looked up at the fading light of the sunset. "Life's hard, you know? Your parents never had it easy, but I figured it was the least I could do. You mean a lot to me Nephew."

His uncle's face seemed to lose all its seriousness as he smiled and shook his head. "Besides, even as a kid, it was fun when you'd come visit for a week or two. You brought all this energy with you, even if you didn't know what to do with it! Why, remember the time you nearly burnt down the house?"

Ted let out a scoff mixed with a chuckle as he shook his head. "Come on, don't bring that up now."

"Oh now, come on. Memories are all we old folks have left!" His uncle teased. "Now, why did you knock down that pot of grease onto the stove again? Oh yeah, because you..."

"Thought you were hiding my Christmas present up there," Ted interrupted.

His uncle let out another hearty laugh, as he continued to tease Ted about the story. That first one turned into two, four, and soon a dozen different stories about child Ted's adventures around the place.

Ted protested the entire time, but deep inside they were some of his most cherished memories. Even if most of them were as cringe filled as a story could be.

Soon the two of them were laughing and teasing each other about the various events in the stories through half the night.