Page 61 of Cognac Secrets

“Anyway,”True said, getting away from herself as the focus of attention. “This guy wasn’t old, but he wasn’t young, either. He had long hair, wasn’t fat, wasn’t thin, but wasn’t like built either… he wasn’t ugly, but he wasn’t attractive either – he was just so…normalbut when we started talking…” She made this noise like she’d had the best sex of her life, and for True, a really good intelligent conversation where she reallyconnectedwith someone almostwaslike good sex. It didn’t happen very often. She was definitely on some kind of neuro-divergent spectrum, but with no real official diagnosis.

Still, though – shedefinitelyhad more than just a touch of the ‘tism – she just didn’t process the world in the same way a neuro-typical person did. She had feelings, but they were much harder to touch than the average person’s… but if you did somehow, a feather-light touch wasfucking insane. Like, when her feelings were hurt, it was like pouring saltwater into an open burn wound or something. Likewise, when she was happy or touched in a positive light – she was positively euphoric and on cloud nine.

Sometimes I wish I could be as numb as she seemed to be on a daily, sometimes I wished I could feel as deeply and wonderfully as she did… and honestly, if ever there was any kind of understanding about that, I think I felt it best or closest when I was with Bennie. The way he held me, the way he looked at me as he moved inside of me.

I almost had to shake myself awake out of my reverie and tune back in to the conversation.

“I don’t know, it was like he got me like nobody else could and it was so strange because I feel likenobody gets me… and when he talked the cadence and timing of itfeltold. You know?”

Louie and I exchanged a look and both of us tittered a nervous laugh.

“Ugh, God, it’s such a pain in the ass trying to explain these things,” she said and put a hand over her face.

“I’m trying to follow,” Louie said kindly.

“Me too,” I encouraged.

“It was weird,” she said. “I feel like I had the deepest and most understanding conversation of my life and at the same time? I feel like it was all some sort of weird fever dream but Iknowit happened.”

We sat in silence, each of us processing in our own way what True was trying to convey and I heaved a sigh. The kind of sigh you hefted when you were rolling up your sleeves to get into it and do the hard work. Sometimes it was like that with relating to True and to understand what she was telling me but you know what? It was almostalwaysworth putting in the work.

True shot me a grateful look.

She knew what that sigh meant. Bitch should. We’d been friends long enough.

“What’re we doing?” Louie asked, looking from me to True to me and back to True. We both looked at him and burst out laughing and it felt good. He smiled and laughed nervously with us, but he definitely looked at us like he wanted to be in the know, too.

Well, if he was willing to put in the work… neither one of us would ever get in anyone’s way. After all, could you imagine how much nicer the world could and would be if everyone stopped rushing for just a damn minute, stopped, and squared their shoulders and really tried torelateto one another?

More bridges, fewer chasms… that’s what the world needed.

“Sometimes it’s hard for me to get my point across,” True started, and with an apologetic tone.

“I ain’t got nothing but time,” Louie said, leaning back in his chair and making himself comfortable.

True smiled at him, and I felt a secret smile of my own flit across my lips, but I got it under control quick.

I wanted my best friend to make friends with the bikers… I thought it could be good.

CHAPTERSEVENTEEN

Bennie…

Louie: Dude! Just a heads up. I ran into your girlfriend and her bestie in The Quarter and I’ve been hanging out with them and I can’t believe you haven’t met True yet. She’s so nice, pretty, and cool!

Eesh.

I didn’t know how to tell him. Like, should I tell him? I didn’t know the rules on that.

I was just about to text out, ‘uh, Louie, you might wanna slow down’ when another text from him came through.

Louie: …and yeah, I know she wasn’t born female or was assigned male at birth or whatever. She’s just a cool person.

I let out a breath and laughed a little nervously and ran a hand through my hair.

I didn’t expect that out of Louie – and I kind of felt like a low-key asshole for it. He was a genuinely good dude, but he was also real fuckin’ weird about sex and sexuality because of the way he was abused and shit when he was a kid.

His mom had passed him off to be raped by dudes in exchange for drug money. That’s when she wasn’t turning to him herself to get her own fuckin’ needs met when she was drugged out of her fuckin’ gourd. It really fucked him up in the head. He didn’t really do relationships and forget about sex. It was sad, really. Like I swear when one of the club sluts came around or came on too hard, the very thought of pussy gave him hives. But, at the same time, even the thought of dudes in that way made him fuckin’ dry heave.

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