Page 8 of Tenderfoot

Up to?

Gah!

“We’re not up to anything,” I retorted. “We have a new mission.”

“And that’s what I’m askin’ about.”

“And me not answering should be your indication I’m not gonna answer.”

“Then it’s good I shut that shit down before you got your ass in a sling.”

Oh boy.

Did he know about Kev and Trev?

I tested the waters. “Do you know about Kev and Trev?”

“Kev and Trev?”

He didn’t know.

This time, I didn’t reply.

“Was that Kev or Trev?” he fished.

“I think, at this point, I’d like to talk about you dragging me out of the restaurant, taking my ear thingy, then picking me up and dumping me in your truck.”

“You were walking away from me, and I wasn’t done talking to you,” he explained, like doing what he did was the most natural thing in the world.

I was already staring at him, but when he said this, I stared harder.

When I could find my voice, I asked, “Did it matter that I was done talking to you?”

He glanced at me. I could see by the city lights his gaze dropped to where I was sitting next to him. He then looked back to the road.

I guessed that was his answer, and it actually was, since it obviously didn’t matter where I was in our conversation at the restaurant since I was where I was right then.

I didn’t know what to do at this juncture. I was in his truck. I didn’t know where he lived. What I did know was that we were headed in the direction of where I lived.

With my choices being yelling at him, attempting to find calm and explaining the myriads of reasons what he did was not okay, giving in and sharing what the Angels were up to, and going silent and fuming, I picked fuming.

Therefore, I turned to stare straight ahead and commenced fuming.

Flounces came naturally to me, and fuming did the same.

When I was with my girls, time taught me I could share my mind. I could be me just as I was. They made it safe. They loved me. I loved them. They were the sisters I never had.

Elsewhere in my life (Hi, Mom!), none of this was the same.

Elsewhere in my life, I did not speak my mind.

When I got angry, I flounced. I fumed. I didn’t share because it wouldn’t matter. What I thought, what I felt, had no meaning. And the only way to nurse emotion was to do it inwardly, experiencing the totality of it myself.

Therefore, our trek down Camelback then 7th was entirely silent.

Javi’s truck was so big, he wisely didn’t attempt to park in one of the allotted visitor spots in the complex’s narrow, hard-to-maneuver parking lot. He parked on the street right near the entrance.

He hadn’t even switched off the truck when I was out.

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