Page 98 of Feuds and Interludes
And he repeated my words to me. “Ask me when this is over.”
Not a resounding, “I love you, I want us to be together, I want to wake up beside you whenever humanly possible, I want to grow old with you.” Nope. Something was holding him back, and until I knew, I was the one adrift.
“Wake up, Boone.”
I stretched in my first-class cubby on our flight back to the U.S. from Tokyo feeling like a defrosted and reheated twice airplane meal. Didn’t look quite right, didn’t taste right at all.
“Sir, we’re making our final descent into PDX. Please put your seat up and stow your belongings.”
The flight attendants had been wonderful, thank goodness. We’d been delayed two fucking days getting out of Japan because of weather and I felt like shit. My voice was gone, my blood sugar had been high the whole time we’d been stuck in the airport, and I’d broken my phone in the process. Bran and Annie had done their best to take care of me despite my shitty attitude.
We were likely going to miss the gala, and I felt like the worst grandson on the planet.
We deplaned and thankfully, there was a driver waiting for us.
“Your associates are collecting your bags,” he said.
“Associates?”
“Greetings!” Rowan and Martin came trotting up. “We’re going to get your belongings for you. Do you have your tags? We’ll bring them in the van. You guys get out of here. You should make it in time for the gala if you leave now.”
The driver hauled ass out of the airport and onto I-84 toward Bolder Breed.
“This sucks. I feel like I’ve been living in a dumpster for a week,” Bran said.
“Or shaken up in a Honey Bucket shitter,” Annie offered.
“God, you’re gonna make me puke.” I felt better being off the plane, but yeah. I was so gross. “I’d almost rather miss it than have anyone within a fifty-yard perimeter of me.”
“Better make it a hundred,” Annie said. “You reek.”
“Thanks. You smell pretty sour yourself.”
The driver piped up. “I’m supposed to let you know that there are clothes in your rooms in the lodge and you should have time to clean up. Ms. Collins says not to worry, they’ll wait for you to begin the performance.”
“Shit. I can’t even sing, we didn’t get a chance to practice. Fucking weather.”
“It’ll befiiine,” Annie said.
“Will you text Gran and tell her I don’t have a phone?”
“Already done. She and Shane have been texting me the whole flight. Thank goodness the plane had good Wi-Fi.”
The ride was bumpy and loud. I was just about to fall asleep when the car stopped abruptly.
“Go, go, go!”
Annie and Bran dragged me up the stairs to our rooms and we all split off to shower and change. I was in a daze, like that spacy feeling you get when you’re woken up from a deep sleep, and I tripped over my pants trying to get out of them. I pulled myself up by the bedpost and got a look at what was laid out for me.
Gran had brought my blue velvet suit and my sparkly gold Converse shoes.
The outfit I’d worn to the induction ceremony.
It felt like a good omen.
That night had been the start to me getting my life together, and tonight I was going to at least lookputtogether.
There was also a white box next to the suit with no markings on it. I opened it up and there was a beautifully craftedboutonniere made with dark flowers, nearly black. Not exactly Gran’s taste…
