Page 99 of Feuds and Interludes
I had no time to ponder. I took a shower, washed my hair three times to get all the funk out of it, and scrubbed my skin raw. I banged on the wall, knowing Annie was on the other side, since I didn’t have my phone. A minute later she was banging on my door.
“What is it?”
She was dressed in a slip dress in a gorgeous blue to match my suit. Bran came trotting over too. “Come on, man. We gotta get out there.”
They both had their hair braided in Australia before we left, and they were able to pull their braids back to look decent.
“Can you guys French braid my hair, please? It will take me forever to blow dry it.”
They both went to work on either side of my head and then Annie joined the two braids together at the base of my neck.
“Damn this shit is long. It goes almost to your ass.”
“I haven’t had it cut in forever.” It had thickened, too, since I’d gotten better with my food and medicines.
The three of us crowded around the bathroom mirror, applying makeup, and then they rushed me through getting dressed.
“Uh,” I said, moving the pile of clothes around on the bed. “No one brought me underwear.”
“Fuck it. Go commando, come on, we gotta go.”
Fuck it was right. There were also no socks, so I was going to have to go barefoot in my Converse, which I hated. Hopefully I wouldn’t have to be dressed like this for long. I wanted to crawl into bed so bad, but the show must go on.
“Let’s do this,” I croaked, and my besties patted my back as we made our way out to the covered amphitheater.
The grounds were packed. There were loads of people wandering around the path that led to where the studio and rehearsal rooms were, looking at all the displayed items available for silent auction. There were servers carrying drink trays and hors d’oeuvres, and I was tempted to snag a whole tray.
“You should drink some water,” Bran said. He grabbed a server and asked them where there was bottled water. He pointed toward the bar, where I found Bruce.
“Hey, you made it.”
He pulled me into a hug, which felt nice, but weird. We didn’t hug. Hadn’t. Was that about to change?”
“Barely. Is Gran okay?”
“Boone, darling.”
I turned to find Gran coming toward me in a gorgeous royal blue sparkly gown…and a cane. With a boot on her foot.
“Gran! What happened?”
She grinned at Bruce, who winked at her.
“It happened weeks ago, I’m almost out of this dreadful shoe.”
Bruce took her other hand and led her to me for a hug. “We went snowboarding after Christmas in Lake Tahoe. We had a fantastic time.”
“Well, it was fantastic until I twisted my foot getting off the ski lift and managed to fracture it. I never even made it onto the slopes.” Gran laughed.
“What the h-e-double hockey sticks were you doing snowboarding?”
Gran put her hand on my arm. “We’ve got a bucket list of things we want to do together. As soon as I’m out of this boot, we’re going to try hydrofoiling.”
“Hydrowhat?”
“Yes! Shane bought boards and we’re going to take them to Hawaii.”
“Hawaii?” My head had already been spinning, but now I was in full-blown shock. “Where is Shane?”
