Page 10 of Brett and Rowdy
“Ash, come on.” He didn’t want to play games, but he wasn’t going to speak the man’s name. The son of a bitch still worked here, in this building.
Rowdy had only spoken to him once—the last day he was ever at this school, in fact. There had been a hard, swift, certain discussion. And once things were said and done, he left town.
And a certain motherfucker had to go get reconstructive surgery on his teeth.
“No, there’s no reason for that to happen.”
“That’s good.”
Ashley took his arm again and squeezed a little bit. “I’m glad you’re here with me.”
“I am too. I want them all to see how fucking fine you are.”
Ashley had been his best friend for over half his life, and everybody who had tormented her? He wanted them all to see how she’d gone above and beyond, just like he’d believed she would.
“Why, Rowdy Duran? Is that you?”
No, he was a doppelganger alien from the moon. “Yes, ma’am.”
He had absolutely no idea who the drawl belonged to, but he also didn’t care.
“Good evening, Deidre. How’s it going?” Ashley’s voice was cold as ice.
Ah, Deidre Bixby. She and Ashley had been rivals, apparently their entire lives, from kindergarten on. The daughter of the town doctor and the daughter of the dude who cleaned up the gas station weren’t destined for friendship. No one could prove that Dr. Bixby had told Deidre about Ash getting pregnant, but nobody else had known. Just the pregnancy test and her.
Up until everybody knew.
“It’s going very well. I’m surprised to see that Dan’s not here.”
“I don’t see why. He’s in Tokyo, doing business. Rowdy came in for Madison’s graduation from Clemson, and so we thought it would be great to come together.”
“There’s no one I’d rather come with. Now, if you’ll excuse us.” He kept his face as straight as he could. “Barney’s acting like he smells something that’s gone bad, I think. He needs some air.”
She was still gasping as they walked away, and Ashley led them somewhere quieter, where the music was easier and the smell of food was less, and she could finally chuckle. “Jesus Christ, that was glorious.”
“Thank you, I appreciate you.”
“I appreciate you.” He felt her relax. “Let’s see who’s here that you’d remember. There’s Holden Pierce. He’s got a yarn store in town.”
“Did you sell him the property?”
“What? Maybe I shop there.”
“In a store with yarn?” She was what? Tying mice up and torturing the cat? “Well, when you retire, you can learn to knit. It’ll be great. You can make me scarves.” He nudged her arm.
“Shut up. You want a scarf, I’ll fucking buy you a scarf.”
“Language,” he singsonged.
“Bah.” She sighed. “This is boring. We should have waited to come until there was dancing.”
“Oh yeah, Barney cuts a mean rug.” He snorted. “We wanted food.”
“They have like, eight kinds of vegan and vegetarian food, Rowdy.”
“So, uh, has the meat and three gone out of style in these parts? All the Waffle Houses close down?”
“Nope.” Her lips popped on the P sound. “But hey, who am I to say what they’re teaching at the career center these days. The sign says the kids there made the food.”
