Page 34 of Keep Your Guard Up
“Do I bother asking?” I interrupted.
“No—” Sunny started.
“Yes,” JJ finished.
I looked to Sunny—a scowl scrunching up her pretty face—trying to plant innocence over the top of my burning curiosity. She rolled her eyes.
“She’s just mad because I got some that night and she didn’t,” JJ tried.
“Yeah, you got some! When you weresupposedto be driving me home!” she shrieked. “We stopped for fuel for five minutes, JJ. Five minutes! I went in to pay for the fuel inyourcar—I come out, and you guys are getting it on! In the car!”
“You didn’t.” I couldn’t hold in the laugh that burst out.
“Sure did, Chancey boy. I saw an opportunity, and I took it.” He shrugged.
“We were thirty minutes out of town. You couldn’t have waitedthirtyminutes?!” Sunny yelled. “Ihad to wait outside for nearly an hour!”
“An hour? That’s a long while for you, J,” I said. I could practically see the steam coming out of Sunny’s ears as she glared at me.
“She was a nice girl. I was just trying to look after her,” he replied.
“Ugh!” Mari threw her arms up and stomped out.
“You seriously do that?” I asked.
“Hah, yeah. Not one of my prouder moments, but I bought her breakfast the next day.” He waved it off.
“Mari? Or the chick?”
“Mari, of course. One of the three women I’d ever buy food for willingly.”
“Who’re the other two?”
“Marilyn and your sister,” he teased, smiling like a Cheshire cat.
“Jackass.”
Chapter 17
Mari
“G’day, Mari!” Rocco shot me a beaming smile from behind the bar where he was simultaneously pouring someone’s beer and making what looked to be a gin and tonic.
“Rocco!” I squealed, stepping up on one of the nearby bar stools and hopping over the old, sticky wood.
He put the drinks down in front of two patrons before waving them off when they tried to pay. I recognised them instantly as Gina and Bobby, parents of little Jacko—a short, stocky kid who trained in one of our junior classes a few days a week.
Rocco was good like that—generous but fair and fiercely loyal. The old man had owned Rock-It’s for over half my life. He’d been behind the bar for even longer. He had never been theowner or manager who sat out in the back room, tapping away on his computer. In fact, he’d hired Nan for a while to do that for him.
Rocco was a Soggla original, someone who loved the town as much as the people in it. Despite missing two front teeth from one of the countless games of footy he’d played, he was always pouring drinks with a smile and a good laugh.
Though his hair was now wispy and grey, he used to have the town’s most renowned dark, long, curly mullet. It was iconic to the pub that was known as the Soggla Hotel.
Though half of the sign’s lights had rarely worked, I could still remember the place clear as day. Dad would take me in with him every Friday after a hard night’s training. We’d sit with Rocco at the bar, who would pretty much abandon his other patrons to have a beer with Dad and me with a fire engine. Even before my mother passed, that tradition had always belonged to just the two of us.
I had been about nine when Rocco took over the old pub and turned it into Rock-It’s. The grand opening party was one of the last things we did together as a family before Mum’s accident. The pub was in shambles when he bought it,literally. Holes in the walls, pool tables missing half the turf, tables surviving on only three legs. He threw everything he had into Rock-It’s, and all his hard work and dedication had paid off.
The now-old man pulled me into a warm hug, just as he always did. Same as he had the day JJ and I admitted my father into an assisted living facility. He’d been here for everything, right behind this counter.
