Page 36 of Never Sleigh Never
Asshole-ish
Logan
With the flip of a switch, Brie hates me again. Truthfully, I don’t know if she ever stopped, but for twelve hours, she hated me less. Is she mad I dodged the almost-kiss conversation? Probably. But the truth—I was drowning from missing my deceased wife and you were right there—didn’t exactly scream “healthy boundaries.” My original answer sounds less asshole-ish. Now, not only does she hate me again, but she’s actively trying to destroy my carnival. Fuck with me. Fine. Fuck with the carnival. Not going to happen. Prior to moving back, I had a lawyer friend scour the Mount Holly bylaws line by line, and because of sections forty-five to forty-seven, I made sure the carnival was just on the other side of the town’s boundary.
Now, it’s nine at night and SportsCenter is murmuring in the background while I pretend to read contracts. I’m a paragraph in when my phone rings, glancing at the screen Jason Clarkson, a former teammate, flashes across the top. I press the talk button. “Hey Clarkson, how are you doing?”
“I’m not so bad. How about yourself?”
“Good, good. Of course, you know, the holidays are always tough.” When I played in Chicago, he lost his girlfriend in a car accident. We’ve gotten close because of it.
“Yeah, they definitely are. So how is the change from big-city life to country boy treating you?”
If he only knew what the last few days have been like, he’d shit himself. “Well, actually not so bad. I kind of like it. It’s much slower paced.”
“I couldn’t do it. Too cold for me.”
“You played in Chicago with me for four years.”
“It still doesn’t change the fact that I hate the cold.”
“You played hockey.”
“Playing hockey in the cold differs from lounging around in a snowbank. You’re moving. Working up a sweat. I don’t want to be wearing ten layers of clothes just to stay warm. If I can walk around with my hockey gear on all the time, sure. Anyway, how’s the carnival life treating you? Did you find yourself some clowns? A magician? A Ferris wheel?”
I bark out a laugh. “Definitely no Ferris wheels.”
“Oh that’s right. You refused to come with us when we rode up to the top of the Willis Tower.”
“I value my life more than standing on top of a glass floor, one hundred and three stories in the air, with nothing but pavement below me. Hard pass.” Now it’s Jason’s turn to laugh. “Anyway, wrong kind of carnival. This is more Christmas themed with games, vendors, and an ice rink. I’ve been busting my ass to get it up and running, and I even found myself in a Christmas war with a girl named Brie McKenna. She’s in charge of the Christmas festival the town puts on.”
“Well, you’ve always thrived on competition.”
“Oddly, it’s been the best distraction.”
“Perhaps a war in the streets and then later you can get freaky between the sheets.”
A laugh escapes me. I won’t lie, the thought has crossed my mind. “No. Nothing like that. Just when I see her, everything else disappears. She makes me feel.”
“I understand that.”
“Let me guess, once you get those feelings out, you move on to the next.”
“I did the settling down thing once. See how well that worked out for me? I’m trying a different approach now. It’s something you should try,” he suggests.
“I’ve never been the type of person to jump from bed to bed.”
“Jumping beds is pretty fun.”
“Plus, I don’t want Josie to see me with a different woman every week.”
“Yeah. That’s true. Alright, well, I just wanted to call and see how things are going. It sounds like you’ve got your hands full.”
“It’ll keep me busy for sure.”
“Talk to ya.”
“Later.”
