Page 71 of Whiskey Chase
“The potatoes,” Scarlett yelped.
I made it to the microwave first and opened the door. One of the idiot-proof baked potatoes had exploded, coating the inside of the microwave with potato particles.
“At least we can split this one,” Scarlett said, reaching in to grab the other potato. “Ouch! Hot!” She tossed it back and forth from hand to hand.
She smacked her elbow off of the counter, and the potato landed on the floor with a dull splat. “Well, shit!”
I grabbed it and brushed it off. “Five second rule, right?” The potato was probably going to be the only edible part of the meal, and I wasn’t going to throw it in the trash.
“Should we wash it off?” Scarlett wondered.
I shrugged. “Maybe if we just don’t eat the skin it will be fine,” I suggested.
She nodded. “I’ll get the chicken out, and you can carve it.”
“Great.” I had no idea how to carve a chicken.Would she be disappointed in that? Did all Bootleg men know how to carve birds? Hell, they probably went out and shot them first.
She pulled the roaster out of the oven and put it on the wood top of the island. “It doesn’t really look like the picture,” Scarlett said, chewing on her lower lip and studying the chicken’s coffee-brown skin.
It didn’t look like any roast chicken I’d ever seen.“I think it looks really good,” I lied.
“Do you need any special utensils?” she asked.
“A knife,” I said with authority. I’d never even seen my father carve the turkey at Thanksgiving. We always had it catered.
Scarlett handed me a steak knife, and after burning the hell out of my hand on hot chicken skin, I grabbed a wooden spoon from the pitcher on her counter. Sawing through the skin was like trying to cut my way through shoe leather with a butter knife. The meat under the leathery skin was bone dry. At least we could dump the asparagus soup on top of it. I did my best to saw my way through and scrape meat off of the charcoal skeleton. It hit the plate sounding like jerky.
“How about I just carve one side?” I suggested, wiping the sweat from my brow. “Then the rest of it will stay… fresh.”
“That’s a great idea. I can use the rest for soup… or something.”
Scarlett made up our plates—real ones, not the paper plates like I was used to with her—with half of the non-exploded potato, a soupy dollop of asparagus, and several chunks of chicken leather. “I thought we could eat on the porch,” she said nervously.
“I’d like that,” I told her, wanting to wipe the worry from her face. I took the plates from her and beckoned toward the door.
We sat at the tiny table, our plates touching. I was just wondering if I should eat the entire potato first to soak up the rest of the “food” on the plate when Scarlett took a deep breath.
“I have something I wanna say.”
I looked up from my plate grateful for the distraction.
“I think things are good. Between us, I mean,” she added. She looked at me like she was waiting for me to say something.
“I… think they’re good too?” I said suspiciously. Was she trying to break up with me? Give me food poisoning and then send me packing? Was this some kind of bizarre Bootleg Justice for not telling her that my almost ex-wife texted me with regrets?
Tentatively, I picked up a chunk of chicken and examined it on my fork.
“Well, I’ve been thinking that maybe we should… what I mean to say is… Oh, hell. I’ve never had this conversation before.”
“What conversation?” I was getting more anxious by the second.
“You can’t leave town without telling me, and you can’t get naked with anyone else,” she blurted out.
I blinked, at a loss.
“I like you,” she said to her plate, sounding like she was choking on the words.
I forgot what I was doing and accidentally put the chicken in my mouth. It tasted like petrified feet.
