Page 10 of Moonshine Kiss
Cassidy
Itexted Bowie as soon as I got home. Dad and June and I struck a deal. We girls would walk home, and Dad would pretend we had nothing to do with the mess at the bonfire. We all preferred to tiptoe around Mom and her hour-long family “discussions” on responsibility and adulthood. I don’t think Dad wanted to sit through another one any more than Juney and me.
It wasn’t like she wouldn’t find out through the grapevine, of course. But by then it would be so blown out of proportion Bootleg style—did y’all see Bowie break that boy’s leg with a spinning roundhouse kick?—that it would be easy to write off as idle gossip.
I got no response to my text. So I called. It went straight to voicemail. Bowiealwaystook my calls.
I washed the makeup off my face in the bathroom that I shared with my sister and glared at the bruise blooming on my jaw. This was all that stupid summertimer’s fault. He was lucky the Bodines didn’t do any serious damage.
My mind started spiraling out of control.Did Bowie really fight for me? Did it actually finally mean something? Did I mean something to him?
My brain clicked into spin cycle as the possibilities danced through my mind one after the other.
He’s in love with me.
He thought Scarlett was in danger.
He thought I was in danger.
He hated Blaine’s stupid shirt.
He has feelings for me.
Wandering into my bedroom, I flopped down on my bed and texted Scarlett, hoping for some insider information.
Me: Is Bowie okay?
She responded immediately, thank the Lord.
Scarlett: He’s shitfaced. Passed out on Gibs’s couch. If he thinks this means I’m sleeping on the floor, he is sorely mistaken.
I sat down on the edge of my bed. Bowie never, ever drank to excess. Jonah Bodine, their dad, was a no-good drunk. So Gibson didn’t drink and Bowie moderated. Who knows what Jameson did. He was the quiet type. Scarlett was blessed with the metabolism of a linebacker and could outdrink almost anybody in the county and their brother and still show up to work the next day. But Bowie drunk? What in the hell had gone down?
Scarlett: How’s your face? You took quite the wallop.
I headed back into the bathroom and snapped a picture of my black and blue glory.
Me: Is it noticeable?
Scarlett: Holy shit. That guy’s lucky Bowie didn’t smash his head in for pulling a stunt like that.
Me (after a good long deliberation): Why did Bowie jump in like that? There wasn’t any mortal danger.
Scarlett: Someone’s on a fishin expedition.
She even texted Southern.
Scarlett: He slapped the crap out of the idiot because the idiot had his hands on you. Now hurry up and get married already!
Scarlett’s opinion carried weight. After all, she’d known Bowie her entire life. But why in the hell would he suddenly go and develop feelings the second I decided I wasn’t ready to take the man for a test drive? Or was my mental tally correct and he’d had them all along for me?
I needed answers. I just wasn’t sure I could survive them.
Flopping back on my bed, I pulled a cheery yellow pillow over my face. If I didn’t suffocate by morning, I’d go and have myself a little chat with Mr. Bowie Bodine.
* * *
Against my college student nature,I woke early. It had been a restless night of tossing, turning, and practicing exactly what it was I was going to say to Bowie. My phone was still annoyingly free of text messages, so I was going into this blind.
