I grab the flask from Ren, who yells, “Hey, now!” and in exchange, I unpack a thermos full of Granny Murray’s hangover tonic.
“Drink all of that,” I tell Zayne.
“You servin’ bacon on this flight with these virgin Bloody Marys?” Ren’s mouth screws up.
“Bacon,” Jovi mumbles from his seat.
I pull his blanket up around his neck as Braxton’s mom storms to me and huffs, “Braxton can’t have bacon. It makes his tummy runny.”
“I’ll make sure to update that dietary restriction in his file.”
“No need. I brought all of his food.” She pushes through me, her enormous bag banging Jovi in the head.
“Braxton needs a window seat,” she tells the Finn, who just looks at her.
“He can’t speak English…”
“Awindow.Seat.” She raises her voice, slowing the words down as if that’s going to help. “You need to move.” Mrs. Beavers mimes with her hands.
The Finn seems to get it and grabs his book and heads to the back of the plane to sit with Fletcher. Mrs. Beavers shoves her son in the window seat then settles down next to him.
“Um… parents don’t really travel with the team…”
Braxton’s mother is irate. “You will not separate me from my son. He is a child. He has never slept apart from me. I have to supervise him. There is a felon on this team.”
Ren blows her a kiss. “We also have a war criminal, so…”
Fletcher’s lip curls back. I sit down in my seat.
My mom sits next to me and opens a container. “Oatmeal?”
“Trina, the charter company serves food on the flight,” Harlowe calls.
“Oh! I brought a breakfast casserole, though.” She unzips another bag. Suddenly, all the guys are wide-awake, sniffing the air.
It does smell good. My mom makes a mean breakfast casserole.
“Butts in seats,” I order the guys, “or you’re not getting any.”
“And I made cinnamon rolls.”
“Not before a—you know what? Fuck it.” I open up Ren’s flask. He toasts me. “What’s a few cinnamon rolls and a couple shots of liquor among losers, eh?”
16
FLETCHER
Jovi is trying to use Google Translate to talk to the Finn, who is stoically ignoring him and reading his book on North American wildlife.
“Google, how do you say ‘We’re going to get slaughtered’ in Swedish?” He frowns at the phone. “Google, how do you say—”
I snatch the phone from Jovi. “Stop it.”
“You think there’s any more breakfast casserole?”
“That’s not in the diet plan.”
“Does it really matter at this point? Google, how do you say—”
