“Do you need a hand?”
“No, they’re not as heavy as the last one.”
I waited until he was out of sight before my fingers brushed the plastic device hugging my ear. It was just a little thing, but it was huge. To me, it was everything. How could something so little scare the shit out of me so badly? Maybe because unlike West, whose life changed on a dime, he was given his worst-case scenario all at once. He’d lost his leg, and he had a traumatic brain injury with a specific set of side effects. He knew what to expect on his bad days. But that wasn’t the case with me.
I thought I had gotten off relatively Scott-free—shrapnel scarring over most of my body and partial hearing loss. I could live with that. But every month I lose a little more of my hearing, which to me equals a little more of my freedom. In the military, I relied on my senses fully, even took for granted that I was healthy and strong, and now, I don’t know what my worst-case scenario will be. It keeps changing, keeps worsening.
That’s what scares the fuck out of me.
I can’t just accept it and move on because my loss is fluid. Every time I adjust, I have to readjust. It just doesn’t stop. It never fucking stops.
I heard the front door open and shut, thanks to my hearing aid, and made my way inside to find McCormick and Stiles.
“Who said they wanted my meat?” Stiles boomed.
“Fucking no one, ever,” West snickered.
“You’re wrong, Wardell, dead wrong. Plenty of people have said they want my meat.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right, McCormick probably said it last night,” West teased.
“Hilarious, fucking hilarious,” McCormick replied, ignoring Stiles’s laughter.
I relieved him of his bag of meat, giving him a one-armed hug. “Happy Fourth, man.”
“Same to you, Aguilar.”
I heard the door open and shut again, and I glanced up to see Riggs and Jax come in. “Pharo here yet?” Jax asked.
“Why, are your panties wet for him?” Stiles teased.
Jax smacked him in the chest. “Why don’t you reach your hand down there and feel for yourself?”
Shaking my head, I ditched all the bitchin’ Bitches and went out back, intending to light the grill, but as I passed the Jacuzzi, I did a double take. “What in the holy yellow rubber fuck?” I stuck in my head back inside the sliding glass door and yelled out, “All right, who fucking filled the Jacuzzi with rubber ducks?” I heard a booming laugh and snapped my head round. Mandy and Nash, those fuckers. They were adding a bag full of rubber flamingos to the duck pond.
Brewer and Tex chose to come through the front door, instead of joining their counterparts in a sneak attack around the back of the house, and they poked their heads through the sliding glass door. “Need a hand?” Brewer asked me.
“I need you to come get your fuckhead boyfriend. He’s trashing my Jacuzzi.” Brewer laughed and shook his head. “Where’s Valor?” I asked, noticing the lack of a kitten slung around his or Nash's chests.
“Spending the day with Violet Gutierrez. Nash said it’s too much chaos for him.”
“You should have invited her," I insisted, thinking about how the widow was probably home alone.
“I tried," Nash insisted. “She said boys will be boys, whatever that means.”
“It means she wanted you to enjoy yourself with your friends and not have to play host to her.” Brewer explained. “We’ll pack her up a plate and bring it to her when we pick up Valor later.”
“Good idea. I’ll make sureTweedledeeandTweedledumbdon’t eat all the meat.”
Speaking of McCormick, he poked his head out the door. He’d chosen his patriotic prosthetic today, spray painted with an American flag. He wore it to group right after he got it, and had all his brothers sign it with a silverSharpie.
“Hey, I brought dessert.”
Wow, sometimes he actually had good ideas. “Perfect. I think you’re the only one who did.”
“Hey Tex,” McCormick called, “where’s Nacho and Miles?”
The little Texan was dressed in extremely short cut-off denim shorts, and through the many ripped holes in them, I could tell he was wearing bright, red bikini underwear beneath. He paired it with an American flag crop-top and cowboy boots.
