“How much longer you gonna be gone,” Nash asked, chucking another duck into the yard.
“I don’t know,” he sighed, splashing his face with water. “Every time I’m up for reenlistment, I think, why the hell not. What else have I got to look forward to? But if I had a place like this, who knows, maybe I would say no next time.”
I breathed in deep. “You know, there’s a lot of things I miss about being in the military, but this place, our life we built here, and you fuckheads, it beats them all.”
Brewer slid his arm around Nash’s shoulders. “Yeah, it does.”
Pharo lifted his ginger ale. “Happy Fourth of July, Bitches.”
We all toasted him with our cans. “Happy Fourth of July.”
R.I.P. Josh
The Bittersweet Tale of Josh The Unicorn
McCormick sat in the corner, cross-legged, clutching a casserole container that smelled suspiciously like burned meat and something spicy. Hot sauce, maybe? He cleared his throat with the gravitas of a man about to confess to murder.
“So,” he intoned, like he was reading Josh the Unicorn’s last will and testament, “Josh met his untimely demise at the hands of a rogue ceiling fan and my own poor judgment.”
Everyone groaned. Rhett already looked like he regretted asking, which, honestly, was fair.
“I was trying to recreate that scene fromThe Little Mermaid,” McCormick explained, totally serious. “You know, where Ariel floats up all majestic with her hair doing that swoosh thing? I had Josh strapped to my back with duct tape and a Bluetooth speaker blasting ‘Part of Your World.’”
Brandt choked on his soda. “I’m not sure what’s worse,” he joked, “that he said it with absolute sincerity, or that Idoknow the one.”
“But then I stood on my bed for the dramatic lift-off, spun around for the big finish, and Josh’s horn—may he rest in peace—got caught in the fan.”
And there it was. The tragedy. The slow-motion moment where hopes and inflatable dreams collided with rotating household appliances.
Mandy just stared. “You duct-taped an inflatable unicorn to yourbackfor a Disney moment?” Like that was the part that didn’t track.
“Don’t act like you wouldn’t,” McCormick said, wounded. “I was filming content for my YouTube channel.”
Right. The content. The art.
Jax prompted him like a prosecutor cross-examining a flight risk. “And the fan?”
“Total carnage,” McCormick sighed. “Ripped Josh clean open.” He made the sign of the cross, though he wasn’t even Catholic.
Tex whispered, “This is why I missed you people.”
Pharo saluted the ceiling solemnly. “RIP, Josh. A gay icon.”
“I just have one question,” Rhett asked. “What were you wearing?”
McCormick turned roughly the color of his beard. “Well. Remember, I was filming content, and?—”
West shot his hand up like he was trying to block a visual. “Stop. I’ll give the unicorn a full burial with floral arrangements if you don’t finish that sentence.”
McCormick tilted his head, listening to the unholy cackle coming from Stiles. “Deal,” he said finally. “But Josh would’ve wanted a celebration of life. Preferably one with glitter and a questionable playlist.”
“And hot dogs?” Jax asked.
“But of course. Josh would’ve wanted joy,” McCormick said, voice wobbling for dramatic effect. “He would’ve wanted glitter, and laughter, and maybe—just maybe—an interpretive dance.”He rifled through his backpack and pulled out a rainbow sash and a sparkly tutu. “Does this look like mourning attire or party wear?”
Tex leaned over, chin propped on his hand, eyes dancing. “Yes. And if you don’t bury him in that, I’m borrowing it.”
West muttered something about dignity and brain cells and the slow degradation of civilization, but he didn’tstopMcCormick from draping the sash over Brandt’s head and declaring him “Queen of Grief.”
