“You need to import some workers,” I tell him. “If you’re ever going to buy your own place, that is. Don’t you have some friends in Fork Lick you can recruit? Get them to come up for a weekend and do a few jobs.”
Kit snorts. “You’ve met Alex. If I could tear him away from his farm and Molly for the weekend, do you think I could get him to strip down and clean?”
“Touché.” Kit’s college roommate is a big, burly farmer who makes up for Kit’s blabbermouth with his stoic silence. “With that beard he’d do a great mountain man theme.”
We shoot ideas for a mountain man package that’ll never happen as we finish up lunch and leave. Kit and I are both scruffy, so we float the idea of growing thick beards and offering a limited-time special. I hate growing a beard—it’s itchy—but I’d do it for Kit.
It’s a Monday and the bar’s closed, so Kit takes me home, just a few blocks away. I could have walked, but I know what Kit wants.
The minute I open my front door he’s down on the floor with Princess, who whines and moans uncontrollably, her favorite hard rubber bone in her mouth and her lips pulled back and eyes squinty.
“Who’s the most beautiful Princess in the world?” Kit asks my golden retriever. I swear her answering whine sounds like “Meeeeeeeeeee!”
I toe my shoes off and rest my keys and wallet on the table by the door. My house is cozy, but it works for me and Princess. Two bedrooms, a shared bath, and a fenced-in yard that’s a smidge too small for a rambunctious golden, but we make it work. It’s one block off the main road and the smallest house in the neighborhood. The best part is that there’s a teenaged girl next door who loves to come play with Princess on nights that I have to work.
I grab myself a soda from the fridge and plop myself down on the couch in view of Princess with the only man she loves as much as she loves me.
Since Kit lives with his parents, he can’t get a dog yet. They have an orange tabby with one brain cell and a hatred of other animals. Honestly, you’d think a cat that was so dumb he regularly attacks his own tail so bad he cries out in pain would be ambivalent about other pets, but I guess that one brain cell is dumb and angry.
Maybe he’s angry about being dumb.
Kit finally comes up for air. “Princess, my darling, my love, my soulmate. You wanna come with me back to work?”
He says it with an upticked tone, the same one I would use to say we’re going for a walk, and her whole body rockets up. She drops the bone and spins in circles, pausing occasionally to look at me and then the leash hanging on the wall.
“Don’t be an asshole,” I tell Kit.
He laughs. “You know you’re going to take her for a walk next. I just love to see her all riled up.”
She’s only been alone for three hours, but yes, I will take her out for a walk next, so I get to my feet as Kit clips the leash on. We walk outside and Kit waits for Princess to pee. My dog squats and also lifts a leg like a weirdo, but does her business and then smothers Kit with kisses before he says goodbye and drives off.
I head down the street with Princess and let her sniff whatever she wants. She played in the backyard this morning and I’ll probably spend the afternoon back there with her again trying to wear her out. Since Mondays are my only day off from the bar, I enjoy my time with her as much as I can.
A motorcycle roars from somewhere nearby, going down Main Street, probably. I can’t see it but I hear it. It’s different from Rory’s, but it makes me think of her anyway.
Why does she come to town every other week? Where does she go after she leaves my bar and why do I never see her around?
Too many questions and too few answers.
Rory
* * *
“I’m moving,” Grandma says while we walk down the hall together. Well, she hobbles down the hall with her cane at a really fast clip, and I lengthen my stride to keep up. We’ve just left her apartment in the senior living community and are headed downstairs to have lunch.
“You’re not moving.”
“I hate it here.”
“You promised me six months. It’s only been two. You haven’t even given it a chance.”
“Bah. What’s there to give a chance? All the women here hate me. They think I’m trying to steal their boyfriends.”
“Well, are you?” Grandma may be eighty-three years old but I wouldn’t put it past her.
We arrive at the elevator and Grandma presses the button to call it.
“Hell no,” she says. “Their boyfriends are ancient. If I’m going to spend my time with a man he better be a hot young thing.”
