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But he was missing a kidney now. And every dues day brought the whole mess back with a vengeance.
He shook all those memories away and nodded at Caleb. “Yeah, I got ‘em. I’ll pay up before church.”
Caleb nodded appreciatively.
“Tildy’s birthday party’s on the weekend,” Maverick threw in. “The old ladies are doing the presents, but we’re putting a collection together, too. Make sure you throw in at least a Ben for that.”
A hundred bucks for a one-year-old kid. For Dex’s kid, and Dex made more than twice the cut Jay did. But whatever. “Yeah, okay.”
“You good, lil bro?” Gunner asked, frowning.
“Yep. Great.” He turned again and headed to the locker room.
He wasn’t great and hadn’t been in a while. For the past year, it seemed like every day he was a little bit less great. By now, he was descending into ‘I suck’ territory, and he didn’t know how to climb back up.
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~oOo~
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Caleb finished hisreport on the club’s finances. To Jay, most of that was blah blah blah, but he’d paid enough attention to hear that everybody’s dues were paid up and to see Eight glance down the table and give him a condescending as fuck little nod, like he was still surprised that Jay hadn’t fucked that up again.
“Thanks, brother,” the president said. “Before we get to the reason I called this meeting, there anything anybody else wants to bring up?”
Jay thought about what Sam had told him a few days earlier. “I guess I might have something. I don’t know.”
All the men at the table turned his way and stared. He felt like a bug under a microscope, and his nerve failed.
“Oh look, our little Jakey’s growing up,” Gunner said with a smirk.
It was typical Gunner shit-giving, the kind of shit he applied with all the subtlety of a a firehose, but Jay’s confidence was raw these days, and it hurt. Gun had once been somebody who looked out for him.
“Fuck it,” he said, sagging back in his chair. “Never mind.”
“Don’t let Gun’s bullshit shut you down, Jay,” Maverick said. “It’s good you’re bringing something to the table. I think it’s your first time.”
For a second or two, Jay sat where he was, deep in his feelings. Then he decided fuck it and sat up straight again. “I don’t know if it’s anything or not. Just that Sam asked me a few days ago what I thought about him prospecting.”
As soon as the words were all the way out, but not a second before, Jay wondered if Sam had spoken to his own father, who was sitting a few chairs up from Jay. Probably Sam would not want his old man to get the news this way.
He glanced guiltily at Simon, but he didn’t look surprised. Most of the table had shifted their attention from Jay to Simon, too.
Gunner, Sam’s uncle, did look pretty shocked.
“You know about this, Si?” Eight asked.
“Yeah,” Gun added. “Sam wants in?”
Simon did a sideways nod. “We’ve been talking about it, yeah. It’s a little complicated. His mom likes having him working with her, but he’s starting to chafe at that work.” A small, ambivalent smile quirked up the corner of his mouth. “He’s been a farmer since he was old enough to go out and collect eggs in the morning, but I don’t think he gets the same rush out of it that Deb does. She doesn’t want to let him go, though, and he doesn’t want to let her down. So it’s complicated.”
“We need another prospect,” Dex said. “We’ve been runnin’ on one for years now, and it’s not enough. I can’t think of a hangaround I’d trust like I’d trust one of our kids.”
Several heads around the table nodded in agreement.
“How do you feel about it, Si?” Maverick asked.
Beside Jay, Duncan stiffened a little. The reason Jay’s patch was older than Dunc’s was Maverick, who’d thrown up every roadblock he could think of between his son and a patch—until he’d finally changed his mind.
