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“I know that feeling,” he said, and he did. He fucking did. He hadn’t lived with Pierre, hadn’t been through what I had been through. But he knew.
Tears pricked the backs of my eyes, but I felt lighter than I had when I woke up this morning. I wondered if this had been Axel’s intention, to lift some of the burden off of me. If it was, I had no idea what to say.
We were quiet for a long minute, the neighborhood slowly waking up around us.
“Okay,” he said finally. “Your turn again.”
I took a breath. “Tell me your favorite story from being a Road King.”
“One favorite? Not possible. I have dozens.”
“Pick one.”
Axel’s eyes met mine, and he smiled. And he started talking.
SEVEN
Axel
“Aren’t you going to ask me what I think of her?”
I looked up from my laptop. Grant was sitting opposite me, his feet up on a chair. Since he was co-owner of The Corner, he was allowed to put his feet up on the furniture. And since we were here after closing, there was no one else in the shop to see it except me.
“What you think of who?” I asked. It was the beginning of December, and Grant and I were doing an after-hours meeting to go over our plans for the business over the holidays—decorations, the final menu of specialty drinks, the planned opening hours.
Business was good, which made me happy—even though this time of year made me remember the time the Road Kings’ secondhand bus had broken down in Wisconsin the day before Christmas, and we’d had to rent a white panel van to get to our Christmas Eve gig. The panel van had no heat, a broken window, and a cracked windshield. It was so cramped that Stone had to ride lying flat on top of the amps, unable to sit up. He lay on his back with his hands on his chest, like Dracula, for four hours.
We’d looked like serial killers, getting out of that van. It had been cold as balls, but to our surprise, a hundred people had showed up and we’d played our asses off. The venue had practically had to tackle us off the stage. When we got back in the creepy van, Neal suggested we should change the band’s name to Stranger Danger. It was a joke that still made me laugh.
Yeah, there were a lot of days I really missed playing rock ’n roll.
“Brit,” Grant said, answering my question. “You’ve been hanging out with her for months now, and she comes here all the time, but you’ve never asked me what I think of her.”
“I don’t care what you think of her,” I said. “She’s my friend whether you like it or not. Besides, you love her.”
“I adore her,” Grant confirmed, smiling at me. He wasn’t the least interested in the nitty gritty of the Christmas plans. “She’s awesome.”
“Glad we agree,” I said. I pointed to my laptop screen. “Can we get back to business? It’s getting late.”
“You’re not dating her?” Grant asked. “Still? No dating, banging, or otherwise fooling around?”
“You know we aren’t,” I replied. “We’re friends.”
Grant gave me an assessing look. He was married, and like a lot of married people, he had plenty of unsolicited opinions about his single friend’s love life.
Brit and I were not dating, banging, or otherwise fooling around. I was good at being friends with women. I liked the company of women, their different worldview, their sense of humor.
Of the women I knew, though, Brit was my favorite. I couldn’t tell anyone that, but I could admit it to myself. Since I’d decided months ago that she needed a friend more than she needed some convenient dick, I’d never doubted the decision. Brit and I had an easy vibe, and we had a lot of fun. We hung out frequently, talked or texted almost every day. Her humor was scathing, her take on things sometimes twisted. She was prickly and funny and smart. She was also determined to hide away in her great-aunt’s house, apparently forever.
I was working on her, though. So far, I’d convinced her to enjoy walks around the neighborhood and running errands with me. I’d also convinced her to hang out at The Corner, where she could relax, be herself, and gossip with Grant.
We had started a weekly Scrabble night at Ellen’s. In theory, the three of us played—Brit, Ellen, and me. In practice, Ellen always bowed out early and either napped on the sofa or went to bed while Brit and I faced off over our little wooden letter-holders. Before she went upstairs, the older woman always leveled me with an amused glare and said, “Don’t get fresh with my niece, handsome.”
Once Ellen went upstairs, Brit and I played Scrabble like a couple of virgins from the fifties—no alcohol, drugs, or sex allowed. I never got fresh with Ellen’s niece.
It was driving me crazy, and more than once I’d felt the urge to text one of my hookups. Some no-holds-barred, break-the-bed sex was just what the doctor ordered. Somehow, though, I still hadn’t done it. I didn’t know why. At this point, I was almost as hard up for sex as I was for a fucking Vicodin.
Too soon? Too bad. I’m allowed to make addiction jokes.
