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As I walk out of the bar, the Tennessee air is cool against my face, signaling Autumn is on its way. It feels good since my high blood pressure is making my skin feel like it’s on fire.
My blood is pumping so hard that I can hear it in my ears. I tried to stay calm. I really did. But seeing Jessie just made me lose my shit. It’s not only the fact that he looks like our deadbeat father, but it’s that he acts like him too. All charm until he gets what he wants.
And the fact that my mother keeps making excuses for him infuriates me.
As I walk around the block, I try to calm myself down. I feel awful that Andi had to see me act like that. Since she doesn’t know the whole story, she probably thinks I was just an asshole. I want to go apologize, but Momma’s right…I need to get my anger in check before I walk back in there.
As I’m walking up the alley by the back of the bar, I realize reigning in my anger might be easier said than done. Jessie is standing out back, smoking a cigarette.
He groans and rolls his eyes when he sees me. “You came here to bitch at me some more?”
“Well, I was out for a walk, but now that you mention it, you shouldn’t be smoking. It’s bad for you,” I say with all the condescension I can muster.
He gives an annoyed laugh. “Oh, there are a lot of things I could be doing that are worse than this cigarette.”
“Trust me, I know.” I scowl at him.
“When are you going to knock it off with all the holier-than-thou bullshit?”
“Maybe when you stop needing to hear it!” I counter.
“If you could get your head out of your ass long enough, you’d see that I’m working really hard to get my shit together. I’m doing better. Much better. But you won’t even shut up long enough to hear any of it.”
I interrupt. “Because you sound just like Dad. Don’t you see that?”
He shakes his head. “I’m not him!”
“Oh yeah? Could have fooled me. You keep breaking Momma’s heart just like him.”
“Don’t you dare bring her into this,” he growls.
Knowing how to push all of my brother’s buttons, I say, “Why? Because you know you’re disappointing her just like he did? Don’t you think she’s ashamed when she talks about you like she was when she talked about him? Don’t you think she wonders where she went wrong with you?”
In one swift motion, he tosses his cigarette aside and is tackling me to the ground.
He lands a right hook to my jaw, and I can feel my lip starting to bleed. I manage to roll him off me and get in a couple of swings of my own, ensuring he’ll have a black eye tomorrow.
Fighting with him takes me back to when we were kids…us three boys always wrestling. But this time, it’s much more serious than us stealing each other’s toys.
We roll all over the disgusting alley until the bar owner comes out and yanks us off one another. He must be pretty used to it because all he says is, “Hey, knock it off!”
Al has known us since we were kids, so I’m not surprised he lets us off so easily.
Without uttering a word to each other, Jessie and I walk in the backdoor of the bar and back to our table.
My momma’s eyes widen when she sees us, and then, her expression turns cold as ice.
She stands up and crosses her arms over her chest. “What happened?”
We both open our mouths, but she says, “You know what? I don’t care. I’m done.”
With that, she picks up her purse and storms out.
Jared sighs and stands up. He tosses some money on the table to cover the drinks we had. “Now, I have to go clean up the mess you two idiots made,” he huffs. “Goodnight, Andi.”
Fuck. Andi.
When I look down at her, her caramel-colored eyes are wide as saucers. “Your lip is bleeding,” she says in barely more than a whisper.
