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It’s a pipe dream.
I’ll never be able to knock Brett and Truett down from their thrones. As long as Truett and his squeaky-clean, all-American family maintain that pure and holy reputation, Brett has all the power. If he didn’t hold Truett’s secrets in the palm of his hand, that entire club and its filthy VIP membership would crumble to pieces.
I’m deep in thought, my mind starting to buzz with some far-off notion, when a hard knock at the door yanks me from my concentration and Roscoe starts yipping his head off.
“It’s me,” Gladys calls from outside the front door. “I need your help fixing the TV again. I think someone taped overDays of Our Lives.”
With a chuckle, I stand up from the chair and open the front door. Gladys is standing on my welcome mat with a despondent look on her face. With long gray hair and a tie-dye T-shirt, Gladys is exactly what you’d expect a sixty-nine-year-old hippie to look like.
She’s as blunt and bold as she is kind and peaceful.
With a shake of my head, I smile while grabbing my keys from the table. “I told you. No one can tape over it. It saves digitally. There are no tapes.”
“Then where the hell is it?” she snaps.
Roscoe scurries down the stairs ahead of us as we make our way to the Laundromat. When we enter, I notice a few regulars in the front. People come in almost daily to either do laundry or just enjoy the free TV and AC. I’ve never seen Gladys turn away a single person in the ten years I’ve been here.
Roscoe greets the regulars as I send them a quick hello and take the remote from the counter. I don’t bother showing Gladys how to find her recorded episodes anymore. I’ve done it enough to know she’s never going to get it. But as long as she doesn’t learn, then it means she needs me. And I’ll admit—it’s nice to be needed.
“So, who was that guy you brought home last night? He’s not still up there, is he?”
My eyes nearly bug out of my face. “It was no one!” I answer far too excitedly.
“He didn’t look like no one. He looked like the kind of man who owns a car and treats his girlfriends nice.”
GladyshatesBrett. Hates him so much I’ve been too scared to even bring him around. I should be more excited to tell her he’s probably, maybe, definitely out of the picture. But I already know thetold you solecture I’m going to get from that.
So we just skim over it and head directly intowho’s the new guytalk.
“He got into a fight at the club, and I was just helping him out. Were you spying on me?”
“I spy on everyone who comes into my Laundromat at three in the morning. So, what’s his name?”
I roll my eyes as I lean on the counter. “Adam.”
“He sounds nice.”
A laugh bursts out of me. “Did you miss the part where I said he got into a fight at the club? He was literally bleeding.”
“Was he beating up Brett?”
“Gladys,” I reply, leveling her with my gaze. “No. He was not beating up Brett.”
“Too bad.”
At some point, I need to tell Gladys that I’m no longer working at the club, which means my income is sort of gone. I don’t, of course. Not yet, at least.
I’ll find something else by the time rent is due.
“The girls are excited about book club next Saturday,” she says as she taps her well-worn copy of the smutty romance of the month on the countertop.
“I can’t wait to hear what Mary thinks about the scene on the raft,” I reply with a giggle.
Gladys cracks up as she replies, “That was my favorite part!”
About six months ago, a few of Gladys’s friends and I started a romance book club.
But not just any romance books.
