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“Oh, yeah,” Xavi said, his voice all groggy and sexy. “We have some meeting with some person at some time next week.”
“So detailed.” I sat on the paper to keep it from blowing away.
“Look, someone called, that showed up in the mail, and I forgot about it until it literally smacked you in the face. Something to do with community service or something.”
“At the shop?”
“I don’t know, Nate. I dropped the ball a bit. What time are we leaving for the track?”
I didn’t overly wanna go to the track, but what else was there to do on a weekend around here that didn’t require crimes, shady shit, or moonshine? I was way too hungover for day drinking, so I’d have to go at it sober and try to have fun. I looked inside, seeing our worn couch and the TV with a shit ton of cords hanging off it, contemplating a couch day. It’d been a long time since I had one of those, but I didn’t want to do it without Xavi.
“I’ll shower and then we can go.”
Xavi stared at the water, a resolve coming over him. “We aren’t losers. You aren’t a joke, Nate.”
“Feels like it sometimes. You heard her last night.”
Xavi turned to face me. “Stop. Stop believing that shit. Who cares if we aren’t the same as everyone else, right? They’re mostly all miserable in their shitty jobs and mediocre marriages. At least we’re happy, you know?”
“You’re one to talk,” I scoffed. “You were fine with everything, and now you seem stuck on some clock you need to keep up with.” Which scared me because I was worried our clocks worked in different time zones or something.
Xavi groaned, leaning his head back. “It’s this age, I think. All of our friends are married and have kids and shit.”
“Yeah, but half of them had kids in high school.”
“Don’t you feel like we should be figuring our shit out? Like, we aren’t even close to married and steady.” He looked at the sky.
“So?”
He sighed again. “I know. It just feels like there’s all this outside pressure for the first time. People are asking me when I’m gonna settle down, and until they started, I thought I was settled. With you. Now it feels like people are judging us for it. As soon as you turn thirty, you’re suddenly expected to have your shit together. My shit ain’t together, Nate.”
He had a safe home, some financial security if the moon cycle was right, a brother who was happy and healthy, and parents who mostly took care of themselves. He had more of his shit together than most people around here, but no one measured progress like that at this age. They put it on the pressure to live that conventional couple’s life with some kids and a home. The only way you got out of those expectations was to be a drunk, an addict, or imprisoned.
“I don’t even want to get married,” I told him. “Ever. Not interested.”
“No?” He tilted his head to look at me, seeing the truth in my eyes. “Not at all?”
I shook my head.
“If I did, it’d be for tax benefits.” He laughed. “Even though I don’t understand tax benefits. Why don’t we learn that shit at school? Anyway, sometimes it feels like I have to follow that path, you know?”
“I know you need to find a different way to end a sentence.” I smirked at him. “Fuck what society wants.”
“Wanna do life with me, Nate?”
My ribs cinched. “You carry around nicotine gum for me even though I’ve been trying to quit for four years. Pretty sure that’s us already doing life.”
“Yeah, but I sometimes encourage your smoking too, so I kind of suck at the job.” He smacked my thigh. “Shower. Let’s go.”
* * *
I leanedagainst the fence and watched Maddox and Devon battle it out for position on their tenth lap. As much as I loved watching them, motocross always made me feel like an epic failure. I didn’t have a skill like Devon had, and I’d always been a bit self-conscious of it.I had nothing to offer but protection, and I mostly failed at that, too. I failed real bad the night he showed up at the Kanes’ front door and found Maddox. Hadn’t even known my dad was around that night. It still haunted me.
Xavi was off somewhere throwing up, but I didn’t think I could move to go check on him. The hangover was settled in deep, making me as useless as I always felt. To make matters worse, Andrea stepped up beside me. Fuck, loved her, but I knew she was about to start asking hard questions.
“Hungover?” she asked.
“You have no idea.”
