There was no way I’d have time to work more than a few hours a week if I did this, or really spend more than the weekend with West. My weeks would be hell. My finger hovered over the little delete X under one class, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I’d stayed up until midnight last night to make sure I got the classes I wanted, and they all seemed interesting. I was tempted to take another class or two that were no-brainers, but again, time was an issue.
When would I get to be with West if I did that?
My phone buzzed again, and I picked it up.
want to hang out dude
This was new. David had gotten friendlier with me over the last few weeks at work, ever since he saw me out at the lake with West. I wanted to have some actual friends, but now I was worried that the only reason he wanted to hang was maybe because he knew… well, that I like the D. But I didn’t want his. If I asked what he was doing texting me when he only wanted to hang out, though, that would make me the D—actually more of a dickhead, not him, and fuck I hated people sometimes.
This was precisely why I didn’t hang out. I leaned my head back against the couch cushion and stared at the water-stained ceiling. The roof had been fixed not long after the damage, but nothing else had because it was only something ugly we could all live with. We were all too busy to worry about a splotchy ceiling, especially Carter and West. Sighing, I closed my eyes and crossed my arms over my chest.
My phone buzzed again, longer and more annoying, and I groaned. It was Mom calling, I knew it without checking. She’d been phoning daily, at least twice, since she walked in on West about to fuck me. I hadn’t talked to her since the day she flounced out, screaming about morals, but I knew she wouldn’t get this relationship, no matter how I explained it to her. I wasn’t even really sure why being West’s boy made me happy, so there was no way I could get my feelings across to her. Who knew why she thought she had a say in anything to do with me, considering I’m over eighteen, and it was an epic fucking fight just to get her and my dad to give me the information to fill out the student loan stuff. My father seriously didn’t want anything to do with me. Mom’s optimism was a giant fucking mystery.
And poor West. My heart clenched. I’d been reliving finding him on the fucking ground outside ever since it happened. It was a lot to unpack, seeing that strong man who was my Daddy literally knocked over by the world. Sometimes I forgot he needed help too, and I’d been trying to make that right ever since. I didn’t irritate him if I could manage not to, at least not in ways that didn’t lead to him punishing me with a happy glint in his eye, and I tried to be a good boy and do everything exactly the way I knew he wanted it done the first time.
But this class thing rankled like no other orders Daddy had given me. I knew I could handle the workload; I just couldn’t handle classes and a job and a relationship and friends. The job, I needed, and I needed West, but Daddy insisted I needed the friends too, and they just didn’t fit into this equation.
My phone stopped buzzing and I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
Although, David was my shift manager, so he checked off two boxes—work and friends. Maybe if I just kept him as a friend, I could double dip. I picked up my phone, ignored Mom’s missed call, and texted David back.
Sure. What do you have in mind?
the Salty Sailor on the east side. pierce street. they don’t Card. We can get away with it
I covered my face with a hand. See? This is what having friends does. Causes trouble. I peeked through my fingers at my class schedule and sighed. Okay, I could do this. I wouldn’t add any more classes, but I wanted all the ones I had scheduled. It was more than West thought was good, but less than I wanted, so that had to be the happy spot, right? We were moving toward me being more my own man in some ways, and more his boy in others, but I was pretty sure school, and my professional future, were something he wanted me to decide.
I powered down my laptop and glared at my phone. It was about three o’clock on a Wednesday. I could go with David, have one drink to kill this terrible fucking summer doldrum that was hanging over my head, and be back here before West was home to cook dinner. I wouldn’t tell him where I went, but I’d say I did a thing with one of my friends, and he’d smile that smile that crinkled half a dimple on his right cheek, and I’d drop my shorts, and maybe he’d fuck me over the kitchen table again like he did last Thursday night.
Perfect plan, if I do say so myself.
Grinning, I let David know I was game, scheduled an Uber, and went for a shower. Less than a half hour later, I was dressed in soft cloth shorts that clung and came halfway down my thighs—they’d drive West crazy later—and a Pokémon muscle shirt, with sweat already beading on my skin.
When I got out of the Uber, I groaned and laughed. The Salty Sailor was in a rundown red building that seemed like it might have been a church at one time. I pulled open the heavy front door and strolled into a bar that made me feel deeply out of place the second I entered.
The décor was 1980s, right down to the black-and-white tiles on the bottom of the walls, and the mishmash of lightning-bolt colors painted on the top. Michael Jackson and Prince had a bizarre shrine of memorabilia in the corner off to my right, interspersed with wooden replicas of pirate ships. The full-sized jukebox near that was thumping out bass and R&B. Every person lined up at the bar was black, and I felt as though I stuck out like a sore thumb.
Not only had I chosen the less-than-straight short shorts, I also wasn’t… well…. I felt bad for thinking about the fact that I was white and the other people here weren’t, which made me self-conscious and sent my stomach squirming unhappily while I tried to figure out if I was racist, or just suffering from in-group/out-group bias like I’d read about in a psych book—but then, wouldn’t that still make me racist?
The bartender, a tall woman with a perfectly round ’fro, dressed in shorts and a white tank top, damned close to what I was wearing, glanced my way, and broke me out of my vicious, introspective cycle when she yelled, “All we serve here is Bud Light and shots of Hennessy, honey. What can I set you up with?”
My stomach roiled at the thought of either one, but I smiled, and forced myself to walk toward the bar. It helped that no one seemed surprised to see me there, or cared at all that I looked young. Gradually I relaxed and reached a seat at the end of the bar near the door. She sashayed toward me as I slipped onto the wobbly stool.
“Two shots, please.”
“Maggie, you’re looking like a billion dollars and then some,” David said, and surprised me into turning around. He was handsome, as usual, and had dressed to be seen out, in a spotless T-shirt made of some shiny, touchable fabric and rolled jeans. He plopped onto the stool next to me and beamed at the bartender, which got him a throaty laugh in return. She leaned her elbows on the counter and fixed me with an assessing look while her red lips twitched toward a smile.
“You’re terrible. You didn’t tell him? You should have seen the look on this boy’s face. He was scared to death when he walked in here.” She slowly shook her head at me, and my face burned like it was going to melt off my body.
There were snickers along the bar, and my cheeks scorched toward nuclear meltdown as I hunched in my seat.