18. Jimmy, The Repairman
18
JIMMY, THE REPAIRMAN
Hayden
“Raynor!” My ears perked up from the cell. It was more spacious than the sin bin, didn’t smell any better though, “You’re out on bail.”
Jimmy was waiting in the entrance for me and we gave each other a big smile. I don’t know what I did to deserve that guy. We’d been friends since high school, abysmal hockey player, but a great teammate, and about the only person I really trust in this world. He’s also my agent. I’d insisted he represented me since the start, despite his lack of experience. He was the only person I knew with a business degree that I knew would always have my back.
“You’re coming with me,” I’d told him when I really started getting noticed in hockey circles, and he’d thrown himself into it. Now he was one of the best in the business.
“Thank God you’re here Jimmy. Cara call you?”
“Nope, caught you on the news, Hay. Figured you might need me, so I made a few calls and here we are.”
Jimmy held up his phone to show me the clip doing the rounds. There was me being held down and handcuffed, while a bloody-nosed man screamed blue murder in the background. Underneath was a revolving newsreel that read “Hellraising In Merryville.”
Ugh. This was not a good look.
“We’ll get the PR team on it, but for now, let’s get you home.”
“Maybe a cold one on the way? It’s been a day.”
“Tommys?”
“Gotta be.”
If Jimmy was a good agent, he was a better friend. I was his enforcer of a different kind at high school. Some of the other kids had taken exception to him, seeing as his family was from the nicer end of town. I put a few of them straight and we were inseparable after that.
As we rode in his car across the city, I hit dial on Sarah’s phone and waited until it rang out. What a jerk I was. She was well within her rights to hate me.
We rolled into Tommys and slid ourselves into a booth.
“Hay, should I be worried?”
“Nah, Jimmy, just got some things going on. Cara’s back in town, Maiden’s had some problems at school.”
I checked my phone again and Jimmy gave me a look that said, c’mon, we’re friends, what are you not telling me?
“What I mean Hay is I am worried. Who you waiting on a call from, anyway?”
I sighed heavily.
“Wait. Hayden. I know that look. It’s the look of someone irrational, whose feelings are all mixed up good and proper. You met someone?”
“Nope. I just let someone down that I really didn’t want to.”
Jimmy shot me a grin that I rolled my eyes at .
“It’s not that, Jimmy. It’s just Maiden’s teacher. She helped him out, and I was kind of… I was a massive jerk, is all.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Why are you looking at me like that?” I scowled back at Jimmy’s odd smile. Jimmy knew me too well sometimes and, hell, I didn’t know what I felt. Just that this isn’t how I’d wanted things to go.
“So, you gonna do something about that?” Jimmy said.
I thought for a moment… “Actually, yeah. Jimmy, you want to run an errand with me?”
“Sure Hay, where we going?”