Chapter 30
August
“Janie and Brendon are heading to The Fisherman’s Catch, and I’d really like for us to go with them,”
I declared the moment my mate stepped out of the locker room after the game.
“Hello to you, too,”
he replied as he wrapped an arm around me and brushed a sweet kiss over my lips.
“I said hello to you first thing this morning,”
I reminded him as he draped his arm over my shoulder for the walk outside. “Now I’d like an answer to my question.”
“We can absolutely join Brendon and Janie at The Fisherman’s Catch,”
he replied. “I just worked up one hell of an appetite. I think we should get some to take home with us, too. Something tells me I’m not going to want to do anything else tonight after I lie down.”
Walking that way should have made waddling harder, but the fact that he kept me tucked close and shortened his strides actually helped.
You didn’t overdo it, did you?
Nope. I feel amazing. Thank you for pushing me to do it. I was going to say encouraging but it took way more than that for you to get me here. I appreciate your persistence, my Persistent Prickly.
I waited to feel the usual rage that hit whenever anyone made a prickly comment in relation to my hedgehog exterior, the nickname Prickles having been ruined for me by an earlier crush, only Persistent Prickly didn’t prompt me to want to take a bite out of his jeans. I’d seen the damned drawings he’d made after that conversation and laughed until I’d had to hurry into the bathroom to pee when one of the whelplets danced on my bladder.
Shit, shit, please don’t bite my ass in front of Brendon, he’d never let me live it down.
Giggling, I turned to look at him when he held the door open for me. “Don’t I know it after the stories Janie told me.”
“Wait, what? Hey, you weren’t supposed to tell him I told you about the great penalty box caper!”
“I didn’t tell him that part!”
I replied, giggling more when Janie’s cheeks turned red when he realized he’d just outed himself.
“Oh hell, you had to tell him about that?”
Gregor said, as Brendon stood there looking sheepish while shaking his head at his mate.
“Seriously, Janie, you couldn’t wait a few weeks before sharing that one?”
“Oops?”
Janie replied, lifting a shoulder in a half-shrug.
“Yeah, right, sure, oops, I’m gonna oops you later.”
“Eep.”
When Brendon made a move to either grab or tickle him, Janie scurried around to the passenger’s side and jumped in.
“I’ll deal with you later,”
Brendon grumbled, pointing a finger at the glass.
“We’ll see you over there,”
Gregor said as he got comfortable and turned the air conditioner on full blast once he started the engine.
With Soundgarden on the radio, we drove to the boardwalk, which was crowded as hell, which meant parking was going to suck and I might have to do some waddling before I got to the yummy seafood.
“Hey, are you pulling out?”
Gregor asked, having rolled down the window to speak to someone in a leather jacket much like his.
“Yeah.”
“Give me a minute to pull around.”
“No problem.”
And just like that, my little walking dilemma was solved. We had a spot two doors down from The Fisherman’s Catch, a distance I had no problem waddling. Not when seafood was involved.
Who was that anyway, I found myself wondering, certain I’d met them at the bonfire baby reveal. Oh, shit, yeah, that was his cousin Baxter, I’d been introduced to him and several others with the same jackets, all family members of his that loved to ride their big motorcycles together.
I couldn’t wait for the chance to ride on the back of Gregor’s, once he got it assembled. From what I’d learned from being around his family, he shared his old man’s trait of starting restoration projects with zeal and the best of intentions, only to stall out when he couldn’t find the exact parts and pieces he desired. Alternatives weren’t an option, apparently, even if they worked just as good.
Getting to spend the afternoon chatting with Janie had filled a piece of me that had been empty and longing since Ever left. Gregor wasn’t into gossip and always looked extremely bored and slightly annoyed whenever I tried to share something I’d overheard at the shop. Clearly, he wasn’t interested, but Janie filled in the gaps between several tidbits I had, just little stirrings around town, nothing vicious or mean, while I provided him with breadcrumbs and snippets of conversation about the expo the town was planning, and the selection process to take part in it. Business had been booming for me since Movies in the Park kicked off and as business owners, we kept our ears open for anything that might help spread the word about what we had going on in our shops.
“You were awesome out there,”
I told him as he rounded the block to pull in behind his cousin.
“It felt good playing like that again,”
he admitted. “With all the gear and everything. Family games we just get out there with skates and sticks.”
“How do you keep score that way?”
“Oh, we’ve got nets we drag out onto the pond with us. Pops keeps them in the shed behind the house. Every now and then, when the netting gets brittle and frayed, he changes it out. It’s the same ones him and my uncles grew up playing with. Kind of a family tradition our kids will have the opportunity to be a part of, too.”
“No one’s ever fallen in or anything, have they?”
“Nope. Ice has to be thick for us to be out there.”
“H-how do you know when it’s thick enough?”
I asked, trusting him, but needing a bit of reassurance before I could lay to rest the protective instincts that had suddenly surged through me.
“Uncle Les uses a temperature and depth algorithm, Gramps and Pops do it the old-fashioned way and bore a small hole in it so they can measure the thickness.”
“I think I like their way better, takes the guesswork out of it,” I said.
“Exactly.”
“And the kids, when they learn, will they have all the padding on, like you did today?”
“When they play hockey, they will,”
he explained. “But when they’re learning to skate, they’ll just be bundled in layers, including thick snow suits, scarfs, gloves, hats and mittens to keep them warm and toasty when they’re falling down.”
“Ohh, dammit, I know they’re gonna fall, but I am going to hold my breath every time it happens.”
“We both will, but we’ll be out there on the ice with them.”
“I am not that good of a skater. Hockey was never my sport.”
“But you do skate.”
“Passably.”
“Perfect, then we will be out there with them, together.”
“So you can chuckle when I fall on my ass, too.”
“That’s only one possible outcome among many.”
“Sure.”
Parked, I waited for him to come around to my side and open the door. Getting in and out was still easy, but stepping up onto the high curbs the town had installed to help keep shops from flooding could be tricky at times. He held me steady and kept his arm around me as we headed inside to discover a short line, and a cold interior, which meant that the people in front of us and the ones in front of them asked for courtyard seating. I hoped that meant there were booths inside, because there was no way I wanted to sit out in the sun.
Even with the time that had passed inside the skating rink and the two games Gregor and Brendon had played, things hadn’t cooled off much outside, while in here was almost as good as being in the arena.
“Do you have a table or booth for four inside?”
Gregor asked when we reached the counter, “Our other party will be here in just a minute.”
“Let me just take a look,”
the hostess replied, checking her charts and then stepping away, presumably to check on the dining room herself.
“Hey, sorry it took us a minute,”
Brendon said, joining us while we waited for her to return. “Had to park behind the toy store and walk over.”
“At least one of the perks of owning the building is having a designated paring spot,”
Janie said.
“We’ve got a booth for you if you’ll just follow me,”
she said upon her return, and with a few menus in hand, led us to a cozy spot at the end of the wall near the bar, near the bathrooms, which was perfect with how frequently I had to go.
As if sensing where my thoughts had gone, Gregor slid in the booth first, leaving me the outside spot so I could get up whenever I needed to.
“Do I want to ask what other stories you told?”
Gregor said as he peered across the table at Janie before shifting his focus to Brendon.
“I’m more curious about what Dash wanted when he pulled you aside after the last game,”
Brendon said, the two locking stares in a way that got a bit intense before Gregor looked away.
“He just wanted me to pass a message to Olly for him,”
Gregor explained, shrugging before picking up his water dish.
But there’s more to it? I asked in his mind, instantly concerned.
Yeah.
Talk tonight?
Of course.
I let it drop so we could enjoy the time with our friends, but now that I’d dialed into it, I could feel the concern radiating from him and wondered if he’d intended to head straight over to the shop to see Olly after he’d taken me home.
Shit.
No, it’s okay.
Guess I thought that pretty loud.
Yeah, but it’s okay, seriously. It’s not critical, it’s just something he isn’t going to want to hear and I’m sort of worried about how he is going to take it. Being here will give me a chance to figure out how to break it to him.
“What’s your deal with Dash anyway? I saw you guys glaring at one another a couple times, even after a good play.”
“Ech, it’s too long of a story and I wouldn’t wanna sour dinner,”
Brendon said, but I noticed the way his eyes slid toward Janie and figured that he was the real reason Brendon didn’t want to talk about it.
“So, did you pick up a business major in college, or are you winging it like the rest of us?”
Gregor asked to shift the subject.
“Winging it,”
Brendon said. “We both are.”
“I majored in dance and was performing with a troupe in Portland until I wrecked my knee and tore my ACL. It healed well, but I don’t ever want to go through anything like that again,”
Janie explained. “Between the pain and the rehab, I’m good with where my life is at. If I wanna dance, Brendon and I just hit the club or go down to the beach and play music on our phones.”
“We do a hell of a kitchen mamba while we’re doing dishes, too,”
Brendon pointed out.
“And you haven’t accidentally sent him tumbling out a window yet?”
Gregor asked, raising an eyebrow at him as Brendon’s face began to pink up.
“Wait, what? Why would you even think that could happen?”
Janie asked.
Gregor cocked his head and studied a squirming Brendon across the table. “Ohh, so you only shared the stories of the shit the rest of us got up to those weekend tournaments, not the spectacular calamities you pulled off.”
“Calamities?”
Janie said, perking up and turning on the bench so he could stare at his mate. “I’ve never heard anything about any calamities, let alone ones that sent someone out the window, and who was this someone you were dancing with, since I know it wasn’t me?”
I giggled as I watched them. Janie so wasn’t pissed, or jealous, he couldn’t even keep a straight face as he teased his ever-reddening mate.
“It was, umm, Dash that fell out the window,”
Brendon said. “I was trying to teach him to dance so he could ask Alex Reid to the junior formal.”
“And you dropped him out a window?”
Janie squeaked.
Chuckling, Gregor decided to take pity on his friend and fill in the rest of the gaps in the story.
“More like he spun him a bit aggressively after Dash kissed him on the nose. It was in the middle of some technique where you pull your partner in, hold them close and make eye contact, and Brendon was being all serious about it while Dash was being the class clown,”
Gregor said. “It was all good, though. He landed in a hedge.”
We all chuckled and giggled at that, then gave the waitress our orders. My tummy would be happy when it reached the table because the smells in here had me salivating while my stomach growled itself hoarse waiting for me to send more food it’s way.
“He’s never going to grow out of that, is he?”
Janie said. “The clown thing?”
Was that a hint of wistfulness I saw as he reached for one of the bread rolls the waitress set on the table.
I could already smell the garlic and butter and reached for one, too. His smile looked tight when our hands bumped, and I could tell that anything to do with Dash seemed to be an issue for both of them. Maybe that was another reason he hadn’t heard this story, aside from, well, the hilarity of giving dance lessons to someone only to send them spinning out a window.
“Doubtful,”
Gregor said. “Best to just take him like he is or leave him alone.”
His words were met with silence and Brendon fiddling with the napkin wrapped around his cutlery.
“So what did you major in?”
I asked Brendon in the hopes of shifting the conversation again in case everything hockey related happened to also have Dash wrapped up in it.
“Geology, otherwise known as rocks for jocks,”
Brendon explained.
“Seriously?”
“Seriously, that’s how my adviser referred to it when I told him that was what I wanted to major in.”
“What do you even do with a geology degree besides, um, study rocks?”
Gregor asked.
“Teach,”
Brendon said. “Get a job for an oil or natural gas company, or even in a mine. Do government surveys, that sort of thing, none of which I was interested in. I just wanted to play hockey and maybe get a chance at the pros. Keeping my grades up was part of the program, so I did it and actually discovered that I loved rockhounding and collecting a rather impressive array of stones and fossils, but I never had any interest of doing anything with my degree beyond that.”
“How far did you make it?”
“Semis, I just never developed the level of aggressiveness the pros were looking for,”
Brendon explained. “I skate hard, but that’s not enough, not when guys are willing to risk taking someone out if it means stealing the puck.”
“Yeah, I feel you there, I’d rather enjoy that level from the stands and not be in the face-offs.”
“No shit.”
“So, this is gonna be a regular thing, right? Me seeing you down at the rink.”
“He’ll be there,”
I said. “Even after the little ones come, and when they are old enough, they’ll be there, too, cheering their papa on as you guys skate circles around the other team.”
“I dream about the same thing,”
Janie admitted. “But kids aren’t in the cards for us yet. Someday, maybe. Right now, we’ve put all our focus on the toy store and trying to figure out how to renovate the space upstairs. After all of us kids in and out of the place growing up, it needs some tender loving care.”
“I’ve got an uncle who tackles old spaces like that,”
Gregor said. “He’s the one who did the lighthouse conversion for me and is currently working on expanding the house addition I’d had added on to the lighthouse, as well as the gallery space in my shop.”
“Oh shit, he did the old fabric shop, too, didn’t he, and helped them turn it into the café?”
“Yup.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have his number on you, would you?”
Janie asked.
“I’ve got his card, actually,”
Gregor said before fishing one out of his wallet.
“Sweet,”
Janie declared, “thank you. I’ll give him a call in the morning.”
“He’ll be glad to hear from you.”
While I was enjoying the conversation, my stomach rumbled, and I reached for another roll, only to discover it in my mate’s hand, where one small, pleading look from me saw him lower it from his lips to my plate, where I quickly snatched it up.
Thank you.
I’m gonna have to learn to make those, too, aren’t I?
He winked at me when he said it and I leaned against his arm to finish eating the yummy thing.
Yup.