Chapter 15
FIFTEEN
WESTON
The low din of chatter, beer bottles clinking several lanes away, along with the racket of bowling balls rolling and crashing against pins, sending them clattering to the maple and pine floors of the lanes, it makes for a good cover for conversation with my brother. Nosy ears won’t pick much up in this place. And make no mistake, residents of Smoky Heights can be nosy .
In fact, with the sounds of the records playing from the DJ booth in the corner—currently Lynyrd Skynyrd—the noise level at Pins + Needles actually makes it so we don’t even have to talk if we don’t want to.
I know that’s Wyatt’s preferred mode.
Me? I’ve got a few things to say after a certain short, pierced little goddess inspired me last night. Just gotta figure out how to get the words out.
I didn’t have it in me to watch Amelia drive away one more time, so I left her to get some rest before she hit the road and I went back to my rental place sometime late this morning. Thank God I was able to fall asleep after I got there. Lord knows I used up enough energy last night, I wouldn’t have any left for this talk tonight if I hadn’t slept the damn day away.
Beer for breakfast might not be the way of the champions, but it’s not such a far stretch for some of the locals around here, and tonight, I’m one of them.
“Bottoms up,” I tell my brother, clinking my brown bottle of brew against his.
Now that my nights are free again, no more engine rebuilds taking up my spare time, I’ve got time for things like brotherly bonding.
Apparently, that’s high on his list, because here we are on my first free evening.
My guess is it’s high on Rory’s list and he doesn’t want to be on her shit list.
Either way, this is our Saturday night now.
Probably better we have a little brotherly bonding before we schedule any family game nights with our mom and stepdad. It might break her heart to watch us go at it the way we normally do, given two minutes in the same room. But we’ve made progress this past month, and tonight might help too.
With a tight mouth Wyatt tips his bottle to his lips and I follow suit.
The alcohol gives me something else in my stomach to focus on, rather than the knot of the knowledge Amelia’s probably long gone by now. The unexpected tug of emotion in my gut at missing her, instead of the usual itch to move on by now. I need a distraction from the unfamiliar sensation. It’ll probably just take another few hours, maybe a night, to disappear and the same old itch to return.
Though, now that I think about it, I haven’t exactly noticed feeling the itch in recent weeks. I was so caught up in wanting her, rather than the instant gratification I’m used to, maybe it’ll take a second for the usual boredom to return.
Or maybe I just don’t want to think about how she might never be out of my system and I’ll be stuck with the need for more of her forever.
We’re four frames in on this brotherly game of bowling, and so far haven’t discussed anything other than the spare I got in the second, or the strike he got in the third. Wyatt’s lips tilted up in a very uncharacteristic smile when he saw the X flash on the screen above, and, shit, I guess he likes bowling more than I realized.
It’s cool this place reopened. It was a staple hangout in our youths, but I heard it was shut down for a while, foreclosed on by the same bank that had jacked up the rates and fucked over most of the residents and businesses of the Heights and tanked our local economy. Rory’s worked hard to get this place, and a bunch of others, reopened, better than before.
“Looks good,” I tell my brother, eyeing the restored bowling alley.
What used to be wood-paneled walls are now covered in a rustic reclaimed wood, with the alley’s logo burned into the far wall, several feet wide, as a focal point.
This is one place I didn’t have to paint hardly anything in, mostly just the back offices. The rest is done in that old barn wood, kinda like the bar is.
“She did good,” he says, and that scruffy face of his can’t hide the way the corner of his mouth tilts up, the way it only does for her.
Apparently, ever since its grand reopening last month, it’s been pretty packed out, especially on Saturday nights like these. The people of our town have somewhere to go, soon to be lots of places to go. Hell, word on the street is we’ll even have somewhere to eat soon. A regular ole mini New York City, that’s what Rory is turning us into. Spoiled for options.
All right, maybe that’s a little heavy-handed on the sunny optimism, even for me. But the town is definitely waking up, turning into somewhere with something for just about everyone.
Standing by the ball return, I wait for my green and white marbled bowling ball to come back to me, after Wyatt just sunk his plain, boring black one down the right-hand side of the lane, only hitting four pins and cursing the shot.
With a series of rolling clunks, it appears in the mouth of the machine, and I grab it and decide to throw with my eyes closed.
“Look, Ma!” I yell to my brother. “No eyes!”
My arm pulls back and swings through, releasing the ball on muscle memory, and I open my eyes to watch it knock down the entire middle section of the pins. Seven and ten are holding on, teetering, and I cheer them on.
“Go down! Down, bitches!”
The universe loves me, and they topple with my encouragement. Or it could’ve been the other pins, still spinning on the ground, that knocked them over. Either way, I’ll take it.
I turn around with a grin and a wink, and my brother is scoffing.
“You did not just do that with your eyes closed,” he refutes.
“Are you calling me a liar or a cheater?” I put up fisticuffs, bouncing in place, laughing at the exchange.
Wyatt does something like an eye roll and blows out a heavy breath.
“You’re an absolute idiot. I’m still convinced the stork dropped you off when Mom was out at the store or something. There’s no way we’re closely related.”
I bump him with my shoulder. “I know. It makes no sense. If we were, you’d be so much more handsome and radiant.”
Wyatt shoves me away from his personal space, but there isn’t heat behind it. It’s his version of playful.
I drop back into the shitty plastic bench seats that line the lane (they couldn’t have upgraded those to something nicer? Plush couches, maybe?) and pick my beer back up, nursing it with a sigh.
My brother doesn’t get up to bowl his turn. Instead, he stays there, ass planted on the bench behind the input for the scoreboard, watching me, beer dangling from his grip.
“How’s life, West?” It’s an uncharacteristic question for him, with genuine interest behind it.
I give him the answer I always give everyone, usually our mother. “It’s good. Things are good.” The automatic response leaves my mouth without thought, despite the twinge of longing in me for something more. A driving purpose in life, someone who makes everything else in this world make sense. Something that anchors me, gives me a reason to stop floating on by, existing in the moment and really live .
But that longing has been there since I hit puberty, since I saw my brother find his purpose in Rory. If the universe really loved me, wouldn’t it have led me to her by now? My person?
By twenty-one, I doubted she was in the Heights.
By my mid-twenties, I doubted any part of my future was in the Heights, that there even was someone for me at all, and I hit the road to stop the constant reminders of it.
Sure, my brother was a miserable fuck while his girl was gone, but at least he knew what it was like to love someone as much as he did.
I spent those years wondering if I was just broken, incapable of a serious feeling toward another human being.
Eventually, I just steered into the skid and kept it casual with everyone, never expecting sparks to fly or for deeper feelings to emerge. Harder to be disappointed that way every time they don’t come.
Now, here we are, thirty-three and only just having my first brush with anyone who makes me feel anything above the cock. And now she’s gone too.
“Good?” Wyatt reiterates it like a question, like he doesn’t fucking believe me. His green eyes pierce mine, the one thing that’s so similar between us, and I avert my gaze.
This isn’t the talk I want to have with him. My issues are my issues. I don’t put my shit on other people. I make other people laugh, I keep things light. That’s my role in life.
So I force a smile to crack back out on my face before I answer him.
“Yeah, man. Felt good to get elbow-deep in grease again.”
That’s not a lie. I’ve missed working on engines. Even if I prefer smaller ones than a Sprinter van. And now that pinch in my chest is back.
“You did good on that shit, you know that?”
“Thanks, bro.”
“Y’know,” he starts, leaning back, legs outstretched. “Gonzo’s accepting that he’s not really coming back. He’s talked to Rory about putting a contract together to sell the garage to me.”
“No shit?”
He nods his head once. “Looks like it’s happening. Anyway, you know how me and Rory go to New York every few months?”
My turn to nod.
“Well, our next trip is coming up soon, and this’ll be the first time without Gonzo at the shop. I was wondering if you might wanna hold the fort down while I’m gone? It’ll only be a few weekdays. But we’ve been so busy lately, it would be kinda dick to screw people over by just leaving their vehicles there, untouched, while I’m off with my wife.”
My chest hollows, then refills with more emotion than it had before. “You trust me to handle the garage?”
“I’m desperate, but not desperate enough to ask you if I didn’t trust you’d do a good job.” A smirk peeks out of his scruff, and I think he means it. “I saw your work on the van. Plus, Google or ChatGPT will be able to give you better advice than Gonzo ever gave me way back when, and it’s not like I won’t have my phone on me if you fuck something up.”
This is my chance , I think. This is my opening.
As much as it feels like an honor to have some form of respect and trust from him like this, I need to clear the air before I can accept in good conscience.
“I know you’re probably booked with work,” he says. “I hope it’s not too much of a pain in the ass to reschedule some shit for a few days.”
“It’ll be fine,” I tell him, waving the beer-less hand. “But…”
Wyatt’s dark gaze sharpens on mine. He grunts, and it’s basically a yeah?
“Well, I just wanna make sure you know that I’m not the same irresponsible schmuck I was when we were kids.”
Another grunt, but it’s more of an agreement. Looks like I’m still fluent in caveman after all the years I lived with this one.
“I know you’ll probably always have on the older brother goggles when you look at me, probably a highlight reel of all my dumbest fuckups,” I go on, trying to keep it light, my signature move. Wyatt’s face cracks a little, probably remembering some of my more impressive fuckups.
This is as heavy as I’ve probably gotten with anyone as far back as I can remember, save those couple of deep dives with Amelia. It’s like working on an electric car instead of a fuel-guzzler. Unfamiliar territory for me, but I try.
“But I’m thirty-three, man. I need to know you’re not still seeing me like who I was at sixteen or twenty or whatever. I’m not the same kid I was then.”
He nods, taking a sip of his beer, before standing and placing the bottle on the counter there. Wyatt holds out a hand for me, and I take it, rising up to join him, and falling into a handshake and a bro hug with him. He claps my back, I clap his, and it feels like a new leaf for us.
For a second, I think Amelia would be proud.
Then I realize she wouldn’t be anything, because she’s gone. She’s not a part of my life to even have an opinion on the happenings in it. Don’t love the way that feels.
The rest of the game whizzes by, me doing my best to ignore the hollow pang in my gut with occasional jokes and laughter ringing out above the sounds of the ball rolling down the lane, knocking down pins. He beats me by seven, so we play another round, where I beat him by nine. We’re mid the tiebreaker game when he brings up family dinner tomorrow night.
“I was thinking, now that it’s getting warmer we could grill out some steaks tomorrow. I’m gonna borrow a grill from Duke. I could swing by and grab you on my way to get it, you can help me get it in the truck and home and all that?”
And, shit, call me Wyatt, because everything my brother said just went in one ear and out the other at the sight before me. I grunt some sort of acknowledgement to him, and he keeps talking, but I don’t hear a word he’s saying.
The doors to Pins + Needles opened around the time my brother’s mouth did, and the women that came in took all of my attention as he was jabbering away there.
Must be girls’ night in Smoky Heights, not just the guys’ night out, because three women strut toward us, and I can’t take my eyes off of them. One in particular.
And here I thought my stomach might not ever float again.
Rory leads the pack, a wrap dress clinging to her willowy frame as she saunters down the walkway in her heels, arms up and waving. Next to her is Lexi, thicker than her sister in tight jeans and a low-cut top. The third, much shorter and slighter than the other two, is wearing white sneakers, tight athletic shorts, and a pastel tee cut off above her navel.
My Adam’s apple lodges somewhere near my chest as I take in her face, let myself believe my eyes.
It really is her .
Amelia is in the Heights.
Wyatt notices me staring, or maybe he just feels the presence of his wife in the room, some sort of sixth sense he’s a lucky fucker to have, and he turns to face the approaching women, all with giant smiles on their faces.
“What’s this?” Wyatt beats me to the question as soon as they’re in range.
“No reason you get to have all the fun!” Rory taps Wyatt on the nose, leaning in for a kiss. I ignore his hand roaming down her dress and grabbing a fistful of her ass. She pulls back to continue addressing us. “We’re here to celebrate the newest future resident of Smoky Heights. Guess who filled out her grant paperwork today?”
Lexi cheers loudly, leaning back, hands cupped around her mouth as she hoots and hollers, while Rory gestures to Amelia, who’s looking brighter than I’ve ever seen her. Cheeks pink, eyes sharp, there’s a glow about her that seems surreal.
My stomach abruptly stops floating and drops down toward my balls as it all sinks in.
Amelia stayed.
She applied for a grant.
She is staying in Smoky Heights.
I want to swoop right in, lift her off her feet, swing her around and kiss her in front of everyone. I want her to know what this means to me. For them to know what she means to me. That last night wasn’t enough, and I don’t know what this is between us, but I want to keep finding out. Together.
Fuck, I wanna scoop her up and head to the back of the alley, somewhere private where I can show her how she hasn’t left my mind since I left her this morning. The new ideas I’ve had for her in that time.
I save it all. Try to show her with just my eyes and a normal smile, the kind I toss out to everyone around me on the daily, and hope she can read into it. That she knows that I know what a big deal this is for her. That I’ll do everything in my power to make sure she doesn’t regret it.
Instead, I give her a hug, just like I do to Lexi, and Rory, in greeting. Bending a good foot down so I can reach her, I pull her in for a quick embrace.
“Congrats,” I tell her, because it’s all I can say in front of everyone else. I let the way my arms wrap around her, how tight I told her, try to do my talking for me. “I’m so damn glad you’re here,” I whisper into her ear.
Lexi starts talking to Wyatt loudly behind us, telling a story about how annoying Rory was with the paperwork, and damn if it doesn’t feel like she’s buying us a few seconds of privacy.
Jumping on it, I take the chance to soak in the moment, just for a sec—the feel of her shoulder-length waves as they brush my face, the scent of her filling my airways, coconut and something spicier, her tiny frame pressed against mine. My cock twitches, hardening against her leg, and I feel her intake of breath when she notices. Absorbing every detail of her in my arms, I lock it into my memory as the sisters start to go at each other’s throats, as per usual.
“Says the woman who’s still wearing skinny jeans!” I hear Rory clap back at whatever insult Lexi threw her way.
“Hey!” Lexi retorts. “This is a good look for me. I’ve been wearing it since high school!”
“Exactly,” Rory says, and I can practically hear her eye roll. “It’s been out of style for years at this point, Lex. Get with the times. Stop clinging to the millennial safety blankets of side parts and skinny jeans. Flick through Pinterest instead of flicking the bean for once. Your wardrobe will thank you, and maybe your sex life will too.”
The sisters start bickering worse than before, but that’s about as much of a distraction as I can count on for the moment, so I force myself to release Amelia.
Pulling back, I give her body a once-over, and finish with a dirty look that’s just for her. Delicate features, perfect little upturned nose with the understated hoop through it, blue-green eyes glowing, she looks absolutely perfect.
“Good to see you back,” I say, casual as any other day, loud enough for the others to hear, with a filthy undertone I hope no one else is paying enough attention to notice.
“Something about the Heights,” she says, crossing one leg over the other and lifting a slim shoulder. “I just keep sticking around this place. Didn’t feel right to leave yet.”
This addiction she started in me, last night was never gonna be enough. I dunno what it’ll take to get her out of my system, but I’m happy we have the time to do it.