Chapter 6
Phelps
“Thank God you’re here.” Phelps opened the door to his New Year’s date, Allie. They’d met at O’Sullivans over in South Bend
a couple weeks ago and hit it off at the pool table. Her cleavage had helped. His New Year’s RSVPs were all coming in by then,
and as they got drunk and the sexual tension built between them, he talked up his old friend group and its storied origins,
the highlight reel of New Year’s parties they’d shared over the years, and the menu he was planning for their big reunion
party (girls were always drawn to good cooks). They ended up making out in a dark corner until Allie threw up and he called
her an Uber and put his number in her phone so she could text him when she got home safe. She was so small—so petite—but with
curves like a camel on steroids, which he’d always had a weakness for. It was cute that she couldn’t handle her liquor.
He hadn’t seen Allie since then. He’d tried, but she was a busy kindergarten teacher with holiday performances to pull off
and parent–teacher conferences to survive. So it was a nice surprise when, two days ago, she texted, Want to go out with me for NYE?? He reminded her of his party plans and invited her. She accepted.
“Are you sure? We’re all old,” he said the next day, laughing when she called him to get the details—what to wear, if she should bring anything—and she laughed and said she was an old twenty-four anyway. And now, added bonus, she’d offered to come early and help get his place ready.
It was eleven thirty. Six and a half hours until liftoff, and he was already making a dent in the elaborate menu. Phelps had
always loved cooking. Food was the easy part. The problem was the rest of the house.
“This is way worse than you said,” Allie said, stepping inside with a crinkle to her nose as her eyes swept the living room.
“Please tell me you have Clorox wipes. Paper towels. And a vacuum cleaner with a really strong suck.”
Phelps scanned the living room as his mind tried to spin out a clever, subtly dirty response to strong suck. The living room chez Phelps was a big space with a couple faux leather couches with various rips on the backs and arms.
A La-Z-Boy, aka, Dad’s Chair. A jumbo TV. The odd picture or two of the boys on the wall, and the giant clock that his ex-wife
Kylie called “modern farmhouse.” Okay, yes, the carpet had some stains.
“Of course I have Clorox wipes,” he said as he closed the door behind her and she peeled off her knee-high boots. “I have
boys. They can’t hit the toilet with their piss to save their lives.”
Skyler and Kayden were with him on weekends. Thankfully, New Year’s fell on a Tuesday this year, because Kylie didn’t like
any disruptions to their custody schedule, and this party was an adults-only affair.
Phelps could feel the stir of excitement in the air.
The memories of previous New Year’s parties were bubbling up inside him like a high.
The year they’d all pricked their fingers and sworn eternal friendship.
The year with the message-in-a-bottle game.
The Truth or Dare year when Will proposed to Jenn, sending the whole group into a frenzy of joy.
The year he’d done the poached pears with the red wine reduction, making Olivia groan with pleasure, one of the most sensual sounds he’d ever heard . . .
Allie was now removing her winter gear—hat, scarf, coat.
“Let me get that.” Phelps whipped the bundle out of her hands and hung her things neatly in the coat closet even as a tumble
of kid-sized snow boots avalanched out.
“You have got to be kidding me. Is this really how you live?” Allie said, kicking one of the snow boots back in.
“It’s a closet,” Phelps said suavely, closing the door. “No one cares about that. And if they do, trust me, the chocolate
mousse will make them forget.”
“Well, let’s see how the rest of the place looks,” she said with a sigh like she didn’t expect much. And then she was off,
prancing down the hall in her tight jeans and equally tight turtleneck. Phelps followed the small storm of a human being as
she opened doors to bedrooms, the fridge, the cupboards, and finally the walk-in pantry where the extra liquor stash lived
on the bottom two shelves. She squatted, trailing her finger over the bottles. Her jeans dipped down, revealing the string
of a thong. A shiver went through Phelps and he leaned casually against the doorframe.
“Is this the bar?” She lifted the vodka and swiveled on her feet. Damn, her ass looked good in that deep crouch. “Do you have
another bottle? This isn’t enough. Are you doing a spiked punch? That would be fun, right? And Jell-O shots. You have to have
those.”
“So, I do have a bar cart in the dining room,” said Phelps, shifting his weight. “This is the reserve. And I wasn’t planning
on Jell-O shots. This isn’t a frat party. We’re old. Why waste our limited drinking capacity on something you swallow whole
and barely taste?”
“Phe-elps, don’t be like that! Jell-O shots are delicious. I’ll make them! Don’t worry. You won’t have to do a thing. I have a recipe and everyone will love it, promise. You have to let me contribute something!”
“I don’t know if I have Jell-O on hand . . .” Now could be a good moment to drop in that smartass comment about strong suck—
“Here’s some,” she said brightly, pulling two powder packets from one of the shelves. She stood and reached up to boop his
nose. “Your place is a dump.”
He laughed. “Did you just boop me?”
She grinned and punched her fists into her waist, thrusting her chest out. “Damn straight, cowboy.” She inched forward until
their bodies were touching. “And don’t test me, or I’ll do it again.”
“O-kay,” said Phelps, heat rushing into his groin.
Just as suddenly as she’d aroused him, she pushed past him, out of the pantry.
“Gloves?”
He gestured to the yellow pair from the sink. “All yours, princess.”
And she was gone.
Phew. He needed a second to cool down before he got to work on the chocolate mousse. He made for the kitchen’s big sliding
doors, slipped on the moccasins he kept there, and stepped onto the snowy back deck, where two wet lawn chairs kept the covered
grill company.
It was overcast and gray, but bright, and at least the sleet had let up. He filled his lungs with cold air and stretched out
his back. Jokes about age aside, he was feeling old.
Pains in his back and legs. He was working for Novak Plumbing, a bottom-of-the-chain job that was way too physical for his mid-thirties body.
Digging literal holes in people’s yards and basements.
Hauling away buckets of busted-up turf or cement.
He’d never sleep through the constant dull throb of pain if it weren’t for smoking weed.
He was thinking of quitting the job. Maybe after the holidays. Maybe after the grill was paid off.
In fact, maybe while he was out here, he’d have a little smoke, just to set the mood, to relax . . . He already had a joint
rolled and ready in his back pocket. He pulled it out and lit it, cupping his hand around the stub to protect it from the
breeze. There was an unpleasant queasy feeling in his stomach. Huh. Where had those nice feelings of nostalgia and excitement
gone?
It’s not that he was nervous about the party. Phelps didn’t get nervous. It was more like . . . an unease. Let’s be honest—as
excited as he was about tonight, the party could easily turn into an in-your-face reminder that, of the old crowd, Phelps
alone had been left behind. Bennett had his dream, living the posh life in Chicago with Olivia; Will was living the suburban
dream in Indy as Mr. Family Man Himself; even Bunny, who he’d invited on a whim just minutes before Allie showed up, had a
whole grown-ass life in Nashville. And here was Phelps, in a crappy rental house in the country, just outside the same crappy
town where he grew up, divorced, with a crappy job and not enough time with his own kids.
Of course, there was one consolation: Doug. You couldn’t say he was living the dream. But who wanted to be in the same camp as Fuckup Doug?
Phelps took his first drag, filling his mouth and holding the smoke in.
He didn’t get mad in a big way very often. Little ways? All the time—when his kids missed the toilet, when they spilled their
LEGO shit everywhere, when his back hurt, when his boss acted like an asshole, when the rent went up, when his ex-wife, Kylie,
was being unreasonable—but the temptation would arise every so often to be really, really destructively angry, and he could
feel the edges of that now, because he, too, had a dream once upon a time: his restaurant.
Six years ago, encouraged by his friends, Phelps decided to buy the Rock the Clock Diner, a Michigan City legend.
The owner, Eddie, was in his seventies and wanted out of the biz.
The place was so ancient Phelps’s own father had worked there as a teen.
Despite the diner’s long history, it had been sitting on the market forever with not even a hint of interest, possibly due to Eddie’s zero-upkeep policy and the inch of grease that lay over everything, saltshakers included.
That suited Phelps just fine; it meant the price was right.
It was scary how what started as a pipe dream grew so quickly, until it felt like the only thing he was living for. It pained
him to think of it now—not just the grunt work he’d done to put together the business plan and the loan application, which
Will helped him with, but the recipe testing, the notebook he’d filled with instructions on how to make a proper gravy and
how to cook a proper egg, which he imagined himself using to train his line cooks. Then, contrary to popular opinion and the
opinion of Kylie, who’d still been married to him at the time, he actually got the funds together. He made an offer. Old Eddie
accepted his offer. Then—
Phelps laughed out loud, choking out some smoke. He had to laugh.
The place had burned down.