29. Rory #2
Allie glares at him, but she offers me a hand to help me up from the couch and slides her arm around my shoulder as we follow the boys.
We pause in the entryway as she kicks off her boots.
One lands on its side while the other sails several feet away and bounces off the door before coming to a rest as Allie steers me into the kitchen.
Dylan sets the boxes on the counter and flips open the lids. One is plain cheese—Nate’s favorite—while the other is half buffalo chicken and half mushroom.
The boys both load their plates with a couple pieces of cheese pizza and carry them to the table. Allie takes all four slices of mushroom.
My mouth waters at the sight of the buffalo chicken.
I don’t think I can eat more than a slice, but I pick the largest one and plop it onto my plate.
I add a few celery sticks, and because I’m the only one eating this kind of pizza, I take the little plastic container of ranch and put it right on my plate.
“Just one?” Allie asks, eyeing my plate as I sit at the table. “Sure you’re okay?”
This makes me grin, reminding me of the sleepovers where Allie and I would demolish an entire pizza each.
“Yeah. My appetite isn’t all the way back. I’ll keep working on it.”
“Well, buffalo chicken isn’t as good as mushroom, but if there’s pizza that needs to be finished off, I’m willing to fall on that sword.” She places her hand, still grasping a half-eaten slice, to her chest in a solemn oath.
“That’s noble of you,” Dylan says, deadpan.
Allie ignores him.
“You know, you’re lucky I like you, Allie,” Nate says, lifting a slice to his mouth. “I’d never let Rory bring mushrooms into this house.”
“That’s because mushrooms are the devil.” I take a small bite of my blessedly mushroom-free pizza and swallow. “You’ll never have to worry about my bringing those things into this house.”
This is one area where Nate and I have always been firmly aligned. Mushrooms are not to be trusted.
“That’s why I love you, Ror,” Nate says, winking at me. “Our shared outlook on fungi. I’m still not sold on the whole buffalo chicken thing, though. What was wrong with sauce and cheese? Why must pizza places branch out into alternate toppings?”
Dylan lifts his slice in the air, like he’s toasting to the idea of boring pizza. “Exactly. Cheese pizza is where it’s at. It’s the OG of pizza.”
Allie wrinkles her nose as she lifts her slice and takes a bite.
“You’re too old to say OG,” she says through a mouthful of pizza.
“Hey, I’m hip. I’m even slay, as the kids say these days,” Dylan says, moving his hand in front of his face, palm toward us in what I’m guessing is some cool new teenage gesture.
Or at least, Dylan’s attempt at it.
Allie lifts her eyebrows and tilts her head to the side. If I didn’t know better, it would almost resemble her flirting stance, the one I’ve seen at countless bars over the years. But since she’s looking at Dylan, it seems to be her irritated face, too.
She narrows her gaze on my brother. “Um, if you’re too old to use OG, you’re definitely too old to say slay, whatever the hell that means. And what are you doing with your hand?”
“Talk to the hand,” Dylan says, doing the motion again, like maybe we missed it the first time.
We stare at him, collectively confused.
Finally, he drops his arm and sighs in defeat. “It’s another slang thing. Pretty sure the kids borrowed it from the ’90s.”
“Oh!” Allie sits up straighter. “I get it now.”
She pushes her chair back from the table quickly, bumping my seat as she stands. I try to hide my wince at the stab of pain that shoots through me at the sudden movement.
Allie clears her throat, lifting one hand to her ear as though it’s a phone. “Dylan, the ’90s called. They want their slang back.”
“You weren’t even a fetus when the ’90s ended,” Dylan points out. He stands, too, carrying his plate to the sink. “I don’t think they’d be calling you to reclaim their slang.”
“It’s a figure of speech. Also from the ’90s. Or from my parents, at least.”
I meet Nate’s gaze while Allie and Dylan continue to trade barbs.
The two of them have always had an…interesting relationship, if you can call it that. As soon as Allie started noticing boys, she had kind of a crush on my brother. She tried her best to tease him in that style of flirting that somehow works for ten-year-olds.
It didn’t work for Allie, of course, because Dylan was twenty years old.
I figured she’d grown out of both the teasing and the crush, as well as her minor disappointment that my adult brother never returned the affection of a fifth grader.
A few days under the same roof seems to have either reestablished or amplified the problem, though, rather than solving it. At the very least, it seems to have brought out vintage insults, apparently.
My best friend and brother couldn’t be more different. Allie is a firecracker, impulsive, and has a flair for drama. She loves being the center of attention, while Dylan is the exact opposite.
He thrives on control and on keeping things in check. It’s what makes him a great principal: he doesn’t get caught up in the drama from the teachers or from the students. He’s neutral, a fair and unbiased mediator for any conflict that comes his way. Unshakable.
Maybe that was Nate’s thought when he decided to ask Allie to stay with my brother for a little bit. It would make sense to reason that of everyone in town, Dylan could handle Allie.
I hold back a laugh as I settle back in my seat, watching my brother and my best friend bicker.
Dylan can handle Allie about as well as he could handle a lit firecracker.
I’m feeling better already, so hopefully Allie can move back in with us pretty soon. Really, if she needs to, she could head back home to Chicago. My recent dramas have taken up more than enough of her PTO and her remote office days.
Plus, if she doesn’t move out of Dylan’s house soon, we’re all in for an explosion.
Allie crosses her arms over her chest as she stands face-to-face with my brother, or as close to it as she can, with their nine-inch height difference.
He matches her stance, arms crossed, and looks down at her with what I’ve dubbed his Principal Stare. It’s the look he fixes on misbehaving students, and it’s intimidating as fuck.
Faced with that, most people would back down. But not Allie. She steps even closer to him, their socked feet almost touching toes as they bicker about slang from the 1990s and who is allowed to use that slang.
I shift in my seat to watch this little drama. A slice of pain shoots through my abdomen, reminding me that I’m only a few days out from major surgery, and that maybe I really do need to take it easy.
“You okay?” Nate asks, concern etched into his features.
“I’m fine.”
Allie and Dylan stop mid-sentence and turn to me, their movements practically synchronized.
“What’s wrong?” Allie asks.
“What do you need?” Dylan says at the same time.
Good to know that Nate’s concern for my well-being can bring the sniping between my brother and my best friend to a screeching halt.
“I’m fine,” I say again, a little louder. “Anyway, aren’t we supposed to be talking about the pageant?”
A look passes between Nate and Dylan.
“What?” I study Nate, then turn to Dylan and back again. Their expressions don’t give anything away, and worry starts to rise in my chest. “What aren’t you telling me?”