Chapter 44 – CJ
“I want Korean barbeque hot wings, pepperoni pizza with extra meat and double cheese, tiramisu cake with whipped cream and a cherry coke.”
CJ gaped at Axel’s order and pushed his paper Soda Jerk hat further back on his head to scrape his scalp. It matched the red and white paper apron he wore. He glanced over his shoulder at the offerings him and Diesel wrote on the menu board.
“None of that’s up there, Ax,” CJ said.
“Call Mom and Reb,” Ransom instructed. “They’ll make it for us.”
CJ looked at the menu board again. Next to him, Diesel leaned against the counter, dressed similarly to CJ, and shook his head. “No. You have ham or turkey sandwiches and chips.”
“Can we bowl again?” Ryder swiveled on one of the stools. “The diner isn’t fun without Mom.”
CJ and his brothers had decided to spend the evening together after the hell of the past few days. They’d started off in the bowling alley with CJ and Diesel against the Terrible Triplets. Of course, those little fuckheads won by blatantly cheating.
Whenever Axel’s turn came, he’d walk the fucking ball down the lane, kick the pins over, and then claim a strikeout. CJ and Diesel decided it wasn’t that serious and let those three gremlins win.
“We set a new record!” Axel crowed at the end. “Ten million points, men,” he said, high-fiving Ryder and Ransom.”
“In your fucking dreams,” CJ responded. “You can only get three hundred points in a perfect game.”
“Yeah, with twelve consecutive strikes,” Diesel agreed, then flipped Axel off because they’d played three games, with Axel striking out on each turn. “That’s only nine hundred points.”
“I prefer ten million,” Axel told him.
“You can prefer a hundred billion,” CJ said. “It doesn’t make a difference.”
Tired of the Triplets’ cheating, CJ announced it was time to go to the diner and eat the meal they’d planned. Four and a half months after his mother’s collapse and CJ could still imagine the blood and remember his father grabbing Mom and running out with her.
Diesel had clapped him on the back. “Aunt Meggie and Jo are fine.”
The words reminded CJ how much he had to be thankful for. Putting aside the trauma of that time, he decided to make new memories.
“Yeah, bro.”
“Have a seat, little brother.” Diesel nodded to an empty stool on the other side of the counter. “I’ll serve.”
CJ shook his head. “I like working with you, D.” He pointed to his hat. A stack of them were in the storage room, along with the aprons. “I don’t want my Soda Jerk attire to go to waste.”
Ransom raised his hand but didn’t wait for anyone to ask what the fuck he wanted. “Hey, CJ, can we take the soda away and just leave jerk?”
“Burn, bro,” Ryder said, high-fiving Ransom, then wagging a finger at CJ. “You can’t look all humpy-faced. You left yourself open to that one by announcing you were a Soda Jerk.”
“They were called that because of their jerking motions when they operated the fucking handles on the soda machine dispensers, asshole,” CJ snapped.
“It wasn’t cuz of the way they acted?” Axel asked.
“No!” CJ and Diesel chorused.
“Well—”
CJ pointed his finger at Ransom before he spewed another insult. “We’re supposed to be nice to each other tonight.”
When everyone walked in last night, shell-shocked from those fucking DNA results, Rebel went to her room and Jana went to the treehouse.
CJ and his brothers trooped behind Mom and Dad to the kitchen.
She’d given Axel the cookies and milk he’d begged Diesel for during their drive back home, while Dad got a beer for himself, Diesel, and CJ.
Watching Axel chomp the cookies and chug the milk, Ransom and Ryder asked for cookies and milk too.
Once everyone was settled on the stools at the counter, Dad prepared a cup of tea for Mom.
None of them had much to say because the evening had been long and tiring.
Right before they went to their rooms, Diesel suggested a brothers’ night, which CJ jumped at the chance to do.
Recently, all they’d done was argue and they needed to remember their bond.
It was more than because they were all Caldwell boys.
It was because they once liked each other’s company and found something to bond over.
The signing of the peace agreement and the way Mom and Dad looked at each other again gave CJ hope that they could put family first and focus on each other again.
It didn’t even bother him that Dad hadn’t invited him to the club when the peace agreement was signed. CJ had had a taste of club life. He knew what to expect, but he’d enjoy his last fourteen months of high school. If he passed all his tests, especially his finals, he would be a senior next year.
“I’m hungry, CJ,” Axel whined, in between twisting one hundred eighty degrees on the stool, turning and kicking the counter, then repeating the process. “I want a pizza. Do we got to have sandwiches?”
“If you eat the sandwiches tonight, I’ll take you for pizza tomorrow evening,” Diesel promised.
“Yay!” Axel spun completely around, then held out his hand to Diesel. “Deal.”
Diesel accepted Axel’s hand and shook.
“Will Jana come with us?” Axel asked, no longer whirling on the stool but still kicking the counter.
“I’ll see,” Diesel said.
“If you marry her, we won’t call you uncle.”
Diesel crouched down and pulled out a basket of various chips. “I wouldn’t expect you to,” he said, standing and shrugging.
Ryder stood from his seat and walked behind the counter, heading for the refrigerator with their premade sandwiches. “You motherfuckers are taking too long.”
“Hand out the sandwiches, Ry,” CJ instructed. “I’ll get the sodas.”
“I want a root beer float,” Ransom said. “Soda Jerks made those.”
“I didn’t bring the ingredients downstairs.” CJ grabbed a plastic container with a ham sandwich label on it. “The next time we do this, I’ll do it.”
Ransom chose both turkey and ham sandwiches, then took a bag of potato chips and another of spicy cheese puffs. “In the interest of peace, I’ll accept that answer. I haven’t had a root beer float in a long time so I’m looking forward to it.”
Axel climbed onto the counter and stretched his arms out, yanking the basket toward him before returning to his seat. “I got a question,” he said, jerking a bag of corn chips open so fast that they flew everywhere. He threw the ruined bag on the floor and took another one from the basket.
Before he repeated his messy mistake, CJ took it and opened it, then handed it back to him. “You need a sandwich, too. Chips alone won’t fill you up. Now, what’s your question.”
Axel shoved a handful of corn chips into his mouth and crunched, then opened his mouth and stuck his chewed food coated tongue at CJ. “If I don’t want no fucking sandwich, I’m not taking one, C.”
“Fuck, fine.” CJ pretended he wasn’t completely grossed out and scrubbed a hand over his face. “What the fuck do you want to know?”
“Why did Ryder got a da-na test?”
Da-Na? What the fuck was Axel on about now? Did he mean DNA? CJ had had enough about DNA to last a fucking lifetime. He sighed.
“Ryder already said why,” CJ said. “Last night.”
Thinking about CJ’s answer, Axel nodded. “It was weird, though. A lot of weird stuffs was going on, though.” He stuffed more corn chips into his mouth. “Reb. Aunt Zoann. Mattie. Aunt Kendall. And Grant.”
“No, that motherfucker wasn’t weird,” Ryder scoffed around a big bite of sandwich. “He was fucking stupid.”
Ransom belched and set his sandwich back into the container.
He knocked aside the wheat bread, snatched off the lettuce, tomatoes, pickles and turkey.
He rolled the turkey around the pickles then bit off half.
“You can’t fault the man for standing on business, Ry,” he said after swallowing.
“He talked about the meth lab at one of our meetings down here.” He shoved the other half of turkey and pickles into his mouth.
Ryder shook his head. “He needs to know the fucking landscape. What do Dad, Diesel, and Uncle Mort always say? Assess, assess, and reassess, whether it’s friend or foe. One wrong move can turn a friend into a foe very quick.”
Smashing his two pieces of mayo-laden bread together, Ransom considered Ryder’s statement. “He wants to do it for the club. For CJ. Who would hold that against him?”
“Narci,” CJ answered.
Like Diesel, he’d been content to eat in peace while their little brothers talked.
But Axel was so in tune with club business because he listened and absorbed information.
Silence wasn’t a sin. And ‘distracted’ silence could be golden.
It eased others into believing you weren’t paying attention. Axel had that perfected.
“Explain,” Ransom said.
“Grant would be competing against Narci.”
Axel scowled. “Then it was up to you to tell that deadbrain fuckhead, CJ. He wants to throw away his money and his life for you.”
Annoyance surged into CJ, but he drew in a breath, reminding himself that he’d listen to the message even if it wasn’t from a messenger he preferred. Like a grown man.
Axel was smart, though, and—like Diesel—he’d be an excellent ally one day.
Finished with his sandwich, Diesel grabbed a napkin from the holder at the end of the counter and dabbed his mouth. “The cat’s out of the bag now. Grant has to figure this shit out. If he doesn’t make the right choice, I’ll talk to him.”
“Me, too,” CJ promised. “I’ve never heard Pop so angry.”
“That motherfucker don’t even know how to fucking cook, CJ,” Axel huffed. “If I was Pop, I would’ve punched Grant in his fucking mouth until he got into a coma and got some fucking sense.”
Ransom lifted his brows, finished with his mayo and bread. “Is that even possible?”
“All torture stuffs is possible.” Axel grinned at Diesel. “Tell him, D.”
“You’re right, Ax,” Diesel said, leaning his folded arms on the counter.
CJ walked to the soda fountain and dispensed five orange sodas, then served them to his brothers before tasting his own. “Speaking of torture—”
“That’s fucking delayed,” Ryder complained.
Axel sucked up the last of his soda through the big red straw CJ had put into the glasses. “Can I have more?”
“Nope,” Diesel said. “You’ll be bouncing off the fucking walls all night and blowing up my goddamn phone because you can’t sleep.”
“I can do that. I pay you.”
Diesel glared at Axel, bypassed the straw in his glass and drank deeply. He loved orange soda and was the one who turned CJ and the rest of the boys onto it. “I’m not having the same fucking debate with you on a regular basis.”
“Suppose I raise your salary by a nickel?”
“We’ll talk about it later,” Diesel gritted then looked at CJ. “What were you going to say?”
“Devon and Rory,” CJ started, looking between the Triplets. “Why—?”
Axel slapped his palm on his forehead. “Oh, brother, do I gotta repeat stuffs all the fucking time?”
“I had it handled.”
“Not sufficely,” Axel said.
“Sufficiently,” Diesel corrected and smirked at Axel’s glare.
“We don’t got to go over that again,” he said with a little sniff, looking at CJ again. “You already know. What my men and me want to know is what are you doing about Rory now that we got revenge?”
“Never talking to that fuckhead again,” CJ said darkly.
“You talk to Ryan again,” Ryder said.
“And?” CJ understood that if he could forgive one fuckhead, he should forgive the other. But Rory, on his self-righteous Uncle Johnnie kick, seemed so much more of a traitor. “I don’t know if I’ll ever feel the same way about Rory.”
“If you keep hating him, you’ll eventually slip up and not only will Aunt Zoann figure it out but Mortician, little brother,” Diesel said.
CJ nodded. “I know.”
“And if you don’t make up with Rory soon, Uncle Johnnie will just get him further in his wing,” Axel added.
“Under his wing or in his corner, Ax,” Ransom said. “You mixed it up.”
“Fine,” Axel said with a long-suffering sigh. “What Ransom said.”
Ryder looked at CJ. “Strategize, bro. Think about ways to test Rory’s loyalty.”
Ransom opened the container with his ham sandwich. “We’re going to do that with Devon.”
“I’m keeping watch on Ryan,” Diesel told CJ.
“You deal with Rory,” Ryder said, grabbing Ransom’s lettuce and tomatoes, and biting into them. “Try to get him back to our side before Uncle Johnnie ruins him completely.”
“You think that’s why Mattie and Aunt Kendall was so sad?” Axel asked, exchanging his empty glass for Diesel’s half full one. Although Diesel scowled, he didn’t stop Axel’s theft. “They wasn’t acting right last night.”
That was true. “I’ll call her later or tomorrow after school.” Maybe CJ would get a chance to talk to her at lunch. It all depended on who was at the table with them.
“By the way, CJ.” Diesel tapped his pocket. “I received a message from Freya. Molly has been safely situated.”
“Thanks, bro. What happens next?”
“Wilkins and Freya will hire private caregivers for her and keep watch over her.”
Molly’s state dampened CJ’s mood, though it eased his mind to know she would finally get help. Only time would tell if she could ever lead a normal life.