Chapter 12 #4
Isaiah sat up straight and started to speak, but he stopped himself.
He grabbed his drink and finished that instead.
Then he signaled for another and I added it to the tab running in my mind.
Bella (brow), Ariana, and Bangkok all shared a very significant look and their significant others got visibly uncomfortable.
“We all have our faults,” Shane said calmly. “When I was a kid, I shared a bathroom with my three sisters and they let me know that there were standards.”
“His big sister used a wooden spoon to enforce those,” I added. “But I think she really loves him. She texts all the time to check in and make sure he’s taking care of himself.”
“They do love me, despite the spoon,” he agreed. Then he asked Derrick if he had sisters, and we all started talking about our annoying siblings. It united us for the rest of dinner.
We did manage to split the bill without argument but things devolved afterwards.
It was late, because the meal had taken forever (it seemed like they’d had problems in the kitchen, an issue to which I could relate after the years of dealing with my grumpy father).
We agreed to go to a bar that was nearby and they further decided that we should walk there, in the dark.
I made sure to be very close to Shane, close enough that our hips bumped and he put his arm around me.
“Thanks,” he murmured.
Unfortunately, the bar was also very dim inside, except for some roving spotlights from the dance floor that kept making him throw up his hand and look away. But the real problem was that Roshni and Isaiah had started to argue again, loudly and vociferously, and it wasn’t masked by the music.
The other three women glanced at each other and went immediately to dance, which was a great excuse to escape.
But dance that had never been my forte—it was pretty much the opposite of the forte of a person who had difficulty walking on a dirt trail.
That was ok anyway, because I didn’t like this situation for Shane.
“Want to leave?” I asked him.
“We should stay for a little while,” he answered, squinting as another bright beam of light cut through the darkness and caught him across the face. “I should talk to them.” He looked around for the three non-fighting boyfriends. “Where’d they go?”
“Follow me. No, put your hand on my shoulder,” I said, and directed him to that side of the bar, trying not to make it obvious that I was leading him and trying not to make him feel needy since he didn’t like that.
Once we wended our way over, it only took a moment before they were all engaged in more football discussion, so I edged my way out.
I decided to try to find a chair where I could watch him but as I went, Roshni stepped into my path.
When the spotlight also flashed in her face, I could see that she’d been crying so I handed her a tissue from my purse.
This bag wasn’t big enough to carry a T-shirt.
“Thanks,” she told me. “This was a really shitty introduction to our group and I’m sorry. Isaiah and I have been arguing a lot about his job.”
“Is it really that terrible?”
“No. No, it’s not bad.” She had leaned close to speak into my ear, so I could clearly spot how her face twisted up as she lied. She did think that his job as a Woodsmen coach was terrible.
“You don’t have to apologize about tonight. I’m not bothered by fighting,” I assured her. If I were, I would have run away from home years before.
“Ok,” she answered. She seemed unconvinced.
“What’s wrong with being a football coach?” I asked.
In her opinion, a lot of stuff. The discrepancies in the salary scale, for one, in which the head coach made a mint and her husband worked his butt off and was overlooked.
The disrespect from some of the players, who acted like divas and got paid even more than the head coach to mistreat the people on the staff who were trying to help them.
She stopped and sighed. “I think I need another drink or ten, and I also need to dance,” she told me.
“Sounds like a plan.” I could have another drink because my budget would allow for that, and I was game to try dancing. Maybe I wouldn’t do it very well (no, I definitely wouldn’t) but at least I would look right in terms of my clothing choice. Corbin had been spot on about this dress—
There was a huge crash at the other end of the bar, like a whole tray had ended up on the floor, and both of us peered through the darkness.
I had dropped too many trays to count at Walter’s but we had used paper and Styrofoam there.
It had been annoying and my dad always got mad, but the clean-up hadn’t been too terrible.
Broken glass presented a problem. As the spotlight swung that way, I saw the Woodsmen coaches, including Shane. Roshni’s husband Isaiah had his hand over his arm but in that split second of time, I saw blood dripping between his fingers. She screamed and we both ran.
The night ended at an urgent care place with them and with more apologies. And it resulted in even more problems afterwards.