Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
“I’ll…” I swallow hard. “I’ll be all right.”
I can’t see him nod, but I can feel it in my soul. “You always are.”
I so, so desperately wish that were true.
“Well…” he says. “I guess I’ll leave you to it.”
I sit still, so still it feels like the wind might shatter me, as he climbs back down the ladder, gets into his truck, and drives away. I sit there and let the minutes tick by, so much so, I don’t even know how much time has passed, only clueing in when the sun starts to fade.
I’d wait forever if I thought it would work—if waiting could make the feeling of utter devastation fade.
The thing is…it never does.
25
Clay
Wednesday, August 11th
Tad Hanson clings to the rocks glass, his knuckles tightening around it as I pull it from his grip and dump the rest of the vodka down the drain just like we agreed I would a long time ago.
His brother Randy stands at his back, ready to help him to his feet and drive him home to sleep it off, and I dig his keys out of the drawer at the back of the bar and hand them over to him.
“Thanks again, man,” Randy says, and I nod.
“Yesh,” Tad slurs, but he can barely hold his head up. “Thank dudes. Clays good.”
When it comes to Tad, it’s been this way for as long as I can remember, and to be quite honest, I don’t know if it’ll ever change. There’s a story there, in the falsely jovial eyes of a man who spends all his time with sheep, one that isn’t mine to tell.
I’ve heard pieces, of course, in the dim darkness of lonely afternoons in my bar spent numbing the intensity of his emotions. It doesn’t happen often, but it happens enough, and for Tad’s sake, I hope with all my chest that it stops at some point.
Randy loops Tad’s arm around his shoulder and gently walks him out, Tad hanging on him with brotherly affection and false jokes. He’s quick with wit and unbearably light sometimes, but I know the truth.
He uses it as a tool to hide the darkness.
The door slams shut behind them, and the piercing rays of the sun disappear, once again plunging the bar into its usual darkness. I wipe down the counters and bus a couple of tables, readying myself for the evening crowd. It won’t be bad tonight, given that it’s a Wednesday, but I’ll have a horde of regulars all the same.
After I’m done, I head back to the bar and grab the sandwich I got earlier from the sub shop the guy from Florida opened up a few months ago and pull up a stool to eat it.
I’m a man of the town and a friend to many, but since Josie left me, I’m also a man of solitude. I eat most of my meals alone when Bennett and Summer aren’t inviting me to join them, and I don’t pursue dating. I tried for a little bit a couple years ago, but I never made it past a first date.
None of them, no matter what they had to offer, were Josie.
I sing along to the station on the radio and flip the channel to catch some of the highlights for sports, but by and large, I’m just ticking time away until the crowd gets here tonight.
When I’m done, I toss out my garbage and run to the restroom for a quick piss and then get back to business as customers start to trickle in for the night.
It’s a steady flow without being overwhelming, and I’m glad I told Marty he could have the night off tonight to celebrate his anniversary with Sheila. It would have been pointless for him to be here anyway.
I pop the top off a bottle of beer and pass it across the counter to Nick Schmitt, the local lawn guy, and then head back to the other side of the bar to bus some empties. I pull them off the counter and look up just as the main door from the parking lot slams shut.
I’m shocked to see Bennett, so much so, I don’t stop myself from voicing it. “My God. What in the world’s going on? Bennett Bishop in my bar on a Wednesday evening? Must be the apocalypse.”
After all his past issues with alcohol, substance abuse, and debauchery in general, he makes a point not to loiter in bars—even if it’s mine. Too many bad things have happened from it. Plus, he normally reserves his nights for Summer, and now that she’s leaving the house less and less in an effort to keep her as healthy as possible, he’s mostly become a homebody.
He sits on a stool at the end of the bar I’m at, where no one else has set up camp, and I don’t waste time before settling up in front of him. The bastard looks tired, and I know there’re a lot of reasons for that. Everything that’s going on with Summer, being the main one, and the scuffle with Norah’s asshole ex-fiancé last week that landed him in cuffs. Thankfully, the cuffs didn’t end in charges, just a few hours at the station.