Chapter Six
I’M JUST LEAVING THE STORE when I find Andie walking down the sidewalk headed right for me. Busted.
Dammit. I have to think up a good lie, quick. The heavy gun and a box of bullets are in my purse, and if she even touches my bag she’ll know they’re in there.
“What in the heck are you doing?” she asks.
I’m all innocence. I could totally work for the CIA as a super spy the way I can hide my emotions. “Who me? Nothing.” I hold out a leg for her to admire. “Just scored me some gorgeous Sorel boots. Check me out.” The big box that holds her fugly boots bangs against my hip and the cheap plastic bag crinkles. I’m surprised it hasn’t broken through already leaving my packaging to get soggy in the slush that covers the sidewalk.
“I got a text from Mack. He said you shot his brother.” She looks up at the storefront we’re standing in front of. “You didn’t really shoot him, did you?”
I frown, acting like she’s crazy. “Don’t look so worried. Of course I didn’t shoot him. I merely grazed him. Big difference.” Hooking my arm through hers, I lead her down the sidewalk. The smell of greasy fried something is calling to me and I need to distract her from this line of questioning. I feel guilty enough as it is; I don’t need to add causing pregnant lady stress on top of it. “Come on. Someone is spelling my name out in strips of bacon right now.”
Andie puts on the brakes, and when she does it with all that weight behind her, it’s very effective. I almost go down, even with the awesome tread on my new boots. I struggle to right myself. I really hate ice. It’s impossible to look graceful or cool on the stuff.
“No, I’m not going into that diner.”
I disengage myself from her to keep from falling again, glad that I’ve distracted her from the shooting incident, but now curious about her diner-o-phobia. I fully intend to stay upright as I get to the bottom of it, so I keep my legs spread kind of far apart just in case the ice has other ideas. It’s probably a good thing I don’t have my gun on my hip yet; I’d look like I was ready for a shootout at the O.K. Corral.
“Why?” I look over my shoulder at the greasy spoon. “It seems harmless enough.”
“That’s where Hannah works. She and I are not on good terms.” Andie takes a few steps backwards. I admire her ability to reverse on ice without even batting an eye. Puffy Girl’s got skills.
I don’t follow her, feeling safer with just keeping my feet planted on somewhat solid ground. Trying to negotiate the icy sidewalk, avoiding the subject of Ian, and also talking about town gossip all at the same time could be a problem for me right now.
“Hannah?” I ask. “As in, Hannah Banana?”
Andie smiles but without much humor. “You remember her, I guess.”
“Who could forget? Daisy Duke from the wrong side of the tracks and a bad dye job. I thought you guys had moved on.” Hannah had a thing for Mack if I remember correctly. But since Mack never liked her back, I thought it wasn’t a big deal.
“Yeah. We moved on by avoiding each other.”
My eyes roam the street, and the image of the town map that’s burned into my brain pops up. I’m a human Google Earth like that. Once I see a map, it’s permanently in there. “That can’t be easy in such a small place.” I feel bad for my friend. Maybe she feels trapped out there on that ranch. Maybe that’s why she works from home most of the time. It can’t possibly be because she likes the smell of cow poo.
She takes me by the hand and tries to pull me in the opposite direction, but I resist. The traction on my boots is amazing when there’s salt on the ground. I’m totally in the mood to do a high-kick right now just because my new footwear makes me so happy, but I don’t. I could accidentally hit my pregnant friend and with the gun incident earlier, it makes me wonder whose side Luck is on today. I’ll do one later when I’m back at the MacKenzie house. There’s plenty of space in my bedroom for a little Rockettes action. I try to do some high kicks every day just to keep my legs looking good.
“Come on, don’t be stubborn,” she says.
“Stubborn? Me?” I really don’t know what she’s talking about. I’m all about compromising and giving in to other people’s desires. A stylist has to know when to keep her mouth shut and just let the frosted tips and mullets happen. Sometimes a bad experience is a much better teacher than pure advice.
She laughs. “As if that’s news to you. Come on.” She waves her hand over and over like she’s trying to tempt a child.
I stick out my lower lip. She cannot resist me now. “No. I’m hungry.” Truth is, I’m really not that hungry. I just want to see that Hannah Banana chick and let her know without Andie catching me that she can’t keep making Andie feel uncomfortable. This is my BFF’s home now. She should feel free to go anywhere she wants. She’s going to have a baby soon, and that baby is eventually going to want to eat a pancake.
She tries to use reason on me. “We just ate.”
“That was hours ago,” I argue. “It’s almost lunch time.”
Andie looks at her watch. “It’s ten in the morning, Candice.”
“See? It’s past noon on the east coast and I’m jet lagging like a bitch. Come on.” I take her hand and pull her along. “I heard all about the pancakes they have there. And you know I love bacon.”
“Their pancakes suck. It’s their waffles that are good. Or so I hear.”
“Yeah, that’s what I meant. Waffles. I heard that too.”
I manage to get her almost to the door before she balks again. “Seriously, this is a bad idea. If you’re hungry we can go to the grocery store and buy a whole package of bacon. You can eat the entire thing yourself.”
I grab the door that’s covered in credit card stickers and an old rodeo flier, pulling it open and letting out a blast of deliciously warm and baconey air. “Nothing beats the food from a greasy spoon. You know that.” I gesture with my bag. “In you go, tubby tubblenstein.”
Her mouth drops open. “Oh my god, you did not just call me that.”
Oops. Did I say that out loud? Quick! Think of something!
“No, it was Ian who did. I’m just repeating his words.” That’s a total lie, but I can just imagine how much crap she’s going to give him for it and then how outraged he’ll be when he finds himself falsely accused. I start giggling just seeing it in my head. It’s really not a bad nickname, come to think of it. She is pretty tubby. I love it when my brain just spontaneously takes over like that. It always surprises me.
“He’s going to pay for that,” she says, her expression going dark.
“Yeah. He should.” I follow her inside, feeling like I just smoked a drug or something with how much joy I’m experiencing. Ian’s going to get yelled at, I have purple boots on, and there’s a delicious waffle about to get in my belly. So this is what happiness feels like.
The air is thick with grease, steam, and the smell of people who should have probably used a little extra soap before stepping outside the house. I flap my arms a few times, trying to get my perfume to fog up around my face. My bag flops around, banging into me and the door.
“What are you doing?” Andie whispers loudly. “Trying to call attention to yourself on purpose or what? I told you, Hannah and I …”
My perfume kicks in and all that’s left of the strangers around me is the slight scent of cumin. Do they serve tacos here?
“Well, well, well, look who decided to drop by and grace us with her presence,” says an exaggerated southern fried voice from behind the counter.
How is it that a girl who’s spent her entire life in the top left corner of the country is talking like a girl from the bottom right or the bottom-middle part, like Texas or whatever? I don’t know. I might be able to figure it out with more time, since linguistics is a special interest of mine, but right now I’m too distracted to try.
I can’t focus on anything but the horrible bleach job that’s been done to the poor girl’s hair. Her cuticles are totally fried, making her hair look like a stack of straw on her head, and the color is what those of us in the industry call chicken-fat yellow. Sooo not attractive.
“Hello, Hannah,” Andie says, all demure, like she isn’t pissed that this girl just said something that sounded rude to me. “How have you been?”
We move farther into the room. Andie’s headed to a booth in the corner.
Hannah comes from behind the counter to follow me. I’m tempted to walk backwards so she can’t get a butter knife between my shoulder blades, but I don’t. Why? Because Hannah Banana doesn’t scare me. She’s named after a fruit, for chrissakes. How can she possibly be dangerous? If her nickname was Hannah the Horrible or Hannahbelle Lecter, maybe. But banana? Nah. No way. Besides. I’ve got a gun and a buttload of bullets. Oh yeah. They call me The Duke. No … The Duchess.
I turn around as I stop at a booth and catch Hannah all smiles. She does have nice teeth, I’ll give her that. It doesn’t hide the bad hair but it does distract my attention from it a little.
“Oh, I been good,” she says. “Real good. Been spending some time with Ian, you know.”
My mouth pinches up without me even realizing it. I quickly smooth it out when I catch Andie staring at me. She’s next to the booth, ready to sit.
I take the spot across from her, a formica table rimmed in aluminum between us. The vinyl-covered seat collapses under my butt with a wheeze of protesting air, but not at all under my thighs at the edge. I feel a lack of circulation coming on already. I better not get a leg-vein over this or I’m going to be pissed. No waffle is worth a leg-vein.
“Really? With Ian? That’s nice.” Andie squats down to sit, but then stops when her belly keeps her from fitting into the booth. She’s got about four inches of too much baby to ever think of making it in.
“Oh, lordy, you are getting huge, girl. I mean, like, hugely huge.” Hannah looks back over at the kitchen area. “Joe, you seen this?”
The man cooking doesn’t even look up, but that doesn’t stop Hannah. “Maybe you should move to a table. You could fit in a regular chair, probably. I think. You could probably sit sideways or something. My god, you must have terrible stretch marks.”
My eyes widen. Them’s fightin’ words if I’ve ever heard any. My trigger finger twitches a little.
Andie’s nostrils flare, but she keeps her cool. “No, I’ll be fine.” She grunts as she pushes against the edge of the table. “Just need to move the table a bit.”
“It’s stuck there, you ain’t gonna be able to move it.” Hannah steps back.
“Sure we can. Just needs a little shove.” Andie grunts once more as she tries again to make more space.
I can see being able to fit into this stupid booth is important to her. Sadness overwhelms me as I see my best friend feeling self-conscious about her weight and this ding-bat banana waitress lording her thin-ness over her. I feel terrible that I called Andie tubby tubblenstein.
The emotion fills me with super-human powers of strength and determination. I literally can feel it surging through my veins. Gripping the table on my side, I pull with all my might.
The table lets out a mighty crack, a screech, and something like a dog bark before separating from the floor. It’s nearly diagonal between the two benches now and I’m almost ready to sweat.
I look down at the floor to check out the damage, assuming from the noise we made that screws will be sticking up out of the linoleum. Instead, I find a pile of dark gray goop that used to hold the table’s one leg in place, and I’m pretty sure it’s not glue. There’s fuzz sticking up out of it too. Ew.
Andie sits down with a huff of air, her face pink and coated with a sheen of sweat. “See? No big deal.”
I grin as big as I know how. “Yep. No big deal at all.” Looking up at Hannah, I lift one of my eyebrows for emphasis. “You might want to get something to clean up that disgusting goop on the floor, though. I think it’s been there for a while. Don’t you guys ever clean around here?”
Hannah gives me a bitchy look. “Of course we clean the floor. We clean it every day.” Her hands go to her hips.
I look down at the gray spot on the floor and shrug as I give Andie my famous bug-eye. “If you say so.” And then I giggle.
Andie smiles, and the two of us stare at each other while we send private brain-wave messages back and forth. She’s loving me, grateful that I got the Banana girl off her back and also very happy that she can still fit in a booth. I’m happy that I could help make that happen for her. Maybe she’ll forget for the time being that I shot her husband’s brother.
“Do you want anything, or did you just come in here to do a health inspection?” Hannah taps her foot on the floor.
I look up at her and smile sweetly. I can afford to be magnanimous because I won this round. “I’ll have one of those waffles I’ve heard so much about and a cup of coffee.” I shift my gaze. “Andie?”
She’s back to being serious. “I’ll have some herbal tea.”
“Sorry, we’re all out.” Hannah gives Andie a tight smile. She doesn’t look very sad about it.
“Okay, how about some decaf?”
“Nope. We’re all out of that too.”
Glancing over to the spot behind the counter where the coffee machine rests, I can see very clearly that there are two pots there and one of them has an orange top. Hannah, you lying b-word.
I stand without thinking about my next move. Once again, my amazing brain takes over and saves the day. “Hey, Joe!” I wave like a maniac in his direction.
Along with the cook, everyone sitting at the counter turns to look at me. Joe the cook is clearly confused. He’s probably not used to strangers calling him out from the middle of the restaurant, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Pregnant ladies should not be denied their herbal tea. I mean, what if Andie’s uterus starts to relax too much? We can’t have that happening around bacon and waffles. These people would be scarred for life. I know I would be.
“You got any herbal tea in the back?” I yell.
He shrugs and then says, “Yeah. Guess so.”
I sit down and scrunch my nose up all cute at Hannah. “Guess you got some in the back you forgot about.”
Hannah spins around and leaves us without another word. Not one single strand of her brittle hair-nest moves. I almost feel sorry for her. Almost.
Andie rests her chin on her hand with a sigh. “Just what exactly are you trying to accomplish here?”
I take the paper napkin from under the silverware and use it to buff the water spots off my knife. “Just trying the waffles.”
She folds her arms on the table in front of her. “You know I have to live here, right?”
“Of course I do.” I line my silverware up and put my messy napkin in my lap, smoothing it as best I can. I can’t meet her eyes right now. She’ll be able to detect the fact that her uterus makes me nervous.
“If you could not make enemies of half the people in town, that would be awesome.”
I look up and stare at her because I’m shocked she feels this way about me. Now I’ve forgotten all about her silly womb. After all I’ve done for her so far, this is what she has to say to me? I’m starting to worry about Mack’s influence. Maybe it’s not as good as I thought.
“Enemies?” I say. “What are you talking about?” Maybe pregnancy makes her talk nonsense. I know too many beers does.
She shifts her gaze over to Hannah who’s busy banging cups around behind the counter. Then she looks back at me and lifts a brow.
“Who? Her? Banana girl? Pffft. She’s just a silly old kitty peeing on walls. She just needs to know that you expect her to use the litter box, that’s all.”
Andie frowns. “I don’t follow.”
I sigh. It’s a pain always having to explain things to her. She never gets my metaphors. We function on a totally different level sometimes. “You know how sometimes you get a cat, and instead of using the litter box, it pees on the wall or the side of the bed or in your laundry basket?”
“Uh … no.”
“Okay, well it happens. It’s the cat trying to tell you that it’s not happy. You’re not doing things the way it wants. And cat pee stinks.” I wait a moment for my wisdom to sink in.
“Yes, I guess it does.”
“So you just have to whack that kitty.” I mime smacking a cat on the buns. “Pop! Show it who’s boss.”
“Whack the kitty?”
“Yes. Whack the kitty.” I nod. She’s finally getting it. Phew. I thought this was going to be one of those times I have to walk her through it step-by-step. Those times give me headaches.
“Do you whack kitties?” she asks.
“Of course not. What do you take me for, an animal abuser?” I instantly picture Ian with a bow in his hand. “Oh, and by the way … speaking of animal abusers, did you know your brother-in-law kills animals?” I nod but don’t wait for her response. “Yeah. It’s true. I thought he was cute before, but once I found that out, I decided he’s not cute at all. He’s ugly. Maybe not on the outside, but on the inside, yes. I’m glad he’s bouncing The Banana. They deserve each other.”
Andie sighs like she just let out all her stress in one breath and smiles. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”
I smile back. “Of course I realize it. You’re stuck in this one-horse town surrounded by bumpkins. How could you not miss my metropolitan charm and intellectual banter?”
She starts laughing so hard she chokes. I have to get up out of my seat to pat her on the back. It makes me wonder how far the hospital is from here, just in case.
“Here. Maybe this will help,” Hannah says from behind me. She’s holding a cup in a saucer. She doesn’t sound very concerned.
“What is it?” I ask, taking it from her.
“Tea, duh,” she says, making a stupid face. “Herbal. Just like she ordered.” She leaves without waiting for me to respond, which is probably good. Andie did ask me not to make her an enemy.
“Here,” I set the tea down in front of my friend, “take a sip before you turn your lungs inside out.”
She sips and then speaks with a croaky-frog voice. “Is that even possible?”
I sit back down. “Of course it is. What goes down must come up, right? That’s just simple physics.”
“Down? Lungs go down?”
“How else do you think they got where they are?” I shake my head. She really has no medical knowledge at all. I suppose it doesn’t matter since she’s not working in a hospital, but you’d think she’d at least wonder about this stuff. I know I do.
I explain, just in case she really does want to know. “Yeah. When you’re a zygote, everything’s on the outside. Then as you turn into an embryo, it all goes inside. Boys get testicles, we got ovaries, but it’s all basically the same equipment. Lungs in, lungs out. Physics.”
She frowns over her cup as she sips her tea. Then she shakes her head and swallows. “You seriously scare me sometimes.”
“I know, right? How do I keep all this knowledge in one brain? It’s just one of those medical miracles. I scare myself sometimes. I’m going to donate my brain to science. Maybe they can unlock some secrets of the universe from in there.”
“More like unlocking Pandora’s box,” Andie mutters.
“Do you use that music app? I do. It’s pretty good.”
She shakes her head, but stops herself from responding when Hannah shows up again, food in hand and a white mug of coffee for me.
The plate with a single waffle and a blob of whipped butter on top distracts me from my next thought. Hannah leaves without a word, which is fine by me.
“So what were you doing in the gun store?” Andie asks.
I busy myself with drowning my food in syrup. The smell of pecans and maple has me going light-headed with pleasure. I’m a sucker for breakfast foods I shouldn’t eat.
I answer without looking at her. I have to act casual, like I was just hanging out, shopping for awful flannel shirts or whatever. “Just buying some boots. See?” I hold out my leg so she can re-admire my footwear.
“You weren’t buying a gun were you?”
I stab a chunk of waffle. “I shot one in there. They have an indoor range. Have you ever seen it?” I shove the big bite into my mouth, hoping I’ve adequately distracted her from the fact that I haven’t actually answered her question. I don’t want to lie, but I also don’t want her trying to talk me into returning my nine millimeter. I’ve already named her Millie and I like the weight of her in my bag. I could probably take someone out just hitting them with it, instead of actually pulling the trigger.
“No. But why you saw it is my question.”
“Welp …,” I wipe off my mouth and cut my next bite, “I was in there, looking at boots, and Ian was there too, talking about a bow and acting like he’s all Robin Hood and stuff … and the guy asked me if I wanted to shoot a gun in his range. So I did.” I shrug and eat some more waffle.
“And you shot Ian?”
I wave my fork around, talking with my mouth full. “No, he pretty much shot himself.”
“Did he have a gun?”
I swallow so I don’t choke. My waffle is kind of dry and maybe a little too salty. “No, I did. But he was standing behind me giving me a bunch of crap and he’d just revealed the evil truth of him being a killer, so one thing led to another and then he got grazed.”
“I’m completely lost. How did he shoot himself?”
“Karma.”
“Karma?”
“Yes. Karma. All those animals he shot? Karma loves that shit. My gun dropped, a bullet came flying out, and it hit him in the ankle. So actually it was Karma who shot him. Karma’s a bitch. He should know better than to mess with her.”
She leans in close and talks in a loud whisper. “You actually shot him?! I thought it was a joke!”
I put my fork down and stare at her. Does pregnancy make people hard of hearing? I’m going to have to Google that. “No. He got grazed by a bullet that Karma aimed at him. I didn’t even have my hand on the gun, so how could I have shot him?” I shake my head, disappointed in my friend. She’s supposed to be a lawyer. This should be easy for her.
I pick up my fork and push another bite onto its tines. “He’s fine. He said he was going home to ice it. It’s just a bruise. There wasn’t even a drop of blood. He was acting like a big baby if you ask me.”
She takes a sip of her tea. “Life is never boring with you around, Candice, that’s for sure.”
I smile awkwardly, my mouth full of waffle. “You know it.”
She laughs.
“Where are we going next?” I ask, taking a sip of my coffee. It’s cold. I glance over at Hannah and catch her smiling. That bitch. She probably put ice in it. I look down into the cup to see if there’s anything else floating around in there. There’d better not be a loogie at the bottom.
I miss the expression on Andie’s face, but not the tone of her voice. “Maybe the hospital?”
“Huh?” I look at her and see her skin going pale. Her eyebrows are coming down from her hairline.
“The hospital?” I ask, fearing her answer.
“Yeeeaaah…”
She doesn’t seem very sure. Now I’m suspicious. “Why?”
“Because either I just seriously peed my pants or there’s amniotic fluid on the floor by our feet.”
And just like that, I lose my appetite for waffles and bacon.