The Fable of Us (2 page)

After I dodged the guy relieving himself, he offered a grunt that could have been an apology just as easily as it could have been a greeting. Grunts, in this part of the world, were a multi-functional form of communication.

Swinging open the screen door, I stepped inside The Hide and Seek, stitching on an expression that said I’d been here a hundred times and would come back another thousand. A quick look at the bar’s patrons glancing at me told me my ruse wasn’t working. With the way some of the guys were appraising me, the term
fresh meat
kept echoing in my head. Actually, when I took a second look around, it looked like I was the only woman in the place . . . or at least the only one a person didn’t need to play a guessing game to identify.

Other than the door I’d just come through, there were no windows or doors cut out of the old train car that was just as rusted from the inside as it was from the outside. The lighting was somewhere on the scale between low to non-existent, and I swore I heard the whir of a generator in the background, possibly what was responsible for keeping the lights
barely
on
and the beers, from the looks of the non-frosty glasses, a few degrees below room temperature.

No air conditioning pumped through the space, not that I’d expected to feel any, and even though the sun had gone down an hour or two ago, the heat was still alive and well inside of this tin can. It was a good twenty degrees cooler outside . . . and I’d been about to swelter alive out there.

Swallowing, I took a few more steps inside. The temperature crawled up a degree with every step I took, so instead of continuing toward the empty bar table at the back, I changed directions and snagged one of the empty stools lining the particle board bar, which seemed mostly held together by duct tape and rusty nails.

I shuffled through my memory, trying to find the last time I’d had a tetanus shot. Only five or six years ago, maybe. I was good.

Thankfully, the stools lining the counter were mostly empty, save for one guy at the opposite end who seemed as content to ignore me as I was to ignore him. The rest of the patrons behind me, staggered around the tables and chairs, were staring holes into my back.
Fresh meat, fresh meat, fresh meat
.

If only my parents could see me now. They’d crap their colons.

The bartender’s back was turned to me for a while as he poured a line of shots from a bottle that was almost the size of my hybrid back in California. If he’d noticed me come in, it didn’t show. As desperate as I might have been to grab a drink or two and get the heck out of there, I knew better than to clear my throat and throw around orders like I owned the place. The Abbott name ran deep in these waters, and just as many people would rather see us sink than swim. I’d changed a good deal from my former debutante days, but still . . . Abbott family photos had been plastered across enough billboards and newspaper articles in these parts to stick to the memories of even the most remote swamp dwellers.

I might have been of the family, but I wasn’t
one
of them. I had to remind myself of that again when the bartender continued to ignore me and my lack of breathing continued to strangle my waning courage. The bartender delivered the line of shots to a few of the tables, and when he returned, he continued being oblivious to the woman practically bouncing on her stool at the end of the counter.

What was this? A boys-only club? A members-only maybe? Whatever it was, I wasn’t leaving until I’d had my drink, so help me God.

“Hey, Tom, put her first drink on my tab,” the guy at the opposite end of the counter said, startling me. From how still he’d been, I’d been under the impression he’d passed out in his drink. “Any woman brave enough to step foot in this place deserves her first drink free.”

The bartender gave one of those infamous grunts. “Considering the tab you’ve run up here, you’re lucky I poured you that drink you’ve been nursing the past two hours.”

I was about to speak up—something to the gist of thanks, but no thanks—when the man at the end of the bar rose from his stool, took something from his back pocket, riffled through what I guessed was a wallet, and slammed a five dollar bill on the counter. “I said her first drink’s on me.”

“Tom” glanced at the bill, ambled down to that end of the counter, then tugged the five from beneath the guy’s palm. “Still trying to play in a different league? I thought you would have learned your lesson with that Abbott girl, but hell, if you want to spend the last five in your wallet on a girl who wouldn’t let you mow her front lawn, who am I to turn my nose up at your money?” The bartender wadded up the bill and shoved it deep into his jeans, a rattle-like chuckle rising in his chest. “You’ve never been one for learning your lesson, Boone.”

This time I had my mouth open and was in the middle of starting my “thanks, but no thanks” speech when the words froze in my throat. It couldn’t be. No how. No way. It couldn’t be . . .
him
. It had been years—seven to be exact—since I’d last seen him.

His voice sounded different, yet similar in the way a person could never forget the color of the walls in their childhood bedroom. Boone. It wasn’t a common name, even buried this deep in the belly of the country.

Still, I couldn’t help grasping that last strand of hope that it wasn’t
the
Boone as my head turned to take my first full look at the man sitting at the other end of the counter. I didn’t need more than a moment to confirm who it was.

The
Boone. Similar to his voice, he looked different, yet the same. The same dirty blond hair ever in need of a haircut, though now it was just long enough to be pulled back into the messiest ponytail I’d ever seen. The same wide shoulders and imposing frame that had made boys give him a wide berth. That had apparently transferred into manhood, as evidenced by the rest of the patrons staggered everywhere in the bar save beside him. The same way he held himself, like he was always ready for a fight, fists semi-curled, shoulders partially tensed.

The same way his Adam’s apple bobbed before he turned and looked at me . . .

His eyes locked onto me, boring through me in a way that made me wish I’d worn body armor before stepping into this place. Unlike the rest of him, Boone’s eyes had changed. They were still the same chestnut shade, but the lights in them had burned out. That spark of trouble or excitement or whatever emotion he’d ever felt had gone out, leaving something dull and lifeless behind.

“On second thought, I’ll take that five back, Tom.” Boone’s eyes stayed fixed on me as he held out his hand. “This woman’s taken enough from me for this lifetime and my next ten. I’m not giving her anything else, the last five in my wallet included.”

Tom grunted at Boone, shoving the bill deeper into his pocket before grabbing a shot glass and pouring something into it.

When I swallowed, my throat burned—parched from the memories I had of the man ten feet down from me, painful from the unpleasant memories that outweighed the pleasant ones. “That’s okay. I can go.”

I stood from my stool as Tom slammed the shot in front of me. It smelled like the cleaner my mom used to insist the maids use to clean the showers with—the same stuff the FDA later banned after discovering it blinded people if even a splash of it wound up in their eyes.

“No need to leave on my account, Miss Abbott. We all know you and your family come and go wherever they want, as they want, whenever they want.” Boone’s voice took on the sharp edge I used to hear him use with others but rarely with me. “Besides, you’re an expert at pretending I don’t exist. It’s been a while, but I’m sure it’s just like riding a bike. Carry on ignoring me. I’m confident I can return the favor.” He twisted around in his seat until he was hunched over in the same position I’d found him in.

I’d known this trip would be a disaster of record-breaking proportions, but I hadn’t factored in running into Boone Cavanaugh at The Hide and Seek. I didn’t need another complication in this already-complicated trip home. I needed to get in, get out, and get moving on.

The frustration that was more owed to fate vented out and latched on to Boone. “Oh, give it up, Boone. Your same old ‘The Abbotts Are the Root of All Evil in South Carolina’ speech is old. Find some fresh material.”

My eyes squeezed shut when I realized what I’d said. Usually I was a seasoned pro at biting my tongue and remembering my manners, but with Boone, that well-honed skill had never worked. Years later and it still didn’t. I said what was on my mind before thinking it through—that was always Boone’s and my way.

“You’re right. I am in need of fresh material, something that’s never in short supply when it comes to your family.” From his voice, I could imagine the look on his face—one side curled into a scowl, the other flat with apathy. “How about this for fresh? ‘Little Sister Abbott Weds Big Sister Abbott’s Old Sweetheart and All-Around Buttplug Rumored to Have Been Fucking Them Both Until Big Sister Found Out and Dreamed About Castrating ButtPlug, But Instead She Flew in To Wish Them Well in Their Forthcoming Nuptials.’” Boone cleared his throat. “How’s that for new material?”

My stomach churned. In addition to my breathing problem, now I was having stomach issues. Leave it to Boone Cavanaugh to unleash the all-out body assault.

Plugging my nose to get it down, I lifted the shot glass to my lips and drank it in one gulp. My body convulsed. The stuff tasted how I’d guess that shower cleaner had tasted too.

“If you’re going for overdone and sensationalized, then I think you nailed it. Well done.” Sliding a bill out of my wallet, I nodded at the bartender when his eyes dropped to my empty glass. My stomach was still twisting from what Boone had just said, from what he’d just brought up. “I’m paying for my own drinks tonight, so why don’t you give Boone another of whatever he’s drinking for that five he just gave you. I don’t want anything from him either.”

Down the counter, a harsh huff sounded.

We were quiet for a moment as Tom poured us each our drinks, but as was typical, that quietness never lasted long when Boone and I were in the same room.

“Ford McBride is pathetic. You should be thanking every deity real or imagined you aren’t the sister who wound up with him.”

I tried to exhale in an effort to calm myself. I couldn’t do it. “Who says I’m not?”

“You do. By showing up for their wedding and plastering on a fake smile for the photographer. I mean, come on, Clara, that was the guy you were planning on marrying, and now he’s marrying your little sister after going behind your back with her for God knows how long.” Boone’s voice rose, every word half a note louder. “If that’s giving the guy your middle finger, then damn, you need a reeducation on the topic.”

“I think I know where to get one if I decide for myself that I need one,” I fired at him, shifting on the bar stool so I was leaning more away from him than toward him. We might have been ten feet apart, but another two inches couldn’t hurt. “And where do you get off trying to paint me as the villain with everything you’ve got stacked up in your corner?” I tucked my hair behind my ear and shook my head. “Me and everyone else the villain and you the hero. Got that twisted around there, Boone.”

When Tom slid Boone’s drink in front of him, Boone shoved it back at him, which struck me as strange. I’d maybe seen Boone Cavanaugh turn down a drink . . . never. “Oh yeah. That’s right. I forgot about you knowing everything about everyone. Guess I shouldn’t have let that slip my mind—that being an Abbott family theme and all.”

My body was so tense, my muscles felt close to snapping. I’d come into this place to find a way to relax, not to get more wound up. Massaging my temple with one hand, I took a sip of my shot with the other. My body convulsed more violently this time. This wasn’t a sip-and-enjoy type of establishment.

“Is this really how we’re going to do this, Boone?” I asked. “Picking up right where we left off seven years ago? Is this really how much we’ve matured all these years later?”

Boone’s head angled my way some. He was silent for a moment, watching me. “Where else would you expect us to pick up, Clara?”

I leaned forward, curling my arms around my drink and staring at the void right in front of me. I couldn’t look at him and talk rationally. That had always been the case, no matter how good or bad our relationship. “Somewhere along the lines of civil.”

Boone’s laugh rolled through the room. His malicious laugh, not the one I used to love. “What you did to me, how you treated me. . . you’re not the person to be going on about civility. Don’t you dare preach to me about being civil.”

I felt the first flash of alcohol in my system, dulling my inhibitions and heightening them at the same time. “And you can just get down from that high and mighty stool down there and stop lecturing me about right and wrong. Nice try.” I lifted what was left in my glass and chugged it. This drink was better than the first two—a sure sign the alcohol was doing its job. “You want to bring up the past, I’m willing to bring up a few pieces of it too.”

From the corner of my eye, I noticed him shift on his stool. He was obviously under the same impression that another couple of inches of distance couldn’t hurt.

“Why don’t you finish your drink and leave?” he snapped, motioning at the screen door I’d come through. “This used to be the one place a person could go without worrying they’d run into an Abbott, and I’d like to keep it that way. I’ve put up with enough from all of you to have earned my sainthood a decade ago, so beat it.” He waved again at the door, waiting for me to run off like I wanted to.

But I wasn’t going to run. Not yet. I’d cut and run from Boone enough times that I wasn’t going to add to that list. Besides, I wasn’t leaving until I was good and marginally intoxicated so I could endure the reunion with my family.

When I slid my empty glass across the counter, Tom didn’t need the nod from me. He knew what I wanted.

“Don’t worry, Boone. I’m not planning on ransacking the place and spoiling your retirement plan of ruining your liver.” That was, if it wasn’t already permanently damaged from the bottles I’d seen him empty as a teenager. “And I’m only in town for the week, so the likelihood of us running into each other again is next to none.”