Page 5 of One Lustful Summer (Texas Summer #14)

Rowan

Ready to take it easy for a night, I turn off my truck’s engine and scan Gypsy’s parking lot to see who is inside. It’s the one time a week where I get to be free for a couple hours, not free to go raise chaos and a ruckus, but free just to take the weight off my shoulder for a few hours.

The father part of me never ends, but for a few hours I can hibernate worrying about the about Jodi, the job-site or the jobs that we have coming up.

Every Thursday, my cousins and I end up at the Gypsy for dinner. We usually have a late dinner, and then we stay to play trivia. It’s something simple, nothing crazy, something that most of the people around my age enjoy doing in town.

Jodi’s with mom and dad, where she’ll spend the night and Mom will get her off to school in the morning. It’s become somewhat of a tradition that we started when Jodi entered kindergarten.

It gives me an opportunity to get out with friends and my cousins. To some, it may sound a little selfish, but I believe it’s best for Jodi and I. There’s a reset period for both of us. While she may spend some weekends with my parents, those aren’t every weekend, just when I’m working on side jobs or making up rain days on a job-site.

Sometimes I feel like I’m neglecting her when I drop her off with my parents, but mom tells me it’s the best for both Jodi and I.

It allows me to recharge. It allows Jodi to recharge.

These Thursday nights and the occasional weekend apart allow Jodi to experience things I’m not comfortable doing. A lot of the times, Jodi comes home on Saturday evening from mom and dad’s, and they’ve made all kinds of different baked goods, something I am not good at.

Now, I can scramble some eggs and cook some bacon, or you can call me the grill master. But a lot of my dinners entail simple, kid friendly meals, which include spaghetti, macaroni and cheese, and chicken nuggets.

Granted, there’s some kind of protein with each one and usually some kind of veggie. Well, can you really have a veggie with spaghetti?

I open the door to Gypsy and scan the tables to see what’s open, and notice my cousin Dean over in the corner. I head his way, giving a nod and wave to those that I pass by.

“Hey, man, how’s it going?”

Dean asks as he stands and pulls me in for a half hug and pat on the back.

“Hey, cuz’. Same shit different day.”

“Ain’t that the truth,”

he replies as we both take a seat. We make small talk while this server heads our way and takes our drink order. Since I’m driving tonight, I give myself a one minimum drink.

While we wait on the others, Dean tells me about the vehicle he’s restoring. While I may be good in the construction area, vehicles were never in my wheelhouse. When it comes to anything with a motor and brakes, I send it Dean’s way. I can do the basic stuff like change a tire, jump a battery, change out the windshield wipers. But anything else and I head over to Dean’s garage.

After a few minutes, Thomas and Chris, our other cousins, pull out the remaining chairs and sit down. Before either Dean or I can greet them, Chris immediately gathers the attention of all of us.

“Who’s that with Lauren? Did you guys see who’s the new girl is with Lauren and her friends?”

I look through the crowd and instantly spot my cousin Lauren. She’s seated with a few of her friends and another woman. As I stare at the woman to her right, I take in the side profile of a woman who looks very familiar.

Dark brown hair, a summer dress, and legs encased in some sandals with a heel on the back. I’m a red-blooded man. I’ve seen legs, I’ve seen women, but I remember those legs, and I remember that side profile. It’s the mystery woman from the hardware store.

She must sense us staring because she turns towards us, her eyes landing right on mine. Her eyes widen at the shock of seeing me, but she quickly hides it and shifts in her seat to join the conversation at her table.

“Whoa,”

Thomas says with a harsh breath.

“You know her?”

His face turned towards me and tilted to the side like he’s waiting to hear a juicy story.

I look at all three of them.

“Not really. I saw her the other day at the hardware. Can’t forget a face like that.”

I don’t need to elaborate anymore. There is no need for them to know that I can’t stop thinking about her. Looking for her face every time I head into town.

“Well, I’m gonna go meet our lovely guest,”

Chris says as he stands up and walks towards Lauren’s table.

Our table is silent as we watch him approach the table. He pulls out the empty chair and turns it around. He takes a seat, straddles the back of the chair and rests his forearms on the top.

As he sits there and talks, all the girls giggle except Lauren. She eyes him with curiosity. I can see her brain working, wondering why one of her cousins is suddenly interested in sitting with her and her friends.

We all know Chris is a major flirt, but it looks like he is laying it on pretty thick tonight. When he shifts in his seat and puts his arm on the back of my woman’s chair, and my stomach clenches. My woman. What the hell. I have no claim on her. I don’t even know her name, but there’s something about her that pulls me in.

He shouldn’t be that close to her. The jealousy that runs through me is something I’ve never felt before, not even for Jodi’s mom. She looks back at me, a small smile cresting her lips, but I lose her attention as she speaks with Chris. I can’t make out what she is saying, but her eyes come back to me a few more times.

A few minutes later, Chris makes his way back to our table, takes a seat, smiles and then reveals the information he found out.

“Her name is Maggie. She moved here from the city. She’s single, and y’all won’t believe this, but she is the one who purchased grandma’s place.”

The shock on all our faces at the news was apparent when I looked at Dean and Thomas. The house was an eyesore, but it held a lot of our memories.

“Bet she was in first surprise when she saw the house,”

Thomas says.

“Yeah, Lauren alluded to that a little,”

Chris answers.

“But Maggie just shook her head and said, ‘It’s okay. I’m gonna figure it out.’ She seems very optimistic.”

While they talk amongst themselves, my gut twists and turns. I wanted to purchase the house, but I didn’t have the money. I asked my uncle if he could hold on for a couple more months so I could try to sell my place and have the cash up front to buy the house. The problem was you can’t get a mortgage on that home, because of all the work that needed to be done. No lender was going to take out a loan on it, so it had to be a cash purchase.

But my uncle, my mom’s brother and also the executive of our grandmother’s estate, didn’t want to wait around. His impatience upset a lot of the family. If had given us more time, we could have done something, but he was so money hungry to get what he could. And because of his greed, we lost the opportunity to keep some of our family’s history.

If those walls could talk. I can’t even imagine what we would find out. Years and years of people living there, of our family, our history.

After placing our food orders with the server, the conversation changes to the end of the school year. Chris and Thomas are both teachers in the local schools. Thomas teaching science at the middle school, and Chris teaching social studies at the high School, and coaching football.

I sit and listen and wonder what it would be like to have an entire summer off, or even a month to have time just to do things for me; for me and Jodi.

As dinner wraps up, and our server takes our empty plates from the table, we order another round of drinks and a sweet tea for myself. I have a one drink minimum if I’m driving.

The announcer, Carl, steps up on the small stage where local bands play every now and again, tapping on the microphone.

“Good evening, Gypsy patrons. We’re going to change things up tonight for trivia.”

This has everyone’s attention. Their faces turned to Carl.

“Since everyone knows everyone here in Paulding and some teams are more knowledgeable than others. I think it’ll be a fun way to mix everything up and make teams of two males and two females. Four person teams.”

There are some groans across the room, but my eyes instantly look over to where Maggie is sitting with Lauren.

Carl continues.

“I’ll give you guys the next five minutes to get teams together, and we’ll have four per team. I’ll be coming around to hand out the kiosks in just a moment.”

He steps down, and the piped music plays again.

Lauren looks over at our table, and I raised my eyes up at her. She’s caught me staring over there a couple of times, watching Maggie. Her eyes going from me to Maggie. A non-verbal conversation taking place.

Within seconds, Lauren stands and says something to Maggie. In a blink of an eye, Lauren and Maggie are walking this way.

“Okay, guys,”

Lauren says once she has approached our table.

“We gotta split teams. Dean and Rowan, are you with us?”

Dean looks at them both.

“Yeah, have a seat.”

“Come on now. What about me and Thomas?”

Chris exclaims with a fake pout on his face.