Page 56 of Shame

“Make sure you answer when I call, okay?”

“I will,” I say adamantly. “Swear it.”

She gives me another sad smile, then leaves.

I wait for the taillights of her car to disappear down the road before I lock up and head out myself. I go right to the club.

Everyone is at the bar, so that’s where I find myself. Three beers in already, which isn’t shit. But when I ask for another, along with a shot, Trudy, our unofficial bartender, asks what’s going on.

“Just a long day,” I say, taking the shot glass once it’s full.

“What’s this I hear about you taking over the diner?” Rhino asks, sitting beside me. He missed out on the cleanup party cause he was getting his stitches looked at.

“What about it?” I guzzle half my beer.

“The fuck you do that for? You know anything about running a diner?”

“I’ll learn.”

“Or you can put the prospect on it,” Grizz says, taking the seat on the other side of Rhino.

At Church this morning, I brought up Noah and how he wanted to be part of the club. Used him helping us out at the diner as a reason to show he’s taking this seriously. He won’t get the prospect title right away, but if he hangs around enough, is loyal, and shows us he’s serious, he will. Coyote likes the idea of people joining. He just needs some time to sniff them out and make sure they aren’t pussy bitches. Noah isn’t. His dad may be, but he isn’t.

“Already thought about it,” I say.

“He’s got the experience. Sort of,” Rhino says, gesturing to Trudy for a beer. She brings one to him.

“A convenient store is nothing like a diner,” Grizz says, shaking his head.

“Could be,” Rhino answers.

“You guys ever think of settling down?” I blurt out, picking up another shot.

“You mean like getting a pet or buying a bigger house? ‘Cause that’s as settled as my ass is getting,” Rhino says, reaching behind the bar for the bottle of Jameson when Trudy doesn’t get it quick enough since she’s pouring a drink for Spam down the end. It’s our bar, anyway. We pay for all this shit, so we can do what we want. Just like the idea of being waited on.

“Why the fuck you guys have me working here if you’re just going to help yourselves?” Trudy shouts.

She’s Rhino’s aunt. Been working here since she was eighteen. She isn’t much older than any of us. Early forties, if I had to guess. She’s a sexy thing and dresses the part. Though no one in here fucks with her like that because she’s family. She’d put any one of us on our asses if we even tried. Trust me, I seen it. Grizz got hammered one night, felt her up, and she got him right in the throat. He was raspy for days. She’s never been one to settle down and says she won’t, either.

“You know we couldn’t get rid of you if we tried,” Rhino says, pouring himself a shot.

“Damn right,” she says, winking at him and moving down the bar toward the clubwhores just waiting their turn for some dick. There’s always more of them than there are of us.

I’m not really sure when it was I got tired of playing the hook-up game. Maybe sometime around when my father died. He was the last bit of family I had, outside of my brother. Ialways looked up to him, and him dying changed so many things in my personal life. Changed me as a person, I think. Just took me a while to notice what it was that changed, I guess. Yes, the club is family too, and I’m sure any of their deaths would fuck with me the same way. But Pops was… well, he was my pops.

“What crawled up your ass?” Kolton says, sitting on the stool beside me.

“Just thinking about Pops,” I say, finishing off my beer.

Kolton scoffs, grabbing the bottle of Jameson. “Why would you do that?”

He doesn’t share the same sentiments about our father as I do, and I don’t know why. But I’m about to find out.

“What exactly is your problem with him?”

Thank the alcohol for that. Lost count of how many shots I’ve done, but this is beer number four, so that’s something.

“Other than being a complete dick? Nothing.”

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