Page 33 of Reaching Little Robyn

“No!” she said instantly, somewhat surprising herself, but she knew it felt right. “You said your friends call you Rooster and I’m your friend, so that’s what I’m going to call you, got it?”

“I do,” he said with a smile.

Still, she couldn’t help but add, “Just please, I beg you, tell me your last name isn’t something awful like Fowl, Beak, or Cock—” Her face instantly burned and she knew it was bright red. “I-I didn’t mean to say that I swear!”

Winston laughed. “I believe you, and no. My folks didn’t go quite as far as yours did. They were just crazy about John Wayne but instead of honoring their favorite actor by giving me his first name, they named me after the character he played inTrue Grit, Rooster Cogburn.”

“So your full name is?”

“Winston Rooster Wane.”

“And you honestly prefer to be called Rooster when you could be plain old Winston?”

He grinned. “Like most kids, it wasn’t really my choice. Once my brother blabbed my middle name was Rooster, it just stuck.Since I also like John Wayne, I didn’t really care. Though I can see where it might be harder for a girl.”

Robyn could easily imagine a younger brother trying to one up his older one. “What’s your brother’s name?”

“Can you believe the little shit was born right after our mother fell in love with a certain Scotsman named Sean?”

“I can,” Robyn said with a laugh. “I mean, come on, that Scottish accent is enough to melt most women’s?—”

“Panties?” he asked in a horrible attempt at a Scottish accent.

“I was going to say hearts.” Robyn rolled her eyes. “So his first name is Sean?”

“Nope, it’s Woodrow. All the men in the Wane family have had first names beginning with the letter ‘W’ as far back as anyone can find.”

“Okay, then what’s his middle name? Wait, let me guess. Connery?”

“No, remember my parents love the characters the actor portrays.”

She thought about it for a moment. “Sean Connery has been in hundreds of movies.”

“He has, but what is the first thing that pops into your head when you think of his career?”

Robyn didn’t hesitate, her giggle ringing out. “Don’t tell me they named him 007?”

He barked out a laugh. “That would have been clever, but no. His middle name is Bond.”

She crinkled her nose at the misjustice of it all. “Well, that seems a bit unfair. At least all my sisters also have bird names, and since none of us have middle names, there isn’t a whole lot we could do about it.”

“Boys have a tendency to want the scales to balance. It didn’t take long after he started crowing…” He stopped and winced. “Sorry, little bird.”

Robyn shook her head. “It’s okay.” When she realized it truly was okay, she smiled. “Really, please go on.”

“Well, when he started calling me Rooster, it only made me want to dig a little deeper and discover all sorts of little-known tidbits about the great Sir Connery.”

“Like what?” she asked, totally enraptured by his story.

“Like the fact he was a milkman before he was an actor. That he was in the Merchant Navy, that he has a tattoo that reads Scotland Forever. But none of those are what tipped the scales in my favor.”

“What was?”

“First let me ask, do you see any kid calling another kid Woodrow?”

“Probably not. That’s a mouthful for a kid. They’d probably call him Woody?”

Winston nodded. “Now, that in itself could have been enough to mess with him if we’d only started calling him that when we hit puberty, but by the time that happened, we’d been calling him Woody for years. By then Woody Harrelson was a famous actor and I had no intention of filling my brother’s head with images of winning the next Oscar.”

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