Page 32 of Bull Riders Don't Swoon

“I mean, yeah, I know. I recognize faces in the bars, even though it’s a different town. They’re out there, but it would be nice to just switch off for once and just be me and not a bull rider.”

We walk in silence because it’s the first time I’ve said that out loud and acknowledged it myself. My alcohol tolerance is shit and I like to party with my friends, but there’s always an expectation.Bull riders are the draw of any rodeo. It’s a sexy and dangerous sport. The bar scene is how I burn off the excitement from a ride. It’s like I have a huge adrenaline dump that takes hours to go away.

Inevitably, the buckle bunnies find you while you’re there. Men and women. I prefer women, but there’s been the odd man I didn’t turn down. All of them were just part of scratching the itch and living up to the wild cowboy image.

A group of shirtless young men with their arms linked together sing as they march down the sidewalk, confident and carefree. I envy that.

“Hey, Jamie. You okay?”

Forcing a smile, I nod.

“Never better, Griff. Well, not true. I’ll be better once we eat.”

The sign for the Burgatory comes into view, and my stomach growls like it knows there’s food nearby. Griff’s face lights up as he laughs and smacks me across the stomach.

“I swear your stomach is its own person. Let’s eat and see what the Cowboy Olympics are about.”

“I like your plan.” Opening the door to the restaurant for Griff, we step inside, and I know he feels the same thing I do. When I look over, Griff has this faraway look as his gaze bounces all over the place.

“Oh my god, Jamie. It’s just like the pub on campus. This is wild.”

The only thing missing is the stage for bands and the colours of our university, but the whole aesthetic is so damn accurate it’s like walking into a time machine.

“Hey, guys. Table for two?”

An olderman in a tight plaid shirt, form-fitting Wranglers, and a smile that could melt the polar ice caps greets us. He’s…very attractive.

“Please.” Griff returns the smile and lingers on the man’s face. That lump in my throat comes back, and I throw my arm over his shoulders.

“Near the action, please. We plan to be here for a while.”

“Cowboy Olympics is…not at all what I expected.”

Griff bends over, wheezing, after we went outside to run a hay bale relay. We didn’t win, and I’m a little embarrassed about that.

“Who the fuck runs with hay bales?!”

Thankfully, it’s the last event of the Olympics. An Olympics made to make us thirsty and order more beer and Jell-O shots…and possibly kill us.

We threw hay bales over high jump bars, ran an obstacle course with a wheelbarrow and then ran a race with a god damn hay bale. My shoulders scream louder than after a bull ride, and Griff is still wheeze-laughing.

“We can’t tell Hunter about this. Or Jackson! They’d never let us hear the endof it. Promise me, Griff.”

Those two would probably challenge us to the same events just to prove they’re more fit than two guys a decade younger than them.

“My arms are still on fire, Jamie. We should be in better shape than this.” Griff laughs and I move in to massage his arms. A few times in university, we’d overdo it in the weight room and Griff would get these crazy muscle spasms. He’d sometimes drink pickle juice to help, which is completely disgusting, but my fingers are magic and smell better than pickle juice.

“Here,” I motion for him to step closer, and he steps up, resting his head on my shoulder as I massage his biceps through his shirt. “Is it getting better?”

“Mhmm,” Griff sighs into my shoulder. “Much better.”

“How’s your arm? You probably shouldn’t have been doing all that with a cast on.”

Griff steps back, but my hand still massages the biceps of the broken arm. “It hurts. I won’t lie and say it’s fine. It’s probably not the smartest thing I’ve ever done, but it was worth it.”

Despite my concern that he overdid it, I grin back. “Totally.”

The atmosphere in the bar has switched to a dance party. Strobe lights and flashing drink cups light up the dance floor as dance beats vibrate under our feet. Most of the current dancers are younger, in their early 20s, or perhaps even some with fake IDs and are teenagers. I don’t judge them on that. We all do things to be a part of the crowd we want to run with, and it’s not always the right thing, but it sure is fun.

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