Page 36 of Hot Mess Express
This guy reallyisout of it. He must be. He’s talking like he’s running on the fumes of fumes in an empty tank, chugging along at barely a mile per hour, and doesn’t realize who he’s talking to.
I come and stand on the bottom step of the ladder, securingit with my weight. “Better?”
Anthony half-turns his head again. “What’re you doin’?”
“You can go higher now.”
“Really? You’re just gonna stand on it like that for me?”
I’m honestly stunned he still thinks I’m Jeremiah. “Yep.”
“With my butt in your face?”
I look away. “Yep.”
“Suit yourself.”
He goes up two more steps. I lean back as his ass, indeed, finds itself right by my face. Even being closer to his work as he is now, he still grunts like every tiny thing is the most exhausting effort.
“Not goin’ out with the others?” asks Anthony.
I turn back to him. He keeps sighing a lot, his butt turning one way, then the other, wiggling unintentionally in my face. “Nope.”
“Why not? Doubt Burton will be there. Didn’t even show up tonight. Bet you fifty buckaroos he’s gonna quit the choir any day now n’ go full-time at the paper ‘cause of his hard-ass dad.”
I don’t know and cannot possibly explain why I’m fighting an instinct to bite his wiggling ass. Why do I want to bite it? Because it’s right there? Why is this even a thought in my mind?
“Of course, he’s got a fancygirlfriendnow …” Anthony goes on, his voice slurring every other word. “How a guy likethatscores a pretty girlfriend likethat, fuckin’ mystery to us all …”
I feel like I’m holding a conversation with Anthony’s butt.
A one-sided conversation, at that.
“Heard you went to Trey and Cody’s last night for a barbecue, one of Cody’s grill things.”
I stare at Anthony’s butt like it’s got me hypnotized. “Yep.”
“You happen to … y’know … meet their out-a’-town guests?”
His voice just went low, like the cheer got squeezed right out. If his exhausted drawl can in any way be interpreted as cheer.
Belatedly, the question pulls me out of this odd butt hypnosis I’m experiencing. Jeremiah was there last night, Anthony knows. He’s getting at something—and I know that something is me.
“Just curious,” he mumbles.
I shrug. “Yeah. You can say I met them.”
“What’d you think?”
Before I answer, he lets out a huff of frustration—I can’t see what he’s doing—then leans back slightly as he tugs at something.
His butt shoves into my face for a second. I frown against it as I try to lean back. “Well,Ithink they’re good people,” I answer in half a sneer, bearing it because I chose to stand here and help.
“That so?” Strangely, he sounds more curious than anything. “Guess everyone else gets to see the better side of ‘em. Especially that Bridger guy.”
He shifts his weight when he says my name. I lean back even more to avoid getting butt-faced again. “What about him?”
“The guy’s just …” He lets out a sigh. He’s growing more tired. I can hear it in his voice, and his legs keep fidgeting. “I can’t put it into words, what I’ve been feeling.”
