Page 23 of Fluke
“How long have you been home?”
“A couple of hours. Why?”
He strokes his bottom lip with his finger.
“Why?” I ask again, picking up another towel. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“What have you been doing the past couple of hours?”
I give him a pointed look. “Typical Friday night shit when you’re our age. Laundry. Ran on the treadmill for a while. Showered. What’s it to you?”
He smirks. “You haven’t looked outside in a while, huh?”
I toss the towel into the basket, the knot twisting harder in my stomach.
Whatever my brother is about to say will be a headache. Hell, my head already hurts. I don't even know what’s going on.
Work today was long and hot. The city sent an inspector to check the legality of a storage unit we’re using to hold our tools after hours because, apparently, a neighbor has complained every single day since we began construction.
So that was fun.
But I bet whatever Moss is here to tell me will be an even bigger ball of joy.
I narrow my eyes. “No. I haven’t looked outside in a while.”
“You might want to do that.”
I narrow my eyes. “Do I, though?”
Moss snickers.
“What did that fucker do?” I ask, my voice rising.
Moss’s snicker turns into a fit of laughter. “I love that you automatically think of Banks.”
“What other option is there?”
Banks has left me alone all day; I haven’t heard a thing from him. It was like the good old days when he had Maddox to pester.
It was too easy. I should’ve suspected something.
“Jess, you have a giant cock in your yard,” Moss says.
“A what?” The basket slides across the room as my foot makes contact. I side-eye a hysterical Moss as I make my way to the window, hobbling because my foot was still sore from the block, and part the blinds. “What.The fuck.Is that?”
Moss laughs louder.
“I’m gonna kill him,” I say, storming out the front door. “The boy has bit off more than he can chew this time.”
The evening heat blasts me in the face as I peer through the golden hour. Standing in the middle of my yard with its face toward Moss’s house is an oversized, multicolored metal rooster. It’s probably ten feet tall.
I glance at Banks’s house as I make my way down the walkway.“Where did he even get this thing?”
“I have no idea. I just got home, and he was driving away with a shit-eating grin, towing a trailer.”
Shaking my head, I knock against the thing with my knuckle. The metal pings. I rap against it again.
“What are you doing?” Moss asks.
